So yet another day has almost past…. I spent the evening by watching two movies at home, In Hell (Jack the Ripper story) and a Beck movie, The Last Witness. They were both rather good although the latter one had a rather heavy part about love and trusting people, that stabbed me rather hard in the chest and got me thinking again.
I feel like I have much more energy now than earlier today. Perhaps my blogging is actually helpful? By the way, I took of my wedding ring yesterday. It feels very strange not to wear it all the time, which I have done since april 2 1996. I met Johanna in december 1990 in the common room in her student corridor. She was watching TV and I said hello (which I did to all nice looking women) on my way to another friend in the same corridor. On the way out she was still sitting there and I wished her a merry christmas. Apparently, that made a strong impression on her 🙂 One of the strongest memories I have from the time before we actually got together was when I was going to visit here. It was sometime before lunch and I went up to the seventh floor where she was living at that time. I rang on the door bell, but no one answered. I waited and gave up after a while and just as I was walking towards the stairs she opened the door to the corridor. Her short hair was in a mess and she was wearing her favorite big baggy training suit, which she always wore at home before she had to throw it away because it was falling to pieces. When I saw here then I became so happy. So very very happy. Where did all that happiness go?
Later the same spring I got ill with a fever and she sat by my side and took care of me.
In may we went to yet another late night fancy dinner and dancing and got home around 05:00. This was the first time we actually realized how light it gets very very early during the summer up here and we had to put up a blanket to cover the window to be able to sleep.
Over the years we coined an expression that keep coming up every time we travel somewhere: “We are on vacation! What do we do? We walk!” 🙂
A couple of years ago we invented a game called “Bubbla” (swedish for bubble meaning the VW beetle). Whenever someone of us saw a Bubbla we shouted it and counted how many Bubblas we saw during that day or week or whatever. I miss playing the Bubbla game with you!
We have shared so much together. And now it is all in the past!

I woke up at 0830, woken by the heating pipe guys working outside (again). I felt rather good when I woke up. Stayed in bed until 10.00 and finished my book. Got up and ate breakfast (Galia Melon) and talked with my best friend Jalle on the phone. He is leaving town for Ö-vik today to work some and to be with his girl friend, Ida. I feel so lonely, The house is very empty. I just spoke with Johanna and Tovah on the phone for 30 minutes. Johanna confirmed that she doesn’t want to move back into the house in August. Tovah talked about people being angry and I guess Johanna has said that she is angry with me, it is quite understandable but it still makes me very sad. Where is my life heading…… alone in the darkness. I get so tired when I am sad. I also eat to much and I just stuffed myself again. Does it make anything better? No, I don’t think so. Perhaps a cup of the will cheer me up.
I got a new toy today, a Canon IXUS 400 digital camera but I am to tired to play with it. Shortly I have to head into town for an appointment. At least that gives me something to do. I have been meeting up with Jalle almost every day since Johanna moved out and now he too is gone (well, not gone in the same sense as Johanna but still not in town).
When I asked Johanna about if she was really sure about moving to a separate apartment she said she was sure and that it was the best thing to do. I almost started crying when she said it though. I don’t know if I want her to move back, but it still feels like loosing something essential in your life. We do have lived together for 12 years of which most of the time we did get along very well. Tired……..
Perhaps I should just shuffle all my feelings down into the well and put back the big lid on it and just work instead. The weather is to nice to be inside though. NO, I shall not ignore my feelings. I have done that for so many years and it is time I stop doing it, even if it is painful. Ahhh, my chest suddenly hurts. It stopped but now I feel even more tired. My heart is pounding.
Alone in the darkness….
Ps. Writing this makes me feel better though.

Physical appearance can be important to some and I have to admit that it is important to me…. and thus I have changed my physical appearance today. How you might wonder? Well, take a close look the next time you see me and/or ask me directly 🙂

I tried to get into bed early tonight, but I got stuck with a new book. All night I have had this anxiety feeling in my chest and whenever I get that I start eating. I got up 30 minutes ago and ate 4 sandwich, a piece of cheese and a can of chick peas. I just cannot stop eating when I feel down 🙁 The house feels really empty, both for good and bad. One should always try to see the positive side of everything, and the positive side right now is that I can do what I want and do it whenever I want to. But then again, it is nice to share experiences with somebody. I am getting really active around the house. I have done more here during the last week than during the last year before that. You get spoiled when you have a wife that takes care of everything. Oh well, back to bed and trying to sleep. Carpe diem.

