Home again

Quiet Monday. Back from my trip to Norway and spending the day with my son. We are eating and making meals together, catching up on our news of the week, and our laundry, etc. I missed him! He's good at asking questions: What did you like best in Norway? What did you do in Norway that you wished you could do here? What are some of the things you and Megan did together? He's slow to acknowledge the moment and avoids "the big deal" conversation to "wrap up" an event. That is, if he's just played a nail-biter hockey game he doesn't want to dissect it right away and really just mumbles a few words of acknowledgment, but then later as the weekend unfolds we'll hear bits and pieces from him. So when I returned Saturday evening he wasn't all full of enthusiasm; just gave me a hug and asked if I had a good time and then stuck his nose in a book. He would fit in just fine in Norway, the land of the understated folks.

I must say next to seeing Megan and enjoying the beauty of Oslo, the thing I liked best was not working. When I heard her teachers and classmates discussing the Norwegian 6-hour workday, I nearly welled up in tears. How sane! How civilized! And then there is that infamous maternity/paternity leave. All over the city I saw well-rested mothers and fathers pushing high-end strollers around the parks and cafes; with so much time off for baby care I also guessed that they also had time to develop friendships with other new parents. So much of the American new parent experience is alone--and is often an abrupt shift from the race and hoo-wa of the working experience. We work right up until we give birth and then after the celebratory visits from parents and friends we're left alone in our houses and yards to tend to and fend for a new life. We walk the sidewalks or the aisles of Target often alone. Once I remember being so tired and lonely after a trying day of feeding, changing, rocking, feeding and changing that I just stayed in my husband's green checkered robe all day, and by the time he got home from work I was a mess. What a different scene from those healthy, active, sociable parents I saw in all the parks in Oslo.

I loved learning the transit systems and how clean and dependable the trains, trams, and busses were. They ran often so that we never waited more than 7 minutes as we worked our way east, west, north, and south around the city. Imagine our light rail line times 100.

I loved seeing the Norwegians face the sun. They've had a long winter of dark and snow--record amounts of snowfall--and so with the longer sunny days they sat out on benches and chairs and on blankets on the grass with their necks jutted out and their faces opened to the sun like river turtles on rocks. Seemed everywhere I looked there was a Norwegian sitting beside me with his face up, eyes closed, and an ever-so-slight, Mona Lisa-like grin on his face. I spent a whole afternoon on my own at the Botanical Garden and after walking through the rock gardens, the Japanese Garden, and the Magnolia Grove, I layed out on the grassy knoll with a half-dozen other visitors. A Norwegian man in office clothes rode up to the area on his bike, pulled a rolled blanket out of his bike basket and opened it up onto a spot. Then he proceeded to take off all his clothes--black suitcoat, white buttoned shirt, black pants, socks and shoes--until he was down to his tight white speedo-looking undies, and layed in the sun for about half an hour. I had to chuckle looking over. Then he got up, put back on all his clothes, shook out the grass from his blanket, rolled it up and took off on his bike.

I was out hiking the hills or along the river or down the stairways to the markets every day and I've not set foot off my porch here since I've been back home. I feel tired and sluggish and a little wistful. It's beautiful out and I should be digging in my garden and flower beds. But I don't feel like being industrious just yet.

There is a Norwegian phrase that I've forgotten but that is illustrative of the Norwegian spirit, and it translates to "actively relaxing." It is an intentional spirit of relaxing, a way of planning for the day but with the goal of relaxing--and not having anything to "show" for it. They are big on day picnics that move into building and watching bonfires near the waters at night. They spend a good deal of time sitting and chatting and looking contentedly on all around them. Hours. In their underwear, too, if they like. You'd think I'd have thought more about this phrase before my trip and maybe I have. But when I saw the concept in action I think, in answer to Tim's question, that is what I want to bring back into my life here at home.