Wednesday outcomes

1. I feel ignored and then I feel relieved. We know the right down deep inside, always.

2. There is a moment when I feel absolutely exhausted from my long working day but then the adrenaline of experimenting in the kitchen rushes in – and I put the dish in the oven and I am done.

3. There is wide variety to choose from and everything smells so good.

Tuesday perfect timing

1. I send my book review on time and wait patiently to see it on the web along with others’ reviews.

2. Despite recent missing lessons and changing teachers Em completes another piano school year with a smile on her face.   

3. I ran after Jay and nearly catch her but she made up a new rule so I have to stand still as soon as she stops. We go on running around our garden and I don’t even lose my breath.

Spanish Thursday

1. The children dance and they twirl and they bounce and crawl to music from different parts of Europe. 

2. Jay and her mates wear red T-shits and a red blossom in their hair - featuring Spain. The only thing missing is that she is not one of the few mates from her group that will be going to school in the fall to yell "Ole!" at the end of their performance.

3. Some dancers are especially sweet...

Wednesday's greens

 

Our late afternoon in shades of green,
talking, laughing, together.

Tuesday's for letting go

1. I hold the cowboy and inspect all the little plastic parts that come with it, and they are all there, in the original box, for almost 40 years.

2. I make some more space on my bookshelves and pile up some more books for the school library. Everybody’s happy.

3. I get a late birthday present and it says to me “write, write, just write…”

Monday, Monday, so good to me

1. There is birds' singing in the air and raindrops on the grass as I walk down to the garden to get the lettuce.

2. After my 30-minute decluttering session I look through the window and I see the rainbow but it disappears very soon. When I look again an hour later there is another rainbow.

3. Jay sits at the table with a bowl of red cherries right in front of her.

My weekend highlights

1. The dance production Odysseyade is staged at the local theater. I love how Em and her group present the creation of the world according to Greek mythology.

2. I watch them leave, holding hands down the sidewalk and the sight of their sisterly love warms my heart. 

3. We come visit our friends to meet their 5-days old Icelandic foal. The girls and I hardly get the chance to touch its soft hair because the overprotective mare is just a step away all the time. Zippy bounces in the meadow like a child.

   
   

photo: Ž.U.

Blown away on a Thursday

1. Morning starts with: »Who do you think I am to carry you around in the middle of the night?«. »My relative!« the little girl says back to her daddy.

2. I am greeted by the fresh wind blowing away the office stuffiness. Going home.

3. I sneak into her bed while she is still brushing her teeth in the bathroom. She is most happy to see me there and then lectures me about how I am not allowed to read now because she has so much to tell me.

Releasing energy on a Wednesday

1. I make a presentation at work. All my suggestions are accepted and I feel like it is because of the excess of energy I am feeling.

2. “It’s too much energy built up in there,” the therapist says. How it cannot be when I am carrying my whole world on my shoulders, I think to myself. They hurt from the massage but it is a good pain.  

3. I ask Jay to tell me her three good things at bedtime and she says without hesitation: »Seeing Vita, my friend, spending time at the daycare centre, going for a trip and ice-cream with daddy.« It is as simple as that: friends, a stimulating environment and happy time spent with your loved ones.  

Tuesday’s time out

1. She stops by my desk and shares details about her new furniture. It’s wonderful to see her happy and smiling again.

2. The smell of freshly cut wood in the workshop.

3. I turn on the TV just as the guys play scenes with garden dwarfs in The Full Monty.

Monday sources

1. I feel the spark of a new professional perspective lighten in my brain but it’s put out by the feed-back from the mayor’s office. A tailor-made job advertisement, obviously. I am annoyed which is not good. The good thing is that I feel activated to move on, to do something, anything. Even dishes.

2. The driving training roads are busy with small cyclists. I wait for Jay to cycle by, happy to see her smiling and being so proud of herself.

3. I look through the window and I see our trampoline and the vegetable garden, the oak tree and houses and then the hilly horizon in the golden evening sun and I know I have so much to be grateful for. 

