We are the Champions!

Seattle must go totally crazy today!! 88°F (31°C) and the yearly Pride Parade happening two days after the U.S. allowing same-sex marriage, following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision! Oh how I wish I was there on this historic day, but Trouble 1 and Fay are, representing the family!

In 2012 Washington State voters approved same-sex marriage, and the number of states following had climbed to 37 before Friday’s ruling which made U.S the 21st and most populous country to legalize marriage between same sexes.  And the world (at least that’s what we like to think) is celebrating!

For as long as I have known Seattle, the city has been identified as gay friendly, and liberal in that sense. A safe place for people who aren’t shaped for the square box family that’s the norm, at least inside the city borders. Seattle is also run by a gay mayor, Ed Murray.

“ - Grab your water bottles and your parasols and join us tomorrow for the Pride Parade! It promises to be an extra special celebration, and we'll be proudly marching. Hope to see you there!”

It’s the Seattle Men’s Chorus on Facebook inviting everyone to join them today. And yesterday they, as well as Seattle Women’s Chorus, were invited by mayor Ed Murray,  to sing at the Marriage Equality celebration rally at the federal courthouse in Seattle. What they sang? We are the Champions!

Somewhere around the Millennium I made a TV documentary piece on choirs, and Seattle was represented by Seattle Men’s Chorus. At that time there were about 250 singers in the choir, all gay. For me, meeting SMC was very special. A choral singer myself I know that every choir has it’s conflicts, as every community, but SMC totally embraced me, as they seemed to embrace each other.

SMC was too big to be a family. It was a village. A community of 250 they didn’t all know each other. But it was their village. It became clear to me that in a relatively safe city as Seattle, Seattle Men’s Choir was singled out as a place without fear.

I got to know Craig who became a good friend of mine. I was invited to his home which was a very special place. Together with seven other men he had bought a house with eight apartments. They were all gay and had their own place within the house. To me, it seemed obvious although I might have read too much into it, so I had to ask Craig the question: “so, is this your safe haven. The eight of you?” He looked at me, surprised. Paused. Nodding slowly. “Perhaps it is”. 

Historians date the modern gay-rights movement to 1969, when patrons of the New York gay bar Stonewall Inn fought back against police harassment. In recent years, the momentum for approval of same-sex marriage has escalated. But the court ruling doesn’t end homophobia. Discrimination lingers in areas such as parental rights for example. Suicide rates continue to be elevated among young people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transsexual. Harassment and bullying are still real. And coming out can still be difficult.

Let’s hope though that the law for same-sex marriages in the most populous country will make a real difference, not only to the U.S but to the world. And I picture the Pride Parade triumphing through a hot downtown today, and let’s all join them: We are the Champions, we are the Champions!

No, the gift of being invited isn't enough. I wanted to be there.

Welcome to my 60 years party on Midsummer’s Day! Kjell

Special invitation, Ida & Luke would like Maria to come to our wedding!

On my table there are two invitation cards. One is from a very dear friend, Kjell. We got to know each other back in high school, lived at the same student home and spent so much time together in our seven party Friends gang it’s a wonder anyone of us got any grades. Well, the others did, me, not so much. And now he is turning 60.

The other one is from Ida and her soon to be husband Luke. Ida is originally a friend of my sons from a village close by, so I have known her since her teens. But she has also become a close friend of mine. And now she is marrying!

I very rarely get invitations. People don’t usually ask me over, and besides from choir get togethers I think the last time I was at a party was February 2012. That was fun though!

And now there are two invitations. From very special friends. And I had to say no thanks. Because I can’t make it. I can’t get there.

It’s Midsummer’s weekend in Sweden, the most precious of all holidays on the 64° latidude. Celebrating the light. And after three months of wet cold and windy Aprils and a June being like early May, summer actually arrived at Midsummer’s Eve! Sun, 63°F (17°C) and a mild breeze instead of exhausting gale. What a gift! Finally, and on the right day.

The modern tradition in my family on my mother’s side is to spend Midsummer’s Eve at Norrbyskär, an island south of Umeå where my cousin, sister and their husbands share a summer house. This year 17 persons from three generations got together, most living in Umeå, but some arriving from the south of Sweden, Paris and Miami. I couldn’t be there.

