No, this is not my dog (or any dog I know as a matter of fact), but I just thought this photo describes very well how I feel. It has been a few very full days work-wise leading up to a climax last night. Today was pretty full too, and the day ended with a five-hour session centered around doing the laundry. Phew. I hate it. T. is not as busted as I am, but pretty close. I seem to resemble the dog above... ;)

Image from Muthumbi.

Aren't they beautiful? I took this picture exactly two weeks ago and the weather was really warm and nice. We didn't know then, but it was the beginning of things changing.

T. has not been sure about when he would stop working at his old work place, but as of Tuesday we do know. His last day is today!

It has been a dragged out process, but the ending came surprisingly quickly. We need to catch our breath now, but then we'll start planning in greater detail. He needs to get a job around here and his apartment to be sold. I'm not sure if we need to fix it up first... let's see what happens. He'll be here tomorrow. I miss him.

This photo was taken on the ferry, just like the previous one, but I think about it in slightly more symbolic terms. "Entré," of french origin, means entrance in several languages, and perhaps more specifically, it refers to entrance on a stage. Presently, I have indeed entered upon a new stage in my work life, where I focus on live performance and what it means in our media-saturated world today.

Weatherwise it has been a really good day today, but this has been the case from other points of view as well. Several pieces of the puzzle have come together and I'm slowly beginning to see progress and prehaps also closure. I know what I'm going to do for the next two years or so, and what I have planned feels amazing. I have just received news about a raise, and indications that the next one is not far away. We have also decided to highlight the aspects at work that are not functioning in a more systematic way and talk to more people. We might not be able to save this place, but at least we will know that we tried.

Some peace and quiet. Serenity. Ease. Nothing to worry about. Aaaah... wishful thinking!

We've decided. I've just booked a hotel room at Hotel Eburon in Belgian Tongeren. Perhaps it's a bit premature. We still don't know what the situation will be in the upcoming summer. But I do hope things will work out.

My partner is in a rather difficult situation where he has been laid off from work and the lay-off period is pretty long (actually until August or September). It is usually custom to let people go and find other jobs (which would decrease the time the company has to pay his wages) but that has not happened, so he's spending most of his time at work doing nothing. In March he has probably spent an hour or an hour and a half on tasks that has been assigned to him by his manager. The rest of the time he just have to keep himself busy, but he still can't look for work elsewhere from there, and we don't know what the future will look like.

I'm in a bit more "safe" situation at my work, but the work environment is extremely bad, mainly because a few people are trying to gain advantages by shutting everyone else out of the decision process. There has been no balancing leadership to speak of and now we have been forced to address these issues directly. A few of us have spoken up, talked to managers on a higher level, decided to be frank about things that have been happening for the last 18 months or so. It's difficult and we don't know for sure what it might lead to.

I think that I, by looking for vacation spots, have been trying to decide things for myself, if only to be able to actually make decisions. I'm tired of uncertainty. T. points out, however, that booking the hotel and planning our trip can not be taken for granted either. I know he's right, but wish he wasn't. I need something fun to look forward to. Badly.

Image from Reisreporter.be.

My partner has just left again. It's working day tomorrow and he had to go, even though none of us wanted to part. Let's hope he makes the six-hour journey back safely.

I stay busy contemplating flowers at the moment. T. gave me beautiful white tulips yesterday and I have some amazing bright yellow daffodils on our bedroom window sill. The green chrysanthemum above has already wilted away, but I still enjoy the photos I took of it a week ago. Let's keep it simple now. Let the flowers work their magic.

Leaving is difficult. Seeing him leave is difficult. The day after parting is always the worst day. The contrast between being together and being apart is simply too big, and getting used to being on my own doesn't feel like a very nice option. Annoying... although I do know that things will change, that we won't live apart forever.

It has been some turbulent months professionally and I haven't really known how I could proceed. Some things I've thought of haven't worked out the way I wanted, but now it seems as if I have a green light to move on to the next step and I'm thrilled. Judging by the response I just received, I think this solution will lead to a more interesting (and hopefully less stressful) work situation, a situation that allows me to focus on my work and what I'm interested in and not on other people's power issues (which I have discussed here and here). Let's hope so.

...is to spend time and energy on holding up a shield, on "protecting myself." I just want to be... I want to be in a context where I'm allowed to just be; where I can focus on studying, exploring and learning more, on interacting without fear. I don't like, and I don't have surplus energy, for contexts in which people just take whatever they can lay their hands on out of fear of not getting anything... where they have failed to understand that it is by giving that you also receive. It's just a matter of attitude. And I'm tired.

A few minutes ago, Christine Schürrer was convicted and sentenced to life in prison for murdering almost 4-year-old Max Jangestig and his not yet 2-year-old sister Saga by Svea Hovrätt. I think most people in Sweden react with a collective sigh of relief.

It has been a difficult case with a large amount of circumstantial, but no hard, evidence. Apart from the long list of weird "coincidences" addressed by the prosecutor, I think the main reason for Schürrer's conviction has indeed been her own actions before the murders, her failure to account for her reasons for being in Arboga and her failure to produce "friends" who could verify her stories. Furthermore, she has shown no compassion for Max and Saga's mother (whom she almost succeeded in killing as well) or the children's father. She has whispered with her lawyers and laughed repeatedly during the trial and, although she has not been defined as mentally ill, her defence (which she decided to conduct on her own) has been regarded less than lucid, if not outright irrelevant. This is what probably has condemned her the most in the eyes of the public.

The sentencing of Schürrer does not make Max and Saga come back, but I still hope it brings some kind of closure for their parents and loved ones. They will be remembered...

Images from here and here (Expressen Västerås).

Tomorrow is St. Valentine's Day and although I never celebrate it, I have to say that it still resonates with me today. I've just got back from a very exhausting work-related two-day meeting, in which our extremely dysfunctional work group was forced to sit down and talk about the problems we face.

Formed in a culture of strong leaders, our group has now been without such a leader for a few years, which has lead to people coming and going, rumours, imbalances and "decisions" taken by a small group behind the backs of co-workers to reach often rather egotistical goals (promotion, platforms to push their own agendas et cetera). It has been very difficult to address these issues, primarily because nothing has been out in the open. All of us have felt what was going on, but few of us had real evidence. Another reason has been that the leader we now have is very new and has not realised what has been happening.

When this meeting was announced, many of us seemed to realise that this might be our chance to do something about it, and there were several of us who approached our leader trying to explain as well as we could what our situation was like. Of course we did not know what it would result in, but today when everything came out in the open and the attitude of the small group (that they, according to them, were the only ones who were "fit" to decide on strategies for all of us, and that the rest of us were irrelevant in the process) became evident, our leader made it clear that transparency and openness was to become top priority from now on. As of now, we are going to have monthly information meetings for everyone and additional strategy meetings for those who are permanently employed (something which doubles the number of people thinking about strategic decisions). I'm hoping for some change now. I'm still not sure whether I would like to stay here, but at least this is a step in the right direction for our group. I really don't like wheeling and dealing, and I definitely try to stay away from people who are attempting to use me and others for their own purposes. It creates a culture I simply don't want to be a part of. Let's hope this is a first step towards a work situation where people actually care about and are happy for each other.

Image found at Cardiophile.com.