i leave my rage to the sea and the sun

Liz Clements's illustrations are spectacular. 

This is the kind of girl I'd like to be, if I were brave enough. 

Pictures on my skin and wings in my hair. 

shades of

Blake Wright just gets me, you know?

huffs

Marc Johns continues to amaze .

we're all stories in the end

(I don't think you understand how much I love both Nan Lawson and Doctor Who. Combine the two, watch me melt.) 

still alive for you

Lovers by Jarek Puczel

monday links (feminism, mainstream-ism, obama, presidential elections, etc.)

Carole Brémaud's paintings are my new favourite thing. 

Oh goodness am I caught up in these presidential elections. (The Finnish ones, not the farce that is the Republican election in the US.) I'm going to blatantly push an agenda here and tell you to have some of this.

My links this week are a bit of an odd bunch. In my defense, I've been dancing around since last night because of all this elections excitement.

Speaking of which, oh Obama. You make me happy when skies are grey. 

And on to an excellent blog post on how to reply to anti-feminist comments.

A brief history of sexual liberty. (Did you know the first so-called sexual revolution took place in the 18th century? Because I sure didn't.) 

Also, I adore Adele. A simply ridiculous amount. I don't care how mainstream that takes me. I'll go wherever she leads me. All my victory dances since yesterday have been backed by this. (Although, this article about the New Boring, also known as the Beige Age, does have a point.)


(My apologies for such an odd concoction of links. Politics do odd things to your higher brain functions.)

right

So another year. Well.

Because I absolutely abhor the way New Year's Eve is made into a huge shabang, I won't be making a retrospective post. I'll be drinking tea and lazing about. Huzzah for not noticing when the clock strikes twelve!


(But there's one tiny thing I might have to point out: 2011 was the first year when I sometimes felt like a bit of a grown-up. I take that as a plus.)


Now I'll roll back my shoulders and take a deep breath. And then just keep on breathing, straight into this new year. I wish you all the most glorious, sparkling and memorable year so far. Let 2012 treat us well.

never hurry, never worry

There's a hiccup in my swagger and worries in my way, although this Christmas has been simply divine.

I've been eating a truly indecent amount and reading almost constantly. (Books, after all, are the very best of presents. I was lucky enough to receive a glorious take on Austen by P.D. James, some Stephen Fry, some highly praised new Finnish novels and almost a thousand pages of brand spanking new Murakami. Oh yes.)

And maybe the most surprising and welcome present of all was a short trip to Amsterdam next week. (Thanks, Mum.) Van Gogh, Anne Frank, here I come.


(Also, if anyone feels like squeeing over the Christmas special of Downton Abbey with me, feel free to do so in the comments. My feelings over Matthew and Mary are full of flailing and smishing and clutching at my heart. Mary Crawley is my favourite character ever in the history of all things and Michelle Dockery is just stunning. Oh show, how I adore you.) 

Picture by the ever-delightful Nan Lawson. 

the eve of the eve

I thought these pictures from Ezra Jack Keats's children's book (published in 1962) might bring holiday cheer to one and all.

The snow here melted as swiftly as it snowed down. But I've been making mince pies and playing Christmas songs, and I've hung my stocking already, and nothing will discourage me now.

I'm on holiday and there's finally no shortage of time. There are hours for sleep and for reading and cooking and simply being. I've banished all thoughts of revision and work out of my head, for just a while.

Today's Christmas song is called Come On! Let's Boogey to the Elf Dance! and it is beautiful. Because what's Christmas without Sufjan Stevens?

i could see for miles miles miles

A tired Friday tinged with relief. Only another week to go till the holidays, until Christmas and sleep and books and friends and family. 

I've been studying history enough to have it bleed into my dreams. I dream of time travel and the impossible weight of a war and wake up with a beating heart, infinitely glad the sound of bombs is only in my head. 

(I won't write about how there's still no snow in Helsinki and only a week till Christmas. 

Except there's this pull in my chest, in my rib cage, a desperate longing for the crackling crumpling 

sound of footsteps in frost. Stars reflecting on a smooth surface of snow. 

I'm also listening to Bon Iver more than ever. 

This song and video suits this final melancholy wait before Christmas perfectly.) 

(Also,  Sandra Dieckmann's illustrations are pure magic.) 

let it snow x3

Again, no snow. It's so dark in the mornings I like to imagine it's actually midnight and we've all been tricked to go to school for an impromptu Christmas party or a huge sleepover. (I've yet to be correct in my guesses.)

Fortunately it is dark and damp and cold enough anyway (and viciously windy and endlessly rainy) for enormous scarves and baking.

Nan Lawson is one of my absolute favourite illustrators. 

(Art inspired by Harry Potter, Doctor Who, Sufjan Stevens, 

Pride and Prejudice, Franny and Zooey and Where the Wild Things Are? 

How could I not be arse over tea kettle in love?) 

windy

Just a bit of Marc Johns for your Sunday morning.

snowflakes and spectres

I'm head over heels with Becca Stadtlander's illustrations. And desperately waiting for the first flakes of snow.


Things that make me happy today include peppermint tea, meeting an old friend, brightly lit windows by dusk, a quick wander-about in a bookstore and the wave of relief that hit me this morning like a freight train. I'm already sleeping better and feeling like a human being again.


Happy Hallowe'en everyone!

monday links (adventures, reading in the loo, long distance love)

I'm kicking off my stress-free November with things that make me happy. Like putting up fairy lights and trawling the internet for essays and poetry, truths and stories. Here is a selection of my favourites.


Adventures in Depression by Allie Brosh of Hyperbole and a Half.

Damien Rice covering I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For. Amazingly good.

For all book-lovers out there, a tongue-in-cheek article on whether reading on the loo is bad for you.

You know how well-written essays reduce me into a flailing mess of admiration and happiness? 

Well, here's one: Will Self wrote a stunning, heartbreaking essay on illness, addiction and mortality.  

Another thing I can't get enough of is spoken word poetry. Sarah Kay on long distance relationships.

And finally, when I was born, I was the 5,524,617,285th person alive. And the 80,727,002,777th person ever to have lived. What about you?

let the wild rumpus start

The Stockholm Subway by Chuck Groenink

This drawing is so eerily perfect I can't stop looking at it.
Also it really reminds me of Maurice Sendak's picture book Where the Wild Things Are. 

One day I swear I'll dress up as Max from Where the Wild Things Are for Hallowe'en and I'll throw a wild rumpus on a subway.

Where the Wild Things Are was one of my favourite picture books as a kid, along with everything Roald Dahl and Astrid Lindgren and Kirsi Kunnas. What were your favourite books when you were little? Also, what's your Hallowe'en costume going to be?

just for a while

No need to hurry. No need to sparkle. 

No need to be anybody but oneself.

Virginia Woolf: A Room of One's Own

hand

By Jesper Waldersten. 

not even the rain

 

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens;only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands

(The final stanza of somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond by e.e.cummings.)

(Painting by the wildly talented Casey O'Connell.)


(Apologies for the sappiness and romance. It's a sublime August and I'm not making much sense at all.)

a reminder

move

One of the most stunningly beautiful videos I have ever seen. (And oh, the things I'd give to go travelling right now.)