I had made the decision a couple of days before. It is just too much hassle. I take up to seats in a car as I have to pretty much lie done. To get from the ferry to the house is a way too long walk for me and although I largely has accepted my situation and physical limitations I am not comfortable being in a wheel chair. Airports and hospitals okay, but otherwise not.

And I don’t want to be pitted. My relatives would have been happy to see me there, but I have a hard time with all the caring “we are so glad you could make it”, heads tilted. Best intentions, I know, but I feel inferior and small. And then, someone driving me home, undressing me, making me ready for night. No. I just want to feel like a normal person. I don’t want the focus on me being all the special arrangements that come with me.

So, I had made the decision even though it wasn’t an easy one. Although, had I known my cousin Pär was home from Miami I think I had coped with the downsides. We haven’t seen each other in three years maybe, and that’s just too long ago. But I didn’t know until it was too late, and it made me very sad. 

On the other hand, I couldn’t have made it anyway, because the day before, I turned acute. A knife in my pelvis. Hasn’t happened since early March, but there it was again. Shit! It’s not allowed to happen in the summer as that’s my only chance to recover a bit. But there it was. Shit, shit! So in a way it was a good thing I had decided to stay home, the disappointment would have been terrible.

My Midsummer Eve had a happy ending after all. It turned out my every day help Josephine didn’t have any plans and was happy to spend the evening with me. She and her close to three year old daughter came over here in the afternoon, dressed in white lace and flower dresses, so of course I had to put my most summery dress on too. The wild flowers finally had come out and we strolled around my front yard in the gorgeous afternoon light while they picked me Midsummer bouquets from buttercups, red campions, cow parsley and cranesbill, the flowers closest to my heart and soul. It was the finest treat they could ever give me.

Hopefully there will be more Midsummers to come, but Kjell is only turning 60 once, and my wish is Ida only marrying once too. Both those invitations came as such a surprise for me. I don’t think I have seen Kjell since my 50-year birthday. And Ida, my sons weren’t even invited but I was! In both cases I felt chosen. 

I tried to come up with solutions for being there but failed. And all I could say was, I am so sorry but I can’t make it. Sorry for them, because they really wanted to share their special day with me - although I know they won’t really miss me, there will be lots of people there. But most of all sorry for myself. No matter how hard I try I can’t tell myself it was a gift enough to even be invited. I wanted to be there.

Three months of April

The bird sherry has been blossoming for two weeks. The lilacs are yet to come and I can’t even see the buds on my grandfather’s apple tree. It’s mid June and the nature is still doubting summer.

Midsummer 2001 we were visited by very special guests from Seattle: Matt, Elizabeth, Olivia and Rebecka. There are pictures of us sitting under the white apple tree, covered in flowers. Most every year since then I have been amazed at that picture, could it really be that the apple tree was blooming that late? But it was. And historically I would say Midsummers has been the time for apple blossom here at the 64° latitude.

But times have changed, summer normally starts earlier nowadays and the blossoming period is painfully brief. The characteristic scent from the bird cherry is usually only a few days before the tree starts snowing. That is, if pre summer is not interrupted by cold winds coming in.

Anyway, these last two years have been strange. Winter 2014 and 2015 arrived very late, at the end of January. They were mild and didn’t produce a lot of snow. We have an official measurement in Sweden telling us when spring arrives. That’s when the average temperature stays over freezing point for seven days in a row. This year it happened February 15 in Umeå, 1,5 month earlier than normal. 2014 was even a bit earlier. To clarify, spring just above freezing point isn’t of course like a Seattle spring or even a Stockholm spring. Spring above freezing point is what we call spring-winter, so still snow, but a sense that winter is loosing it’s grip.

Now, one would think that spring arriving 1,5 months earlier than normal would be followed by an early spring-summer and summer. That the birches would go green at the latest May 1st instead of the normal May 23. Nope. Not at all.

These last two years March has felt like April. April has felt like April. And May has felt like April. Three months of April. Temperatures pretty much equal. Lots of rain. In fact, May 2015 was the wettest and coldest May in Sweden since pretty much forever. I hate it, the much longed for light returns but since it’s always cloudy and cold it feels morel like fall than spring.

