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Authors: Gøhril Gabrielsen
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have left the house I immediately long to be back home? Every step, every metre I put behind me, I am distancing myself not only from home but from myself. I become roomless, hollow, without roof and walls. And as I turn round, the relief, the sight of the house, everything that step by step returns and becomes alive again. And when at some point on the way back I am reunited with myself and embrace my domestic happiness, I start to laugh. How long have I been away – five minutes?
To be quite honest, why all this talk about being composted in earth and moor? I who am never outside? Even Ragna is hardly outside the door for long periods. In the summer, the mosquitoes chase us indoors; in the winter, there is the cold and the wind.
When Ragna was young, she met a man from the south at a mountain cabin out on the plateau. Apparently he remarked that she was lucky to live in the midst of this magnificent scenery, that she certainly must have many fine outdoor experiences every single day. Ragna always grinswhen she tells the story, and I can well understand that: for us who are indoors most of the time, nature is simply something that takes place outside the front door – mosquitoes that come and go, and stunted birch trees that come into leaf in spring and shed their leaves in autumn. No, it’s nothing to get all spiritual about. It’s actually the house, my room, that I don’t want to leave, and I would rather rot under the floorboards than on the boggy moorland.
To be quite honest once again, why do I insist on this urgent need to stay put? On the radio I hear about people who have to leave their homes at great speed, their own country, people who disappear, vanish, fleeing across mountains, seas and dangerous borders. To escape threats and persecution. Chased away from their work, family, bed, the cup in the cupboard.
What have I got to lose? Nothing more than my own screwed-up existence. But even that is too dear, too good, to be abandoned.
Now that Ragna has become one of those who fear having to move, will she understand my wish to stay? Will we work things out, now that the threat of banishment has become part of her life? Will we become two sisters who fix each other’s hair and do each other’s nails? Will I hold out a skein of wool while she winds it into a ball?
Out with the ointment and antiseptic, bandages and plasters – we’re a little family with pus and pain in our cuts and scratches.
*
I dream that Ragna is standing by the seashore, on a beach with fine silver grains of sand, not unlike the shore of one of the lakes near here. She is standing on a large stone, warm in the sun, fishing with calm, slow movements, unaware that I am standing in deep water further out, waving to her.
‘Catch me!’ I implore her. ‘Haul me in!’
I signal as best I can, with my arms and hands. But Ragna goes on casting without getting any nearer to me, while her catch grows bigger and bigger: great heaps of cod and coley. I begin to tire of signalling to her, my feet are sinking deeper and deeper into the soft seabed, and large fish steal round my body, ready to attack at the slightest sign of weakness. Finally, though, there is a tug at my flesh, the hook has caught a firm hold of my neck, and at a furious speed I am pulled through the cold water. As I break the surface I feel a great happiness, a rush of joy. I am in familiar surroundings again, in the light, fresh air, where I can breathe and move freely. While I lie flopping on the ground, dizzy and happy, I suddenly notice Ragna’s scrutinizing eye. She picks me up in her fists, holds me tight towards the sun, evaluates, twists and turns me, bends my arms and legs and neck, stretches me out, and finally pokes a finger into my stomach. From the displeasure on her face, I am afraid that my body is too pale, too thin, too small, too odd, but before I have time to protest, she breaks my neck, twists it round and throws me down to the other
To be quite honest, why all this talk about being composted in earth and moor? I who am never outside? Even Ragna is hardly outside the door for long periods. In the summer, the mosquitoes chase us indoors; in the winter, there is the cold and the wind.
When Ragna was young, she met a man from the south at a mountain cabin out on the plateau. Apparently he remarked that she was lucky to live in the midst of this magnificent scenery, that she certainly must have many fine outdoor experiences every single day. Ragna always grinswhen she tells the story, and I can well understand that: for us who are indoors most of the time, nature is simply something that takes place outside the front door – mosquitoes that come and go, and stunted birch trees that come into leaf in spring and shed their leaves in autumn. No, it’s nothing to get all spiritual about. It’s actually the house, my room, that I don’t want to leave, and I would rather rot under the floorboards than on the boggy moorland.
To be quite honest once again, why do I insist on this urgent need to stay put? On the radio I hear about people who have to leave their homes at great speed, their own country, people who disappear, vanish, fleeing across mountains, seas and dangerous borders. To escape threats and persecution. Chased away from their work, family, bed, the cup in the cupboard.
What have I got to lose? Nothing more than my own screwed-up existence. But even that is too dear, too good, to be abandoned.
Now that Ragna has become one of those who fear having to move, will she understand my wish to stay? Will we work things out, now that the threat of banishment has become part of her life? Will we become two sisters who fix each other’s hair and do each other’s nails? Will I hold out a skein of wool while she winds it into a ball?
Out with the ointment and antiseptic, bandages and plasters – we’re a little family with pus and pain in our cuts and scratches.
*
I dream that Ragna is standing by the seashore, on a beach with fine silver grains of sand, not unlike the shore of one of the lakes near here. She is standing on a large stone, warm in the sun, fishing with calm, slow movements, unaware that I am standing in deep water further out, waving to her.
‘Catch me!’ I implore her. ‘Haul me in!’
I signal as best I can, with my arms and hands. But Ragna goes on casting without getting any nearer to me, while her catch grows bigger and bigger: great heaps of cod and coley. I begin to tire of signalling to her, my feet are sinking deeper and deeper into the soft seabed, and large fish steal round my body, ready to attack at the slightest sign of weakness. Finally, though, there is a tug at my flesh, the hook has caught a firm hold of my neck, and at a furious speed I am pulled through the cold water. As I break the surface I feel a great happiness, a rush of joy. I am in familiar surroundings again, in the light, fresh air, where I can breathe and move freely. While I lie flopping on the ground, dizzy and happy, I suddenly notice Ragna’s scrutinizing eye. She picks me up in her fists, holds me tight towards the sun, evaluates, twists and turns me, bends my arms and legs and neck, stretches me out, and finally pokes a finger into my stomach. From the displeasure on her face, I am afraid that my body is too pale, too thin, too small, too odd, but before I have time to protest, she breaks my neck, twists it round and throws me down to the other
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