36 YEARS AND A DECADE OUT OF THAT.

Last week's Wednesday I turned 36 and this week's Wednesday this blog became a decade old.
The later is a lot and the first neither a lot nor a little; age is a weird concept as it means so much to you at one point (Dag is counting the days, rather literally, until he turns six and dreams about being a magic ten years old) while you at some point just forget about the numbers. (Well, you do have all the physical factors to -painfully- remind you at some point though.)  Right now I don't feel old and I don't feel young and I feel both old and young and, me being something of a constant thinker and non-sleeper am even more so now; having thought a lot about life and my life the past year; what was, and was done, and what is and what will, should and can be. Call it something of an existential crisis, or perhaps existential possibilities. Either way, in general it feels like life does get better all the time, so far at least. And it seems to go by very very fast as well.

So yes indeed, it is late 2017, and I have been blogging here for then years!
In internet time, that is a whole lot. It's fun scrolling back every now and then to what both is and feels like such a long time ago. Obviously, it was a very different life ten years ago, but a lot can also change, or develop, in five.

And obviously, my name is so-not-up-to-date - are there even "fashion blogs" anymore? You know, originally the name was meant to be an sarcastic nod towards outfit blogs, as I when doing freelance work usually just sat around in leggings or underwear working, and then headed over to the harbour to work some more in overalls. And not the nice jumpsuit-y kind, but blue and neon yellow workwear. (well, in that kind of sense I am pretty close to the old days; I seldom get to wear my nice wardrobe because now I am mostly moving around at the studio, moving in the car, or moving on stage in something totally different. That, and also I don't fit most of my old clothes anymore. Ha ha. Sniff.)
So I planned to just do outfit posts on different wool socks, black t-shirts and blackunderwear. But as we all know it never turned out that way and also at this point one can't really change the name now can one?

But ok, lets look back! Because I totally did nothing at all last year when I turned 35, which, as we tend to count in fives and tens, was something more of a thing, I'll go back six years to when I turned thirty. (That's the year I actually celebrated my birthday; we had the True Blood party!)

Here was me then with a new lens. I think I look pretty much the same, but lets be honest here - my skin was indeed six years younger and also two thirds of my clothes from that time don't fit me anymore.  Those physical factors that come with time...

When I turned 25 we (J, my boyfriend at the time) took our friends on a cruise to celebrate. We knew the crew so here we are on a visit to the bridge. (I AM SO YOUNG what is this!)

J is a super fella who still works at sea and has a young boy and a second kid coming up.

And when I turned 20 I looked like this. (Yooooouuuung)My boyfriend at the time was also one whose name began with J. There's a lot of Finnish male names starting on J. I remember this one as well, we had Nepalese food with my family and I wore a long black-and white 1970's maxi skirt.
This J nowadays has a huge Dali-inspired moustache and works as an artist.

Because pretty much everything before I was 25 was shot on film there's not too many pics of my younger years (the two ones above are scanned from an album), especially not if you compare to the constant flow of pics everywhere today. I don't have any  from my 15th birthday here at home but here's one from the autumn when I had turned fourteen. I remember those pants but I have a hard time remembering life and my patterns of thinking back then. We called each other and talked for hours on the phone at home, you could make group calls and we secretly called dating chat lines, used pay phones when out on town and dreamt of being 18. But this I do remember: one day when out walking I told myself to always remember that when you are fourteen you have thought about everything so much already, that you do get things.

And then there's a gap so here I turn one!

If anyone of you have been here with me for the decade-long ride all along I say thanks and send you smiles in ones and zeros! As to anyone who jumped on later as well.

MY TOP-5 LISTS

For the moment.
Apart from the daily to-do list(s). And apart from the weekly and monthly ones as well.

I am a total list-person. I write lists on my phone, on the back of receipts and opened envelopes and random A4's around the house and in multiple text files. And in email drafts. Lists are the foundations of how all practical (and less practical) parts my life is organised. Sometimes I write the same list a couple of times, to get to go over things again (or because it's enjoyable if it's a list of fun things) or because it feels like it's one step closer to be done that way. Ha!

So, here's my "top five" lists for the moment

1. List of lists to be made.
Yes, for reals.


2. Movies I want to be able to catch while they still run at theatres.


I really want to see Moonlight.

This is a constant one, that comes and goes, and that seldom gets anything checked off because work and kids and life and all that. But this winter we managed to see one movie with Eddi, so I've given new hope to actually seeing a couple more!

Also bubblin' under:
Books I want to read (I'd like to read far more than I do nowadays but feel I don't have the time. Hell, internet!)
Shows I want to watch (And no, these two are in no way connected. Ehrm...)


3. Things to renovate at home -

including separate lists of:
-wallpapers I want to use
Turns out there are more of those than walls. And it's good most of my lists are a slow process because this changes one throughout the years.
-storage; how to organise what and where
(this never ends)
-interior details to add after the hard work is done (the one you'd like to dig into immediately; fuck the hard work-part)

This set of lists is constant, because an old house will always need something, but is now back in the top-list segment, as things will kind of, somehow, finally start happening over here for reals soon!