Now we’re at mid June and it feels like mid May. The greenery is extremely slow. The midsummer flowers, those we need for the may pole at Midsummer Eve usually are nowadays withered at Midsummers, which is a problem. Not this year though. They haven’t started blossoming yet, and we are five days from Midsummer Eve! Midsummer 2014 was the coldest and wettest in history (below freezing point during night…) but at least the flowers were out doing their job. Not this year!

So, now I only have one wish. That 2015 continues as 2014. Because after a record cold June the heat swept up here all the way from Africa and kept us hot and sweaty for two months! Pretty much like a normal summer in Seattle, starting at 4th of July. Even with (nowadays) Seattle temperatures which I know Seattleites think is too much, and a lot of Swedes did too.

As for the mild winters, 2012 and 2013 were dreadfully cold with tons of snow. Of course the climate is changing but I’m sure there still will be cold winters and typical Swedish summers with highs at 68°F (20°C). 

The moskitos showed up today which is a good but annoying sign, it’s finally “warm” enough (59°F…) for bloodworms to become the summer pain in the ass. The lilacs just have to open any day now followed by the lupins. But the buds on my grandfather's  apple tree which I can’t even see…? Well looking at it from the bright side, the best is yet to come.

Stoltergården summer work

What I loved most about it was coming back to the house, hearing the hammering and brothers laughing together. Coming home.

It was my friend Mats who grew up in Dalarna in Sweden where most every home stead has a name, who started calling my place Stoltergården. Stolter from my name (stolt in Swedish means proud, so my name is Proudman) and gård means place or residence.

Stoltergården contains of the main house where I live, the baker’s cottage which is a summer house, the combined wood shed/coach house, a hay barn, an out house and a play house. It was my grandfather on my mother’s side who built the place which also of course had a barn for livestock, torn down in the seventies by my dad when the roof didn’t hold up anymore. My mother, her sister Inga-Märta and brother Arne were born here.

Maintaining a place like this is a lot of work, and as I can’t do anything myself anymore, it’s becoming a problem. Big things I would have to hire people for anyway, but things like a little paint here and there, taking down half dead trees, cleaning out the coach house, taking care of windfalls in the grove, saving the slate tiles on the stone pavings from vanishing under overgrown grass, things like that is just normal maintenance which simply has to get done.

I am the kind of person who just doesn’t do well in decay. And a place like mine doesn’t either. We had both come to a point where I had to make a decision. Either I have to find a way to take better care of Stoltergården or I had to sell to someone who could do it. 

I had a sit down talk with my sons. This isn’t about moving the lawn when you can squeeze it in anymore. This is about keeping Stoltergården in the family or not. So?

My proposal was to set up a work week every summer. A week dedicated to the (of course never-ending) list of top priorities which just has to be taken care of. The proposal was approved of by both sons, with a slight correction, at least for this year: three days in the pre summer and three days at the end. Noon - 9 PM.

So, I wrote the Summer 2015 to do list, decorated with flowers in bright colors. The flowers are important. List was in three parts. One for indoors, in case of rain. One for minor repairs and paint. And one for the yard and light forestry.

The pre summer days happened this week. And it was when I got back from my treatment on Monday, the first day, I was welcomed by the hammering and happy brothers laughing together. Music to a mother ear.

The weather cooperated like it had read my list. 

Day 1 rain was poring down and most things on the indoor list got done. 

Day 2 clear skies, and it was safe to cover the deck under my grand father’s apple tree with a fresh shiny black coat. A couple of young maples growing too close to each other on the yard next to the picket fence was removed to give others space to develop into big trees. This was hard work and took most of the day. At the end though, what for the labor was most attractive on the list, starting the chain saw, happened.

Day 3 was a mix of sun, skyfall, thunder, and overcast. Windy, as always here, nowadays. During the rain more indoor maintenance. But than in the afternoon getting to the main attraction, only sniffed on the day before: taking care of the windfall down in the grove.

Trouble & Trouble haven’t before worked with a chain saw. It has been dead for some years, saved last summer as their uncle Kjell took it to the work shop and now it’s up and running again. And the necessary safety equipment has been obtained. So, on to it!