I have not been blogging for a while, and the reason is that a lot of things has happened in my life during the last month. First of all I am now living alone as I and Johanna have separated. She is currently living with Tovah in Värnamo in her brothers apartment. We have been separated 1.5 weeks now and I am beginning to get the hang of living on my own. We have decided to live in separate homes until at least mid august but Johanna is already planning ahead for a more final solution, divorce. She is looking for a small apartment here in Luleå where she can live until the end of the year and then move down to Småland somewhere. The reason she wants to stay in Luleå at all is so we make it easier for our daughter to stay with me alone. Johanna has been home with her for several years now and that of course makes it harder for her to be alone for longer periods with me. I might not have been the most engaged dad, unfortunately.
So what what brought this all about then? Well, me and Johanna haven’t been too happy together during the last year or so and Johanna put it quite well, “It has been a long time since we had fun together.” We didn’t talk to much with each other and just shared a house without actually living together. This made me at least sad and when I meet a new friend, with whom I got along very well things perhaps got a bit out of hand. I started meeting my new friend and with that came all the lies at home. This all made me feel very bad and pulled me down into the abyss where I just wanted it all to go away. Anyhow, Johanna found out and left me on the spot and disappeared with my daughter for a week. Well there it is….
I have never really lived alone in my whole life. When I left my parents in Malmö I moved into an apartment that I shared with two guys from the university. After this I moved into a shared apartment closer to the university where I stayed for 3 months before I moved in with Johanna in march 1991. I have now been alone in this house for 1.5 weeks and that is the longest period of time I have been alone in my own home for 12 years.
A friend of mine who divorced a couple of years ago ended up in the same situation where he started to live on his own after the divorce and he made himself to a martyr where he was set on really learning how to live on his own. I have no such fixed plan and I certainly don’t want to become a martyr. I have been meeting with people, going to parties and I have to admit that I have been drinking way to much. I decided this morning when I got home around 03:30 (drunk again) that I was going to put away all the beer, cider, wine etc. into a cabinet and not drink for a while. I also have too try to get more sleep. I am a bit behind in that department. 5-6 hours every night is not enough.
What about the new woman then? Well, she is divorced and have two children (boy 10 and girl 12) that live with her every other week during the year, but now during the summer they are living with her the first part of the summer. The boy seems to have accepted me immediately but unfortunately the daughter has not. She has been very angry with her mother about me being there. This has obviously put the “new woman” into somewhat of a tiresome situation with me against the daughter. The woman also is really undecided about what she wants in the future and currently she is traveling on business followed by a visit from her sister during the coming week. I guess we will see what happens but it feels a bit like I am currently rather far down on the list of important things in her life 🙁
I would like give credit to two of my very close friends Jalle and Håkan who has helped me tremendously during this period. Thanks guys for being there for me and listening to my rambling about myself and women.

Am I getting old?
I was down in Stockholm yesterday (lovely trip actually but that is another story) and on two occasions I had a hard time understanding what people said.
The first was in the taxi to he airport here in Luleå. A young man (22+) was arranging some fair details over his cell phone and although I clearly heard what he was saying I had a really hard time understanding what he was saying. I was such a mix of slang in both english and Swedish and almost no sentence was complete.
The second occasion was down in Kungsträdgården in Stockholm where a young man (16+) was talking with his friends in suburb-Swedish. Now here I understood about 30% of what he said. His friends clearly understood him and they answered in plain Swedish.
In both cases it was young males that looked Swedish.
Did I talk that strange when I was younger? Did all people over 30 have such a hard time understanding me? I really hope not!
Was the difference in language this big 15 years ago? I do not think so. Is this an effect of so many new persons moving to Sweden? I read somewhere recently that 2010, 15% of Sweden’s population would immigration background (I guess that means one of generation 0, 1 or 2 would have moved to Sweden from another country). How will the situation look like in the western world in 50 years from now?
Will this lead to that countries will disappear altogether in the end? Why should that happen someone might ask. It hasn’t happened until now. The main difference between the world today and 200 years ago is that people move around much more. I guess most young people today has already been half way around the world (US, as etc.), which was not the case 50 years ago. It is much easier to move to another country today. I moved to USA in 1996 and that wasn’t very much hesitation for me. “New country, new town, I will adapt.”

I am now back in Sweden. My brain is total mush due to time zone differences and only about 1 hour worth of sleep. I hate flying back from the states 🙁

A person I recently became friends with told me: “I haven’t known you good enough to call you Peppar.” That made think, do you need to know somebody just to call them by their nickname? Is Peppar part of my old shallow attitude? Perhaps it is. I have started signing all emails and notes with Peter instead. So far nobody has commented but we’ll see if anybody notices.
On a sidenote, I have also started to write my emails more carefully. Both by limiting the amount of them but also use more words and most importantly, use more nice words. There is to much business in our high-speed society. People need to relax more. There is always time for a short break and reflection. The rest of the work day becomes much more efficient then.