My home is my heart.

Hodgepodge of Karla's recent brain activity: Enjoy.

Tonight we got a very big treat. We got to hear some incredible live Swedish folk music. It was gorgeous. The singer is a professional who has toured all over the world and there she was, performing for 13 Americans and about 10 Swedes in a little folk high school in Dalarna. I was reminded tonight of how political performing can be. The quartet was not wearing Swedish folk costumes. They explained that their reasoning for this was because the Swedish Democrats, the political party who has recently come into power and hates immigration, has adopted the folk costume as a symbol that the Swedes should "keep Sweden for themselves." These musicians were wearing traditional folk shoes, however.

On Saturday it will be time for us to leave again. We will go to the train station and board the 2:30 pm train for Uppsala. I must say, I am quite happy this one leaves before the crack of dawn. Now that we are so close to leaving, I find myself wondering why it is I seem to feel so attached to places right as we are about to leave. I thought that there was no way I could love Mora as much as I loved Jokkmokk and I'm sure those of you that have been following my posts are rolling your eyes thinking, "oh lord, she brought up that place again." I do not know how I will think of Mora when I have left, but as I roll my suitcase out from its corner and begin to pack it yet again, many images roll through my seemingly always hectic mind. I think of the opening ceremony of the Vasaloppet and the skiers crossing the finishing line one by one. Then of course there was the day this week when Sonja and I braved the bus system and visited the Carl Larsson house and then sat by the water with the intense sun on our backs. I can smell smoke on my clothes I wore yesterday and will so fondly remember our "Viking" outdoor picnic.

Today at the concert, Anna told us, in not so many words, how important the present moment are. Right now, we are in Mora and that is our most important place because it is what we are experiencing right now. On Saturday, we will move and then it will change again. Again, pulling out the Sami card, Nils-Aslak Valkeapaa wrote a poem entitled, "my heart is my home." Though I doubt I feel this on the same level as the Sami do, I think I'm beginning to understand what this means. I always kind of felt a bit like a wandering Nomad when I went to college- home doesn't really feel the same anymore, but a tiny dorm room really doesn't so much either. So, there I am, somewhere in the middle, one foot in, one foot back.

It feels the same but different here. I really feel like a wandering soul. I have about 6 outfits to choose from each morning when I wake up, and then I pack those 6 outfits into my big red suitcase and move again. Sometimes I wonder if maybe I should have decided to just go study on my own for a semester or a year somewhere. That way I could really connect to just one place and not feel that just as I'm "getting it" it's time to leave. But then I remember that so much of what makes this trip is the people I get to experience all of this with and the many incredible people I get to meet along my journey. I was thinking the other night, in the sauna of course, how much I love knowing that I'm not really saying goodbye to these places and people. I can't explain it, but there is a constant feeling somewhere in my soul that tells me I will be back again and I will meet these people again, one way or another. I'm so lucky.