Yesterday was Jacob's 7th birthday!

Woohoo, happy birthday Jacob!

We had a nice little chat on the phone last night, he was right in the middle of playing with the Lego Speed Racer I had sent him. He had been or was going to be on some picknick with his school, which sounds like a load of fun :-).

Love him, and while it's sometimes hard to be on the other side of the planet, I stay confident that's he has a good life.

Yet another year and with loooong silence from me. It was about a year ago that I said anything about myself, wasn't it? Ah, yeah, last time I said anything at all was a rant about sane customer relationships...
Last time I spoke about my life was even earlier, when I basically asked the universe to shut the fuck up :-).

Suffice to say that a lot has happened since. One of the possibilities that I talked about in that last one was a new relationship, which started not very long after. It started off quite well, but somehow, we got off on the wrong foot somewhere in the middle of the summer, and I spent all from august and on to try to rectify that (my part at least). I imagine we got to a point where the relationship would be workable, but unfortunately, other conditions of life came in and made the relationship impossible, and it ended a bit before Christmas (some time between the middle of November and the beginning of December, depending on who you ask).

I assume you've noticed that I'm not really giving very much detail at all. This is one person that I won't even mention by name, for the simple reason that I'm pretty sure she wouldn't want me to. I guess that at some level, I'm protecting her even today, and I'm probably going to keep doing so. I'll say, though, that I miss her, at the very least as a friend (I haven't heard from her since... some time in January or February).

Sometime during the autumn (I forget exactly when, but spyro plays an important role in this happening), I started talking with Charlie, who I've know of for quite a while (because we're both on the same polyamory mailing list) on Facebook. We quickly became fairly close (as close as you can get through a text-only interface) friends. With the help of a mutual friend, who just happened to invite us both to the same event, we ended up meeting some time in late November, and we had a very nice chat over a couple of beers after that event. Among other things, we found we had many things in common in our respective backgrounds (it almost got ridiculous, really...). We realised that yes, we were interested in each other, and a few weeks later (two, I think), a new (poly) relationship started. It has deepened and developed ever since.

Remember the endless search for a bigger apartment? Last time I wrote about it, I was quite discouraged and thought nothing would ever happen, but last summer, something finally clicked and we were three people doing a triangular trade, and I've ended up here. I moved on in the beginning of last autumn, we through a renovation (through which I was evacuated here, which wasn't the nicest apartment, but hey, that was only for 3 months!) and have ended up with something that has exactly the kinds of wall papers I want and so on.
Reaaaaally nice, and I'm really happy to be here, and it ended up being what fulfills all my needs in the best possible way!

Jacob... well, I really dunno what to write here. On one hand, we keep visiting each other, I've been over in Boston last autumn and this spring, and he was over here in Sweden for Christmas, and... heh, I just figured I do know what to write ;-)... and it's felt marvelous to be with him the times it has been. It has felt marvelous to be able to provide some space for him instead of being cramped in a 41 m² apartment, even if it was in that evacuation apartment.

In his development, I've mostly noticed that his language gets better each time I meet him, and it's quite nice to hold entire conversations with him. It's equally nice to see him interact with other kids, over in Boston as well as here (which I think he does marvelously well, even if the other kids don't speak the same language!). Last summer, when he was in Sweden, I watched him interact with a girl for a long time, him speaking in English and her in Swedish. Marvelous!

Credits where credits are due, thank you Lisa!

What else... oh, yeah, work... nah, that'll be for another entry, when I feel like it.

Jacob will be flying back home this evening after having spent 12 days here. It's been a marvelous time nevertheless, and I feel I've a better connection with him than I've had for a long time! It's probably because he has been with me around the clock for the better part (8 days) of this visit.

I'm realy writing this note because a friend reminded me ("I've read through your blog to see how Jacob and you were doing... Not a word!"). Sorry, I was too exhausted and simply forgot...

Anyhow, it's been an eventful and uneventful stay. Some days were about going out, meeting friends, having lots of intense fun. Some others were about just having a relaxed time, sometimes even downright boring, which isn't bad in itself, as boredom visibly sparks creativity (did Jacob read my previous entry? Somehow I doubt that ).

