Another Travel Day...The Last One

At the moment I'm in the train on my way back to Helsinki to catch my plane. I'm so sad I want to cry but somehow it's like my medication is preventing me from showing emotions. Maybe a good thing. Yesterday we were in Lahti for the last show of 'our'. Finnish tour. It was in Sibeliustalo and that is a big theatre with seats. A seated concert sounds funny but it was amazing. So relaxing and we had the best seats in front of the bass player. First row. So no one in front of us. Unfortunately we were not allowed to take pictures, so I could only take a few. I hope those turn out to be good ones at least, but I am afraid that won't be the case with the lighting there. They all spotted us quite quickly. The singer waved at us, the bass player was grinning a lot, we had some nice jokes to laugh at and even the drummer was acting completely goofy. Great to see how much fun they have on tour. I hope they will enjoy the tour in Europe just as much. I hope that there will be a chance in Europe to talk more to the guys, the last two days we didn't have that chance and I am sad about that. We still have so much to say (at least I have). I also wished there was more time (and mostly more energy) to discover Finland and spent more time with my friends. Just a few hours was not enough. I need to come back here and do all of that and more. For now, my eyes are to tired to stay open so let's see if I can get some sleep right now.

Tampere And Lahti

Sooo tired. After all these days of traveling and partying and concerts I am completely exhausted. Still, one more show to go tonight, luckily it is seated! Yesterday meeting with one of my friends was great. I could tell she was so nervous at the beginning but after we checked out a bar and had a drink it was all okay again. The show was good, had fun because the bassist was trying to find me during the whole show but did not find me, as he knew I was going to be there. They were all acting goofy again during some songs so we had a blast. I couldn't see that well because there were a few tall guys in front of me, but the music was good and it was fun with my two friends. So now we're in Lahti, just got a phone call from another friend that decided to come along for this show as well, as we will meet at the signing session and at the show afterwards. Hope to see the guys again tonight after the show, we had such a blast with them in Helsinki. I don't care how exhausted I am right now, I can sleep next week! Will post more stories when I get back home!

Sad, Sad Day

Tonight was a big, BIG disappointment. We waited outside the venue after the show and after one and a half hours they finally showed up outside, said goodnight and that was it. Never have they acted like this before and I don't know what to think of it. Marko is always the silent type but at least I always got a hug and a hello from him. Today nothing. Maybe he has a girlfriend or something, I don't know but it was weird and makes me sad. This summer he even sent me a message asking where I was after a show and now there's nothing. I wonder if I did something wrong and if I should've come to Finland at all. I hope tomorrow is going differently, otherwise I guess I will be devastated afterwards and it will probably affect my burnout more than I want to.

This morning everything looked bright and shiny, now the world looks dark and lonely. I am so glad I got to share this with my friend and with the two other girls I've met on the forum. One came all the way from Seattle, she must be feeling even worse.

So now my friend and I are in our hotel room (by the way the band is not staying here, we found out when they walked away in a different direction), having a vodka, totally against my rules of not drinking with anti-depressants. I just hope to forget this sad experience and have a blast the rest of the week,

I wrote a bit while I was on the plane this morning but I am not feeling up to posting it at all. It just seems so pointless to post all my thoughts and hopes that I had this morning. All went away by the indifference of one guy. One guy I should not even like but I can't help but loving him. So stupid to fall in love with a guy from a band but sometimes dreams come true, I've seen it before and I was just hoping for the same. I guess it was never meant to be and I just did not understand before. Everytime I give up hope he comes back to me and is so sweet and now he is acting like this. It is Munich all over again. I was there three years ago and then just before he talked to me a lot and while I was there he just ignored me most of the times. He is such a bad boy, I should forget about him. I will, just can't right now. Let's see if this vacation will bring me the closure I need to go on with my life and forget about all of it.

Diary Of A Finnatic Day 1: Travelday

Woke up around 10 in the morning. I planned on sleeping longer but unfortunately my sleeping rhythm is not like I want it to be. I decided to do some yoga, since it would be the last time for a week. Yoga makes my mornings less crappy and like always this time it worked like magic again.

I even remembered to take my 'Tuesday'-medication for hayfever after the one I use on Monday, so at least it will still work when I get back home. If you don't take it for more than a week you can start all over again with the schedule of one drop on day 1, two drops on day 2, and so on. At least this way I will prevent that.

After yoga I worked on my neon-lace top. I did not finish it in time. I found out it was too wide on the side so I have to adjust it quite a bit and so I decided not to spend any more time on that and just relax a bit. Took a long and hot bath, did some work on my legs (you know, girl stuff) and then I had just half an hour left for packing the last things.

With everything stuffed in my suitcase, I could finally leave at 16.22h. I think I packed way too many jeans and t-shirts, but since it is raining all the time over there and quite cold, I thought better to bring too much than too little. Even my pair of high heels fitted in there. I am happy I could bring those with me since they make me feel sexy. I am just so short that I need a pair of shoes to make me feel more confident.

