Tellus makes another home run and our rather superfluous existence carry on for another round. Nostalgia in the shape of short term memory-loss compel us to recall while we regret, relief or delight in the past year. Like a near-death-experience the year flashes by, and at the end of the tunnel – “ring klocka ring!” and another aerial battle of fireworks. At the same time we blurt out a few halfhearted echoing promises that this year, this year, we will quit smoking, loose weight, call family and friends more often, learn something new, or be brave and carpe diem. We promise ourselves that we will change.

I too imagine grandiose personal growth and change: I will be more diligent, I tell myself, work harder. Reach out a hand and grab what is just beyond reach. Learn patience, learn to let things go, and more importantly, learn to identify when which is due. 

Sitting home in Sweden I let the breathtakingly beautiful and bittersweet E du nord – Kari Bremnes, shape my mind, and with a powerful love for the north, med sitt snötäcke och barrskog, I allow some of my own 2015’s death-flash project before my eyes: A change of country of residence, 31 books, 36 blog posts, eight visited countries, a handful of paintings, a mistake or two too many, a few new friends and a few reunions, too many tears and too little laughter and a frightening abundance of ‘feeling-nothing’-ness, a couple of salsas and foxtrots, and… one waltz.

The new year dawn, with equal parts inevitability and deliverance, as a (falsely) perceived new beginning. The past year becomes a place to leave behind failures, heartbreak and disappointment. The upcoming year, a place to plunge hard work, hope and expectations. Personally I have tried to abandon expectations. They alone are the source for disappointment and my supply of bravery is no longer what it once was. Life proceeds without any regards to expectations and instead of fighting it, I realised one have to embrace it. Therefore, I welcome 2016, to the best of my ability, without any such predefined constructions. What will be will be, is a liberating state of mind.

Returning to change, I have decided to throw aside my standard nonsense resolution “become a better person”. Instead I aim to revive an old attitude to life with a far more selfish incentive: fake it ’til you make it! Perhaps it proves the utter failure of my previous endeavour, but presently it strikes me as much more fun and constructive. Being of an awfully self-reflective mentality, I fear my biggest obstacle will be to fool myself, but then again, if not fools, what could we possibly be?