Some of the moments I will cherish the most are falling asleep with Jacob, taking him to see the clown Manne (we saw "Uppåt väggarna", which is with Manne's son and daughter, also clowns), seeing his connection with Eva (they really formed a good relationship of their own, which makes me happy!), spending time at Tom Tits Experiment with my first girlfriend (yes, we are friends at this point) and her two daughters, and just marvelling at Jacob's ability to connect with other kids here, on any playground, even though they don't understand each other's languages.

What else? Well, for starters, it feels like this spiritual connection I've always felt with Jacob has truly had a chance to be refuelled and strengthened. I think very few will understand what such a connection means and how important it is for it to exist to be able sustain a long distance relationship with him, him living on the other side of the Atlantic Pond and all. I'm putting it all on having been with him around the clock for 8 days!

Anyhow, for being the last day that I'll see Jacob for a while, I'm in fairly good spirits. I'm thinking of this as a relaxed day, haven't really planned anything specific, just being together and doing what we want with it. Oh, and I need to make his bags, which I had planned to do in the morning before he wakes up, but didn't... Hmm, I wonder what that really says about my state of mind...

What a joy it can be to see your son again, even if it's just for two weeks!

I'm currently returning from yet another visit in Boston to see my son. It was great to see him, as usual, and I just marvel at what looks to me like leaps of development (of course, I understand that it's only an illusion and that that his development really is smoother than it seem to me).

I got to meet his new teachers, as he has moved on to Pre-K, and the first teacher of the class almost double over herself over how marvelous Jacob seems to integrate and interact with the rest of the class, how positive he seems to be, always comfortable in his skin (those were her words!).

What I did with him? In practice, no so much in particular, I picked him up at school in the afternoons, played with him a lot, cooked food for him, took him out to playgrounds and to places he could bike. Basically being a parent, and we had a lovely time!

I'm discovering that for each visit, my love for this little fellow seems to deepen more. It may also be that I become more aware of my love for him as I go. I honestly don't know, but it's really not that important which it is.

I took him out once, going to the Full Moon restaurant, and it was really for selfish reasons, I wanted to meet a new friend who lives north of Boston, but it was great anyway, she's already met Jacob, seems to love him to bits, and the restaurant has a play area for kids, so Jacob could have a fun time either way.

Photos will come up as soon as I have my new album structure set up, and I hope I'll remember to update this entry with a link.

In less than two weeks, I'm starting my summer vacation by welcoming my son Jacob to Sweden. Soooo looking forward to having him here, taking him places, or to my parents, or just have him for myself for a day. We'll see what happens.

So right now, I'm preparing myself for his arrival. Simple things like making sure I've food, getting a bed for him up (I'm still in a small apartment, so there's gonna be an extra bed unless I decide that I'll sleep on the couch), checking out things I can do with him, ...

It's been an intense few days. Lisa and Jacob flew here so he could visit Sweden, me, my parents, ... They arrived on the 23rd, and we all went to the apartment where they would live. Spent some time there, and then Lisa and Jacob went to visit some friends while I was dropped at my place.

The next day, Jacob and I spent checking out the area of the new place I hope to move to soon, then went to my current place to have dinner and spend some time together. We found some of his old toys in the cellar and brought them up, watched a movie (a Veggie Tales one I have in my movie archive), played and had a general pleasant time together. Note that this year, Christmas was a little unusual. We would normally celebrate it on this day, the 24th, as is customary in Sweden, but for practical reasons, we chose to celebrate it on the 25th instead.

So, the 25th, we went to my parents. Picked up Eva on the way, and went on to celebrate Christmas. The people present were my parents of course, my brother, my aunt Karin, Jacob, Eva and me.

Jacob had a bit of trouble with all the grownups chattering away at the dining table to start with, but came back after a little while, and seemed to enjoy unpacking he presents, playing with us, watching a little bit of TV, ...

The 26th, I took Jacob back to my parents again, just to spend time and to celebrate my mom's birtday as well.

The 27th (yesterday or today, depending on how you look at it ), Jacob, Eva and I went to Junibacken, which is a wonderful place for a kid, very much dedicated to the works of Astrid Lindgren. It's filled with exhibits that you can play in and with. He had a blast! And I'm quite happy to see that he has such good contact with Eva.

After being done with Junibacken, we dropped off Eva at a convenient place (she had stuff of her own to deal with) and went to my place to have a good dinner. Yum! We spent the rest of the evening just playing (sometimes a bit on his own while I dealt with dishes and similar things). It was a sweet moment.