I walked to the train station and found out there were no trains driving to Heerlen. They had no buses going there either so I had to take a different route, which meant the ticket I bought was invalid. I went to the information desk and they put a stamp on my ticket, saying invalid. I have to send it somewhere when I get back to get my money back. Had to buy a new ticket and then discovered the train was delayed. Luckily I caught the next train and all went well until I arrived in Venlo. No trains driving to Düsseldorf from over there, so I had to take a bus, which took about an hour to get to Viersen. I had to wait about half an hour over there to get to Mönchengladbach and then finally at 20.08h I arrived in Düsseldorf. I decided to eat dinner at McDonalds at the trainstation, before taking the next train to Düsseldorf Airport at 20.45h. Good decision since otherwise I would have been hungry still...

When I finally arrived at my hotel, I was told the hotel was fully booked and they found me another room in a hotel in the same street. The other hotel paid for the extra costs of this room. Now I have breakfast but no wifi, which sucks and is the reason why I write in Open Office instead of on Blogger. I asked the lady at the front desk if she could call a cab for me tomorrow morning at 07.00h. She will give me a wake-up call at 06.15h to make sure I won't oversleep. I wonder if I am up for breakfast this early tomorrow. I guess it is time for me to go to sleep. Probably was already hours ago but I knew my boyfriend would call me anyway so I thougth it'd be better to stay awake until then.

So to recap this day: way too much traveling. Officially the trainride would be 2 hours and 9 minutes and it took me over 5 hours to get here. Ridiculous! I hope tomorrow will go better. I just knew though my boyfriend would comment on this, and so he did. He said if I go to Finland to see Sonata, this is what I get. Nice huh? He also told me not to make out with the band. Really? How did I deserve these comments? I can make sneery remarks about him too next time I feel like it but don't dare to say it out loud. Then I will gather all my courage and just say it. That's what you get! (it's what he always says when he thinks I did something wrong. It's like he feels I am punished for it and it is good that way. This remark is one of my biggest annoyances in our relationship).

For now, time to go to bed. Tomorrow around this time I hope to be partying with some hot Finns, and who knows, making out with one if it pleases me. That's what you get for saying stuff like that, boyfriend! Peace out!

Packing Stress

It's been a busy weekend with doing lots of laundry, ironing clothes from at least three weeks...Today I packed most of my things. I hope I did not forget anything. I packed the presents for my friends (I got a PAIN shirt for one of them and some Dutch cookies and candy). I also finished my lace longsleeve, finally to my liking. At the moment (apart from writing) I am trying to finish the last top. If it is not done by tomorrow I won't bring it, but I can at least try to finish it. I used black jersey and attached neon yellow lace to it. It's a sleeveless top and it is quite blinding to look at it.

I printed all the hotel reservations, the concert tickets (I wonder if it is sold out, because my friend was really terrified that would happen, that's why we bought them already and not at the door of the venue), and my plane 'ticket'. I hope I can check in tomorrow before I leave, because I did not get a notification for that just yet. Apparently if I want to check in at the airport I have to pay €15 extra because I bought the cheapest ticket there was.

Tomorrow I will leave around four in the afternoon, at least that's my plan right now. I want to be as relaxed as possible and I think it would be nice to spend the evening relaxing in bed watching some TV. Before that I will take a long and very hot bath, for some more relaxation, and pack the last things. I am still undecided what clothes to bring, by now I have a giant pile of clothes and I have to fit it all into the little suitcase. I also want to bring my high heels and I have the presents that take up a lot of space as well. I am afraid it won't fit, but at least I will have some room on the way back home. I will have to wear my wintercoat when I am traveling because there is no way that will fit into the suitcase. At least I won't get cold in the air.

I think for now I will relax for one more hour, watch some TV and maybe do some knitting or sewing, and then go to bed in time. Tomorrow will be stressful enough, so I need my sleep.

I hope I can find the time and wifi to post something about my trip when I am in Finland, but if not, I will probably be writing a travel report next week! For now have a good night and again kauniita unia!

Great Festival Announcements!

My friend came over this morning so we could do Pilates together. My muscles were still sore from yesterday's yoga, so it didn't go that well, but at least my abdominal muscles got some exercise. Afterwards we finally ordered tickets for Wacken Open Air. She is asking for it for weeks now and I was still wondering if I should go or not. Just when I got the confirmation about the order in my mailbox, in saw a message on Facebook saying Rammstein is confirmed for Wacken!!! So I think it was the right decision.

This evening during sewing class I got a message from her, saying Sonata Arctica is also confirmed...I couldn't help myself and a scream escaped my lips. Everyone looked at me like I was an idiot. They thought I'd won the lottery. Oh well, for me this is the lottery. So far, this is the best line-up ever for a festival. Sonata, Amorphis, Nightwish, Sabaton and Rammstein. I only wish for a few more, but I can live without them: Summoning (wishful thinking), Iron Maiden, Crashdïet, Hardcore Superstar, Dissection (wishful thinking), King Diamond...So many more I would love to see (again). But even without those it will be an awesome festival! This really made my day.