4.  Things to grow in the garden

Because what if, this year, for reals.
It's a fun one though. Let's see if we make things happen big(-ger) this year, and all trough the summer...


5. Blog posts to write

This would make a book by now, all the unwritten ones.
If there's a hashtag #toooldtopublish here's where it comes to use.

Are you a list-writing person? Are your lists rather constant or do you get to check things off?


(Online source for top photo: vintage.es. No known original source for the final photo.)

FOR THE LAST TIME

At the beginning of this month, on my way to the airport (everything is about multitasking and combining two things these days) I stopped by the city flat to take down the last lamps and to leave the keys there for the new owners. Moving out is always a little sad, and even more so if you've lived in the house/flat for some time and put a lot of memories and heart into it. I think this was one of the hardest moves, as I have been around this flat since birth. The absolute worst move at the tie was then I was  four and we moved away from the first home I'd ever known. (Which happens to be across the park from this one.) I missed it terribly, and some months later my grandfather took me to the building so we could go up with the familiar elevator and look at my old door. He showed me there was a new name on the door, and told me there were new people living there now. I remember being very sad that we could not go in and look at "my home" because surely they would have understood.

This is the flat I bought Dag home to first, and it's Eddi's and my first mutual home. It was the first home I was able to decorate and renovate totally as I wanted to, (with my mint green Smeg for example that I took with me now that we moved). This was also the place I had my first "job" at; I used to clean at my grandmother's as a teenager for pocket money, so I really knew every corner in and out. As a child my grandparents would watch me when my mother was at work, and I'd sit on the kitchen table watching the cars turn down from the big road and drive along the park and I'd be as enthusiastic over each and every one NU KOMMER MAMMA!; "this one is mommy!. Some time ago Dag would do the same and try to see when Eddi or me were coming home.

Here's before we started renovating it in 2010 -

And later the same year in action.

Bye bye kitchen!

It was also on the floor of this kitchen that I realised who my grandparents were (one of my earliest memories; I was propably two or three years old) - sitting there playing I heard my mother say MOM to my grandmother and was all "aaah, so that's why we're hanging around these old people all the time". We used to spend many Christmases here, and one time- I must have been around five- I was a hundred percent sure I saw Santa flying in the sky with his reindeer sleigh. Like, for reals, he was there. Weird that my parents were not that stunned out by it, but just sad that it was great.

Before the renovation in spring 2010.

 

And six and a half years later when leaving.

In between it was nice!

This photo was when we had just moved in and thing weren't really in place yet.

Now it's empty. Or, was.

I will miss my bedroom window view!

Most of all I'll miss the kitchen window!

We are now settled in the countryside for good, with a lot of boxes and ikea bags, no room for a Christmas tree this year, and with a big need for further renovations. Neither Eddi nor me have been home a lot lately and won't be for some time either, so I will have to be patient and take it bit by bit.

And now some new people are living in the flat. I hope they will have lots of great memories as well!

VEGAN SANDWICH BLISS

From the list of small things (or maybe not even that small in the end) that make me happy:
Going to the big super market after work at 10pm because
1) nowadays it is open that late because of free opening hours.
(It's so god damn great I tell you, for anyone that does not do the normal 9-5. Smaller stores have had longer hours for years but now any store can choose their hours themselves and all Prisma's are open until 11 pm for example. And if you live out in the middle of a god damn field like I 99% of the time do nowadays, you are thankful)
2) and in that store, although not in the centre of Helsinki, you can easily pick and choose out of several vegan options available next to any non vegan-or vegatarian one. You don't even need to find that one sad hippie-shelf in the back corner for your almond milk anymore, it's all centrally located and full with lots of different options! 2010's, yey!
3) I can thus have a classic sandwich with cheese and even maddafakin baloney on it, with chocolate milk on the side and it's vegan all the way.

I am not a self-declared vegan, but do I most of the days follow a vegan diet. Sometimes by planning my meals, sometimes more "by accident" as I am so accustomed to it by now. I was on a full-time-vegan diet for a couple of years over a decade ago, and the selection was so much different back then! There is so much more to choose from than Tartex nowadays!

I've never been too fond of vegan cheeses, often found them a bit yucky, but the VioLife one is as good as it's reputation - no funky side taste here. They even have parmesan which I want to try! And the pizza cheese. (And for anyone over here eager to try it: do so from the S-labeled stores, as the K-ones sell these to about double the price as the S-ones!!). The latest sandwhich filling I tried out was vegan baloney with green pepper (soy based). Something I haven't had on my bread for years and years! Also, on a side note: the vegetable breads by Fazer are great! This time I tried out the newest version which is Finnish dark rye bread with zucchini and parsnip. The veggie percent is over 30.