Trouble 2 is a careful person, in everything he does. That’s a valuable asset when it comes to handling dangerous machinery. In addition, ground and greenery was heavy from the rain, more reasons for being cautious. For Trouble 1 the perfect assignment was picking up the water-heavy birch stumps with the incredibly effective and horrible hook, filling the wheelbarrow for further transport to the special place next to the wood shed for cleaving the wood, which has been asleep for many years.  

In three days a lot of the things on the list was done. Check. One of the important things with a list is the check part. Check, check. Done! Good job! High five! Add more colorful flowers!

In addition to the work done, we had three nice days. Afternoon fika. Carb rich dinners. Put the late summer work days in our calendars. We even squeezed in a production meeting for a film project we are working on. And all three of us were in a good mood, I enjoyed it tremendously.

Win win win. One more win with this concept is avoiding the entire summer frustration on days, weeks and months passing not getting things done (on my part) and the constant pressure from me waiting for things to happen (on my sons' part).

To give some little sparkle to all the must do I had the idea we every summer could ad something fun to it, some nice improvement to Stoltergården. Trouble 2 suggested building an outdoor kitchen at the baker’s cottage south wall, where the barbecue takes place. Trouble 1 wanted a cableway from the balcony over the front yard all the way to the tree house. That’s my sons.

Today my beloved uncle Arne would have turned 90 if he had still been with us. He grew up here, and at his funeral I promised him to take as good care of his childhood home as I possibly could. Tonight his blackbird is singing over the fields and I hope he watches his niece and her sons doing their very best.

Kung Fury is king!/2

As it is Mother’s Day in Sweden today, let’s just make one thing clear: there is a very important mother crucial for making this dream come true. I’ll get back to that later.

So, I don’t think anyone is surprised really. That the trailer who set off the kick starter campaign which made it possible to make a short that premiered in Cannes last week and on Swedish National Television SVT and released on the web this week has gone viral and is nothing but an incredible success.

It was Christmas Day 2013 when 28-year old Umeå animator and filmmaker David Sandberg launched his trailer on Youtube simultaneously with the Kickstarter crowd funding campaign. The goal was set on 200 000 $ to make a 30 minute film; a free release for the web, but when the one month campaign closed the amount was more than 600 000 $!

David had an idea about a playful martial arts police action comedy breathing the eighties. The plot is the Kung Fu cop Kung Fury who’s friend is killed by the most dangerous Kung Fu crook ever; Adolf Hitler aka Kung Fürher. To take revenge Kung Fury is traveling back in time, but those time machines aren’t perfectly reliable and he ends up among dinosaurs, Vikings, Nazis and mutants. Yeah, the plot is as crazy as the 1,5 years that followed!

David, who looks a lot like a young Johnny Depp, is starring as Kung Fury, and friends from the young film scene in Umeå (mostly) fills in as the characters Kung Fury meets on his voyage. The plot is set in Miami, but the 30 minute film is shot in front of a green screen and most of the locations and environments created in computerized post production, an incredibly time consuming work, made by David.

I have followed the project since a lot of the people involved are friends of my children, the cinematographer Martin Gärdemalm practically grew up in my house since he and Trouble 2 spent all of their school years from kinder garten through the film program in high school together. Plenty of films previous to the grown up professional carrier are shot running around on my front yard with Trouble & Trouble’s 2000 Christmas present, the JVC video camera that lasted through snow storms, sand pits and jumping in the lake, incredible gear!

Therefore, it is such a treat looking at the photos from the Cannes festival, handsome young men in tuxedos and bow ties! And I watched the SVT broadcast sipping a glas of white, knowing that the most important opening was taking place simultaneously here in Umeå, where it all started, among crew, friends and supporters. And directly after the premiere in Umeå on Thursday, these guys flew to New York for a screening the short at Rooftop Films! 

Kung Fury was of course also released in cyber space, and did it go viral (6 000 000 viewings yesterday!) and did it make it all the way to the top of the IMDb! The international movie ranking list goes from 1-10. Kung Fury has reached 8,5, in company with Amelie from Montmartre (8,4) and Star Wars (8,7), to name a few! This is crazy! Huffington Post, Variety, The Verge, as well as media in France, Brazil, Russia, Australia, China, the list just goes on…

Trailer, music video (did I mention the video where David Hasselhoff performs the lead track True Survivor…), and then the 30 minute short. What’s next? Well, a full length might very well be in the makings.

