Week 23 & 24 – „One Year – One Island“
Now it’s happened. Somehow I knew it, it was only a matter of time before it would happen: I haven’t been able to keep up with my weekly schedule. Even worse: there’s a huge gap of about a month in my planning! I painted the last picture in Gärdslösa (week 22) in mid-March, and the one after that, the old tractor in Långöre, just a few days later (week 23 of the project). But I didn’t paint the picture of the church in Löt until mid-April (week 24 within the project). I had actually wanted to compensate for my planned stay in Germany by painting two pictures a week – both before and after I returned – to keep to a weekly schedule, but sometimes Livet kommer emellan! (= life just gets in between… is that how you say it in English?)
The thing is: While I live in Sweden, my three adult children live in Germany. My youngest child, my daughter Leah, graduated from high school here in Sweden in 2014 and then moved to Berlin. My two sons were already „out of the house“ before I moved to Öland and live with their own families in Germany. My mother and brother also live there; they all live quite far down in the south of Germany. So in our family we are traveling back and forth a lot to see each other. Once or twice a year, my husband and I drive to Trelleborg, then take the ferry to Rostock, and from there directly to Berlin. My husband usually stays in Berlin to help a friend with some craft work at her sailing school and to visit his own family in Berlin. I, on the other hand, get on the train directly upon our arrival in Berlin and I am picked up hours later by my mother or brother from a train station in Bavaria. I then spend about at my mom´s, borrowing her small car, and then drive to visit each of my children. After about another week, I drive back to my mother’s, drop off the car, spend another night or two with her, and then say goodbye at the train station – back to Berlin. About five hours later, my husband is standing at the platform. We get into our car together and start the journey home, including the ferry crossing.
It’s been like this for many, many years – once around the end of March before the lawn-mowing season, and once in mid-October after the end of the tourist season. We can’t really leave in between because that’s when we earn our money, both from mowing the lawn of our customers and from the café and art exhibitions.
Okay, I’ve gone into a bit of detail now… but what I wanted to male clear is, that even before I started my „One Year – One Island“ project, I knew I would have to somehow compensate for the two trips to Germany if I wanted to create 52 paintings within a year. So, I had already painted the old tractor in Långöre in advance, and I planned to create one more before the trip. But I also had to do two months‘ accounting, prepare for our seasonal opening at Easter shortly after our return, do laundry, pack, sow tomatoes for the greenhouse, etc. In short: I didn’t have enough time. I also tried to find time to write my blog post at my mom’s, but somehow it’s like diving into another world. Suddenly, completely different things become important, and your own life with its tasks, obligations, and resolutions seems so far away and quickly swept aside in your mind. So, no post on Substack either. On the journey home, my husband and I share our experiences, and then—mile by mile—our conversations turn closer to our upcoming work and our own everyday lives. It’s about 26 hours from my mother’s front door to my own, seven of which we sleep in a cabin during the night ferry crossing. Plenty of time to mentally come home.
After 10 days in Germany I noticed I was getting sick. I was sniffling and coughing. Unfortunately, this is almost inevitable, because I have little contact with people during the winter months. My untrained immune system is completely overwhelmed when I suddenly board a crowded train or go on a shoppingtour with my daughter on a Saturday. During the last two days at my mother’s, I also infected her with my virus, a really stupid parting gift! I slept almost theentire car ride in Sweden because I felt so sick. But since we were planning to open our café five days later, there was no point in being sick: I worked many hours in the garden and on the farm, with a tissue and headache pills always at hand – as my needed friends and helpers. From Good Friday through Easter Monday, I stood in our barn with a scarf on for our big flea market, which we had already announced. I also couldn’t cancel my appearance as the Witch of the North this year; I had promised to come (I reported on this event in my last blog post). So: business as usual! My husband was at the café for those four days. I felt miserable, and as soon as we got through the holidays and closed the farm to visitors, I stayed in bed for three days to recover. Sleep is often the most important part of getting well. Today my ears are still blocked, but the cough and cold are gone.
Four weeks had passed before I finally went for a tour with my drawing pad. Where had the time gone? By then, it had truly become spring on Öland. And I was looking for a motif that would capture this. From previous years, I knew that in Löt, in particular, many gardens would be covered in primroses, wood anemones, and scillas. And the small town of Löt was within the area considered for the next painting. In the upcoming watercolors, I also want to document the lush blooms, the fresh green, and the full force of spring here on the island.
The old tractor in the dilapidated barn, which I had painted before my trip, still bore the long, dry grass of winter. That day, it was also cool and not at all spring-like. I liked the morbid charm of the barn. The roof must have collapsed long ago, the boards crooked—the building no longer offered much protection from the weather. In the background on the right, an old Volvo stood overgrown with long grass. Is the person who once proudly drove that beautiful car still alive? In the countryside and in small communities, one often has the feeling that little or nothing ever changes. Time ticks slower here – definitely outside of the tourist season – and when, for example, the local grocery store replaces its old, noisy freezer with a modern one, it’s a noticeable change that people talk about. It’s easy to get the impression that nothing ever changes here. But that’s not true. The process is just slower, gradual. The barn above the old tractor was once new and must have stood in good condition for many, many years. The little old tractor was once purchased at a high price by a farmer – perhaps even as the first tractor after the workhorse, who knows. But now it is rusty and has served its purpose. Next to the big green tractor of my neighbor (the biggest dairy farmer in the area) the little red tractor would look like a toy; these vehicles have changed so much over the decades. And so, while I sat there painting the tractor, I philosophized about transience and renewal, about slowness and the long-awaited spring. And now springtime is here… whoosh, time really does fly by sometimes.
