Just when it's Needed

As you might have gathered from my last post I've been feeling a little down lately. There are a few reasons for that but none of which I'd like to share here. My blog is personal enough at times and sometimes I wish it had stayed anonymous but hey! too late for that now. Maybe this post will fit into the bigger picture later on but for now I'd just add a few other lines.

It's been the usual Monday. Like Garfield I'm not a big fan of Mondays (and there was no lasagna for dinner either!) and The Cure thinks they're both blue and black... but Fridays... I'm in love.

After working overtime I finally sat in the car, driving towards my mountain flat. The light was quite beautiful and I felt grateful we had turned the time one hour ahead. Nothing like a bit of sunlight to cheer up some sombre thoughts. The car radio came on automatically and as usual I started the search for the channel that worked on that part of the road (I told you I live in the middle of nowhere!! :) After some crackling a beautiful voice sang her heart out. Listening without listening, the words seem to find their way into my mind and suddenly I started laughing and crying and laughing again. The last two verses were of the song was all I heard but it was as if it was meant for me in that instant. Thank you Universe!

After some googling I found Pascale Picard and her song " Smilin" on YouTube so I could share it with you.

The Balance

Maybe it's because I'm tired or because it's Monday but the moral is pretty low today. Driving home to the apartment after an hour of overtime I realised that the balance is not right now either.

For three years I just wanted to find a job! I really wanted to work, to have a job but staying here away from the home where I have my life, my hobbies, husband and cat doesn't feel right either. I want both and not having to choose between the two. I've been here two months, and tonight I can't imagine another 4 here. And I'm fully aware that 4 months doesn't sound like much, that's why accepted the six in the first place but...

I can't help thinking how much nicer it would be to come home to L., tired yes, but making dinner together, watching a film or reading a book. And to have time and possibility to do things after work. The fact of going to the doctor is becoming difficult, going to the shops, doing errands... cramming it all into the weekends is just stressful.

On the positive side the evenings are getting brighter and its easier to plan a little walk along the river. Hopefully the next three evenings I can get out of the office earlier and take some photos of the springtime.

The Scent of Childhood

I've been time traveling this this afternoon. In crystal clear flashback and I was standing on the sloping hill leading down to the sea. The same road I would walk to school not far from Bergen where my parents used to live. It was the exact same perfume... mixed with the smell of green and newly cut grass. I wish I knew the name of the tree with those white flowers but I do know one thing; when the sweet perfume is in the air, it's springtime!

Aaah, life is beautiful!

You Better Stop. Please.

Now this advert is the most annoying ever!! I wanted to say something about the singer too but after some research I found out she's a real singer with a band, having toured with famous people so I'll leave that out. She is surely good at what she does as long as she stays out of my TV screen in the morning during adverts.

To me there's a reason one sings in the shower and in the car. It might come as a surprise but NOBODY can hear you. That's the trick and let's leave it that way! Pliiis?

As one of the commentators said so elegantly on YouTube:

Elle meneeeeeeeerve mdr

Where to Start?

I know I had a lot to say when internet was a far off dream, something that would only happen to the "regular" French people. Two months passed where I, when nobody was looking, was sneaking into my igoogle to peak at the blog headlines, looking at my fav photoblogs wondering when I'd have time to go outside and take some of my own.

January was cold and dark. The mornings started at 7am, and it was dark, I went outside and immediately uttered some less nice words about the temperature which most often (and still is) below zero degrees celsius which meant scraping the ice off my car. The second week at work I was placed in the archives. If you haven't been to a storage archive before then I can tell you that they are normally placed in the less attractive parts of the buildings and most surely have no windows. I enjoyed it though and it helped me getting into the job more at ease. Getting to know people little by little. And when I was let out in the evening the sun had set and I had no energy left but to go to bed early.

You have no idea of what a pensioner I have turned into. No actually, I'm sure the pensioners around this village have more fun than I do!!

February was the month I finished the second part of the first project and was allowed to get to know my office. I knew I had a desk, colleagues and a great office chair but it had seemed far off when I first was stuck with 26 cubic meters of paper to handle in a windowless archive. My social life outside work had improved too. My landlady, a young spirited pensioner, invited me for dinner together with her friend, who again brought her locataire, a dutch girl my age. And after that we got into a the habit of having weekly dinners. The two local ladies, C and J, are the most welcoming, open and charming french people I've met in my three years in this country. Maybe it's the fact that we're away from the touristy seaside. Or maybe it's the size of this little town that makes them more open, even though this village is surviving on tourism as well.

And the weekends?? Come friday afternoon and I can be seen racing in the car, vroooming along to loud music, singing my heart out. I honestly can't wait to get home on fridays. To my little monstercat and L. Lorenzo, who since january has been preparing every weekend down to every detail. Once I walk in the door there are wonderful parfumes coming from the kitchen. All I have to do is sit down and enjoy a succulent dishes and good red wine. This gets repeated for the rest of the weekend until I once again race off in the car monday morning listening to the news and not singing a single note. But what more can I ask for? Nothing! :)

March is here and I'm permanently at my desk, at least for now. It's a slow moment as my office is putting in place procedures and building foundations for future projects. So that leaves me with moments where I invent very important task like looking for tickets to Norway or browsing google earth dreaming about beautiful places.

It's strange (and wonderful) how much you appreciate the things you had but suddenly don't have anymore, or at least not so much. Before I got this job I couldn't wait to get out there, and now I can't wait to get home, to go to Italy, to jump on a plane to Norway, go sailing... and the list goes on. There's another taste to life when you have to look forward to something, need to plan it, to wait for it. I wouldn't trade it for anything - well not yet... We'll see when I'm getting closer to the end of my contract ;)

Houston, we have a...

CONNECTION!! I am actually writing this from my little mountain flat on my new laptop.

*Happy sigh*

And suddenly all the planned posts I've had in my head seem to have disappeared but hopefully my brain will connect too after this initial euphoria of wireless internet and illimited phonecalls to 80 countries around our beautiful world.

Coming out of the Dark Age (?)

The internet box have finally arrived at the Point Relais.

Web sweet web, I will soon surf you again... *Smily sigh of relief*