Here are my own favourite vegan bread-spreads, that also work as side dishes to any bbq or salad/meze buffet. And definitely worth trying and serving even if you or your guests aren't vegans or vegatarians -

Green Lentil Tapenade

A delicious picante mash of cooked green lentils, garlic and vinegar and some more stuff. A little (just a little) more detailed how-to with ingredients can be found if you click the link behind the name.

Vegan Liver Patée

I just love this one, and many sworn carnivores dig happily in to this without thinking of it's veeeeegan label. It makes a great ingredient in the best pasta sauce/lasagna filling evvah! Click the name for the recipe.

Ok, now I am hungry again.

(As usual, none of these were sponsored mentions, it's just me digging stuff. But it'd be awesome if they would be though, awesome for me at least. But alas, they are not.)

2030

It just struck me the other day that we are now closer to the year 2020 than we are to 2010. Which was like just a little while ago. That also makes us closer to the year 2030 than 2000. Which is freaky.

Altough the yeear 2000 does feel like a very long time ago, when one thinks back on everything that's been in between.

(Illustrating this post is a photo from 1999 - further away than 2030 that is - that has an actual analog light leak in it. No filters here no!)

But the same goes for when you talk about years and you think "10 years ago" would be somewhere around 1996 but that's twenty years ago already. If I really start thinking about it 1996 was indeed ages ago, I was just a kid. And everyday life was very different.  From what you did to how you did it and what you had to go along (no lattes back then no!) But 2006, that was ten years ago already? No way! THAT feels very scary. But, as we talked about this with a friend the other day we started going trough things we did in '06 and some everyday life details, realising that quite many things still have changed in a decade -I didn't get my first computer before 2005 for example; I read my emails at school back then and certainly not ten times per day like now -even though it feels like it went by with the blink of an eye.

I also realised my age is now closer to 50 than 20. Which is both totally something of an of course it is or whatever , and kind of terrifying at the same time. We were talking about age yesterday with Dag; I told him the cats are now ten years old, and then, mainly just stating it to myself, I said that that makes them "pretty old already". Dag then asked "Oh, so they will die soon?" to which I replied that not quite yet, although it will eventually happen one day. To which Dag replies, with his calmest and wisest voice, the one I use when I explain things to him:
"You know mom, one day each of us shall die."
(Then he listed pretty much every person and animal he knows that will all die one day, just to prove his point.) I still remember one night when I was about five, or max. six years old, lying in bed, thinking about how much I loved Christmas. Then I started calculating that my parents were 30 years old and that meant there would only be about fifty more Christmases to spend before they would DIE. And I felt so so sad when thinking about it and started crying; 50 Christmases felt like so little and Christmas was so awesome and it would all happen in no time. My mom came into the room asking what was going on. I didn't tell her why I cried, and I have remembered it like she got a little annoyed at my late-night-whining. I was really hurt that she did not (read my mind, apparently, and) appreciate me crying over her mortality.

It is actually funny how you can remember some thoughts and insights from your childhood, but you still cannot recall how it actually felt, or how you reasoned like that, how the exact thoughts were at that time. The brain can store so much but it can't store, how would one say it, the mind itself(?) as that constantly changes as life goes by. It's not the way you can save and choose to run an older version of your  operating system...  Memories of how one thought are more like headlines-  my parents would die one day, only fifty Christmases left - or a synposis. Well not only thoughs, but whole periods of times feel like a quick synposis when thinking back on them. I wish there'd be some way to record how the mind functioned and how it really felt at a certain time. And not only for childhood, also for the teenage years, (yikes). That  might help with the teenager here at home (during which discussions I always feel so very old). Or to serve as good and painful torture some ten, twenty years later. For oneself, that is. "Did I think like that?" Well, a regular recorder would do for the torturing part, just to get to hear teenage-oneself later in life. Teenage sarcasm is certainly not that refined yet and the lines are less quick that the youngster thinks, I have noticed. "Omg did I actually say that". Sometimes wish my parents would have recorded my shit. Or well, not really. But if it would've been common practice you know. I did keep a diary that I haven't ever really opened afterwards, but one thing I remember telling my self in my teenage years was the following: Remember, when you are fourteen you realise everything. You think so much about it all and you think about everything.
And it worked; I remember thinking that, but alas, I have no idea how my mind actually worked back then and what all those things, apart from the usual teenage stuff and time and the universe and so, I actually was thinking about were. (I was always one to stay up late at night back then as well, thinking about Things.)

When time and age and how fast things go gets to me (summer is on it's way but it will be Christmas  and winter and darkness here again in no time - see, little five-year-old-me was right- and then it will be not only 2030 but 2050 and I will still have the same things on my to-do-list, you know) I just try to think about the fact that time really does not exist at all, everything just is in a constant state of RIGHT NOW and that is all there is.
Which to be honest, does not exactly help me to start sleeping earlier at night either...