So now I have to go back to my sewing maching because I made a mistake with my jeans and during class I mostly was removing seams. I am a little behind schedule now but I will try to keep up and finish everything in time without stressing about it. Good luck to myself!

This Week

A really short message this time since I need to be sleeping already. I just wanted to give a sign of life.

I've been very busy this week. I tried studying a bit and it worked out quite okay. Not too difficult what I did, because I tried more difficult things and it didn't go well, so I decided to do the simple things first. Besides that, I did a lot of sewing. I am trying to get another jeans finished for my trip, and I think I will get them ready in time. Worked way too long on them today and got quite a bit done. Tomorrow there will be class again so I guess after this weekend it will be done and I will even be able to wash it before I travel to Düsseldorf for my first night.

Yesterday I had an appointment with my mentor and a physiotherapist. I thought it was only going to be the three of us, talking about my study, but apparently that was not the case. I was so nervous for hours, and then found out it was just a meeting with different doctors, one speech therapist and one Mensendieck therapist. They get together every once in a while to talk about their work with musicians and dancers. Yesterday we went to a place called Klimmen. The physiotherapist who is going to help me with my research (he will do all the measurements) has his practice there. He just opened it last year and treats many professional athletes and dancers over there. He was a dancer and dance teacher before as well, so he knows a lot about the profession. He also knows exactly how dancers react to things and I think he is perfect for helping me with my research, because he knows all the important things about dancers. I am hoping, after I've finished my masters, that I can get a job over there. Working with dancers has been the reason for me to start studying physiotherapy and after that movement sciences. I always felt I wanted to be more than 'just' a dance teacher and I really hope I can find a job in this area after I've finished my movement sciences master.

On Tuesday I had therapy as usual. We talked about my upcoming trip and I was advised to not do to much anymore this week, so I can save up some energy for the trip. Of course, I've been a bad girl and worked too hard on my jeans, but I am hoping I might finish them tomorrow, so I can rest a lot this weekend and just pack my things and do nothing else. We will see how it goes. She also told me to just enjoy all of it and even though I should rest enough, she said she can understand that I want to see a lot of the cities and might do too much. I told her probably I need another week or so to get back on track afterwards, but that is okay. So I will not think too much about things I should do and should not do and just enjoy all of it. I am really counting the days now and get more butterflies in my stomach with each day. I hope I am not expecting too much...

My therapist told me to try and start packing already, and make a list so I can cross things off it when I packed them. That way, I might stay calm and relaxed. Yesterday I wrote a list, but I have the feeling I am missing things on it. Can't think of anything though. I did not pack anything yet, but tried to find my passport and luckily found it. Just in case. I have an ID card with me anyway. Tomorrow I need to do some serious ironing, I think I have saved laundry waiting to be ironed for about three weeks now. Of course I won't do all of it at once, but I need to start tomorrow so I can be finished on Monday. And I should decide on which clothes I want to bring. I checked temperatures in Helsinki every day this week and it seems it will be around 10 degrees Celsius during the day. Need to bring a warm coat and sweaters, that's for sure!

Now it's really, really time for bed. Good night to all of you and sweet dreams, or: Kauniita unia! 

Train Ride

Only a short message this time. I am sitting in the train at the moment. I will meet my friend in Tilburg and we'll go to the Efteling, an amusement park.

Yesterday my sister came over. Although we barely see each other and normally I cannot be with her for too long, yesterday we had a nice time. We went for a bagel (of course, it seems that's all I do lately) and then walked to my place. She brought some tshirts that could use a make-over and I finished one of them. For the rest we talked a lot. She has a boyfriend that's I think not the right guy for her, and se loves him so much she does not see it. Of course I am not the one to talk, I am not doing too well on the boyfriend-front either, but at least I realize I have to do something about it. Now I only need the courage to do it. I lack courage though, so it will take me some time, but I am sure this cannot go on like this because I am not happy.

On Wednesday we had election day in the Netherlands. I had a hard time deciding between two political parties but made up my mind in the afternoon and voted for my choice. Quite different from what I normally vote, but the party I normally vote for had some weird plans according to me.

In the evening I did an extra sewing class because I had some left-over classes from last year. It was fun and I did quite a lot. Mostly cutting fabric, but since I don't have that big of a table at home, it was the best thing to do. At the moment I am working I three things at the same time. I am making a top with black jersey and neon yellow lace over it. I am also making a black lace longsleeve that I can wear infer a corset or summer top. The third thing I am working on is a summer skirt. I will post pictures of all of it when they are done. I will also post pictures of the two heart shirts I made as soon as I am back home. Now it is almost time to get out of the train and take the one to Tilburg. I hope my friend and I will have a great day but I can't imagine otherwise, she is the perfect company!

