Old books

Just a few days ago my great-grandfather Matija would have celebrated his 134 birthday (22 February). On Tuesday I finally held the books, he had written about 100 years ago, in my hands. A treasure. The paper was falling apart while I was turning the pages and probably that’s why it is only possible to read those books in the library. I wonder why no such books existed in my granddad’s library. Were they too liberal, too funny?

Three books written by my great-grandfather and all signed with his pseudonyms.

Collected funny stories.

Short stories.

Index of short stories.

Matija obviously liked “to be” someone else because on all three covers his pseudonyms are written - Blaž Pohlin, Franc Svetlin - and nowhere his real name is mentioned. Was it too dangerous to write his real name, although everybody knew that he had written those stories? Nobody knows the answer today.

While reading his books I wondered if those stories are somehow connected with his life. He had four sons but I don’t think he spent much time with them as he was a banker during working hours and a librarian and an editor of a newspaper in his free time. As my aunt told me he was not very happy in marriage, because his wife was not very sociable and clever. Or maybe he just thought so… Yet another man who was running away from family duties, but consecutively other people had benefit from that. It sounds so familiar…

65

Time flies, and another year is around. There’s always good food on our table at this time of year because my mum is celebrating her birthday.

I am glad that I had started to make a napkin for her present early because in the end it served as a prototype. I started to make another one about 14 days ago. It was finished yesterday. It is not as perfect as I wanted it to be but at least it doesn’t have any mistakes.



As months go by I am finding out that I, too, started to feel old. I am engaged in all sorts of activities but there’s still something missing. That’s why I am so much more looking forward to see the spring coming into our land, which will, hopefully, wake me up from this winter sleep, so that I will feel alive again.

Knights

The other day when we celebrated Slovenian yearly cultural day (I still think that celebrating the death of a poet is improper) I visited one of the museums in Ljubljana. The exhibition about knights (in Slovenia) is excellent with lots of information given in different forms – from object like knight’s garment, weapon (most of it was found in Ljubljanica river), plates, cups, paintings to written information on life of knights.



It was interesting to see so many children in the museum. “What did you like most?” one mum asked her son. “Knives,” he answered plainly. What I liked most? Actually I liked the whole exhibition but I was most impressed by a photo and a story about two knights who were fighting against the Turks. They lost the battle (like they had supposed) and were killed. The heads were cut off their bodies and skin was removed from their skulls, stuffed and sent to their relatives. After many centuries their skins (stuffed) still exist and the photo of them is shown at this exhibition; covered with a dark piece of cloth and so high, that children can't reach it. Impressive, really.

Carnival time

Yesterday was the last day of this year’s carnival time. I decorated only the door of our house. It looked like as we were the only people in our neighborhood celebrating Shrovetide. Children have grown up and nobody wearing a mask knocked on our door this year. Such a pity.

But! As each year I made a costume for myself and visited my parents and entertained our guests in the evening. As a pretty (kind of old and too fat) fairy I was making wishes to come true. I also made some sweets, called krhki flancati in Slovenian, to properly celebrate this day. Mum made doughnuts with jam, and our celebration of the carnival was perfect!

Today is just another ordinary day, the day when sweets and meat aren’t on our menu. And it should be so until Easter.

Winter food

There are still some vegetables below a blanket of snow in our garden. One of them is black radish. This is typical winter food. I always grate it and mix it with beans, I add some salt, spices, garlic, pumpkin oil and just a little bit of vinegar. An old advice to cure cold is to cut the black radish in half, scoop it so that it gets a small hole in the middle and put some honey in it. Leave overnight over a cup and eat honey that ran through the hole next morning.

In our fridge we still have some fresh celery (root) from our garden, but once it is eaten and if the snow doesn’t melt, we will have to use deep frozen peas or mangold. We have already eaten the last pumpkin; this year they were rotting like never before. I guess I picked them too late. I am glad that we have still lots of food in our garden. Leek, yellow kohlrabi, black radish, root celery, rapunzel, chicory, parsnip, turnip, probably also carrots if they were not eaten by mice.

In no time spring will knock on our door, so … slowly the time to prepare new plan for this year’s vegetable garden is approaching, too.