So, how is all this possible. A great idea, talent, hard work, persistence, friends/colleagues, communication skills, and, a mother. 

Because of Mother’s Day, the Umeå local news paper Västerbottens Kuriren yesterday chose to draw attention to mothers behind successful young people from the area. One of them was Kristina Bergwall Sandberg. She is David Sandberg’s mother as well as project manager for Kung Fury. She is also the one who has supported David’s personal life economically and practically during the last few years. Her son simply moved in with her here in Umeå to be able to fulfill his dream, and she was on board. She admits it wasn’t always easy, but what she wanted and absolutely worth while. 

For me, there is one personal draw back from this world success from Umeå. The cinematographer Martin Gärdemalm was supposed to shot some footage for me last week. The magic pre summer light is here, the virgin greenery that changes from one day to the other, and I needed to capture it for a film I am producing. I am not sure that happened. And now he is off to New York. And I am watching the days and evenings pass knowing they are not on my B-roll. Damned Kung Fury!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72RqpItxd8M (trailer)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTidn2dBYbY (music video)

http://www.svtplay.se/video/2970515/kung-fury/kung-fury-avsnitt-1 (30 minute film)

Is there someone else living here too?/part 4 - The End

So, pretty much four months. From when I discovered the water leak to it was all taken care of. Most winter and the entire spring.

Some weeks ago Bengt returned to check if the construction fan blowing hot air in under my kitchen floor, transporting the humid air from there to my fire place, had done it’s job. It had! He found that all the wood, as far as he and his instruments could reach was dry, and I was finally safe! I can’t even put in words how happy I was to hear that. I couldn’t quite take it in.

Now, the reason for the leak was the outflow from the dish washer which was clogged up. It was placed in the back of a cabinet next to the dish washer and I didn’t even know it was there. And I felt really uncomfortable putting the floor and the shelfs in the cabinet back, knowing that wicked thing was back there possibly sabotaging my life again. I started to get really paranoid about this.

So I talked to my plumber. Leif, a good man. We came up with the solution drilling a hole in to the bathroom behind the kitchen cabinet and simply put the dish washer outflow there instead. I pictured it to be an ugly solution ruining the bathroom, esthete as I am, but after this water damage winter I was willing to compromise, I don’t ever want to go through this again.

Leif though, told me he could fix a chrome pipe that would go with the other pipes, and the outflow itself he would put on the sewer going from the sink down in the floor. Again, I pictured something less attractive than my choice would be, but what the heck, as long as it was safe.

That’s when I came to think about it! The sink! The favorite sink which I replaced with a different one when I had a water damage in my upstairs bathroom ten years ago! I knew I wanted to put it in the downstairs one, because the one in there was just very ordinary. It was on Leif’s and my to do list for some years but it just never got done. And the poor fragile thing has been sitting in my would shed among a lot of junk for ten years and I had given up on the plan to get it into the house again.

In my before-life, with a family, I always had plans for the house. Big plans, dreams even, needing money and family consensus. And smaller plans, things I could often take care of myself as I was a strong crafty person with skills my father had taught me well. I saw possibilities for improving most everywhere, I was always aiming for them and had a never ending to do list which I enjoyed. Switching sinks I couldn’t have done myself, but I wasn’t as handicapped as I am now, had more energy and would have made it happen. 

In my after-life I have accepted that neither big or small dreams will happen. I am fully occupied taking care of big or small catastrophes trying to maintain the house as is.

But planning the dish washer outflow solution with Leif I remembered the sink…and the little dream…what if…maybe… Yes, why not?! We weren’t dead sure the wall could carry the long buried dream but I was willing to give it a try.

Tuesday afternoon Bengt was scheduled to come back and finish up his work, and before that the outflow thing needed to be done. Which of course was delayed and happened the same morning. The chimney sweeper accidentally was here as well. And then I had this meeting with my bank in between. Sometimes I feel like my life is a live broadcast with cues having to match perfectly into each other. Click, click, click! A live broadcast life is not for people who don’t do well under pressure and I can’t recommend it.

Anyway, tuesday evening, Bengt had filled the cleaned out and now dry departments under my kitchen floor with new saw dust as insolation and put the floor back. The night mare winter 2015 water damage was dead and gone. Goodbye, and I won’t miss you. No, not a bit. It’s one more thing I have survived.