Bad Weekend Rant

The last two days have been mostly without internet. Monday it was completely gone and yesterday it went down a couple of times. Since I've been tired from this weekend I didn't really need it anyway, although I wanted to write again on Monday. So let's now write what I wanted to get off my chest  already on Monday.

On Sunday I had a difficult conversation with my boyfriend. He thinks I am not investing enough time in him. According to him I need to cancel my sewing classes on Friday when he comes over or when I go to him for the weekend. He thinks I am not coming over enough anymore as well. I told him that if he wants to see me longer he could have come over earlier the weekend he was here. He thought that was not necessary since I did not cancel my class, so he was not feeling like he needed to come over earlier. And this weekend he would have wanted me to come over on Friday evening, skip my class and because I did not do that, he thought he could spend the whole afternoon somewhere else and I could come over in the evening instead of in the early afternoon. I think if he really wanted to see me he would not go anywhere in the afternoon or sleep that long so he would have been here earlier and then I would not have made an appointment with another friend on Sunday evening. He always wanted me to stay late in the evenings on Sunday when I could still drive, so that I would be home somewhere between 23.00h and 01.00h. I really did not understand why he would make plans with his friend when he could have stayed here longer but he told me that otherwise he would still have left early since he has a JOB. He really feels the need to explain that everytime to me. I know he has a job, I had one before as well, next to my studies, and even then I left late. Plus I had to start early on Mondays but he can start around 11 in the morning so he could have stayed late. I sometimes feel he thinks he is so superior to me because I am not working and studying is not going well either and he is working.

I feel this superiority as well with other things. The way he tells me I am doing things wrong or that I am annoying him and I have to stop what I am doing, it feels like he is talking to a child that doesn't know anything. I told him this a few times already but he tells me it is ridiculous and not true at all. When I say that I get the FEELING it is like that, not that it in fact IS like this, he still thinks it is ridiculous and I should just get over it and change what I am doing. Then just after this he wants to hug me, and of course, feeling very annoyed by the way he treats me, I don't want to. Then he gets mad at me because I don't want to hug. I explained to him that when he treats me like this I cannot suddenly be cuddly, that I really need to be left alone for a while. It seems he does not want to understand this.

Oh and of course this weekend he had to bring up me being very egocentric for booking a trip to Finland when his mom has her birthday, or even going to Sonata shows when his friends have birthdays...Really, this happened only once and is not even completely true. The thing is that my friend came over all the way from Austria, and she will probably never be allowed by her husband to do such an expensive trip again. She came over to my place on this birthday of my boyfriend's friend. We already planned everything for my friend to come over, and the day after that we would go to the Sonata show together in Belgium. Even if this show wouldn't have existed I would still have skipped the birthday because I think a friend coming over from Austria for one time in her life is more important. I can go to this guy's birthday for the rest of my life if he wants me to. But the thing was he turned 30 and that is an important age, on top of that he almost never celebrates his birthday. That is 's what my boyfriend brought up as arguments why I had to be there. It's another thing though why I didn't really consider that I might have to go there for a party. One and a half year ago I did skip a Sonata show for the birthday of one of my boyfriend's friends. He tends to forget that fact.

I keep on ranting about all of this, I just cannot understand why it is me who always seems to be the bad guy. Yes, I planned my trip somewhat unfortunate, but when he brought up that I could have gone to many other shows in Finland, he was using that in his own advantage again. Because when he wanted to do part of a tour in Finland with a band, he told me that only Helsinki was a possibility because the other airports are hard to reach, if there's any at all in the neigborhood of the concerts. Unfair to use this against me when he at first said this was the only possibility to go to if going to follow a band touring in Finland.

So I think this will be the end of my rant for today about this topic. Could be I have more to say but probably not about this. I felt bad this weekend but now I think of it again, I just get very pissed off by all of it. I WILL NOT LET HIM RUIN MY VACATION!!!

Travelday

I've been thinking of customizing my new suitcase a bit. Of course it is very pink already, so I will definitely find it at the airport, but I thought it would be nice to add a little extra. I have part of the Sonata Arctica logo as a tattoo in my neck and I like this version of the two A's. You can find the logo in the booklet of the CD Unia, it is the one on the page with Tommy's dream. I have it completely black as a tattoo and I enlarged the original picture today on my pc.  I think I will add a bit more lines to it, so you can see depth in it, but I am not sure yet. Will have to find a nice spot on my suitcase anyway.

Today it was lovely weather so I spent most of the morning and early afternoon outside. Then I had to pack my things and take a quick shower and it was time to go. When I arrived at the train station, I saw an announcement saying no trains were riding between my city and my first transfer. They had buses ready and apparently they changed a lot in the schedule so I could catch all my other trains! It was never this well arranged in all the years I had to travel by train. Really great organization. 

When I arrived at my destiny I already saw my boyfriend and a girlfriend of his waiting for me. Her boyfriend just arrived as well and we walked to the trams to catch the next one. All in all a quite relaxed trip for my standards. Only a bit of stress with my last transfer as it said it was going to the same city as the train I just got out of. I asked one of the passenger and he assured me this was the one I should be in.

