Diary.

I’ve been keeping a diary for some time now – for various reasons. It has helped me to focus and stay sharp; also, it is a habit that I have been able to keep. The problem is that it has kept me from sharing myself online, which I think is a pity. Not that my visitor numbers would be high, I just thought I could peeking out again. So hello!

Reeds and attempts of ice on an unusually warm Sunday in late January. In South Finland, that is. Wait, it is February already… this picture has just lost some of its charm 😀

I have been properly activating myself, signing up for a lot of voluntary activities that I do not burn for (that was the idea) and trying to get busy with art again although a certain someone has been successfully stopping me from it. I have been rather grateful lately – for health, for material wealth, for wisdom and… for the fact that I have been able to avoid ways of living that would destroy me in the long run. Also, for the skills I have been developing in the past years – patience, fatigue resistance and humbleness.

And I think that Dry February is absolute bullsh*t – everybody who feel like they should take part in it might like to look at their alcohol consuming habits and other life choices in general. But the whole challenge made me think about my identity, my presence, my visibility.

I’m afraid I will never make it into the news – I’m not an exceptional scientist (in fact, I do not want to work in research), I don’t take drugs or drink and I don’t think I will need to recover from dependency on these, I don’t live in a country exotic enough to my compatriots and because I ignore social media I remain invisible to most people (including my peers). My health troubles have prevented me from achieving what I had imagined, but they are not interesting or serious enough. My art is breakthrough in its honesty, that is, how little I depend on Photoshop and general augmentation and instead rely on tangible media. My life is not drastically minimalist or zero-waste, my taste is somehow different but not crazy enough. I’m not exceptionally anything, but I’m exceptional. And I feel good about that.

(Re)starting while the nature is getting ready to rest.

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Unlike in the real (continental) Europe in Finland the autumn has already arrived – pretty much everyone is back at work, children are back at school, leaves are slowly turning yellow, the sun angle is smaller, too (read: shining into your face all the time), there is actual darkness at nights and all the new hobbies at adult and children’s education centres are about to commence within the next couple of weeks. The nature is getting ready to rest, everything is slowing down, and we are entering new life phases and making big changes. Alright!

Yes: another “starting afresh” post from me – but, to be honest, since getting a kid I’m constantly on some kind of a learning curve as opposed of being trapped in some kind of a stereotype. Every day is different, every day has some great highs and absolutely dreadful lows, and, some inevitable have-to-survive-this moments. This doesn’t mean I need some change in my life regarding (baby) free-time, I absolutely do, but I live in my own happy space-time where the only indicator of the time as understood by other people is my little Lela.

This, too, shall soon change, but I have to admit that me, a person who aspires, will achieve and needs results (and compares the results with pretty much anything in the world), have finally learnt to take small steps and allow myself take time in letting the changes sink in. Also, there have been some profound changes in my life recently, and no, not just Lela-related. I grow as a person. I’m full of ides. I have been changing my diet and my lifestyle as such. I buy very little and recycle a lot. And, while I’m so looking forward to boxing again this autumn, I do not feel I’m starting afresh. Rather, I’m just accepting that things have changed for some time (just like the furrowed lake surface in the picture above), and I’m just in the flow. All is good.

Doing in order not to be not doing it. And pictures from Warsaw.

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I think that we all remember our parents asking us with a lot of reproach at some point in our childhood or teenhood that annoying and well-worn question “If (s)he jumped off a bridge would you?” – usually as a reaction to our pitiable excuse for doing that silly something that that friend did too (and before us).

Now, many years later, I noticed a social trend (ha!) that has become even so obvious with the wide-spread use of social media. I called it doing it for not not doing it. It is a bit like doing what our peers are doing. Only his time we are not following a silly friend, but we are doing what others in our physical, social, industry or virtual surrounding – and, importantly, very often those we do not know – are doing not for the thrill, but for the fear of being labeled as “those who are not doing it“. It is rather interesting, nowadays we hear from everywhere that we should be original and not be afraid to step out or think outside the box (anyone else hates these buzzphrases?), yet the fear of not being a member of the herd is real.

For example several weeks before the Helsinki Pride, random companies, organisations, associations, political parties, restaurants, probably even daycare centres and post offices, well, everybody was turning all rainbow and sexual minorities aware and friendly (errr… I don’t know how a company of tens of thousands employees can “be” anything in the first place, but let’s leave this aside for now), and of course, there is nothing wrong with it when you actually mean it, feel for the rights of minorities and your (organisation’s) values are somehow connected to those of the minorities – but at some points, the number of fans and supporters reached a critical mass and the support became and issue of who is not with us.

And that is wrong.

It forces peoples and organisations to hypocrisy and soulless trend following, and dishonour the original thought or cause.

Surely, trends spread and once they have reached enough people and have lingered about for a while, they are replaced by another one. Yet one thing is the way trends emerge and spread, yet whole another is how we are forced to submit to the trend in order not to be associated with its opposite.

So no, just because I’m not not Charlie or I do not associate myself openly with Helsinki Pride, it does not mean that I do not feel with the editorial staff of Charlie Hedbo or that I’m a homophobe. I just don’t want to be a part of this.

And now time for a batch of completely unrelated pictures: Warsaw. On analog camera. I liked the city and I’m satisfied with the way the pictures turned out.

… and a picture everyone who has ever been to Warsaw has:

While I write

Helsinki · Expat · Photography · PhD

Author: maii