We come from a land down under...

(This is from a few weeks ago when Tetovo was shrouded in what felt like an eon of fog--but was perhaps 2 sun-less, smog-full months).

First: a little griping about the weather. (and no. no kangaroos).

Driving up the mountainside outside Tetovo, there comes this point where it looks like the view has bi-polar disorder: above, blue blue blue skies with unbelievable visibility. Rarely have I seen the sky so clean around Tetovo. And below, well, it looks like the perfect setting for a horror movie where something ominous is about to emerge out of thick fog. Climbing a little further up, we stood looking down into the valley. Usually Tetovo stretches out, from the base of the mountains into the plains surrounding the city, with the highway, winding through some hills to Skopje. But today--it was an entirely different landscape. As if the entire valley--across the valley well past Skopje, up the valley to Gostivar, and down the valley towards the Kosovo border--had been completely  filled up with grey soup--the kind of fog in J. Alfred Prufrock which curls around our street corners and falls asleep. The tops of mountains were reduced to the archipelago in some strange, new ocean, and Tetovo, a submerged city (Atlantis? perhaps a bit of a stretch). Across this 'sea' from us was a spectacular panorama of mountains, seen from a distance.

and the city had disappeared. completely.

a little fount of cloud/smog/fog above the Jugochrom factory (controversial neighborhood polluter) just east of town, was the only indication that there was  something under this sea. (and, no doubt, doing its part to add to the rising sea levels.)

as we broke the mjegull (fog) barrier, I could feel our spirits skyrocket; laughing, we shed layers--usually necessary for the damp cold of the fog--positioning ourselves, stretched out like cats, to capture the most sun. Up, above the fog, it felt like an entirely new day, totally unconnected to the day we had began below, sugmurged in fog.

Crossing back through the fog, on our way home, was painful. Again, within the span of 15 m, the world changed completely. Vibrant colors were replaced with hazy, muted shades of grey, the car ahead of us became two parallel red lights winding down the hill.

Sitting in our apartment, I can't imagine weather less inspiring than this grey. There's plenty of natural light. but no sun. no variation. no passing of the day. an absence of time--or at least natural time. the mechanical time counts off each second. not eagerly. not patiently. just counting.
and perhaps with much less predictability, I too am counting until we can reemerge from under the curtain of fog for another reminder of what color, light and liveliness are all about.