Show & Tell: Slow

Västmanländskan's second theme of the month is slow or långsam in Swedish. She presumably chose this theme because it was långfredagen yesterday, the Swedish name for Good Friday, which translates "long Friday". Traditionally this was a day of tedious waiting as one was not supposed to do anything, at least not anything fun, in order to honour Jesus who suffered and died on this particular day. Well until the 1970s Swedish radio only played hymns and there was a ban on public entertainment (until 1969), and shops were closed on this day. My mum, who is born in 1954, has told me that when she was growing up she had an aunt who was very religious and wanted the day to remain solemn. Luckily for my mum, her father was more of the secular kind and used to play cards with my mum and her sister when the aunt wasn't watching.

I had quite a slow day yesterday, though not necessarily boring. My dad didn't pick me up until 1pm (I'm spending a few days at my parents while Peter is skiing with the lads) so I had a lazy morning. And the afternoon and evening was mostly eating and hanging out with my parents and my grandfather. My dad and I took a walk with my grandfather - a very slow walk since he walks with a cane and must not rush.

Today the weather has been absolutely gorgeous and I have spent most of it sitting outside in the sunshine reading. My mum and I also took a little trip to a flower nursery which also has an antique shop (where I found a birthday present for a friend). This evening my dad and I took a walk, admittedly quite a bit longer and in a much higher pace than yesterday's walk but still very relaxing. While I'm writing this I'm sipping some camomile tea - the drink with the ultimate calming effect.

I think this is what Easter is supposed to be like. Christmas can be very hectic as there are so many things to do beforehand and people to see during, but Easter is a time to slow down, get some rest from work and catch up with yourself. Maybe a new start, in the way Jesus came back to life (except for his later ascension).

This weekend my thoughts also go the IT team at work who compared to me do not have a slow weekend. Instead they are working hard on deploying our new IT system. If everything goes smoothly (fingers crossed) the new equipment will replace the completely archaic and slow system we have now. The "future" has been delayed for several years - when I started working there three years ago, I was told we were going to get our new computers "soon" - but on Tuesday slow is no more! By the way, speaking of slow IT, as I'm writing this on my parents' super-slow computer I'm not able to upload any photos to go with the post :)

Enjoy the rest of the weekend!