Memory Lane

Another sunny day had me singing praises to God for hours on end.  We couldn’t stay indoors, knowing the hours were fading fast before cloud cover took over, so we opted out of cleaning the house (even though company was coming) and went for a walk in the sunshine.

The path we took today was the one we discovered last week on another outing.  It’s a path along the shoreline, somewhat, around the tip of the island where Kory grew up.  Kory remembers from childhood going in that area to pick wild hazelnuts, and sure enough, there was an entire forest of hazelnuts all along where we walked.  We even found some still on the tree that we picked for old times sake.  It was a special day for Kory, remembering the times he did that.  He said they brought them home and dried them, saving them for Christmas as a special treat.

From one side of the island to the other takes about three hours at a good clip, but we thought we’d just walk for an hour and see where it took us, then turn around and head back to the car.  As it turned out, we walked so close to the shore at one point, not far into our journey, that we decided we simply must get out of the woods and head for that glorious sunshine.

The rocky shore provided plenty of places to lay back and relax as the rocks were bigger than cars.  The sun was actually warm enough that I took off my shirt to maximize my Vitamin D intake, and Kory just got buck naked and walked around like it was the most natural thing for him to do.  At least going topless is Norway is the norm, but the Full Monty is not.  He was having a great time hopping on rocks and eating lunch in the nude.  He made me laugh.

We could have stayed all day but we were up against the time constraints of Kaleb coming home from school, so we only sunbathed about an hour before we made the big turn back to the car.  There was no one else on the trail and no boats went by the in water, but we could see from the evidence around us that where we were was a forgotten place that once had farms, mills and boat houses.  It was all long abandoned and overgrown now.   The moss on the rocks was at least four inches thick in some places and the trees have taken over areas that were once cleared for farming.  Kinda sad in a way, but also kinda cool that the rock walls were still standing and foundations to buildings haven’t crumbled.

Kaleb actually beat us home as he had a big PE day at school and got out a little early.  The whole school competed in different athletic events and they actually give cash prizes to the classes that won.  It was like track and field Olympics where they had to run 2 kilometers, do the long jump, run relays, shot put and all kinds of events.  He loved it and it was the perfect day for such a thing and he got his wiggles out before he came home, so that was good for me.

We had to clean up the house a bit tonight – running things down to storage and hanging up pictures we’d yet hung up.  Kory’s cousin (from his father’s side), Ingebjørg from Bergen, is now here for three days so we couldn’t have the place looking like we normally do.  Cousin Odd (from his mother’s side) came over earlier for a little visit, but he doesn’t notice the dust bunnies under the couch or the dirty socks on the floor, as I’m sure Ingebjørg would.

Ingebjørg arrived late tonight so I made soup for “kvelds mat” while Kory went to pick her up at the airport.  We didn’t have long to visit before bedtime, but tomorrow there will be plenty of time for that.  I think Kory will be showing her around a little as my to-do list needs some attention and most of it requires quiet time, so Kory definitely needs to be out of the house for that.  And the last time she came for a visit was in America, just two weeks after we got home from living in Norway for a year.  Kory was flat on his broken back and couldn’t do a thing, so I was the tourist guide then.  Now it’s his turn.