Blog: This I have to take seriously

It came to pass, one day in De­cem­ber when I was away on a wor­king trip, that I found an email in my per­so­nal mail­box. I chec­ked the tit­le, saw it was so­met­hing about blogs, and al­most swi­ped it in­to the junk fol­der, so it would not dis­turb my thin­king. I have an in­for­ma­ti­on ma­na­ge­ment sys­tem whe­re­by all un­ne­ces­sa­ry and dist­rac­ting mes­sa­ges are im­me­di­a­te­ly scrap­ped, those about so­met­hing that can be de­le­ga­ted are for­war­ded, those that re­qui­re at­ten­ti­on are de­alt with, and anyt­hing ne­ces­sa­ry is arc­hi­ved. My daugh­ter, who is stu­dying eco­no­mics, re­cent­ly told me that, wit­hout kno­wing it, I have been using the traf sys­tem.

Blog: What if I laughed, touched and had the courage to trust

At the be­gin­ning of the ye­ar, I wrote down three wis­hes. I al­so inc­lu­ded them in my pra­yers.

Blog: Children’s rights

Whe­ne­ver I think about the Day of Child­ren’s Rights, I won­der what that day re­al­ly me­ans. We sel­dom think very pro­found­ly about the rights we had as child­ren – or have now as adults. At le­ast I feel that I was born and grew up in ma­te­ri­al abun­dan­ce with many rights. We sel­dom think that many of the things we con­si­der self-evi­dent are inac­ces­sib­le to many pe­op­le. Or at le­ast they need to work hard, of­ten even at the risk of their li­ves, to at­tain those things.

Blog: Fads and fashions

When I was in pri­ma­ry school, I got a pair of jodh­pur-type pants with side bags at the thigh. I had to wear them for school. It hap­pe­ned to be a very cold day, and we did not need to go out for bre­aks. I sat at my desk all day, hi­ding the bag­gy parts of the trou­ser legs un­der my hands, so no-one would see them. I was very fas­hi­on-cons­ci­ous at that age. Pants with bag­gy legs were not in fas­hi­on then.

No confirmation picture was taken

Last sum­mer I was ab­le to at­tend the con­fir­ma­ti­on ser­vi­ces of three grandc­hild­ren. They were fes­ti­ve oc­ca­si­ons. The yo­ung con­fir­mand may even be a bit em­bar­ras­sed as the cen­ter of at­ten­ti­on, sur­roun­ded by his or her grand­pa­rents, god­pa­rents, ot­her re­la­ti­ves and friends who have come to ce­leb­ra­te.

On a speaking trip

My fat­her ser­ved as a spe­a­ker for de­ca­des. When it was his turn to speak at ser­vi­ces in our home cong­re­ga­ti­on, it was al­wa­ys spe­ci­al for us, his child­ren. I do not think I was ever ner­vous for my fat­her. Ma­y­be I did not even wor­ry about such things as a child. But I do re­mem­ber the spe­ci­al fee­ling I had when I sat at ser­vi­ces, lis­te­ning to my fat­her speak.

Blog: Now or never

When I was pon­de­ring whet­her or not to start as a blog­ger, I ap­p­ro­ac­hed the to­pic from a num­ber of pers­pec­ti­ves. What things could I give and what could I lose? I gu­ess they would tell me if my posts are not good enough, or if my style of wri­ting is not ap­p­rop­ri­a­te for the for­mat. And I could get caught red-han­ded by an ac­qu­ain­tan­ce, ha­ving pos­ted an ext­re­me­ly pro­found text on­li­ne. That ac­tu­al­ly hap­pe­ned al­re­a­dy. ”I wouldn’t have gu­es­sed that a guy like you would be wri­ting a blog”, said one of my re­a­ders.

Blog: Each years makes us older

This will be my last blog post for Päi­vä­mies – I think. I have been blog­ging for two ye­ars, sub­mit­ting a post eve­ry month.

Blog: Do we only accept ”good” friends?

I got feed­back about my pre­vi­ous blog post that made me pon­der more deep­ly about how we in­te­ract with ot­her pe­op­le. This is part of the feed­back mes­sa­ge:

Blog: Romantic journey in wilderness

Whe­ne­ver I think about a jour­ney in wil­der­ness, I im­me­di­a­te­ly re­mem­ber the 40 ye­ars that the pe­op­le of Is­ra­el spent tra­ve­ling from Egypt to what is now Is­ra­el. It was an ar­duo­us and dan­ge­rous jour­ney ac­ross a dry and hot de­sert. The story of that jour­ney inc­lu­des desc­rip­ti­ons of ar­gu­ments, comp­laints, re­bel­li­on and des­pair. But there were al­so good mo­ments. Skil­l­ful ar­tists have even rep­re­sen­ted that jour­ney as a ro­man­tic ex­pe­di­ti­on.