We went to my boyfriend's parent's home for dinner. I got to meet the girlfriend of my boyfriend's brother and she seems very nice. We got along well immediately. After dinner we went across the street to the birthday party and stayed there until just now. I went home with a friend of my boyfriend, who takes care of his ill dad and brings him to bed every evening. He just went home and will go back to the party as soon as his dad is taken care of. He is such a sweet guy, doing this for almost a decade and not ever is he complaining. I wish him the best girlfriend of the world, he really deserves it.

The party was quite nice, not that loud (this friend has two children so it's not as wild as most of these parties around here). I felt I was starting to stare again, which means most of the times I am tired and cannot concentrate on the conversations anymore. Also, they had a cat, which I am allergic to, and on top of that they had peanuts and peanuts crisps on the table and even the smell makes my airways and nose block/close. I am highly allergic to peanuts but this was quite a strong reaction. I can still feel that breathing is harder right now so I am happy I got to get out in time.

Tomorrow will be very hot outside and I guess also inside. I will be awake early like normal and my boyfriend will probably get home late and drunk so I guess he will be up late again. I brought a book. Even if I can read only a few pages at a time it can keep me busy for a while. I also brought my knitwork (good for many hours) and my laptop, so I guess I won't be bored, but it would have been nicer to be at home where I could sit outside and enjoy the sun, probably for the last weekend of the summer. But who knows what next week will bring. I hope it will be good as well since one of my best friends and I planned to go to the Efteling (amusement park) on Saturday. We'll see. Nothing to do about it anyway.

For now, time to do my bodyscan exercise and then go to sleep. Good night!

Weekend!

The sky looks so beautitul tonight! You can see many stars and I wish I had someone to share it with this evening. But I can enjoy it by myself as well of course, and so I did.

Had a nice class this evening and almost finished my heart-shirt, only need to add buttons and button holes. I wonder what to make next.

We had a lovely day over here with lots of sunshine but not too hot. This weekend will be very hot again, probably the last warm weekend of this year. Even though it is warm outside, you can already feel that autumn is getting closer. I've noticed the change two weeks ago and I like it. Autumn is a beautiful season with all the nice colors in nature.

Not much else is happening over here at the moment but it's like the quiet before the storm I guess. In two weeks I will be running around the house completely stressed because there are so many things to do and too little time. At the moment I cannot think of anything I could do already, so I'll just try to take my rest before I need all of my energy.

Tomorrow I can sleep long and in the late afternoon I'll take the train to meet my boyfriend. He changed his mind and now will pick me up from the trainstation so I won't get lost. Very nice! We will meet up with his parents for dinner and his brother's new girlfriend will be there as well. I am curious what kind of girl he likes. I hope she is nice, because he is such a good guy and deserves the best girlfriend. After that we'll cross the street to go to the birthday party and I am looking forward to it. My boyfriend's ex-girlfriend is there as well and we get along very well. I am happy to see her again, we had some nice email contact lately and we did some shopping a while back and I feel we really bonded. I hope we can make some plans for a nice weekend together. She is into making clothes as well and she even dyed some shirts. I would like to learn the technique to dye my own fabrics, because I had a few ideas for that but didn't know how to do it. Plus it is really nice to have a girl's weekend!

That's all for now. I can't promise I'll write this weekend, but I am sure I will be back on Monday with new stories!

Planning The Weekend And Some Very Good News!

Just a very short post today. One of my best friends sent me a message yesterday evening about having lunch together today. I always jump to the chance of having a bagel and fresh fruit juice, so we met at 11.30 this morning. She brought her little baby girl and so I had only eyes for her. She is such a beauty and so sweet. She even smiled a bit at me and I really felt so happy holding her.

Since there's whooping cough going around the family of my sewing teacher, I was afraid my friend would not go to class for the next few weeks, but her daughter just got her shots for that and so we will meet again tomorrow for class. I am so glad we are seeing more of each other again!

After our lunch we went around the fabrics market, but they were already packing everything, so not that much to see anymore. At least I got to exchange the jeans buttons I bought a few weeks ago. I hope these will stay put on my pants, otherwise I will lose my pants again. I also found some black lace to attach to a summer skirt I am making (black with neon yellow). I know I am a bit late with making this one, but I just wasn't that fast these last few months. I planned to make it already in January...

After meeting in the city I was tired again. I think meeting up with different friends every day is just too exhausting at the moment, but at the same time I am enjoying it immensely and it makes me feel less alone.

My boyfriend just called me because he wanted to make plans for this weekend. I am going to his place by train. It takes me quite some time but since it is the last time I will see him before Oktober I guess I should go. He already made his plans: he wants to go to some CD sale in another city and in the evening go to his parents and from there to a birthday party of his friend. I told him I won't go with him to the CD sale because I will be tired already before the party starts then.