They're flying back tomorrow morning. Quite early, really, so all I have left is to wave them off at the airport. It's been a wonderful few days, and it's sad to see him leave. But that's the path we've chosen...

There's are more pictures here

So, Jacob and Lisa left a few hours ago. I made them company to the airport, and Jacob and I had a pretty good time waiting in the check-in line, playing a bit of Blue's Clues pretend.

After check-in, they were actually to get through security in a bit of a hurry. Separating was tough, Jacob reacted by crying (something I haven't experienced separating with him before...), and I had myself a cry when leaving the airport. I talked with Lisa on the phone later, while they were still at the gate, and Jacob had recovered.

I won't work today. Just no point with it, I won't be able to focus.

I've tried to express what I want with my son many times, and I keep getting a different interpretation of what I said back at me, from many people. Can't quite figure out why, and this is just an attempt to clarify it, to myself as well as to anyone who cares reading.

In this entry, the topic is specifically about having him travelling to Sweden at regular intervals.

As some know, my son is a young boy of two nationalities. Born in Sweden from a US mother and a Swedish-French father, and has lived in Sweden for the first three and a half years (he's four and a half at the time I write this) and is now living in the states. It should obvious to anyone that his identity contains heritage from both countries.

A few times now, I've expressed that it's important that he visits Sweden for his own sake, to maintain that part of his identity. Quite a few times now, this has been expressed by others as my wish to see him, and I can't remember having heard much else. Expressed that way, it sounds quite a lot more selfish than it really is. That would be something I'd want from my son.

Don't get me wrong, I am immensily pleased to have him here, there's no question about that it. I find it enormously pleasing to have him in my home, playing with toys (Legos and a Brio train set being his favorites) he left behind when he moved to the states, or taking him places here. However, there's a bigger picture, and it's vivid in my mind at all times.

Being a person of two nationalities is a treasure, there's no doubt in my mind about that. It provides a wider perspective and range of opportunities, the latter from having two languages at the very least.

Because both nationalities are part of my son, part of his identity, I very strongly believe that both should be nurtured, and that the only way to have that is for him to be regularly immersed in both cultures, seeing each of his parents in their home turf, living with them, seeing his grand parents on both sides and even sleeping over with them (or at least in their home), seeing and experiencing each country itself, and getting in touch with the languages. I consider anything else as no less than robbery.

That is something I want for my son. I think that's quite different than wanting something from him.

Some of these things have not been taken care of well enough. It's time to do so. It's time I do so.

My son is currently here in Sweden, as I've mentioned before. And since he lives in Brookline, MA and his stay here is quite short, he is of course in the rythm of the US east coast (they are 6 hours behind Sweden). So, to spend time with him, I try to be awake as long as I can, but at the same time, there are some things that I need to tend to that is within the Swedish rythm...

End result? I've tried to live in two time zones with a 6 hour difference at once. This isn't good in the long run. I will need to catch up on sleep tomorrow after the son and the ex-wife have taken off to get back to Brookline.

I need to deal with this in a different way next time...

I haven't written one single line here while I was in Boston! I didn't expect that, I thought I would have one tirade after another. See, i not only expected to visit with my son, but also to have some time to process my own internal crap. And true, I have, but a lot of that have happened with specific people using e-mail, and I honeslty forgot I had a journal.

Anyhow, I've actually had a marvelous time in many ways. I got to live in this beautiful old house, owned by a wonderful couple (the hubby is a fan of Scandinavian movies, which was quite unexpected!). I'll happily go to them again.

It was wonderful to see how my son has developped, and quite sad to separate from him. He's a wonderful kid, and I do miss him a lot. I loved playing, hugging, being cozy, talking, watch him do gymnastics, play with friends, solving all the little things he needed to solve and all other things that I currently forget.

Another unexpected thing was to discover different facets in my ex. Good things. That's good, because they were probably always there, I just wouldn't see them through my filters before, which means that I've really let go of some of my issues. Hooray!

While being away from Sweden, I also had the time to process some other crap, like what's happened in me in the last few stressful months, finally let out some emotions that I had bottled up for a while, and finding myself again. Getting more grounded, basically.

Right now, I'm sitting on the plane to Newark, grounded at Logan Airport (Boston). The ongoing blizzard is just enormous! My ex called me, telling me she had seen lightning, and that the last plane that left Logan got struck by lightning and had to return, and that's why they closed the airport. Last thing I heard was that the airport itself was (partly?) out of power, and it's quite possible the same goes for parts of Boston. It's rumoured to be the worst blizzard since many decenies.

