Sunday calm

The children play rosy and star-eyed on the winter slopes. Along the quiet streets are rows of snowmen, snow dogs, snow squirrels and snow lanterns. The adults are involved.

It's so fun to watch. The children and the parents, the joy in the eyes. And the warm lights in the windows. I'm so glad I ended up here after the devastation, where I am, where life is expressed in a completely different way than in the middle of the city, at Medborgarplatsen, where I lived.

It's not beautiful there, rather ugly. People do not look at each other, they have agitation in their eyes and seem to struggle with the minutes. That's not the case here. Here people nod kindly to each other, ler, small talk, stays here and there. The children are playing. What is life ? What's worth something – egentligen – in life?

Strange, but I would never have come here without the destruction. Something new and different came out of it. An invitation to the forest, fåglarna, the scents – to a quiet and friendly life. Maybe a little boring, but calm and friendly. And the excitement and the movement, the city's energy is less than half an hour away. It's amazing. I desperately tried to get out of here for several years. No longer.

You have to see things in perspective. And you still know nothing about how it could have been otherwise.

Tonight I could not sleep. Så är det ofta. But I never think about misery. I stopped doing that many years ago. What keeps me going and keeps me awake are fun things I want to do. Sometimes I have thought that it is creativity that is my savior, it is the one that allows me to still always find something exciting, something that makes body and soul happy. But it's not that simple. There are many examples of creative people who are unable to move on. The secret is another. I do not know all the secrets that help, but I'm pretty sure that a strong reason why people are able to get through all the different difficult challenges life presents us with, is the ability to be grateful.

It sounds almost a bit religious, but that's not at all what I mean. I have with me two mottos from my mother. ”Drop it!” och ” Count your blessings!” They are very useful. And in recent years, I have finally learned to practice ” DROP IT!” – också.

I ordered a sewing machine that was on a midday sale. It is lime green and very simple. I hated needlework at school, just because our teacher was so bad. The needle in the sewing machines always came off when I sewed. I could never learn to wood, because I did not dare to ask properly, because she towered over us who were bad at that with her long body and an expression of contempt and impatience in her face high up there. She did not like children. The other class had a kind craftswoman, who affirmed the children's own embroidery motifs. This aunt did not. And the gloves you had to knit became small and rock hard because I had so much hand sweat when I knitted. Everything we had to perform I had to smuggle home so that my mother could do it again. In high school, I dropped out of sewing, took the subway to the other side of town and softened up with my big brothers who lived in a collective and drank tea and listened to music.

Men nu! A sewing machine.

When the children were small, I became obsessed with sewing, of trying to understand how clothes really fit together. Then I lay awake at night thinking about how to actually sew sleeves to a garment. Easy for those who can. I created freely, pants, vests, skirts for the kids and even a bathrobe with a hood. Then the needles went off again. Hela tiden. And the mess could not be sorted out.

Now I have sat and sewn seams by hand, and felt like a painting from old times and it has been very sad, for at the same time the desire to create something new has arisen. There is so much you can do ! Sew on clothes, sew clothes from old curtains and tablecloths, se tehuvor, dishcloths, even COFFEE FILTER!

All night I cut different fabrics and tried to assemble into new things in my head.

Life is not enough! There is so much you want to do! So much heaven you want to invent in all simplicity, plus all the OTHER things that are not cozy chores AND then all the other things like going on adventures! Why do not have time?

Maybe because you stare down at the cell phone!?

I'm glad I grew up without the internet and cell phones. I KNOW deep into the marrow what it is like to be lost in something – something simple and opretto – only for oneself and not to show off to the world – I know what it's like to immerse yourself in something that catches one without being disturbed by any mobile, or social media that grabs attention and triggers even constant social curiosity.

Allt det, which is …. fundamentally I think. To feel good. To be grounded. To breathe well. To have time to ponder. To have time to be grateful and to see. To remember. To plan. To gather. To feel how much you love and live and can in all simplicity. To play.

Like all the children playing on the slopes, rose-cheeked and star-eyed, who with happy open faces drag their sledges to the hill where they meet, just to play until darkness falls.