I have to come over around six in the evening on Saturday and he expects me to just take a bus or whatever to get to his place. He cannot pick me up from the trainstation because he is in another city and so has to go by train?! I think the least that I could expect would be that he would pick me up from the trainstation, since it is a lot already with all the transfers I have to make until I get to the main station in his city. From there on I don't have a trainticket anymore since they don't sell them over here, so I have to get out to buy a ticket, wait for the next train and then drive to the next trainstation, get out and walk about ten minutes to his home. Would be nice if he would be at one of those places to pick me up. It wouldn't have to be by car, just meeting me would be fine. I wonder why he asks me to do things for him and not does something like this back. I am going there because I know he wants me to be there for his friend's birthday and to see his parents again. That is why I am going. It it were up to me, I would rather stay at home, because I know how late those parties end and I will be tired hours before that already. I will have to go to his place alone in the evening and he will be there very early in the morning and stay in bed until it will be too late to do anything nice on Sunday. And then we just have time to make breakfast and shower and it is time for me to leave again. But I am glad it is the last time for this month, because these weekends cost so much energy that it takes me days to recover. And I need to save up some energy for Finland. I know that will be exhausting enough already. Although seeing Sonata shows every night will give me energy as well!

Okay this was supposed to be just one paragraph of blogging. I guess my boyfriend's phone call made me disappointed and I am also feeling more lonely because of it. Why does he not understand how difficult some simple things are for me? I know he cannot see anything wrong about me from the outside, but inside I am not doing well and I thought he got it. Apparently not. It makes me sad.

One very good thing though: today my Finnish friend confirmed she will be with me and my friend for sure for the Sonata show in Tampere!!! And we will meet up early in the day so we can have a nice long chat, maybe one drink and she'll show us around town. Up til now it was not sure her husband was okay with it, but now he is so this will be an even better trip! She and I are so alike, I am so curious how it will be in real life (and I guess I wrote this before already...sorry. I am just so excited about it all!).

Bodyscanzzzzzzz.....

I've been so lazy the last two days, not writing my blog but watching TV instead...Not that much happened over here anyway. However, I did finish my knitted sweater yesterday, and although it might be a bit big, the yarn is so nice and soft that I don't care. I will try a size smaller for the dress though. Just because that one needs to be tight.

My sewing is a bit on hold, not going as well as I was hoping and I might have to change the whole heart shaped back again, just like with the other shirt. Oh well, sometimes you need to try things out.

Yesterday I had therapy in the hospital as usual on Tuesday's, and we went quickly through my log of daily activities (I write everything down I do). Then my therapist wanted to do the bodyscan exercise as it is usually done. This means about forty-five minutes of focusing on your body and what you feel in every little part. We started with focusing on breathing for a short while and then we went to the first bodypart, the left foot. You work all the way up to the upper leg and buttocks and then switch to the right leg. Once we were at the right foot my concentration was already gone. I had so much trouble to stay with what my therapist said. I missed a few times which bodypart I was supposed to focus on and I even almost fell asleep a couple of times. It was so hard and when she was finally finished I was so glad. I felt a bit ashamed that I could not concentrate that long but on the other hand, that is one of the reasons why I am in therapy at the moment, because I cannot concentrate on anything.

I felt really weird after this exercise, I cannot even explain it anymore. I was completely tired afterwards and that's why I wasn't really into writing anything yesterday. I liked to do it one time, because some bodyparts are almost completely skipped in the eight-minute version I am doing at the moment. This one shows how it is actually supposed to be done. My therapist also told me she wanted to show me, because initially it was my psychiatrist's plan to do group therapy for mindfulness, and then I was supposed to be doing this from the beginning on. That would have been a really bad choice! I am so happy my therapist decided to cancel my subscription to that group and now gives me individual therapy sessions in which she decides at what point I am ready to take more difficult steps (always with discussing it with me first). I am very blessed to get such a good therapist who understands what I need at what time.

For this week I have the assignment to still write everything down I do, but I can choose one day and not write anything down. On that day I have to try to do everything without setting my alarm (like last week three afternoons) and see how it goes. I am excited that I am this far already because it'sbeen bugging me that I have to write every little thing down. Sometimes I forget and then I have to think back so hard and try to remember when exactly I started doing something. I hope when I get to go to Finland I can not write down anything for that week, it would make it so much easier. Plus people would not look at me like I am an idiot for typing on my phone all the time. Especially when we get to meet the band, I don't want them to think what a loser I've become.

I still have to do all my exercises: the 'staring' exercise (look at things and try not to judge anything, just concentrate on shapes and colours), the breathing exercise, the eight minute bodyscan and the three minute exercise (in which I focus my thoughts, focus on what I feel in my mind and body and then switch to breathing, first normal and then try to breath through my whole body, very relaxing). I think for now it's enough exercises. Next to this I have to keep trying to do physical exercises: my pilates and/or yoga and some walking or cycling.

