Volcano days

So for six days, Earth spewed it’s guts and extended to us mere mortals a reminder that we are, and always will be, only human.

The cloud’s gradual precipitation across mainland Europe was really a gift, and I wander if in time we’ll come to mourn its passing. In my highly romanticised opinion, it wasn’t simply an inanimate object but a living, breathing, pulsating reminder of our own existence, the unpredictability of life and the beautiful serendipity of chaos. A poke in the ribs as if to say ‘ Don’t take life too seriously, have a few days on me’.

As stranded tourists made the mad dash for Calais, the Navy awaited in it’s own modern day kitsch rendition ofDunkerque. ‘It’s the spirit of the blitz’ some claimed. Mankind was set to be reunited and rekindled in the spirit of love and kinship, if only for a moment. All it takes is a war, or a volcano. ‘Nah, it’s all just an election stunt’, cried the miserablists.

Back in Sweden, the trains were gloriously blocked and the hire cars all vanished. People, people everywhere and not a lift in sight. From a little island retreat in the Stockholm archipelago, I watched the weather drift through the dreaming spires of the old town with visions of Kerouacflittering in the wings as I contemplated a mad dash across a Europe, now littered with legitimate bums. But the days were bathed in warm spring sunshine that were ushering in colour after a heavy winter, so I decided instead to wander the streets and enjoy this little gift of time.

In a tea garden over cakes and pastries, I met Stina who was hosting her radio show - an open mic session for the disabled where the laughs are real and never self-deprecating. It was real life for all that it is and could be, where there were pancakes with blueberry syrup and cream. Free pancakes that buttered smiles all across the room. Then there were the galleries where I discovered Lee Lozano and her enviable collection of phallus’s and choice use of language. I never knew art could be penises and rude words, never were we taught that at school. Maybe I could have made it after all.

And then the snow came and sifted through the cobbled streets. And with the flurries came Gordana, the Romanian with the kaleidoscope eyes that took me back to the streets of my childhood flicking marbles in the gutter. She took me to a vegetarian café full of arty types. We walked the back streets where she told me of her homeland and the ogre count Dracu who impaled criminals on the street for all to see, from where Bram Stoker drew some inspiration for his Dracula. And somewhere in the cold, a little spark and a memory of tenderness as she held my arm, and I willed the eruptions to continue long into the spring.

And then the cloud shrivelled and we parted ways. The televisions celebrated ‘a swift resumption of normal service’. There were cheers from industry types, ‘hey, we can make money again!’. A swift resumption of routine, a swift return to normality. One of the seats on the flight was mine, and I had to take it, as for me like everyone else, normal life waited. What a downer.

It felt as though for a little while the world woke up from the deepest of slumbers, and we opened our eyes to the skies and our hearts to one and other. For the briefest of moments, we were all alive and well and open to the wonders of the world. And it felt good.

But tomorrow won’t be like today. It’ll be back to reality, and I’ll miss the volcano.