I've just finished a 70-hour-online-course of German.
Have I ever mentioned that I love learning languages 😉?
My favourite blog written in German is this one: https://www.elaineok.com/ ; I love reading it.
(with the help of translators - for example this one: https://www.deepl.com/translator you can read it as well, it is beautifully written; I love Elaine's photos).
I also love learning languages with the help of songs. I love this one: Bist du okay?**
**Ja, ich bin okay 😊
I knew for at least a decade that I should do some extra exercises. I've always done enough walking and cycling... but this mainly makes your lower body fit. When working I just never found time nor motivation do to some research what exercises to do.
I got a random newsletter from my local community six months ago - there was news that local pensioners' association moved their class "Exercises for a healthy spine" online and that everybody** was welcome. The classes are twice a week in the morning. I had time so I logged to the class, it is lead by a wonderful retired physiotherapist. I loved the class so much and I have been attending it ever since.
I really feel that my body is stronger and fitter now. I am so happy and proud of myself.
I am attaching a photo of all the sport accessories that I need for the class. I love them all, but most of all I love the huge white ball. I am sitting on it right now, while typing. It is much healthier for my spine than sitting on a chair.
**everybody was invited to this online class, regardless of age. Can you imagine that I am the only person there below the age of 60! Most of the attendees are ladies in the age group 65-75. I love them so much, they are my role models how important it is to take care of your body all your life.
I have been spending at least 3 hours per week for learning French for the last six months. I have been attending a French Zoom online course with a native speaker. I just love our classes! The teacher is very good, we have a homework every single week. And attending a course gives me an extra motivation for watching French movies.
It is a very difficult language to speak, so I can't speak (yet), but I already understand a lot.
And here is an absolute highlight of my learning of French: a lovely 8-year-old French girl is reading a story in French via Zoom couple times a month. I enjoy listening to her so much!
I have a friend from France whom I met through blogging. We also met one day, I met her family and she met my husband. If you went through infertility you know that meeting new friends with children can be difficult. Well, with my friend from France it wasn't. Perhaps because she is one of the kindest people that I ever met. And also because I liked her little girl so much from the very first moment (and the little girl liked me too).
I asked my friend if her daughter would be willing to read to me. She asked her and she liked the idea. So now we have a win-win-win arrangement:
***
I used to listen to French chansons a lot, after a long time I am listening to this one:
http://thenext15000days.blogspot.com/2016/01/jacques-brel-la-chanson-des-vieux.html
Just wonderful!
I am so happy - I've just got the first vaccine against covid19. My age group isn't entitled to get a vaccine yet, but an older person didn't show up for his or her appointment so they had one vaccine available. I got a phone call that if I can come immediately, I will get the vaccine. Of course I came immediately :)
I haven't been working due to the pandemic for whole six months. And another month of non-working luxury is in front of me. I will start working again in the first week of June.
So I thought I could share with you my favourite things that I've been doing during the pandemic. Things, that I always wanted to do but never had enough time. I will write one activity each day. First I wanted to write one post, but the post would be too long :)
So here it is, a pandemic activity Nº1: Daily walks in the nature. I went for a walk almost literally every day (the only exception were few days when it was raining cats and dogs).
I installed on my mobile a step counter, my daily average number of steps for the last 180 days: 10.750 steps. All those steps were done in the nature, there are many beautiful walking trails very close to our home.
It feels just great, having enough time for a daily exercise.
There are some gifts that mean a world to me. This is a story about my beloved box of coloured pencils.
It was 18 years ago when I just moved into a new flat with my husband. We went on a first shopping together in a big supermarket. While shopping for food I noticed a huge pile of boxes of coloured pencils, each box contained 24 coloured pencils. The brand was Jolly... it is an Austrian brand that has been hugely popular since my childhood. When I was a child it was impossible to buy them in my country (=ex-Yugoslavia), so once my parents drove to Austria and smuggled them (together with coffee and all other stuff that was impossible to buy here). I got a box of 12 Jolly coloured pencils when I was 7 years old and I had those pencils for more than 10 years.
I told this story to my husband. And I told him that all my childhood I wished to have a larger box that would contain 24 coloured pencils, not only 12. But I never got them since they were to expensive.
My husband took one Jolly box and put it into the shopping charts. I asked him what was he doing. He told me that he wanted to buy me the large box of coloured pencils that I wished my whole childhood.
I was deeply touched. I told him that I didn't need the coloured pencils. And he replied that it didn't matter, that he wanted to buy them anyway.
I think this is the gift that means the most to me.
And it wasn't true that I didn't need the big box of coloured pencils. I needed them, I just didn't know I needed them :)
There was something beautiful that I noticed today. My husband and I planted 15 lavender bushes last year, this winter was very cold so I wasn't sure if lavender survived.
I noticed today that all our lavender already have some little fresh green leaves. This means that they live! I admire their resilience and the determination to live.
I want to believe that I am like lavender.
***
This is our lavender (with a bumblebee) last summer:
I have an excellent news. My father has already got the first vaccine against covid19, my mum will hopefully get it by the end of the month. I guess me and my husband will get it by the end of the summer... the vaccination goes really slowly in the EU.
The pandemic brought up all the worst (and with some - all the best) of people. I hate all the negativity and all the hatred against anti-covid protection rules that there is among people.
I still love the quote from last year:
Stay at Home! Your grandparents (or great-grandparents) were called to war. You're being called to sit on your couch.
To see things from different perspective sometimes I need to read and watch about really horrible periods of time and about brave people who fought and tried to survive.
*******************************************
I loved the novel Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. It is hard and great, it is beautifully written.
“Look at you. You're the kindest person I know. Look how beautiful
you are. Why do you need so much outside of yourself? Why isn't what
you are enough?”
―
Half of a Yellow Sun
“He realized that what he wanted most of all, with her, was time.”
―
Half of a Yellow Sun
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I also loved the movie 1917
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8579674/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
I loved everything about this movie. It is one of the best movies that I have seen.
The topic about childlessness has become less and less important to me as the years are passing by. Writing this blog has helped me infinitely. Sometimes I wonder - does my writing still help anybody? I am not sure, but then sometimes something unexpected happens.
I see that someone reads (almost) all my post from the last 9 years within few days. I am deeply flattered, when I see that...
Or I get an email from a young woman, a decade younger then me, who has just quit all infertility treatments and is accepting their childless life. And she says that writing to a real person, who went through the same feelings ten years prior, helps her.
I love that. This means I am still a needed part of this community. I may not be a mother... but I love the idea of being a big sister to someone who is in the hardest times of accepting childless life.
I see that as paying forward... I will be forever grateful to all the women who had walked this path before me and have helped me.
***
I have heard a beautiful sentence recently. "I'm not here just to be a mother, I'm here to be me."
Sometimes I overthink - what is my role in this world since I am not a mother?
Being me is just enough!