And in the downstairs bathroom there is the forgotten and dream abandoned oval sink as the crown on the new chrome sewer hiding the dish washer outflow, I am saying you can’t even see it if you are not bending down sticking you head in there! You are opening the door giving the nice sense of something slightly different, but you won’t be able to tell what. I will be the only one knowing what makes you feel good is a shiny sewer under an oval sink, perfectly matching the big round mirror and the little square cabinet on the wall. Just as I pictured it ten years ago.

Now, I won’t give you some positive crap about the water damage hell had to come to fulfill my long gone dream of the sink switch. But standing in my downstairs bathroom experiences the subtile joy of different shapes making a harmony I can come to some reconciliation with this long and horrid winter story.

The loss of a tree

I was lying in my bed hearing the chain saw do it’s work. Waiting for it. And there it was. The thud. When the birch fell. I could feel it in my body. My heart sank.

- I would need to cut down that birch, I can’t get around it with my equipment.

It was Sören, ringing on my door bell. Still early morning and Josephine was here to help me to the bathroom. Sören is my leaseholder, taking care of a part of the fields on my property, some of them right next to my place. 

For the last 20 years or so those fields next to me have been lying fallow (is that the right expression?) becoming beautiful meadows which I enjoy a lot. This year though, Sören is going to sow grain on those fields. And I like it! When I grew up I loved the barley changing to yellow in the fall, hearing the grain in them rattle in the wind. And the idea of the fields actually being cultivated again feels good. My grand parents would have appreciated that. And it makes my place more alive. However, this comes with Sören having to use more equipment than he normally does. And being more frequent. 

At the northwest corner of my house is an old birch, guarding the back of it. It stands at the corner of the grove between me and my neighbor, the tallest tree, the pole finishing the grove, defining it, looking out over the fields to the west. I love that birch. The early summer greenery backlit from the sun when it’s about to set in the northwest. My friend listening to my evening balcony summer concerts.

There is a thing with me and trees. And I know I am not alone when it comes to this, that’s a comfort. These last few years I have been forced to cut down some of those on my yard. The mountain ashes in row my grand father planted next to the baker’s cottage protecting the front yard from the wind, are falling down from age. I just’ can’t take all of them out at the same time, only one per year. And I need to prepare myself rigorously. Imagining my little kingdom without it. Touching the emptiness. Letting my body sense it. And then let it happen. Standing there watching it. Being present. Being there in the life changing moment. Over dramatic? That’s not how it feels.

I do wish I wasn’t so damned sensitive. I so envy people who aren’t affected by whatever brings me out of balance. Those people who kind of just shrugs everything off. More like dogs. A shrug, and it’s gone. Or, not even a shrug. Just a yep. Moving on. God how I wish I was built that way. But no. Grandpa’s mountain ashes, the big bird cherry tree. The gorgeous maple me and Trouble & Trouble’s dad planted when the boys were babies, which caught a decease and died on me. They are all leaving empty spaces in me and in my kingdom. Scares.

This morning I woke up having no clue that 30 minutes later my birch would be executed. The thud. That sound. Me not even out of bed, listening to it. I had half an hour to prepare. Me, who needs half a year.

It’s not Sören’s fault. He is just doing what needs to be done to take care of my fields. And of course he doesn’t know I am a HSP and he should have started talking to me about this years ago. He is a good person.

I am trying to find the right words for what it feels like standing on the balcony looking out on… nothing. Nothing there. Just an… area. Like a hole in the universe. Stretching into me. I am lying on my couch, the balcony door open in the calm and sunny evening. Birds singing. And I can feel through the walls of my northwest corner which I am facing, that we are unprotected. The house and I. We are vulnerable.

The dying trees has to go. And when something dies, in the best cases something is also born. But this corner pole birch was brutally killed on a Saturday morning while I was still in bed. It, and I, wasn’t ready for this. And I can’t let a new tree grow there because it won’t work for Sören. I can’t put a stone there to mark the corner. Now, it will really be a challenge coming up with a different perspective. Making a shift in perceiving these grounds. But I have to. And I will. For now though, just let me grieve a while.