BACK ROAD

Still from yesterday morning ... the old back dirt road full of memories ♡

TODAY AT 5:19 PM

Left the house searching for the sky
Found it at the end of the road
At the end of another day
So far away from my memories
Of the times I used to call this place home

THE SCENT

The most wonderful scent of the linden trees announcing Summer is near ...

RURALITY

Late afternoon just before sunsetting. Went for a walk searching for what remains of my childhood innocent rurality now rapidly being swallowed by concrete and pollution and noise and progress

ORANGES AND LEMON TREES

Those were the days of the long high whitewashed walls
Bordering almost every street, every corner of the old town
Looking up between the earth and the bright blue sky
There were always the sunny trees of my childhood memories

BACK ROAD

This morning went back to the back road
The house still standing on the horizon
A landscape of memories

TILIA

Even after so many years I still miss my mum everyday. Her gentleness, caring and wisdom. The delicate, warm sweet, slightly sleepy and powdery scent of the Linden flowers remind me of her last day exactly 14 years ago today

PRESERVE

All this will be gone soon. Replaced by concrete and tarmac. Trying to preserve memories of mornings past. 

Still struggling with time passing and everything being left behind ... the loneliness and sadness remain

IN THE PARK

Went to the park and the back dirt road this morning
Places I used to go to so often, nearly everyday
Hadn't been for a long while
Memories came flashing by, the deep feeling everything was left behind
Searched for solace in the tiny details
Connecting my new self with what I used to be
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Fui ao parque e ao caminho de terra batida por detrás esta manhã
Lugares onde costumava ir tantas vezes, quase todos os dias
Há muito que lá não ía
As memórias brotaram, o sentimento profundo de que tudo ficou para trás
Procurei consolo nos pequenos detalhes
Conectar o que sou hoje com o que costumava ser

ETERNITY

This was the place. On Monday the 28th February 2005, on what turned out to be the coldest night of that year, I found Lucas on this right place. A small curious puppy wandering while I was driving alone. He was my best friend, my companion. For 12 years we shared everything, everyday, we went everywhere together. When he died I was with him alone, I buried him alone, I cried alone. He left and something in me left with him. 

Then the time came to move back home (I was living somewhere else at the time of his death) and I just felt that I couldn’t leave him behind. So I unearthed him, a whole mummified body of dried bones, fur and skin. I made a bonfire and brought his ashes with me back home. It just felt right that way! 

A couple of months ago, back in August, I realised it was time to say goodbye. It didn’t make sense for his ashes to be in a little box at home anymore. That was when this place, this precise stretch of road came to mind and I knew what to do. I had to close the cycle! 

Yesterday I returned alone, nearly 200 kilometers away and scattered his ashes under an old olive tree by the side of the road next to where I found him almost 14 years ago. I left him to the wind and listen to the silence and something was complete, a mission accomplished, everything in its right place ... and a deep sense of quiet peace grew inside of me. 

Life moves on! Yesterday I closed one cycle but I also closed another much wider one, of exactly 27 years today. 27 years of hopes, of broken dreams, of building and loss, deep loss, of uncertainties, trials and errors while so often taking wrong turns by not listening to my inner self, by not knowing. Everything is so much clear now, so many things make sense and fit perfectly now simply because there is a reason for everything. 

Another chapter is finished, a volume is complete. Now is the beginning of another one. A new chapter, a new volume that feels pretty lonely, yet an unknown place that feels strong and structured and certain. Life and the future will be another thing different from what it used to be and I’m writing my history but there is something that now I know and that is memories are the place where we keep eternity.
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Este é o lugar. Na Segunda-feira dia 28 de Fevereiro de 2005, na que viria a ser a noite mais fria desse ano, encontrei o Lucas neste lugar. Um cachorro curioso que andava a vaguear enquanto eu conduzia sozinha. Ele foi o meu melhor amigo, o meu companheiro. Durante 12 anos partilhámos tudo juntos, todos os dias, fomos inseparáveis. Quando ele morreu estava sozinha com ele, enterrei-o sozinha, chorei sozinha. Ele partiu e algo de mim partiu com ele.
Até que chegou a altura de regressar a casa (eu estava a viver noutro lugar quando ele morreu) e simplesmente senti que não o podia deixar ficar para trás. Por isso desenterrei-o, um corpo inteiro mumificado de ossos secos, pele e pêlo. Fiz uma fogueira e trouxe as cinzas comigo de regresso a casa. Senti que era assim que deveria ser!
Há uns meses atrás, em Agosto, percebi que tinha chegado a altura de me despedir. Já não fazia sentido as suas cinzas estarem fechadas numa caixinha aqui em casa. Foi quando este lugar, este preciso troço de estrada  me veio à mente e eu soube o que tinha de fazer. Era preciso fechar o ciclo!
Ontem regressei sozinha, quase a 200 quilómetros de distância e espalhei as suas cinzas debaixo de uma velha oliveira ao lado da estrada onde o encontrei quase há 14 anos atrás. Deixei-o ao vento e ouvi o silêncio e algo ficou completo, uma missão cumprida, tudo no lugar certo ... e uma profunda tranquilidade cresceu em mim.
A vida continua! Ontem fechei um ciclo mas também fechei um outro maior, de exactamente 27 anos hoje. 27 anos de esperanças, de sonhos quebrados, de construção e perdas, profundas perdas, de incertezas, tentativas e falhanços por tomar caminhos errados, por não ouvir a minha voz interior, por não ter conhecimento. Tudo é tão mais claro agora, tantas coisas fazem tão mais sentido e encaixam perfeitamente agora simplesmente porque há uma razão para todas as coisas.
Um capítulo terminou, um volume está completo. Agora é o início de um outro. Um novo capítulo, um novo volume que sinto solitário mas ainda assim um lugar desconhecido que sinto forte e estruturado e exacto. A vida e o futuro serão uma outra coisa diferente do que costumava ser e escrevo a minha história mas há algo que agora compreendi, é que as memórias são o lugar onde se guarda a eternidade.

LATE AFTERNOON TODAY

As I write Spring is high and Summer is approaching 

The light is golden and time moves on, untouchable

The fields are fresh still due to months of rain

And yet so many signs of the new season

Minute details

As in the late afternoon skies 

And the song of birds ... the same as my memory 

Just as I have come to know them so well

Where I feel at easy 

So much home inside of me