This morning one of my good friends came over and we did a Pilates session together. Afterwards we did the breathing exercise and then made some tea with honey and started singing. We did a really long session; exactly three hours and our voices were far gone by that time but we had so much fun it was hard to stop. I am happy to say my voice was quite okay today and with one song, Leaden Legacy from After Forever and could even reach the high notes quite well. After that song I really felt my throat muscles cramping but I like to have muscle soreness in my throat, because then I get the feeling I really exercised those muscles. And I think I used them with the right techniques, so no harm should be done to my voice. I fact, by doing this I could sing higher and more clean. I should really start doing some singing lessons again but at the moment I think I am too insecure to do that.

My friend stayed over for quite a while and then I said to her I really needed her to leave because I needed my rest. I know myself a bit better by now and even if I don't feel it at that time, I know I will later that day or the next day. And yes, just a few minutes ago the tiredness hit me completely and now it's even hard to stay awake when I am writing this. I think I need to go to bed early again today! I hope tomorrow will be a good day again because I really felt a bit of a panic coming up today when I was walking outside (yes, I did that today!). I told my mentor that I would probably be done in two weeks with my research protocol, so this week and next week and then I would want to hand it over to her...It sounded like a lot before but I know this weekend there won't be any time for it and on Monday I will be exhausted from traveling so much this weekend. So not that many days left. I need to get something done tomorrow and Friday. I hope I can. But first, it is time to rest.

The B-Word

I started watching the first season of the L-word again. The L-Word is a TV series about a group of lesbian friends and their lives and loves. All memories come back from that time in my life and I am totally in love with this series again. I could never get enough of Shane (Katherine Moennig), she is so hot! Most people look at me as if I were an idiot, because she is so androgynous but I like it. To me she is a beauty and will always stay that way.

My best friend back then (she still is one of my best friends now) and I went to a few LGBT-parties and shared so many fun moments there. It's a different world in which we could be ourselves and meet people like us. I am sad this time was suddenly over, and I still don't know why. I sometimes wish to go back to that time. At a certain point we just stopped going to those parties and I wonder if she never misses it.

I remember I was studying physiotherapy at that time and I met this beautiful girl in the train on my way back home. It was winter and that day someone stole my jacket so I had to go home in my sweater. I felt stupid sitting in the train in mid-winter with only a sweater, but she sat across from me and smiled at me with a lovely smile.

I did not see her for quite a while, and I did not even know she was studying in the same building as me. I met her again in the school cafetaria and she looked at me from across the room with those intense, dark eyes. Ever since then I tried to go in there as many times as I could, to see if I could meet her again. I saw her a few times and we had eye contact but we never got to talk to each other and until now I still don't know her name. I don't even know what she was studying there. My mystery woman...forever lost.

I never really came out officially as being bisexual and until now, my parents don't know. I was always a shy girl and it took me a long time to realize I was bisexual. In elementary school I was always a bit of a loner; being bullied I got even more insecure about myself and I found that it was easier to talk to boys than girls. Maybe the girls always felt I was a bit different and knew more than me who I was.

In high school I got bullied even more, I was sometimes so scared I didn't want to go to school and tried to fake being sick. Since I had a giant lack of sleep it was not always necessary to fake it. I was sick a lot. I did pre-professional ballet school next to my normal high school and this was quite a distance to travel every day. I had to get up around 05.30h every morning and got home late, then had to eat and do my homework until I needed to go to bed. Sometimes I had so much homework I had to stay up late until it was done, but the alarm always went off at the same time and there were almost no exceptions, especially in the first three years. It was very heavy. Added to that there were almost no breaks in school, because in the breaks combined with a normal school-hour we had our ballet classes, modern dance classes, jazz dance classes and folklore dance classes. In later years there were additional music lessons and dance history.

All of these classes were great and interesting but it took a lot of energy from me and I can't remember a holiday I didn't get sick. I guess it was a bit too much. Still I enjoyed it all, except of course all the mean girls in school. They were threatening me and saying mean things and I only had one good friend there. He later turned out to be gay, but I could have guessed since he was also in my ballet class and he loved shopping for clothes as much as I did. Bottom line is we found each other. Other people made fun of us. They knew we were different and of course it was even more obvious than in elementary school because we were those 'ballet sluts', as they called us.

Somehow some of the ballet girls (we only had one boy in class, my friend) got to be the cool kids in school. I never found out how they did it, but they were. I wondered what they had that I didn't have and what I could do about it. I never found out. I am secretly hoping that all these bullies are now having a sad and lonely life and are very unhappy. I know how childish that sounds and of course they also made me who I am now, but they made it hell for me to get here. I should get over it. Maybe therapy will help me with this as well.

After highschool I went to ballet academy and as far as I can remember I had my first girl crush over there. I just did not know until after I completed the academy. I heard she got married and has a child now. She was a beauty too and so grown-up! Remember I was only seventeen when I went there and she was quite a bit older, about six years I think. We became quite good friends but she always had another and better friend than me. I just wanted to be closer to her and although we went out a few times after school as friends, I think she never saw me as anything else than the little one from her class. I was the youngest in my year, so they always called me 'the benjamin'. We had one reunion from school (and she wasn't there) and I could tell they still thought of me like that. Most of them have children now and are married. I would love to see all of them again, our little group of eight girls. We shared some good and bad times together! I just wish I had something nice to share about my life, something I accomplished over the years...

