Grey sky, 2 degrees and a light rain, Sunday still

I suppose that knowing someone from another culture, knowing someone for many years who has a different starting point, gives one a window into a different life.  Maybe. The window isn't large and isn't always open.  Its a window, not a door. To be a door it takes years and oftentimes learning a language, a culture, a history. Still a window is enough. The window not only lets light in, but lets light shine out. It lets one peer in to get a glimpse of how life is somewhere else.  This is one of the gifts of travel and of relationships between continents. There are many ways to be human.

Sunday Anne left for church and I stayed behind to write and just be. A half hour before worship I put on my jacket, locked her door, then began to walk down to her congregation, Voksen sogn, Voksen Parish, in a light drizzle.  The church bells rang, signaling many things: the beginning of worship, the role of religion, the call to community, the relationship here of church and state, perhaps simply a beautiful tone. The liturgy was instantly recognizable.  The place was packed.  Three baptisms that day.  Great music with piano and trumpet.  Proud parents in traditional Norwegian clothing (Bunad) Then she gave her sermon on Christ the King Sunday, the end of the church year, with the text of Matthew 25, "you did it to me when you did it to the least of these."

Anne is beloved in her parish. And she in turn loves them. Multiple people told me in very good English how much they liked and loved her as their pastor. Good.

After cookies and coffee and conversation we drove home, up the hill for a nap, then to watch a Swedish film, "Sa Som i Himmelen" (as it is in heaven) about a famous conductor and his small town, to which he returns after a heart attack, to recover, then to come to terms with his childhood and his life by teaching a small church choir how to sing, how to gain their voice.  We both cried.

Afterwards we shared a dinner of white fish, vegetables, aquavit, wheat beer.  A full good day.

Two days left.  I can already feel the "turn" to home.  Its only fitting that if the flights work, I come home on the eve before Thanksgiving, the day of my daughter's birth 17 years ago.

The baptism at the Voksen church