Guests

Friends visiting my home are a good reminder that I should be grateful for what I have. Alright, some of my friends and colleagues are still at the beginning of their thirthies and I don’t know many people who have even in their forties their own home without lots of help from their parents, so there’s still time for those youngsters to find a place and call it a home.

Although the place where I live is far from what my image of coziness is, at least I have my own roof above my head (and all credits paid off!), my own table to eat at and my own chair to sit on. It is good that friends remind me of this from time to time. They are pleased with as little as a warm room, a comfortable armchair, a cup of tea, a slice of an apple strudel and lots of books around them. Some don’t need fancy lights (we still have bare lightbulbs sticking out of the walls) or fashionable couch (we still have only armchairs) or expensive pictures on the walls from famous artists (I wouldn’t want to have one of those even for free because I really don’t understand or like modern art) to feel good in my home.

It is a sleeping beauty, this home of mine, because I know exactly what I want it to look like one day. Hopefully soon; after all I’ve been living in this house more than eight years! I just hope we won’t have another flood once again. This would be just too much even for me.

So, the last time we had friends around I had a chance to teach one of them how to knit, and I have to say that it was real fun. I reckon that it was for both of us. This also reminded me that we have all still so much more to learn.

Counting

Yes, again, like each and every year since 2005, I counted the waterfowl on two rivers in my country. The instructions said that we should have been there at 7 am but my experience shows that an hour later is just fine. It is too dark to see black dippers standing on rocks too early in the morning although the white patch on their neck usually betrays them to a skilled birdwatcher.

International Waterfowl Count

My salvation for few moments from deep snow.

It must be pleasant here in summer.

There were 13 dippers on my list this year, which is a record. Most likely I missed some of them because I had to watch my step and also snow on the trees prevented me to see the opposite river bank well. For the first time I was able to spot the kingfisher there and I found out that trudging through knee deep snow was not so tiring after all. I needed four hours for my

Knee deep snow - you can imagine that it lasted me long to walk just this far.

A dipper!

Green and cold.

The scariest part of my path. I ran until the end of it. The train came only a minute after.

section which is about 3,5 km long. Going back to the car by plowed country road, which lasted less than an hour, was like a pleasant afternoon walk.

Day two was as always a bit boring. Well, actually it is far from boring if sun shines. This year I caught cold just a day after the count...

Winter

I don’t call it winter wonderland anymore because there’s no sunshine that would expose those magic crystals in rainbow colors. I like to shovel snow - I take it as a recreation for my arms and back – though, this winter it is heavy as a stone. Cats prefer to stay in warm places, only sometimes one of them thinks of catching birds. Ž nailed up two sticks on a feeding house, so that cats can’t go in. They used to wait for birds in there.

Neighbor's cat trying to catch sparrows. :)

I thought of making a lace napkin for my mom but this one is not perfect enough to give it away as a gift.

In a certain way I like winter. In weather like this I can read, make lace, learn Spanish or do something else. This is actually a peaceful time of year. At least this winter it is. Holidays behind, plans for the future ahead; for a moment I am content with what there is.

Nine

I am not sure that those were really happy times but at least they were a welcome break from the constant pain. Nine years ago I weighted ten kilograms less than today (although this doesn’t really show on the outside and I have no photo of myself from that year to show people how I skinny I was then), I was full of energy and determined that my life should be a happy one from that moment on. Though, it was far from that. On Friday, nine years ago Ž stepped into my life and changed it forever. This year we spent some pleasant moments in my favorite bar in the city centre to celebrate our anniversary. Eating cakes. :) Who knows where we will be in nine years?

Presents

I am always looking forward to preparing presents for neighbors and girls (who are just colleagues, not friends). This year I crocheted some mistletoe leaves to decorate the wooden pendants with Christmas motives. I found the instructions in a book that you can see in the picture. Ž said that they look like propellers, not mistletoe leaves. Well…

Usually I make presents for our neighbors but this year I thought of giving each of them a box of dried persimmon and a laurel twig. I have some ideas for the future years written down but I will probably have to start working on them sooner than in the middle of December. What I disliked this year was buying presents for the kids of Ž’s colleagues. I will have to figure out how to make this easier next year. They are all loaded with toys and I think that they don’t need more than they already have.

So, now I am already thinking of a birthday present for my mom. I guess I will be making lace again. :-)