Lately there has been some luck with the fish traps; on several days I've caught a bream or two. Also, we've had a period of warm summer days - about one month earlier than normal. After the dark cold winter it feels so refreshing to be able to go outdoors without wearing extra clothes. This had an effect on my routines; I've been cooking my morning coffee outdoors, drinking it on the stairs, enjoying the warm sunlight. One morning was so warm that I felt like taking a quick swim in the garden pool - where the water is still rather chilly.

On different days I've been taking pictures and drafting ideas for a blog post, but then I've just lacked concentration to write. And it was exactly this lack of concentration which got me thinking about how spring / early summer is represented in Finnish culture. On the other hand, there is this thing called spring-time-tiredness. It is a known phenomenon that many people experience seemingly unexplained tiredness during the spring time. Death rates go up - suicides included. Which seems strange; one would think that rapidly increasing daylight would cheer up and make people feel energetic. But it seems that for some people the spring is just too intense, too much to handle. Well, and generally speaking the intensity of seasonal changes is thought to be connected to arctic hysteria - a yearly ebb and flow of passivity and passion, reservedness and crazy openness. Yes the seasons of nature seem to contribute towards a certain bi-polar tendency of Finnish mind and mood. Hehe, well, but in my own personal life, this year it has been more like modest yet enjoyable mania =) And now the weather is back to semi-cloudy and +12 °C. Well, but to get something written about those days of early summer mania, let me pick one small story;

As I might have mentioned, there is a kind of a 'hippie collective' located twenty minutes walk away from my place. I lived there for nine years, before buying a place of my own. The collective has always been kind of a hub which connects a lot more people than the ones who live there. So, a lot of good people, with who I've shared many years of my life. Although the place isn't located that far away, I haven't been visiting them so often - mostly because of my own inner problems with social life. Well, but last week it was 70 years birthday celebrations of the eldest member of the collective. And on several occasions she especially wished for me to join the party - which was intended to last for a weekend. Well, I went there Friday evening late.

We had the traditional smoke sauna. And then it was food, speeches and some booze. One would've thought that it was 17th celebrations instead of 70th - only that people giving speeches could go back in memories for decades, picking up all the funny incidents, all the warm and humorous stories so well describing the person being celebrated. We laughed a lot. There was a fire burning in the fireplace, a couple of friends started playing guitar and singing. And at some point we all joined in for a birthday song. At around midnight I headed back home, walking down the small forest roads. At this time of the year it doesn't get properly dark, instead it was a pleasant twilight. And because of the extraordinary weather, it wasn't that cold, but just pleasantly mild warm night. As I walked I realized that I was a bit more drunken than I thought - a side-step now and then, hehe. And somehow, the whole world felt like floating in a soft mellow cloud of feel-good.