Sunday's highlights

1. We go for a long walk and Em asks me to talk about my recent reads and afterwards she tells me about hers. Happy time.

2. The smell of allspice from freshly baked cookies in our home.

3. As I close the window in the room upstairs I see the illuminated church belltowers on the hilltop and I think to myself how my father would have enjoyed that view if he had ever slept over in that room.

Thursday's creativity

1. »Are you happy I am helping you?« »Yes, I am, Jay.« And so are the little seeds we plant and the lettuce we water.

2. A wonderful piece of art in my mail box saying »Life is a Mess – just breathe« - and live it to the maximum, I add in my mind.

3. Despite low quality of some old family black & white photos the scans are very fine and I put together a project I had in mind for a while now. Healing comes my way. 

   

   
   

Wednesday’s turn-outs

1. My last minute arrangements for lunch break turn out delicious.

2. There is a late afternoon summer breeze and hula-hoops being whirled around.

3. It’s late and I am tired and I don’t want to do my exercise – but then Jay joins me and comments the DVD workout and I do it anyway, and it feels good to win against my biggest enemy, laziness, just by being distracted by my little girl.

Monday’s naturals

1. Jay keeps bringing me new and new storybooks from the library shelves while I ponder whether to borrow two or three for myself.

2. I encourage Em to go for a hike but she tells me she had already gone out, saw a rainbow just as she walked down the road and around the corner, ran home to get her camera but the rainbow disappeared by the time she came back. Em likes rainbows just like me.

3. I harvest some vegetable from the garden and listen to the evening singing from the forest and the meadow.

Sunday at home

1. The DVD workout requires weights – I don’t have any, and half a liter bottles with water are too light. I laugh at the thought of my girls waking up and seeing me do those upper body exercises with a package of flour in an extra plastic sack, each in one hand.

2. I use muscovado and add less than required in the recipe, sprinkle with chopped hazelnuts instead of the usual blueberries. After it is baked and ready to eat I hold my breath to hear family feedback. “This is gooood!”

3. Jay dashes through the door to report: “I can ride the bike by myself!” What could be greater than that, to be able to ride anywhere with the wind in your face and your hair?

An unpredictable Thursday

1. It is starting to be impossible to predict her response to clothes I buy for her and to places I take her to. She is growing up, definitely.

2. The unfairness of the situation makes me a little angry. But no one is to blame. And I am the only one to deal with it. So I just dive in and I am over and done with it by the time I have to leave.

3. It was 100% pure magic to listen to their music live, again. The neighboring town’s school gym may not be the perfect environment but it’s packed with locals and non-locals, even with people speaking German and English, and we are all just enchanted.

 

Wednesday’s fine

1. There are some great things in my mailbox today: a romantic movie and some embarrassing stories to read which remind me of situations when I felt the blush rising in my face. All is fine as long as I am able to laugh at myself.

2. I glance at the TV screen wishing I had the time to sit down and watch the movie amid all the things and people that call for my attention. But it’s really just an impulse because I like the actress and her haircut, and what I really want is to give a shower to Jay and sweet-talk her to sleep.

3. I can’t remember the last time a book made me cry… My cheeks are wet from tears and it is so liberating. It’s only just page 94 and more than another 100 pages to go.

Tuesday smiles

1. I dial an unknown number and hear a familiar voice. Happy memories from 20 years ago come to surface.

2. I make a crazy promise to wear a very short skirt for a certain special occasion which is very unlikely to take place ever. The whole family laughs just at the thought of it. I do, too.

3. The smell of strawberries in my shower. I check the image on the container if it is just strawberries or strawberries with cream.

Tuesday surprises

1. Em is eager to read her new poem to me. Indeed, a perfect combination of her favourite activities: writing rhymes about reading books.

2. A postcard and a letter in my mailbox. They are from different countries, but both have polar bear stamps.

3. I drive to the local theatre in the rain drizzling evening. Then the light cuts through the drapery and I see two ends of a rainbow. My first rainbow scene this year.