ancient sects

when I was studying at University, I lived in a student apartment with shared corridor, shower and kitchen. in another room lived a young Italian man, a classically trained musician, with whom I had deep discussions about music, mathematics and mysticism. I was studying the history of ideas. it was almost as if he couldn't help letting some things slip, but then he never answered follow-up questions. I wondered if he was just winding me up. but the things he could say wasn't stuff you just make up. and the light in his eyes was not, couldn't have been, acted. i had to act patient and hope that he would give up more information by himself, that he would reveal a little more.

later I read a novel by Patricia Duncker, The Strange Case of the Composer and his Judge, and I was reminded of our discussions. and my suspicions.
the novel is about the investigation of what everyone thinks is a suicide sect. the protagonist learns it is an ancient sect known as the Faith, and the members are highly placed in society. The chief government adviser on the environment and global warming in the Swiss department, scientists at the nuclear research station at Grenoble, the Director of Research in Astrophysics, such people. and it's not originally a suicide sect although members have started to commit suicide. and the protagonist will become a lot more personally involved than she would have ever suspected.

the novel made an impression on me. it touched on a subject I've discussed with someone who used to be a fellow student. so when she committed suicide this fall, I thought of the novel again. I felt guilty, because of our past discussions, and also because of a blog post I wrote just a month or so before she did it, that was on the same subject. but I'm also comforted. I know we share the same beliefs about death. the same beliefs that the members of the Faith had in the novel by Duncker. I'm not saying I'll commit suicide, or even that I want to. I'm just saying I do not fear Death. not all who choose to die are running from something. some of them are running to something.

into the wild

today we went ice-skating for the first time this season. finally! how I have anticipated this!

others had been there and hacked with peaks in the ice to see if it was thick enough. we were also trying it at sunday, but then decided to wait just a couple of days more. we were the first ones to skate on the lake Athulen this season, the ice was just about thick enough. about cirka 50 mm thick now in general, thinner by the shore. it looked like glass, and the lake looked black and deep underneath it. we almost didn't dare to skate today, luckily we were not scared off by the ice breaking under our skates by the shore, but ventured farther out on the lake.

the sun was setting (ca 14:30) and the waxing moon was rising. the sky was purple, pink and orange in the west, colors and light that was mirrored in the lake ice. the Ice surface was partially obscured by a thin powder of snowflakes, otherwise it would have been like a big mirror, I've skated on lakes like that before. the ice resounded with our strides, making a kind of musical sound. sometimes cracking noises. I also felt like I had a singing in my body, as if me and the lake and the forest around it, even the sky, was singing together in a mystical way. 

I was smiling, laughing, my eyes were tearing up, and I was crying out loud with joy and excitement. I don't know what to compare it to, maybe when one kisses ones loved one for the first time. it's similar because of the feeling of risk involved. this is possibly lethal, the ice sheet is thinner at places but it's hard to tell where.  It was possible to skate all over the lake, as we discovered, but there is always a risk. that's what makes it all the better! 

It's such a simple and inexpensive, childish pleasure but it's one of my favorite sports in wintertime. (if not THE favorite one, now when skeleton cancer has ruined snowboarding for me, according to the doctor, forever.)

now I just come to think about something that I take for granted and you maybe don't know. in Sweden there is something called allemansratten. 'all men's/peoples right'. it means that i can go skate on whatever lake I want to, i don't even need to ask, or even know who owns it. i, and everyone, can pick berries in all the forests we like. we can not destroy anything or take anything that doesn't renew itself. I can put up a tent and camp out for the night. and so on. certain plants are protected because they are rare, and one shouldn't litter, etc. it is my belief that allemansratten should be a world-wide thing. when I visit other places where all wilderness is fenced in, owned and forbidden to go into, I feel so restricted, it's like I'm suffocating.

skating on the lake ice doesn't use up any recourses, it doesn't take anything away from anyone, it doesn't involve any high tech; just a couple of pieces of metal one straps to ones sturdy hiking shoes. of course it wouldn't be possible for many people to do it at once, we couldn't even skate close to each other on this thin fresh ice without bursting, and it was just the two of us. in a similar way, it doesn't matter how simple lives we all lead, if we are too many we break the ecology non the less. it's not just us humans the recourses are for. it's all the other beings too.

what I want to say is;

THIS is living, this is truth, pure, not corrupted and false. 

so when so many people are using up precious recourses for joyless luxuries to entertain themselves, I would like to encourage people to rediscover other simpler, truer joys in life. this is one of my answers to how we will preserve the recourses, the minoan way. the minoans enjoyed nature, adventure and sports.