Closing chapters and graduation

“All living things never stop changing, only synthetic things stay as we would demand of them.The rest follow the natural law. From a plant to love, to you, to us, change is the purpose of life of existence… your power is in how well you learn to adapt and create your way back to your center of balance each time. How flexible and embracing you become of change. That’s where your power lies”  M,  In Constant Bloom

So, on Tuesday we took a three hour bus ride to the mainland, to prepare for my second youngest sister’s graduation. She was finishing highschool (super yay!). This was at the boarding school all three of us, except the little one of course, had attended. This place holds so many memories for me, and for all of my sisters too I bet.

We all attended this rather old school, mainly because it was owned by the church we grew up in. It was the first step away from the comfort of home for all of us. I remember my first day there, almost 11 years ago, as a 16 year old shy Ugandan girl still perfecting her Danish. It was supposed to be only for a year, to immerse myself in Danish of course,  but I ended up staying for 4 years. This stay formed me in so many ways, the building and landscape housed so many of some of the most precious and heartbreaking memories, that all helped make me the person I am today. We knew visiting, that this would be a memorable few days for all three of us. The end of a thread that started, the day my mom and sisters dropped me off, to Thursday, when we collected the last of my little sisters things and drove away. Most probably the last time in a very long time.

Life is just so interesting in so many ways, like from what we expect and how it all turns out. This place taught me how to let go of wanting to figure everything out perfectly. I mean, it tried to teach me that, but I didn´t get the lesson until 3 years after graduation. It was also at this place that I really fell in love with being alone, with taking long walks in the forests and the quiet beaches nearby.

You see, the place is situated perfectly in the “countriest” of mainland Denmark, where people speak Danish with a tune to their words. Where the sounds of birds wake you up, where the air is scented with tree scents and the salty sea, horse crap and tense teenage sweat.  It´s a place where the sunsets and sunrises seem to burn a little brighter and longer. It is surrounded by wheat and rapeseed flower farms, which perfectly marked the changing seasons, as time had a strange way of standing still there.

 

The school is cupped in a little hole-like landscape, with a road that starts at a high hill and goes all the way down to the water. It´s a beautiful, peaceful and an enchanting place. Although, some days it felt like hell and I wanted to run up that hill as fast as my legs could carry me and never come back. It also collects a group of diverse beings, from all different walks of life. There are people there, who have lived and worked there all their lives, and people who come from around the world to volunteer only for a year. And regardless of how special your existence seemed to be there, life at the school has an interesting way of moving on perfectly fine, even when you are no longer there. Living there made me more curious about travelling too, because I was exposed to all these new people, who came to volunteer and they would tell me about their homes and lands and worlds. I knew, even being in that small place hidden perfectly from the rest of the world, that there was so much more I wanted to become familiar with one day.

When I graduated from the school, I was so ready to leave, you don´t even know. Perhaps, it´s great that I am only writing this 7 years after finishing. Had I written this post a few days after graduation, I feel the tone would have been very very different. I guess that all has to do with time, and perspective and finally being ready to look back with eyes of wonder and appreciation for all it actually gave me. I met so many beautiful souls at that school and so many stories that impacted my life.

I met one of my favourite people there too, Riks. We met on the school’s annual Open Day, where people interested in attending the school visit before enrolling. Usually it´s the students’ job to show future students around and magically, Riks was one of the two students showing me and my mom around that day. Little did we know, that a few months later, we would be inseperatable. We were such an odd coupling too (and still are): The short semi chubby African girl, with the very skinny and tall  half white and half Inuit girl, but I guess that´s the perfect match. Even though we have been thrown around the world many times and we have talked less and more in different periods, we have always kind of found our way back together. That´s exactly what happened yesterday too. Even though both Riks and I live in Copenhagen, we were on the mainland at the same time by coincidence.  So of course we had to meet at the school, and say goodbye to it together. We took one of our favourite little walks, where we often talked through the confusing happenings in our teenage life, about school, crushes and big plans for the future. It was perfect.

My whole family also got to finally see my sister perform with her school band, where she sang the song World’s Greatest. A song of such nostalgic value for me and my family. That song, as well as Storm is Over, where the two songs we heard on repeat on the plane, on our journey from South Africa to Denmark,..so many years ago. To be honest, it was such a cliché ending to  it all, but only because it was such a very perfect ending indeed (*awwwww shugsss, I know ).

So that´s what I did this week, and you?

I can´t wait to see where the next chapter takes my little musical and magical sister, whom we are all so very proud of. Either way, as always, I hope she finds the courage and passion to bloom wherever life might plant her next.

With such big love