Let's talk about the darker days before Christmas

A village near the sea, grey and rainy days, an old renovated fishing cottage, ancestral furniture, dogs, candles. All topped with a fluffy mist....
This is my well being in the darker days before Christmas.

Of course I love light and sunshine, it makes the world so much brighter and we need it, but these darker days...... Every year again I am looking forward to them. I can't wait to lit my candles. To embrace the soft glowing light creating comfortable shadows and giving a warm glow to my furniture, maintained and loved by many generations before me. To listen to Bach, to read a book. To drink hot chocolate or Winter tea.

No, I do not live with ghosts from the pasts. Maybe it has to do with not always feeling comfortable in this modern world although I benefit from technology and improved health care too!
Often I crave for a more quiet world, less distractions, more simple. With more simple I mean more quiet, alone with your thoughts, less white noise. There is so much noise: traffic, plains, machines, radios.....  Living in a quiet village near the sea, is a blessing.

My former house, a renovated small farmhouse, was far more isolated although situated near a drive trough country road. At the back and the front no neighbours, just country views. I loved the house, it was comfortable and cosy. Still... in my new house I feel even more comfortable. More at home.
Last week I talked to my lovely neighbour about our mutual feelings for this village and the beautiful Wadden Sea. She and her husband moved here 35 years ago, she originates from Germany.
Even now she can get emotional talking about how wonderful it is to live here, which caused me 'wet eyes' when I agreed.

One of my ancestors owned a plot of land in a nearby fishing village. With my huge amount of Scandinavian DNA (the Vikings did not only ravaged the Friesian coast but also 'mingled' with members of the local population) it is not surprising that I feel so rooted here.
The current exhibition 'We Vikings' in the Friesian Musem in Leeuwarden is a 'must see' and on top of my list.

My DNA is used to long dark winters full of fires and stories to pass the time. I can imagine myself listening in front of a fire. My fantasy at work about elves, trolls, giant birds...... I love standing in the middle of nature, inhaling the cold air, watching the many stars we still see here, my feet guided by the night when walking the wet lands.
Genetic memories and reality.

Soon the Christmas tree will be up again. I respect our Dutch Sinterklaas but the very first Saturday after this wonderful festivity for children, the tree goes up. And already I am planning which changes I have to make to my sitting room to give it a prominent place. It will stay there for at least 4 weeks, spreading it's soft light. Adding to my home feeling.

Photo: Ike Roelfsema

I am also looking forward to the Christmas illumination of the village. There are so many old and beautiful cottages here. Often built close to the next one to shelter each other for the fierce cold wind from sea.
To hear the church bells in the 800 year old tower, wishing it could speak. Wishing it tells stories about all those Christmases it witnessed. In mostly hard times where people struggled to survive, but also happy times of new marriages, new born children.

The darker days before Christmas: simplicity and soft glows.....

Love,

Helen

Let's talk about Value

Value, a small word of great importance.
It is attached to, in my humble opinion, everything in life. Nature, people, emotions, you name it.
Ah yes, value of money and objects but I do not want to go there. Apart from the money you need for a basic life, money can be a burden, too much and you lose the feeling for real values....
Objects? Nice, enjoy them but enjoy above all the simple side of them, not what they are worth in money.

Maybe I am the incurable optimist but even when life is less attractive, I always find value in little things. Of course, I am blessed with a good health but also know the down side of e.g. fighting Cancer. Even that added more value to my life.
And value in friendships, relationships. Only a very, very few friendships remain which is good, you can not hold on to or depend on others all your life. Or being dependent of what others think of you. Fifty different people have fifty different opinions of you. Let go, be you.  After all you are the base of your own life and from this base you develop and become stronger.
You need to be able to rely on your own base, it lasts until you very last day, broaden it and secure it.... with values.

November is a month where value speaks more often to me. It is a month in which I lost people - who played an important role in my life - through death. Each in their own way; with much love or far less love.
I miss my mother who passed away 11 years ago this month. Maybe it has to do with age but the more people mention I look like her, the more I miss her and getting older I also see the similarities in look more and more. And I am proud of it!

When life is hectic or when my brains are too occupied, I wonder which advice my mother would have given and realize how valuable it is to have had a mother like her. No, she was not a saint, she was a real human being, strict with a touch of stubbornness. But above all loving, sincere and honest.
She taught me the value of all living creatures, the seasons, the basic things and love. That ever so complicated but also simple love of opening your heart to receive and return love. The value of vulnerability of love.
Which on its own, allows you to know the value of grief. You can not grief when you do not know love and the other way round. Yes, love can hurt, so can grief. But grief can heal, so can love.

