August 17

My father was a good driver. And he drove fast. I used to sit in the back seat and observe everything he did. He explained to me how car driving should be done.

- You have to brake before the road turns, and then start to accelerate on the way out of the turn, he said. That makes the driving smooth and comfortable.

- You should always move aside when someone faster wants to pass, and always wait for slower drivers to move aside when you want to pass, he said. And when they do, you should always thank them by waving or flashing the lights.

He showed me how to flash the rear indicator lamps; left, right, left.

I don’t remember ever being afraid. I thought he was the best driver and I felt safe. But my mother was afraid. I remember her holding on to the grip above the door, breathing in and out. Sometimes she screamed a little. Ooh! No! Watch out! I even remember her trying to get out of the car once we were driving on a serpentine road on Gran Canaria.

- What are you doing?! Close the door, he said and stopped the car.

- No , I can’t handle this, she said and opened the door a little more.

- Yes, you can, he said. It’s not dangerous. I’m driving really safely.

Obviously she had to continue inside the car with us and we returned safely to the hotel a couple of hours later. My mother exhausted by fear and my father frustrated by her lack of trust. I never understood why she was so afraid. I thought we were perfectly safe.

I think I got a little from both of them. I learnt how to drive a car fast and safe. Yes, I’m an excellent driver! And I learnt how to be afraid when someone else is driving.

I go to work by bus. It is usually the same driver every day. He is so nice. He is funny and friendly. He stops the bus anywhere someone wants to get on or off the bus. He takes detours to let people walk less when it’s rainy. But he drives as if he had stolen the bus and stuffed it with cocaine. He is known as the Rally-driver.

In his bus I have been a lot like my mother. I hyperventilate and check several times that the seat belt is fastened. I also choose to sit in the bus on the basis of which seat I think is the safest if we would crash. (I vote for those in the center of the bus, next to the aisle.) I don’t scream but once I told him I was afraid. He was just laughing at me and then he drove as fast the next day.

Today he told me and the other passengers that he got a letter from somebody who had driven behind him and measured his speed. That person was very upset and wrote that the Rally-driver was driving dangerously fast, faster than 110 km/h on the small road. The writer had chosen to be anonymous so our bus driver could not respond to him/her or defend himself. He was a bit sad about it, I think. I think he felt sad because someone doesn’t trust him when he himself knows he is driving safe.

Then I suddenly thought about my father and the feeling of being safe there in the back seat when I was a child. And I though that the Rally-driver is driving a lot like my father used to do. It’s the way he drives fast, but manage to keep the bus steady by braking before the turns, and then speeding out of the turns. I never jump around on the seat, my back is always glued to the seats backrest. Actually the feeling is quite familiar and relaxing in a way and reminds me of my childhood. 

Thus, I leaned back and closed my eyes and let the Rally-driver sweep me fastly towards my home.

August 06

A summer has passed and we will soon face the autumn. It’s ok, but it’s always like taking a big leap into something new. The days of work means less freedom and more claims. On the positive side it also means more creativity and possibility to work with the things I love to do and maybe make a change for some people or companies.

I spend time in the city of Umeå. I buy some new clothes. It’s mostly a matter of arming my self, the clothes are my new armour and I am the knight who now walks towards new challenges. I like to build up a character before I start something new. It protects me a little bit from stress and makes everything a little bit more fun. I can be someone else and that person can handle much harder tasks than I think I can do myself.

Maybe I should have an alter ego and really build a person I can use at work? She can be my armour against difficult tasks and situations that are hard to handle. That is what stylists do. They help famous people to build a person in which they put all the good properties the famous person needs/wants and then they leave the rest outside of this character. Of course I don’t have my own stylist, but I can I try to do this myself.

So who is this business character I want to be?

Professional skills:

• Her super strength is the possibility to see patterns and how different things are connected and how the contribute to sustainable development. Her brain is making huge mind maps of people, recourses, processes and goals.
• Her delivery is always suited for the customer and helps the customer to continue developing from her/his situation.

Personal skills:

• Her best quality is humour. By seeing the funny things in life she can help people to relax and be creative.
• She is also a good listener, but she can also give advice when people need that.
• She is not afraid of telling people what she thinks, even if they have another opinion. (I have to remember this, because this is hard!)

Appearance:

•       She dare to look how she want’s.

That should be enough for now.

July 13

We follow the small roads through forests and fields. We pass villages with names like; Stensvassa, Normlösa, Västra Husby, Bjärka-Säby, Lotorp and Butbro. A deer look back on us from a field. A group of horses find shadow in a grove of oakes. A field with wheat and cornflower undulates in the breeze. The smell of rain and the sight of a lake shimmering between dark spruces speaks wordlessly to me.

