My three cherry trees!/The times they a-changing/part 2

They survived!

All through this long winter I have been watching them. For each day more embedded in the snow. The three cherry trees I planted last fall. The 20-year project trading my grandfather’s big worn out mountain ashes dying on me for something else. 

http://homeisawayawayishome.blogspot.se/2017/10/my-three-cherry-treesthe-times-they.html

They made me happy already in September, guarding my front yard to the west in suites so red they looked like bon fires in the fall dusk. So far so good! I had watered them every day up until the frost hit, as I was told. But how would the winter treat them? 

My heart pounded with joy when I noticed the leaf bulbs. Yes, all three of them looked like they were preparing for the summer coming. And in about a week there were signs of flower bulbs!

One of the criteria for the tree I picked was pink flowers. I was dreaming about a sky of pink facing my fields in early summer. I realise now I was a bit optimistic when it came to the multitude, picturing the young trees covered already the first year. That didn’t happen. But there were definitely lovely pink flowers, I had picked the right tree!

A different criteria was green leaves. Ornamental trees most often come with red/brown leaves and those don’t attract me. I find them dark and they feel like fall to me. So green leaves were important as well.

The leaves and the flowers opened their bulbs pretty much at the same time. And didn’t the leaves look brownish? Hell, they did. I kind of tried to ignore it but after a couple of days the disappointment took it’s grip on me. All that research I did, was it in vane? Did I choose a cherry tree with brown leaves after all?! Do I have to learn to live with this fall feeling through my summers? Learn to like it?

Well, maybe not. Are they not slowly changing into green? I actually think they are. It looks like they are starting out brown/red, but as the leaves unfold they reveal a dark green costume. That would make me very happy!

Since two weeks now I (am getting helped) water them every day. They are really thirsty and it’s warm and dry out there, we haven’t had rain since…when? And the pros tell me I need to water them the first three years for the fine roots to develop before they can manage on their own. So, that’s my assignment.

The first mosquitoes are joining me in the light late May evening. I look at my trees. They survived the winter. The flowers are pink. And the leaves are patiently turning into something greenish. I think we will be happy together. A good match. 

Moving on. But here I am.

I woke up sleepy. Calm. My skin was dry. A long lost feeling of safety. Like there was a family around.

In my life people are passing by. They come. They go. In-between they are a piece of my existence for a while. For as long as circumstances allow.

It’s time for personnel shift again. Who will they be? The people helping me out with the shower. Making my meals. Dressing me. Will I like them? Will I feel happy when I here them put the key in the front door in my fragile morning? Or discomfort? Will they become my friends?

It’s not unusual. Some have been my closest people. Friends who I love and trust and feel relaxed and safe with. My people. Friends who I wish would always be in my life. But they won’t. They come. They go. In-between they are a piece of my existence for a while.

I greet them. I wish them welcome to my home. To my life. To me. I connect. Because that’s what I do. If someone is open for connection I will open my heart. Although knowing it will break when they leave. For a while I might trust the situation. Thinking this will last for a while. Some months maybe. Starting to feel comfortable. Allow myself to relax. And enjoy. The mental balancing act enjoying although waiting and fearing the end of it. And then one day the news comes. This will be my last week. This is my last day.

And I smile. I listen to the plans for the future. Good for you! That’s the right thing to do. I am so happy for you.

They close my door for the last time. Walking away. From me. Towards the future. And I let my burning tears burst and I cry my eyes out on the dinner they just brought me. For the last time. 

Last year three of my neighbours here at the road moved from the village. They were all dear and fun friends who were a great joy and safety to me. Although I know they are not leaving because of me I feel deserted. Abandoned. But I smile. And wish them all the best in the world.

I’ve been through this so many times it’s created a kind of numbness within me. “I am going to sell the house and move”. He said coming up the stairs after the work out of shovelling the snow from the path up my house. I was lying on my couch smiling at the sound of it and how fortunate I was having him around. “I am going to sell the house and move”. 

It’s like the message is bouncing. Running off my brain of teflon. I understand it’s because I can’t take it in. He explains why and it’s out of a good reason of course, I applaud it. And I smile and tell him he is making the right choice. He leaves. I am empty. My mind swirling, grasping for something that doesn’t hurt, only finding fragments of pain out of nowhere coming attacking me. Making it through the shield, finding my heart and my gut.

There are two parts in these situations so difficult to me. One is the loss of people I like and love. And being left. The other part lies in the phrase so frequently and positively used: moving on.

A little 4-year old girl who doesn’t know me that well sometimes visits me. The other day she asked me “Why are you always here?”

The people leaving me, whether it is home care or others, do it because they are moving on. They are making healthy choices for a better future. They are moving on. Because they can. And because it’s the right thing to do. That’s what we are supposed to do. Leave what’s not working for us and move on. 

I can’t move. It is really hard moving on when you can’t move. 

I am watching people my age constantly moving. They are spending time in their cabins, going to concerts, traveling near and far, swirling around in happy clusters, planning for an active retirement. On the move.

“Why are you always here?” The little girl was too busy to wait for the answer. Off she was.

I am here because this is where I can be. I smile and waive my cheery goodbye and good luck as people are heading for their future. Moving on. I pull my blanket tighter around me here at my couch. Trying to not feel too sorry for my secluded self. Things could be so much worse. But I am envious. I envy having a choice. Of making a change. Of moving on. And I am in such need of stability.

I woke up sleepy. Not immediately attacked by a swarm of acute worries to handle even before I open my eyes. I was calm. My skin was dry. A long lost feeling of safety. Familiar although ancient. Like there was a family around. I had dreamt about my sons father long ago. It was a good dream.

