The place we went is called Rovies. Its a village by the sea, in Northern Evoia. The magic of Northern Evoia is that it combines gorgeous sea villages and amazing mountain villages. In less than 30 minutes by car you find yourself from the pine and fir forrest with the rivers and the waterfalls to the gorgeous sea side, with lacey beaches and cute fish villages.

The most amazing thing was nature. The rebirth was everywhere. First, all the ground was covered by a green carpet of fresh grass. Then, the wildflowers were colouring the carpet with all colours you can imagine. Yellow and orange daisies, red poppies, purple and blue anemones, pink stars, anthemis that sweetened the scent of the air, and so many others that I only have the "unofficial" names in greek. Like red "starlets", small red flowers in a shape of a star, orange "tangerines" that are like tiny tiny tangerines and are fluffy, purple drops, that are really very short flowers with a bright green stem and purple drops forming a tiny bunch like grapes, bell flowers of all colours....ah you can only understand when you see, my description is too poor to give it justice really.

Then the pine and the fir trees green and glorious, and the poplars and the platans with their bear brunches full of newly formed tiny leaves, the ivy hugging their trunks.

And then, in 30 minutes, to be in the beach, the sea breeze filling your nostrils, the sun shinning, the small fish boats in the sea, ouzo smelling everywhere from the small tavers by the beach...it was really really beautiful.

We had not been there for about 4 years. Last time we were there, Angelos and the rest decided to follow the creek and find the water falls. We had been told that it was a rough path, but it was doable. I remember struggling for half the distance, and then not continuing. I saw the water falls about a week later, in the photos. I was angry, I was sad, I was depressed.

But this year, I saw the water falls. I walked all the hard path. I puffed. I struggled. I had to cross the creek at various instances by jumping from rock to rock, something I have been afraid to do all my life. But I saw the waterfalls! I have the photos to prove it!!!! And you know what? We walked for 2 hours to get there, to discover that the municipality had built a path and had curved stairs in the ground, and had put ropes on the side, so that people could go down there from the top of the hill. We were a bit disappointed to see people there! But we climbed up the stairs and took the road down to where we had left our car, so we didn't have to go all the hard path back again. It only took us 30 minutes to get back to the car, while it had taken us 4 times more to get to the waterfall!

What was a frequent image while Angelos was driving around the mountain, an image that stuck to my head really, was that in some places, under very high and huge trees, where the sun was not really getting to the ground, there were small ponds of snow. It was really strange, because of all the spring evidence, the warmth of the sun, the wildflowers.

It really made me feel like I was watching myself. Like I was watching my soul there. Like I was watching the way I feel. It was strange really, because I know how I feel of course. But to see my feelings and myself depicted like this was really sureal.

In my soul, and in most of my body there is spring. There is this strong feeling of emergence, of rebirth, of life. There is colour inside me. There is light. There is the strong willingness to live. To create. To multiply. To feel and experience. But there are dark corners still. Frozen corners. Stagnant energy. There is still snow. There is the eagerness to move. And there is the frost that sometimes makes me unable to move.

Yesterday I said that sometimes I feel like I am possessed for the way I so mindlessly eat at times. I think fear does this to me mainly. Fear of loss of life. Although I was a shiny example of eating just my apples and my veggies and rye rusks all day friday and saturday, in the taverns where Angelos was eating all kinds of yummy local delicacies and drinking wine or ouzo, I returned to Athens after the bad news and ate souvlaki on Saturday night, and lots of finger food I prepared at my inlaws house on Sunday for a "farewell" meal for the uncle amongst close relatives. And I had icecream for dinner too. And lots of sex as well. Angelos told me last night that he too felt like doing all the things alive people do in excess. But this is not a good reason to pig out :o(

It was a good day yesterday. The funeral was quiet with the sadness of the loss but the relief of him resting now instead of suffering. We saw many relatives of Angelos who do not live in Athens. We laughed after the funeral sharing funny stories of the deseased. In Greece we say that there is no wedding without tears and no funeral without laughter. I walked for 7 km in an hour in the treadmill when I woke up, I had breakfast before coffee and blogs, I ate well, I even walked for half an hour on my way home from work.

But the image of the snow under the darkness of the strong big trees stayed constantly in my mind.

I think it is about time to aknowledge those dark, frosted spots, and let the light warm them.