Tag Archives: childhood

What did you love?

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Renndølsetra 7There comes a time to most of us, at forty five? Fifty? We seem bewildered in our own lifes, and do not seem to recognize the landscape we are in as the one we set out to find.

Which could be good, life is full of surprises. Even immovable and unsurpassable mountains turn out to have secret doors.

If you find yourself hammering at this mountain trying all the sesam-sesams you are able to imagine while no one works, you might see a coach or read a “Your dream will become true” book.

They will both ask you to remember: “what did you love to do as a kid, what do this love tell you about who you are?”

liten solveig med kanneMost of us are not able to pinpoint the passion of our youth though, we loved a lot of things. I, for instance, loved to sit in the windowsill of my room, watch the roaming fields and read, as well as building playhouses in the woods and running tracks. I would not want to make either into a living.

Perhaps we are blind to the truth all around us? I need to turn this question upside down. Instead of starting the hunt for loves and likes and happiness, I stop now and then and see what I have been doing, even if I had no time for it. What my soul is drawn to and need to do, then I make room for thatstjerneskjerm

Then I take a step back now and then and consider the output of what I have done and what I haven’t done, what did I learn to do it better next time? I have found that the answer to middle age confusion is not necessarily to do something else, but to know the essence of what you do and why.

hvit peonI think the road to middle age wisdom is to learn the lessons from the road we have travelled, and know how to apply our understanding and wisdom to every task, every challenge, every opportunity  life gives us. Mostly.  If we are on the wrong road, no amount of putting mind and soul to the task will set us right. It would be bad though if we actually are on track, but so busy comparing gear and GPS readings that we never get around to enjoy it.

hvit alliumI tried this exercise in my garden today. I already know I need to be there, though I was not really aware of what I have been doing all these years.

Now I know. I have been planting white plants. I have taken care that the sunlight gets to play through the petalshvit rose I have given every flower room to grow and thrive. I have been steadily and unvaryingly watering, tending and working to create place for joy asolveig med vannkannand peace. Hopefully that is what I do wherever else I am too.

And yes I love it, still.

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To give is to keep – a daily post on prized possessions

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Things tend to fall apart...

Things tend to fall apart…

Before going on my bike ride this morning, I read the daily prompt, what was you most prizes possession as a kid and what became of it? The question kept mulling in my head, even if I had written a post already today…I think I could be called a transient hoarder. That is ,I have always liked to have a lot of something, but I also like to give it away. Like in having enough plates and cutlery for  a big party on the ready in my pantry, and lending it to everybody. Or baking an enormous amount of cookies and let the boys and their friends have it all. Or giving away most of my books when I have read them. One time I gave away all my summer clothes in fall and forgot all about it, when next summer came around I got to clear out and sort through every closet in our house looking for them, added bonus! It has nothing to do with generosity. It has all to do with having moved a lot and knowing that it is what you use your things for that it is important. Plates are for serving friends and family, not for storing.I love it if someone needs something I am able to give.

I own the the beauty if not the plates!

I own the the beauty if not the plates!

On the other hand I love beauty. While I subscribe to the idea of William Morris ” have nothing in your home that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful”, I have transcribed it for my own use to “have nothing in your home but love, truth and beauty”. As my friends know, that makes me obsessed with having lovely dinnerware, table linens and cutlery…and flowers. The point is that the things I treasured in childhood are gone, the settings and the atmosphere the things were used in lives as fresh memories in my heart. I remember the blue china children’s tea set….how I longed for that, what parties I planned! I got it and we had so much fun. Years later my brothers used my play house for raising turkeys, and I found a blue cup used as scoop for their feed. I just laughed, I did not need that. Quite accidentally I still have three items from my childhood though.

Somebody else's treasures

Somebody else’s treasures

They were all treasured in their time and they each tell a tale of what truly makes something precious. The one is a sterling silver porridge scraper, don’t you know what that is? My mother did not either, I got it for my baptism. My mother tried to find a way of using it both for me and for all my siblings, but never got the hang of it. It was constantly referred to as a most valuable item though, it is still in my silverware drawer. I keep it as a reminder that monetary value is a funny thing. The other is the small rocking chair that I got for my fourth birthday. I loved that chair and was able to sit in far up in my teens. I have read so many adventurous stories in that chair! My brothers turned it upside down, unhinged the door of a closet and made a slide of it, someone has cut letters in it, it has moved with me into eleven different houses. Now it sits in the living room of our cabin, waiting for  new adventures.

These brothers do not make slides of chairs anymore! Still playing though!

These brothers do not make slides of chairs anymore! Still playing though!

I keep that one because it is so well done and is still doing its job. It also reminds me that even things that keep, never grow, while a human has to grow to keep. And then I remember the same birthday, a friend gave me a tiny mercury glass bell to hang on the Christmas tree. That was a totally new idea to me, that I as a child could own  something so grown up, something not a toy! Through all those years and all those moves that is one of the few Christmas decorations that have survived in my family. I took it with me when I married,  for 31 years it has been shining on the up most branch of our Christmas tree. One day it will break, or one day I will give it to one of our children for their Christmas, neither way it does not really matter. The treasure to me is not the bell itself, rather  the reflections of all the Christmases that bell has mirrored. Those glimmers of joy are for always a part of who I am.

watering can

And then some years ago I got my grandfather’s watering can, never a treasure , always the one thing that reminded me of his steadfast nurturing and caring for every living thing, me included. A life filled with memories of love, my true and lasting childhood treasure.