I wonder if I would be better off with a girlfriend than a boyfriend. I guess not, I guess there would be the same kind of issues or otherwise other things that would make me unhappy. Sometimes I wonder if I am able to be in a relationship and be happy. Maybe I should just be single for the rest of my life. I just don't know what I should do. But better to not know in advance of course. I should just take things as they are. Keep remembering the Mindfulness lessons. Not trying to change everything but live in the moment and enjoy it as it is. It is hard to not critize everything. I still have a lot to learn, that's for sure.

Food, Food, Food and Food. Oh, and Food!

This weekend went by very fast. My boyfriend was coming over so on Saturday morning I had to clean. A lot actually. I have fabrics, threads, little pieces of paper and yarn lying around everywhere in my living room. I just don't see the point in vacuum cleaning every day since I am sewing every day and would make it messy again. It might sound lazy but I think it is just a waste of time, time that I could spend doing nicer things.

He would come over between three and four, which means around four most of the times. My door bell is broken so I was walking to my bedroom (which is above the front door downstairs) every two minutes to look out of the window and see if he had already arrived. It was about 16.30 when he finally arrived. Apparently he invited a friend over for this evening and he had to clean his own house.

We went shopping for groceries and it is always fun to see how foreign people react in another coutry's store. I am behaving exactly the same when I go across the border for groceries. Everything looks so tasty and you want to buy everything. Fortunately, I was not hungry when we went so I could make him behave a bit and not buy everything that looked nice. We bought some scampi and pasta to make a scampi salad with garlic sauce. Since there would be two evenings we were supposed to have dinner together, we decided to go out for one evening and make dinner ourselves the other night. Yesterday we went for Chinese/Cantonese food and it was quite tasty, although the hot sauce was really not hot at all. I couldn't discover any peppers or chili in it. It was tasty though.

The thing with getting Chinese food is that you always get giant portions. I tried to eat a lot yesterday but there was still so much left that I could eat from it two more times. The nice things I got for us as little snacks for later in the evening are still left untouched.

This morning I got up early while my boyfriend was still sleeping (he went to bed late last night, playing Guild Wars 2 with his friends) and did some yoga. Then I ironed a part of the giant pile of washed clothes (still a big pile left unfortunately) and started working on another shirt.

Around 13.00h he finally woke up and I made us breakfast. Yeah, our days are mostly spent thinking about food, preparing it and eating it. And then relaxing after we ate too much of it. I made wentelteefjes (french toast), since he never had that before and I wanted to make something different than I normally make. I added a chili-garlic omelet with bacon and baked tomatoes with garlic. If you did not know yet, I love garlic. I never made french toast before and it was delicious, if I may say so myself. I used the internet for a basic recipe and changed it a little. I will definitely make it again!

After this late breakfast (which was lunch for me) we decided to continue watching Fairy Tales, a British series consisting of four episodes with each a different cast and a different fairy tale. We started last night with the first two episodes and today we saw the other two. Now we can cross this one off the list of TV shows to watch and go on to the next. We found one already: Grimm. It started last year and to me it is comparable to Supernatural with all the different beings that exist. I hope it will continue being this good.

I really would like to do some other things with my boyfriend: go out, take a nice walk, go swimming or cycling around in the neighborhood, sit on a terrace and have a drink and a talk together in the center of the city. Go to the zoo or a nice themepark like the Efteling. But with our different circadian rhythms it is hard to do something. It would be nice if we were more awake together. Normally I would give in and change to his rhythm of staying up (very) late and getting up late, but I really need to stay in the same rhythm so I won't get any more tired than I already am. This regularity is important at the moment.

I found it odd that he planned an evening with a friend of his, because this meant he had to leave quite early and normally I would have complained about this because I would like to see him more/longer. But somehow I was okay with it this weekend and this makes me wonder do I really still care about this relationship? I mean we had fun together, but it was fun as friends and it didn't seem to involve more than that. The going to sleep alone and getting up alone and spending the morning alone made me feel sad about how this is going in the wrong direction. I do still care about him. I wonder if I care enough and if I am sad about what we had and not have at the moment, or that I want it back. I really don't know anymore. I was secretly hoping for him to bring up what he said to me last week about me not caring about him, or at least not caring enough to skip my vacation. Then we could have talked. Now everything went so normal and smoothly and I didn't dare to bring it up and cause a scene. I think I should just let everything go its course and see what will happen. Some things need to go how they go and it is not possible to change them anyway. Maybe this is one of these things. Mindfulness tells me to accept things the way they are and not try to change them. Maybe my not knowing what to do is something I have to accept and in time it might change to knowing what I want to do, but until then I can just leave the doubts be and give them a little room in my brain to be. With this thought I leave you and will go to bed. It is time to sleep.