The lavender

 

 

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:

Paying forward

 

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! 

Merci beaucoup

 

I've just had a French course that I love attending.  I was put for 15 minutes in a break-out-room with a 60-old-woman. We had to do a dialogue - I was interviewing her, so I asked plenty of questions. Some of the questions she helped to form - like this one - Are you married. So I asked her if she was married.  She replied in a very sad voice: "No, I am a widow."  I could see her pain and somehow I sensed that her loss was recent. So I said: "I am sorry for your loss." She looked directly into my eyes (well, she looked directly in the camera) and said: "Merci beaucoup."

It was a brief moment. But it meant a lot.

After working on the interview I asked her if she was planning to join the next level of the French course and she replied that she wasn't sure. I encouraged her to join. Her eyes sparkled and she said that she might.

I made a little difference in someone's life today. It is not a lot, but I feel good.

Dandelion

 

In my country we believe in healing powers of dandelion.  Picking up dandelion is a national hobby every spring. 

As I have written before, the only positive side of pandemic for me is having time. I love having time for picking the dandelion, cleaning it and then making a tasty salad. It is delicious is warm potatoes and eggs. I add also salt, good olive oil and vinegar. Bon appetit :)

Happy Women's Day!

 

“The woman who follows the crowd will usually go no further than the crowd. The woman who walks alone is likely to find herself in places no one has ever been before.”

 

― Albert Einstein 

 

 

 

I came across this quote today. I am not sure if it is really Einstein's, but I like it anyway. 

 

This post is for you, my dear reader. I wish you a Happy Women's Day!  

 

I am not walking with the crowd. But I am so glad, that I am not walking completely alone, I am glad I have you! 

 

 

PS: I took the photos of the snowdrops today on my daily walk.  

Longing in my eyes

 

I went for a long walk through the forest yesterday. I really love walking!  I took this photo, I adore the very first spring flowers. 

I was thinking how therapeutic it was for me writing my blog. I have been writing it for 9 years, so far I have written 947 posts. 

I would like to thank you, my dear readers, for reading my blog. Without you I would have stopped writing years ago.

There are many posts that meant a lot to me. This is my favourite post, I wrote it 6 years ago:

https://thenext15000days.blogspot.com/2015/03/i-can-see-that-you-dont-have-children.html

I don't know what touched me the most. Perhaps that a complete stranger saw the longing in my eyes.  He got me and many people whom I have known for ages never had.

While thinking about this dinner, I remembered that he wrote me few weeks ago but I forgot to return the text. So I called him yesterday when walking. He was happy to hear me and we had a nice chat .... he was alone walking as well.  Perhaps I can be for him a bit of a daughter he never had.

I love the moment when I wake up in the morning

 

There is only one advantage of the pandemic: having time (I am still not working). 

I was raking the lawn when I saw this beautiful little daisy. It is so pretty!  I love having time to stop working for a while and just admire it. 

And I love having time for learning different things. I recently joined an online French course. I love it, we have a really good teacher. We practiced conversation and the question was:  "What is your favourite moment of the week?". I loved the answer of a fellow student, a decade older then me. She replied: "I love the moment when I wake up in the morning and I see that I am alive and well and that there is another day in front of me."  

I just love her attitude to life!