Pine Martens (Mård)

Stockholm Roller Derby is always trying to gain exposure, and to try and get 'into' sports groups.  If STRD was to be acknowledged by the city as a sport then we would have support for venues, and for hopefully a venue within Stockholm.  'Within' Stockholm in most peoples minds equals within 'zone 1' of a train ticket.

Most of the time STRD practices and competes outside of the inner zone, out to where you have to take a second train- the 'commuter' train or the pendletåg.  Roller Derby could pull a much larger audience, and get more skaters to practice if we were centralized. 

Trying to get leagues established, and trying to get Roller Derby recognized as a true sport is how I find myself ins situation that are so strange to my life, and so discordant to my history.  STRD was part of an opening ceremony in the Olympic stadium- which was honoring the hundred year anniversary of the 1912 Olympic games held here in Stockholm.

The King and Queen came around the track in a horse and carriage (!) after we skated around with the segueway polo group (polo played on segueways- but who am I to point fingers?).

I and another skater who comes from Finland were the only ones in the group excited to see the King and Queen.

My goal this year is to see a pine martin.

 Apparently many pine martins live in a park- nearby- that I can get to by traveling on the pendletåg.

"What then shall we choose? Weight or lightness?"

The view from my deck- at 2 p.m. and 2 a.m.

 

For years I kept a journal- or a diary is the more appropriate word.  Somewhere along the way I decided that I was dwelling in my past.  So I stopped.  But, I like having the blog so I can go back a year or two and see what I was doing at about the same time, and compare.

Memory is malleable and mine is unreliable.

This last year was eventful.  

This apartment feels so normal- to wake up to the sounds of people all around, to open the curtains and see a plane fly by, hearing the post drop through the slot in the door.

Yet, Tasmania feels like it always did, some secret, almost unexplainable paradise.  I feel so lucky to have so much in my life.

I am happy to be here, and I am happy to be there.

 

Whether here or there I am the same person- I go through the same cycles of behavior and each time I find myself a little surprised to be acting in such a way.

Living through these bizarre summers, each so different from my internal sense of the word 'summer'.  Here summer is this incessant light, the sun is so close that its light follows you from one side of your apartment, to the other- from one side of your day to the other...

That is the truth of the light, one long day.

Here the sun does not guarantee heat like it does in Tasmania.  

Summer weather is volatile like Tasmania, rain could come at any time.

Neither has the predictability and consistency of a California summer.

There is a reason so many songs are written about California.

It's summers, it's warm nights.  Californian summers have a feeling of opportunity, yet without the grave price of winter.

But I don't mean to sound as if I am eulogizing something I have lost.

This is what I have learned, I can love and appreciate all the places and people that I keep muddled up in my brain, that I remember in snatches and scraps through my fallible memories.  This is what makes me seem a bit scattered- I am always trying to work through so many cues.

 

...to think we can find happiness...hidden in a kiss...

I remember this feeling now- as I experience the feeling again.  Of days going by with so little attention, with so much to do that my mind has no time for reflection.

My friends were all in wonder about how I could live in such an isolated place as Tasmania, and I admit sometimes life there is challenging.  But I have garnered a love for quiet times, for silence, for darkness.

Of course- here I am in the land of the midnight sun.  The night comes on but there is no longer true darkness.

Zok comes home and leaves over and over.  Technology means he is never that far away and so I only keep a week of his schedule in my head at a time.

 I miss the days of properly bound, month long tour books.

STRD has a bout coming up.  We are splitting into two teams for a local fundraiser.  What can I tell you of consequence?

Stockholm has more lilac trees than I have ever seen in one place.  I carry secateurs in my bag and steal a few each day.

I am trying to grow plants in pots from second hand stores- that I can carry on the train.

Zok has been in a funny mood- he made us blueberry scones, with whipped cream and strawberries for dinner at 10 p.m.

I blame the sunlight. 

 

Hönet av Pepparvägen och Saltväggen

We survived yet another trying venue.  The B-team lost and the A-team won against Helsinki.

I was just happy to survive. 

Everyone had a few (three) Derby days off.  All I did the day after the bout was brave the grocery store.  A small one that has a scenic route to reach it.  Zok prefers the shorter less scenic route, and the much bigger, louder grocery store.

Tonight practice.

Tomorrow Zok returns home for a few days!

Summer is being obstinate by refusing to start.

I love the corner of salt and pepper.

...some think I have done alright for a girl...

My first international visitor to Stockholm was here over the weekend.
I wish he could have stayed for a month of weekends!

The two of us spent our thirtieth birthdays in New Orleans.  Neither of us during that warm October could have invented the lives we live now, even if we would have had the forethought to try.

We both spend part of each year in Europe (Me in Stockholm, He in Paris) these days.

Somehow we let almost ten years go by without visiting.  We have always and still do, write letters to one another, regularly.

He is the reason that each year I get at least one Valentine.

Being the chatter box that I am, I related more than I learned.

But I have nothing to say that isn't positive.  As we were parting I said just that, seeing one another again was too much a gift to feel even bittersweet about brevity, or forgotten topics.

Besides we will always have the mail.

...The lights shining through on you...

More mysterious holidays in Sweden...some say 'socialist!' some say 'no! its pagan!'.  For me, it is a day in the sunshine and no post delivered.

Zok left for to do show dates at some time- the wrong side of morning.

I had a full social day and the sun was out so-

I skated on the Tunnelbana! (Subway) So Brave! Such a RULE BREAKER!

I have a plan now, the plan involves walking on my toe stops whenever officials are able to spot me, then sort of hiding behind a post when I am near the cameras.  I have grown to love the shocked or dirty looks I get by apparently endangering all with my fancy wheeled footwear.

I had to leave the picnic/party/holiday fest early to meet up with some of STRD new skaters.  I did not get a clear answer about the holiday (read - my Swedish is still limited and Finnish well forget about that!).

  All the new (and not so new) skaters met outside the same cemetery we favored last year.  Here is the link so you have a clear idea of how this cemetery is more paths in the forest than skating atop graves (We do not do that!).

http://www.skogskyrkogarden.se/ 

I had a lovely day.  The trees are finally blooming and there are (also) mysterious pathways of flowers literally everywhere.

Who plants them?  Perhaps the skogen tomte! 

http://auntida.tripod.com/tomte.html 

 

Glasgow Bout-or "Sopa, hora, idiot....TJOCKIS!"

The blogger format has changed - again, and I am a bit too tired to navigate the changes.

Here are my roommates as we wander the alleys of Glasgow looking for the others so we can have dinner.

This photo sums up my feeling that I am indeed too small to play derby.
Our team lost.
By many many points.
I didn't know losing could be so much fun!

This bit of novelty sums up our Hostel.  We stayed in a Hostel that was atop a steep hill, then our room was at the very top, stairs that were strange and crooked.

The view from atop a city statue.