As 2022 arrives, we’re ready to unlock a new year full of unknown moments and events, and hopes and dreams to turn into plans.

With the world still in pandemic chaos, a lot of items on my calendar are written in pencil, underlined twice, and accompanied with a fat question mark.

As I mentioned before, my word for 2022 will be ‘Focus’. It’s a bit funny that the word to focus on is ‘focus’, isn’t it? 🙂
The main subject to practice the 2022-word on will be my work. Since all my plans for 2020 got disrupted by a pandemic, I’ve felt very challenged with finding focus in both my work and my life and I have given myself the freedom to be all over the place. This creative freedom has been both great for brewing new plans and ideas and to get some of the Covid-stress off my shoulders, but at the same time, it’s hard work to get a ship back on route after drifting. With 2022 arriving, I’m ready for some kind of Renaissance :-).
(And as I mentioned in my previous post, I already started with regular yoga practice- and Oh that feels good!)

There are definitely days where I swear and yammer: “Where the fuck did my old life go to?!” In those moments, it feels like I have lost myself, or at least a part of what made me Fenne. I’d just take the train to Copenhagen or Stockholm to wander around, I’d go to sketching evenings and galleries in Antwerp, bookstores and cities, and meeting up with friends all over Europe. I was able to work more or less everywhere and connect with all kinds of people. I could take my godchild to a musical and eat fries indoors at a friend’s house.

With the idea that this too shall pass, I have to keep in mind what kind of phoenix will rise from these ashes. Into what kind of person will this situation transform me?

A few weeks ago, I was making some red-colored pompons for holiday decorations in the studio and while fluffing up this ball of yarn, all I could think about it how it looked like a covid virus. Things like pandemics affect us and change us all, I don’t think there is any escaping, even for those who pretend there is nothing going on. Of course, pompons are just a silly example, but at the moment I am reading a book called “Pale rider, the Spanish flu of 1918 and how it changed the world” and looking at a similar situation from the past, invites to a better understanding of some current events.

While it’s hard to share all the unsure and question-marked plans, I do want to wish you all a very healthy new year with a lot of creative inspiration, curiosity, and warm friendships. 2022 will need a good dose of hope and courage. Probably some more patience too 🙂
Perhaps we’ll find a way to turn this shitshow into our version of the roaring twenties, who knows!

Happy New Year!

Creative greetings,
Fenne

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