This is Östergötland, my homeland. I am imprinted on this scenery. My body respond to it without my will. There is nothing I can do about it. It simply communicates, “be with me”.

July 11

Suddenly sun and happiness. Days of depression are over.

July 10

It’s vacation time in Sweden. Almost nobody is working. The big industrials are closed. Social services like medical information, news papers and communal transportation are on a minimum level and only the most important services are still open.  And the only thing that really matters to Swedish people on vacation is the weather.

It’s a question of national interest, and national stress, how the weather is going to be in July. The forecasting starts already in May. The newspapers scream with their headlines:

It is going to be a sunny summer! Hurray!

The best weather will be in Tornedalen! 

Make sure not to be on the west coast this summer!

July will be the rainiest summer for centuries. Try to get a ticket to Greece NOW!

This summer turned out to be one of those nightmare summers. It’s cold, rainy and windy. Depression is a fact. I think some Swedes would prefer to be Greeks and rather stand the economical depression than this weather depression.

And how about my situation in this depressed country? We have been travelling 900 km south and it’s not better here than in the north. Wherever we come the cities and villages are wrapped in some sort of silence.  It’s like if Sweden was muted. The sound of laughing people is not there. The sound of children who get cold water splashed on them doesn’t exist. Nor do the music from the garden parties.

When I check Facebook to see what people are up to - they aren’t up to anything. They continue discussing politics and financial crisis and lost dogs or cats, like if they where just taking a five minute break at their job. No pictures from the beach or the hammock.

And I am ill again. Having a cold. It’s almost ironic, but mostly sad and cold.

July 03

Visiting Sweden can be an adventure, even for a Swede like myself. There is always a surprise hidden where you didn't expect it. And the surprise is never what you expected a surprise to be. Let's conclude this to the fact that you have to be open minded enought to know that you are being surprised. 

We followed Vindelälven to the metropol Björksele where my private biologist joined a running competition. It's a competition where a team run all the way from Ammarnäs, where Vindelälven begins, to Vännäsby where it joins another river called Umeälven. When he was finished for the day we went sightseeing. This is what we found: Stortallen (Big pine). Ok, let's remember that pine is basically the tree you see everywhere when you are in Västerbotten. Thus, the Stortallen must be something really surprising. Something specatcular!

The information sign told us to go 3 km on a dirt road. Then walk 1 km on a trail in the forest. We were more and more sceptical the further we got. "Can it really be that big?", we asked each other. "Can it really be worth walking here with all the mosquitos and getting out shoes wet?", we asked each other. 

Then we saw it. And it was HUGE! It was the biggest pine I have ever seen. I was really surprised.

June 30

"If your eyes could speak, what would they say?" (The book thief) This is what my eyes tell me.

The world is deeply green.
Flowers are shouting "here I am".
The birds are patrolling land and lake.
Light will never go to sleep.

June 29

It's 11 pm: the Dandelions are waiting for wind.

June 28

I like the poem “No man is an island” by John Donne.  

While I’m drinking a cup of coffee in the garden I watch the ants working on the ground. Their work contains mostly of carrying different things; seeds, tiny sticks, grains etc. They are absorbed by their work and nothing can stop them. I put my foot in their way; they walk round it. I put my finger in front of one; the ant smells it and then passes it. I drop blades of grass on them and they continue like nothing has happened.

I imagine myself walking in the forest and then suddenly have five logs falling on me. I would either die or panic. On reflection, I would first panic and then die. But the ants just continue like nothing has happened. I find this interesting.

First the practical question, why don’t they die even though the blades of grass are as heavy to them, as a log would be to me? My husband, the biologist, explain that the energy in the blade is much less than in a log. Hence, the actual weight of the blade is the important thing, not the size. 

Second, why don’t they panic? Even when I try to chase an ant with the grass, it doesn’t react. It just continues forward like nothing has happened. Are ants stupid? No, I don't think so. I ask the biologist again but he doesn’t have any explanation to this. Thus, this question might not have any practical answer. It may be existential instead. Maybe the ant doesn’t panic since panic wouldn’t change anything in the context of the ants society? One less ant doesn't matter to the ant society.

Sometimes I discover an ant-nest under a rock in the garden and when I remove the rock the ants are in total chaos. On these occasions they panic. Hence, this is my theory; the ant is part of an anthill. The ant is nothing without its anthill and the other members of the anthill.  So, I guess the ant can’t see the threat to it self as anything dangerous, since the ants focus on being a part of the anthill - not to live alone. It is a complete unselfish species.

Maybe John Donne was inspired by ants when he wrote that poem? Or are human beings like this as well? Do we fight for our community or do we fight for ourselves?