5 things I am thankful for

1. The beautiful people I have around. The ones who tolerate my messes and dance to stupid songs with me. And pour oregano into my pint and share a pizza before continuing the night. And live in other cities and make me miss them and then come back again and make me thankful for all the luck I've been given.

2. London in September. I haven't kissed anyone near Leicester Square and I haven't been the drunkest I've ever been at a house party near Soho and it pains me to think that I'll have no connection whatsoever to the pavements I'll be walking on. But I'm going to be fine.

3. Copenhagen in under 30 days. Eating cheap food and drinking cheap wine on the balcony. And mornings that are so bright it hurts to be alive.

4. Being alive and breathing. I had a dream where a man committed suicide by jumping from the third floor and almost fell on me. The man died, I didn't.

5. I couldn't think of anything else but secrets and clichés.

Light-headed and aloof

A messy me in august 2011, longer hair, more flesh around the bones, someone I don't recognize that well

I usually hate self-portraits and I end up hating each and every one I've ever taken, except the ones where I don't look like myself. There's something so exceptionally vulnerable about the ones that do look like me. It makes me rather uncomfortable and they end up in the bin.

If everything works according to plan, I might be leaving Helsinki for a short while pretty soon. I finally did send that message where I said jag kommer and I don't regret it. Now if everything works out I'll be spending two or three days living with the boy who said that us living together would be an unbearable rollercoaster ride. Hopefully we'll see about that soon enough.

I don't have to go to work anymore tomorrow morning. I'll go for a run and eat my usual breakfast and lunch combined: a bowl of all-bran and a glass of OJ and then run some errands. And avoid collateral damage, which approached me today in the form of 1 missed call and 1 text message. 

I'm making myself used to a simple version of freedom, I guess.

"Dynamic employee for the Summer" "Freelancer" "Hej! I am a 20-year-old girl from Helsinki" and other things from my sent e-mails folder

London ages ago

Everything's going fast, fast, fast but so painfully slow - job applications, job rejections, rental applications, unanswered e-mails, the last day of day job tomorrow, new job applications flying around, cold cover letters, freelance work, temporary work, a month, a month and a half, obscure time patterns.

Copenhagen is constantly interrupting my thoughts. I have weird dreams at night and keep seeing catalogue models who look like someone who I wish I won't run into in Osterbro.

I want to send a message to Copenhagen that I'm coming soon; sing it like that swedish Veronica, jag kommer and such but my voice wasn't meant to be recorded and I don't know if I want anyone to wait for me or not.

I keep having second thoughts about everything; about quitting my job and about having these napoleon complex-like wishes, but then again, it's so useless to worry about how life goes. If you do good, it will come back to you. I'm beginning to sound like a self-help book - alarming.

And whenever I've been feeling let down and apathetic lately, I've resorted to this song. I wish some of its quiet power and beauty and rawness will transfer through my headphones.

It's real as far as I can see

I came home late, after a tea and two pints of cider. And a lot of talking. And a bit of kissing under windy April skies.

We accidentally had matching coats and he laughed at my stories. He had dark curly hair, as you'd expect someone from French Canada to have. He smelled good like nice boys always do.

He was nice. So nice.

There was absolutely nothing wrong with him, quite the opposite, but I'm still a bit stuck on something 1172 km away. I feel so stupid but I can't help it, damn it. I guess it's always the ones that end like tearing a band-aid that get you stuck.

Have a nice weekend you all, let's hope mine is a collateral damage-free one.

That's alright, that's okay, I'm alive

You know when there's that certain kind of wind or that certain kind of sky that makes you remember things? Tonight it was the deep blue sky and the traffic lights that made me think of Copenhagen and airports and wide streets and things to come.

I received my first subscription issue of the International Herald Tribune and some books for LSE and Houghton Street. It's almost spot-on six months until my home city is London. I feel like smiling like an idiot. Nothing dramatically positive has happened, it all just somehow feels right. Everything's going to be alright.

For a few hours everything has been in its right place. Time has been frozen for a while, right now I refuse to worry about London or fret about the job situation in Copenhagen.

I'm going to see Helsinki-Vantaa again sooner than I thought. I'm leaving early Sunday morning to make a flash visit to London, see where I'll be spending the next three years, try to fall in love with the place, try to see myself on a morning run in Hyde Park or staggering home tipsy with someone wonderful. I feel like it's going to go well.

Tomorrow things might be different but right now I feel sweet and strong and capable and lovely. I have achieved something already. And it feels overwhelming. Now it's time to take it further.

I started to write a real paper diary again, because it finally feels like this life is something worth writing about.

The ugliest sneakers in the world (or so I've heard) & the bucket list for April-August

Fave lbd and apparently the world's ugliest shoes that I love despite everyone else hating them (and no, no undergarments can be seen in these pics, only misfortunate shadows)

Learn danish.

Taste meat just to remember how it tastes like.

Lose two kilos.

Buy a white blazer.

Run 25 kilometers.

Write postcards from Copenhagen.

Read Dostoyevski when you're down.

Kiss by the Seine.

Learn to be cool in the Scandinavian way.

Feel accomplished.

Have a crush on a total stranger.

Ride the S-toget alone from start to end.

Write a short story.

Learn how to use your charms.

Learn how to be carefree.

For the last six months I've been waiting for the day to come when I run

Hjemme i Koebenhavn, Louisiana

Today I woke up next to lovely friends in an apartment filled with blinding morning light, the kind you only get in Spring. In my wallet I had a card with a name and a phone number, in my head a blizzard of hours of fun and confusion; St. Patrick's day, work party with champagne drinks, afterparties and lousy encounters, finally ending with people I genuinely like so much.

I've tried to write my feelings down and just keep on erasing everything. The way I felt this morning, walking in the shoes that gave me insane blisters and squinting my eyes to avoid the sun's full effect is something that I just cannot describe easily or poetically.

Suddenly, the burning I've had for a while turned into this positive rush that hasn't ceased. I no longer feel the need to pack my bags and head to Copenhagen because I want to leave things behind, I want to leave because things feel so easy here right now. It's a relief not to be desperately seeking for something better, but to merely search for new horizons. I wouldn't call this a chance of a lifetime but I cannot help but gush at how extremely right this feels, more right than any relationship or major decision or any thought I've had in such a long time. This is quickly turning into a lousy conversation subject, but I cannot help it.

I feel like I can finally, honestly, breathe.

I hold my breath, there's a smile on my face, and my face wasn't made to wait

Kastellet and morning sun on

Nørrebrogade

I told you 'bout all those fears,
And away they did run.
You sure must be strong,
And you feel like an ocean being warmed by the sun.

I'm stepping on nothing.

I quit my job yesterday morning and I'm leaving Helsinki behind on the 1st of May. I have no job or apartment waiting for me when I land, but I know quite a few friendly faces, how to use the S-tog and the metro, and how to get a certain bartender's number. I know the place makes me lose kilos as accidentally as one loses keys (happiness makes you thin, that's what they say).

I'm hoping my fears will vanish even though I know they won't. They're all tumbled together, the fear of Rue des Archives and Nørrebrogade and the huge unknown and I can't make sense of it all.

Since cynisism isn't making me free, I'm turning to extreme naïveté. I'm scared. So I'm leaving. The only medicine for fear is to face it and just go go go go go. You can't second-guess these things. No-one lives an interesting life by sticking to their day jobs and apartments and lousy, grey weekdays.

A thousand conundrums at once, I love my life and I hate it to bits.