Pia, the woman I am doing volunteer work for met me at the train station in Floby. Her place is about 5 km from Floby, on a beautiful forested road. Her house used to be the local school that housed the unmarried ‘spinster’ who taught the younger children in one classroom, as well as the married male teacher who taught the older students in another classroom. He and his wife and their eight children all lived in a space now occupied by only 2 people! Pia has spent the last several years remodeling the building, creating a space for herself as well as an apartment she rents out and rooms for workaway volunteers who help with her animals and other activities like gardening and foraging for berries and mushrooms in the local forests.
The house is situated next to an old church with a small, well tended graveyard. I met Giorgia, a young woman from Italy who volunteered for four months with Pia last year and is now back to help out and to housesit while Pia goes to work on a film down in the far south of Sweden later this month (she is a make up artist who has worked on films all over the world). I also met her two dogs and two cats that I will be helping to take care of. They are all rescues, and the dogs in particular had come from very abusive households. Pomona is the newest dog and can take a while to feel comfortable with strangers. We got on well though, she was soon licking my hand, and when I sat next to her she kept putting her paw on my leg. I’m sure it helped that I fed her dinner and give her a treat. Aldona, or Donnie for short, is a former hunting dog, a type of Spanish greyhound who was basically left to starve to death. He was skin and bones when Pia adopted him and has now more doubled his weight. Despite having been abused in many ways, including getting his teeth kicked out from one side of his mouth, he is very sweet and loves to be petted. He is very self-conscious about eating and has to be fed after all the other animals so that he can do it in private, also Pomona will eat all of Donnie’s food and the cat food as well if she gets the chance! I haven’t had much of a chance to get acquainted with the cats yet, Scampi and Smullen, siblings who are purring machines.
After I learned about the feeding routine, I got settled in to my temporary home, which is the apartment upstairs that is normally rented by an Italian engineer, but he is on vacation for the next week so I get my own flat! Later on I will move into the bedroom downstairs for the remainder of my stay.
The church bells rang out at 7 PM, apparently that they go off at 7 AM and 7 PM every day. I got to know Pia and Giorgia as we made dinner, delicious shrimp crêpes with a very tasty cheese topping and salad. I discovered that both Pia and Giorgia love to play card and board games, like me, so we played several rounds of Skip Bo and had a blast. It is so much fun to have people who enjoy games! Before I knew it, it was dark outside, and we all headed to bed – it was almost midnight at that point!