Someone is currently talking on the phone, and telling her father that the snow has cleared up (which it has), and that we probably should be on our way in not too long. I can't really tell if that last was a small lie or not. The runway is still covered with snow, and the plows are working hard to shovel it all out of the way. Well, that's a bit better than a couple of hours ago, when they thought that they would have to close the airport for the night.

What worries me the most is that I might not be in Newark in time to catch my flight to Sweden, and it would really suck if I would have to stay in Newark over night, as I've heard it's really tough to get hotel rooms in that area. Ah well, we'll see how it goes, and when I'll find myself in Sweden. I'm having good faith.

Update at 16:09 EST (22:09 CET):

we were just told that we will take off in about 10 minutes! Woohoo! That means we'll get to Newark on time, I hope. Life looks a little bit brighter.

Update on december 10, 17:06 CET:

what an adventure! So, the taking off "in 10 minutes" was quite a misunderstanding. That was when the de-icing process started, and let me tell ya, the wings were covered with about 5 inches of snow! So you can imagine the de-icing took a while (I didn't clock it, but I'm guessing something between 30 and 45 minutes). We finally took off from Logan somewhere after 5pm.

When we arrived at Newark, we quickly found out that the plane to Stockholm had already left. At this point, Mr P (who I had already started talking to back at the gate at Logan, and who I decided at this point would be a travel buddy, since we were both going to Stockholm and found ourselves in the same predicament) and I simply had to go to Continental costumer services and see what we could get. We got a flight to Paris, and the flight from there to Stockholm would be with Air France, landing us in Stockholm at about 18:15 today.

Well, we had a couple of hours to kill in Newark, so we went for a bite. Found ourselves in some kind of "Portuguese" café, where we ate a pretty good chicken in herbs with rice and fried potatoe slices, and talked. I got to tell Mr P bits and pieces of what goes on in my life and where my passion lies, and got to know that he travels a little everywhere in the world, feels really stressed out, and especially now, since he is to visit his girlfriend in Stockholm and doesn't enjoy the delay, at all. He was really happy to hear I had a strong passion for something.

On we went, flying over the Atlantic, after another delay of, IIRC, less than an hour. We weren't sitting very close, so I read a french newspaper, played a bit with the entertainment unit that was individually available on this flight (I watched "Batman begins" and played a few games), then slept a little bit. Woke up an hour or so before we landed at Roissy Charles de Gaule. Before landing, I watched the french landscape, saw the small villages, one after another, before we started seeing the northern suburbs of Paris, and that's when it hit me! Oh, ce que la France me manque! Last time I was there was about 10 years ago, and that's just too damn long! I realised I got to come back, breathe the air, smell the smells, touch the ground. It really is a part of me that I haven't been in touch with for a very long time.

Anyway, at Roissy, we got through passport control, then went to the local transfer services to get our boarding passes, and I had the immense pleasure of using French with someone beside my mom, and it was as much a pleasure to help Mr P getting his boarding pass as well (more use of French ).

After a short personal browsing in the small local bookstore, and buying 4 French comic books (Ah, la BD française!), Mr P and I met again at the gate, and simply waited until the time of boarding, me reading one of the comic books I had just purchased, him reading some magazine he had purchased.

I'm currently sitting in the plane writing this update, having just eaten a good little dinner (my only complaint would be that it was served cold, but it was fish, so it still tasted good), with a good white wine (hey, I'm on a French plane, what other excuse do I need? and it was a Côte-du-Rhône, how could I say no?), and life is currently good. Mr P is currently watching a movie on his laptop :-).

You know, it's good to have a random travel buddy like that. Makes all the waiting much less boring. You get to talk and have a social time in the middle of all the waiting and (mis)adventures. This is good. It was meant to be. I really appreciate it that Mr P is with me on this trip.

Update on december 10, 18:05 CET:

Ha! I was just offered the "Flying Blue" card, with which I can collect miles and get some free one. Cool! And I'm noticing that I'm the only one who got that offer. Must be because I spoke French with the crew. I knew speaking would have benefits, but this was a bit unexpected. Anyway, I'm signing up. Hey, if it gives me free tickets to go see my son, I'm not gonna complain!

And now, we were just informed the descent to Stockholm has started. Guess it's time I close save this update and close the laptop.