Wednesday

22 March 2017

— Sweet Basil now up two inches in the windowsill garden Esther gave me for my birthday.

Good Morning All,

With one major fly (more like a dung beetle) in the ointment, yesterday’s jam-packed schedule was a total success. I hopped in the car around noon, not long after sending off the Day Book, got two clocks and a couple of picture frames at Ikea, and made it to the Copenhagen Main Station just on 2:00 to meet my friend Anna, the better for us to repair to the All-You-Can-Snarf Pizza Emporium for lunch and a pleasant chat.

The new school building lived up to its impressive pictures by being just about the ugliest new edifice to go up in Denmark over the past ten years. This is saying something,  since present-day Danish architects seem on a mission to neutralize the beauty and grace of Denmark’s historical buildings.

I met Lorenz, one of my English Department colleagues and friend, as he was leaving the building to go pick up his daughter for piano lessons, but he nevertheless took the time to guide me up to the English department on the third floor, where Becca, another colleague and friend, gave me a big smile, and the three of us picked up the conversation from where we’d left off last time. Very good to be back with them!

After that, I  ran into at least a dozen old colleagues and friends who seemed quite happy to see me. A highlight was a student coming up to shake my hand and tell me I’d taught his brother and was a legend in their family. Happily, I recognized the family resemblance and we compared Red Sox notes and hopes, since he, his brother, and the whole family are members of Red Sox Nation.

The dung beetle showed up when I returned to my car and had a parking ticket, which I did not deserve. But so what? Only for 650 Danish kroner, a mere $94.20. For a bleeding parking ticket! Still, a mere pittance for a retired fellow like myself.

After consulting my courage level, I decided against going to the location of our old house in search of daffodil bulbs. My car, however, had different ideas, and then there I was turning on to Hultoften. I held my breath around the last bend. Holy Toledo! Everything else was gone! I was looking at a field of mud covered in heavy equipment tracks. Very weird feeling. Where I'd spent thirty years, there was nothing but air.

Well, not quite nothing. The new owner had pruned the apple tree I’d planted for Britta, but it was still there. No sign at all, unfortunately, of any daffodils in progress. Disappointed, I walked down to Jakob’s, my neighbor at the bottom of the orchard. He was just coming out to fetch his daughter from dancing class. Awfully nice seeing him again! When I told him I’d come in search of daffodils but had not found any, he asked why. I said I guessed they all got plowed under. He grinned and said, “So whaddaya think those are?” He pointed to two large earthenware pots, which contained—he explained—Mormor’s daffodils in the larger one, and the frontyard bulbs Britta and I had planted back in 1986, and which had come up every year since. He’d dug them all up the same day the heavy equipment arrived. If I eventually find a neighbor here even half as kind and caring as Jakob, I shall be a lucky fellow!

Then home to a fine natter with Lowell, smiling backgammon dice, and I purchased a painting from him, the one I liked the best of the couple of dozen I like a lot! He is probably putting it into the post even as we speak.

Go Well and Stay Well,

Bhekaron