Blog: Light and shade under the sun

Bril­li­ant red and blue flo­wers, white rib­bons and fresh green everg­reens against a backd­rop of gloo­my late Oc­to­ber night. Some ye­ars ago I went to the ce­me­te­ry in the night to take pic­tu­res. I was due to keep a ser­mon and was loo­king for stark cont­rasts, ima­ges of dark­ness and light, bright­ness and som­ber­ness. I was ab­le to cap­tu­re all that in one pic­tu­re.

Blog: Should I give feedback?

I have of­ten come ac­ross si­tu­a­ti­ons where it would have been good to give feed­back. Too of­ten, ho­we­ver, I have not gi­ven any. For­tu­na­te­ly, there is still time to le­arn and de­ve­lop this im­por­tant skill.

Blog: Weekdays and holidays

On­ly some of the days in our uni­que and va­lu­ab­le li­ves are ”holy days”. For most of our li­ves we toil away at our dai­ly tasks and du­ties. We work hard from day to day and es­pe­ci­al­ly hard be­fo­re a ho­li­day, so that we can then ful­ly en­joy and ap­p­re­ci­a­te the free­dom from la­bor. Sla­ving away, I would call it!

Blog: Eleventh hour

Many of us know the fee­ling of ha­ving to rush to an ap­point­ment or get­ting an as­sign­ment done just be­fo­re the de­ad­li­ne. Some may even ha­bi­tu­al­ly wait un­til close to the de­ad­li­ne be­fo­re they ac­comp­lish their task. This may be es­pe­ci­al­ly true of stu­dents pre­pa­ring for an exa­mi­na­ti­on or wri­ting a pa­per. Some even say that they work most ef­fi­cient­ly kno­wing there is not much time left.

Blog: Growth, flowers, and potatoes sprouting on my window sill

I can­not say exact­ly when I be­ca­me a plant ent­hu­si­ast. I am in­te­res­ted in hou­se plants, cut flo­wers, and even edib­le plants. The ama­zing growth of plants is fas­ci­na­ting and ma­kes me dream of new plant in­di­vi­du­als.

Blog: Pandemic entertainment

We are well in­to the se­cond ye­ar of the co­vid pan­de­mic. What a stran­ge time it has been! So­me­o­ne told me about their use of time, sa­ying that if they need to go to the post of­fi­ce to get a pac­ka­ge, that is the on­ly thing they can fit in­to their day. How hap­py I would be now to have even one pro­per thing to do eve­ry day. But that is not al­wa­ys the case. On those days I read the dai­ly pa­per more ca­re­ful­ly than ever. If there is not­hing el­se, we will go to the ne­ar­by rail const­ruc­ti­on site to see if the work is prog­res­sing well.

Blog: Shame

On the 7th of Sep­tem­ber 1986, the cas­ket of Ur­ho Kek­ko­nen, who had been Pre­si­dent of Fin­land for a qu­ar­ter of a cen­tu­ry, was brought in­to Hel­sin­ki Cat­hed­ral. Af­ter the fu­ne­ral ser­vi­ce, eight lie­u­te­nant-ge­ne­rals car­ried the cas­ket in­to a he­ar­se and wal­ked by the side of the he­ar­se as far as the Hie­ta­nie­mi Ce­me­te­ry. All church bel­ls of Hel­sin­ki rang throug­hout the jour­ney. All Fin­ns see­med to share the grief for his pas­sing. I lis­te­ned to the ce­re­mo­ny bro­ad­cast on the ra­dio, watc­hing the lar­ge ro­wan tree that had tur­ned red out­si­de my win­dow. Flags were flying at half-mast.

Blog: Group work for one person

I star­ted in a new job, and du­ring the first few months al­re­a­dy I have had many things to think about. As if I did not have enough on my plate al­re­a­dy! Our child­ren of­ten laugh and say that I could write good de­tec­ti­ve sto­ries with my wide-ran­ging ima­gi­na­ti­on. My ima­gi­na­ti­on brings a lot of co­lor to our dai­ly life, of­ten on­ly in my dre­ams but so­me­ti­mes even in real life.

Blog: For the last time

There are many last ti­mes in hu­man life. They in­vol­ve great joy and ex­pec­ta­ti­ons, but of­ten al­so pain and lon­ging.

Blog: Left by the wayside

I have been mar­ve­ling at the num­ber of pe­op­le with com­pu­ter skil­ls du­ring this pan­de­mic. We have on­li­ne ser­vi­ces and live-stre­a­med pre­sen­ta­ti­ons as a rou­ti­ne. In our home zion, for ins­tan­ce, we had a cong­re­ga­ti­on eve­ning on­li­ne. Eve­ryt­hing was done re­al­ly pro­fes­si­o­nal­ly. I could not have ima­gi­ned this a coup­le of ye­ars ago.