Everyone inherits good and bad things from both parents, grandparents and so on. Add life experience on top of that and you become that one and only unique you. Value the freedom of being unique and use it to become rich. No, not 'rich as in money' but rich as in being able to make your own choices. To discard what does not make you happy and let grow what does make you happy.
Learn the value of positive energy and stop spending energy on things you can not change or that do not make you happy.

Photo: Ike Roelfsema Photography ©

Learn the value of opening your eyes to see beyond what is immediately in front of you. The value of learning, taking on new things, challenging yourself which level you can reach. The value of expanding your world with new things, this can even be in a small radius around you.
Learn the value of colours, even when it is black and white because there are so many gradations in between!
Or the value of music, even when you can not hear it. Though you can feel it, through your fingers, in your body, your heart. Music is not only the sound of instruments, it can be a voice, a word, the wind, the sun.

Last but not least, learn the value of making mistakes. Without you don't grow.
If a decision you made turned out to be a mistake, do not feel sorry, it happens, it is part of life. Avoid doing it twice but do not feel shame. After all you are very human, how valuable is that!


Love,

Helen

Autumn, Winter and Music

My last post was also about music, I know.

But music is important to me; it either articulates my feelings or it opens up my heart to feelings I have hidden for what ever reason. And these reasons do not always have to be negative.
Although not born and bred British, I am familiar with the 'stiff upper lip': you don't want to show your emotions or don't want to talk about it. Nothing wrong with that.

Being busy and concentrating on daily tasks ánd a different future, deepest emotions are not always in place. I tend to push them away to a corner in which I can not always find them back again although I know they are still somewhere; they never leave me. My way to handle my life.

Fortunately I have a positive spirit and recognize new opportunities when they arise.'Varras' is not accidentally chosen; this Finish cow bar elevates my life to a new level.
Seasons also have their influences on my spirit and energy. The people who know me well, know that Summer is not my favourite season. I love sunshine for it's light ad warmth but it often drains my energy. For me a Summer Sleep is more appropriate than a Winter Sleep!

Then it is time for Autumn and I wake up, I start living again and my energy returns.
Don't ask me why, probably an amalgamation of cooler temperatures, colours, scents and skies.
The rain singing it's song, the mist fading contours and narrowing the world around me, the fiery colours of leaves and skies, energetic thunderstorms and the strong smell of wet decaying leaves and mushrooms.

The forest is a busy place for wild animals gathering nature's goodies to survive the Winter; by eating as much as possible for a deep sleep or stockpiling.
And suddenly there is silence; nature waits for the first snowflakes changing the world into a white blanket that muffles sounds; boundaries disappear.
I do not have to explain that Vivaldi's Winter and Autumn are my favourites.

It is this stillness that triggers forgotten emotions. A stillness that makes me aware of the many blessings in life. Stillness penetrates everything and adds balance.

It is not only stillness that reaches my heart. I mentioned earlier that music can do the same and without expecting it.
This happened to me this week. I came across beautiful photo's taken by Gio Boretti. Browsing the photo's I suddenly listened to beautiful guitar music that touched my heart, the compositions is called 'Love for an old wolf' , I shared it on Facebook.

But it was 'Winter Silence' that reached, without warning, the deepest corners of my heart where I, to my surprise, had hidden a few unshed tears. And I am not ashamed for these feelings, no stiff upper lip. I listened and listened.

I have never met you Gio, but thank you!!

Helen

Beautiful Moments

Please share my beautiful moments with me....

It is August, the rain is pouring down and leaves little drops like diamonds on the large window apposite me.
The wind moves the trees in a fast pace; green apples - still growing - dangle at their branches, not trying to give way to the wind.
I see the very first yellow leaves dwelling on the grass. Is this an early sign of Autumn or the drought of the past weeks?

Next to me the scented candle flickers in the antique glass and creates a cosy and comfortable atmosphere in the otherwise dark kitchen where I type my stories.
I listen to a beautiful CD which arrived with the post on Tuesday. A friend who knows how much I love classical music, sends me these CD's for which I am more than grateful.

Photo: Helen Varras

The first part of the CD I play over and over again as it touches my heart. It stirs an emotion I can not explain. It is encouraging, inspirational, beautiful, it comforts me. But at the same time it makes me feel small, a tiny human being in the universe. Above all it causes grateful feelings. I am alive, I have a life, I have a gift.

When I listen to this music, the world around me comes to a halt and every sense of me is aware of what I hear: Suite no. 3 in D-Major: part 2 'Air' Johan Sebastian Bach

Helen