From down coat to bikini in one day: spring on the 64th latitude

Umeå and Seattle are on pretty much the same temperature for a stretch, which is really unusual for not even mid-May, looking from the Umeå horizon. I am not complaining though!

After the longest, coldest and most snowy winter in many years, it looks like the meteorological summer (the average temperature 10°C/50°F for five consequential days)  will arrive much earlier than normal. It’s always such a mystery how those things work.

Try to imagine this picture: at the edge of the grove there is still snow left from the HUGE pile that’s been added on during the winter from plowing the road leading up to my place at the end of it. In the same time I just got a hasty and fun visit from the three little girls visiting my next door neighbour, their grandpa. They were in swimming suits as they had been in the plastic pool.

That’s how weird and magic it can be at the change of seasons here at the 64th latitude. This Monday I was putting away most of my winter coats, but I left two of the more springily down ones because I would probably need them. Yesterday I was in my sun chair in a bikini. And I didn’t even have a sweater beside in case - that’s usually how we are working on the tan even in July. No, 22°C (exactly as Seattle!), blue sky without a cloud and perfectly still! That’s what I call a summer hallelujah moment.

Last year I spent most of the summer on the lengthy and difficult project planting three cherry trees. When they were finally in the ground I (read people helping me) had to water them every day until the frost came. That’s for them having a chance to develop those fine roots they need to pick the water up.

During the winter the stems have been covered with a meter of snow (3,30 feet). I have been wondering how they were doing inunder the snowpack. My joy was great when I two weeks ago could notice leaf buds on all of them. They had survived! My darlings are alive!

I have been told to water them two more summers. Sigh. But I’ve invested so much in those trees so that’s what I’m gonna do. As the temperatures are soaring I started yesterday. My God they were thirsty! How come, the snow is barely gone?!

The answer is the ground frost. Or the lack of it. You would think a meter of snow pack would leave the ground filled with water as it all melts down. But thanks to when and how it has been snowing for six months (!) it turns out there hardly has been any ground frost at all here at my place at the end of the road. Therefore the meltwater from the snow has been running right down deep into the ground leaving nothing for my cherry trees to drink. Amazing!

The birch next to the snow pile is quietly changing her dress into a green one. The girls next door are laughing in the much awaited warm afternoon. The blackbird is singing his adorable stories in the evening sun. My balcony door is open letting cool air in now. The deers are grazing from the first green grass on my fields. I want to put the time on pause. This is where I want to be.

The embarrassing result: no literature Nobel Prize 2018 / Swedish Academy part 3

The speculations have been going on since the crises started. And for every member leaving. This week it was a fact. There will be no Nobel Prize in literature 2018.

http://homeisawayawayishome.blogspot.se/2018/04/the-swedish-academy-and-2nd-amendment.html

http://homeisawayawayishome.blogspot.se/2018/04/king-for-dayswedish-academy-part-2.html

At five occasions before has the prize been cancelled. 1940-43 during the 2nd World War. And 1935 when the reason might have been the members of the Academy couldn’t agree.

2018. When a majority of the Swedish Academy members protected an accused sex offender linked to the Academy. In fact, the Swedish Academy imploded as a part of the Me too movement. At this time in my text I can’t decide on wether this is extremely sad or if it’s the ultimate eruption. The perfect storm.

To visualize the picture of the Swedish Academy at this hour, the 18 members are down to 10. Two left years earlier for different reasons, six these last weeks (including the Permanent Secretary Sara Danius who was forced down) as a result of this crises.

The remaining members (at least the ones speaking) are underplaying the accused sex offender’s behavior. They are choosing not to see and acknowledge the problem but is pointing at others factors as the fundamental causes for what the Academy is going through this spring. They are lacking insight of the decease.

The decision to cancel the Nobel Prize in Literature 2018 was taken by the Academy itself on Thursday. They are too few at the job and the Academy has lost trust all over the world. It is said though that the Nobel Committee put pressure on the Academy. Damage control. They don’t want this filthy drama to spill over at the Nobel Prize as a whole and the respected and dignified institution it is. 

What is striking to me is the Swedish Academy not seeing how the Nobel Prize in literature is bigger then the Academy is. It’s the Nobel Prize God damn it! The most important award within literature in the world. An award which eminent authors are hoping and dreaming of all their lives and only a few are chosen for.

No, it seems like the prioritization here is to save the Academy such it now is, not the Nobel Prize. And not only that, but saving a dark overgrown duck pond where a couple of the birds are quacking loud and with confident intensity of their own righteousness.

I feel sick. That’s how embarrassing this is.

The other day I heard an Italian journalist comment the news. I can’t believe this is happening in Sweden, he said. You are so organized and there is no corruption - as opposed to his own country. How could it happen?

Well, it happens everywhere. In every profession, field, organisation, community, society and country. That’s what Me too has pulled out of the dark and silent impassable shrubby woods where men who abuse and assault women sexually hide in their dens. Spurred, cheered and guarded by chums alike.

The Swedish Academy turned out to be one of those dens. And Me too blew it up. The core of the elite of the elite did not have immunity. The house of cards fell. And there won’t be a Nobel Prize in literature 2018.

Extremely sad or the ultimate eruption? Both, and I hope for the latter to make a real and profound change in our society. But it’s also damaging to Sweden. IKEA, ABBA, the Swedish welfare and the Nobel Prize. Our four world wide known signature trademarks. 

2018 is the year when the golden Nobel medal melts down to dirt and dust. An embarrassing landmark on the Swedish timeline for which we always will be remembered.