Maybe I should title this, 'Sweden: There and Back Again'.
I've wanted to go since I was nine years old and found a copy
of 'Great Swedish Fairy Tales' at the library. It was
illustrated by John Bauer, and I was in love with his work
-- and Sweden -- from then on.
My ancient John Bauer Page
My friend
Jesse Hamm, though, had thoughtfully become engaged
to a lovely Swedish girl he met in a Christian Comic Book Creator's
chat room, asked me to be best man at his wedding and provided
an opportunity to go, at last, to Sweden ( that was the
"all about me" version, but, hey, any excuse, right? ).
Here they are
mugging for the camera
at a grocery store
in Vadstena, Sweden.
^_^
The flight out there was achingly DULL.
NINE HOURS in a cramped
plane seat. That's the price one pays for travel to Europe.
I sat between Peter and Paul -- which was comforting, I suppose.
Paul was from the Czech Republic and hardly spoke. He fingered his
wedding-band and slept most of the trip. Peter was from Germany.
His life-long dream was to come to America, and visit Graceland &
The Grand Ol' Opry in Nashville. He had a huge Elvis-like pompadour
and was wearing cowboy boots and a black western shirt with long
white fringe; Kind of a character. He hardly knew any English,
but he talked a lot more than Paul. I didn't get any sleep the whole
nine hours. They showed a Bowdlerized version of 'In Good Compay',
which I hadn't seen. It was 'aiight'. SOMEbody swiped my Ray-Bans
while I was on the plane, so I was half-blind for most of the trip.
Klubbensborg, the place where I stayed the first night and would be
staying Sunday and Monday, is really lovely, lilacs blooming wildly.
It's a hostel, so it's pretty rustic and you have to provide your own
towels and bed-linens, but it's right on Lake Mälaren and my room
faced the boat-docks. It was chilly, but I left the window open
the whole night. Mind you, I didn't sleep at all! It didn't get dark
until nearly midnight, and it started getting brighter at around 2am!
About 10:30 p.m., six local boys boisterously took a small motor boat
out on the lake. Around 12:30, four of them came back, still boisterous.
I was envious of their fun, but I was far too fatigued to have enjoyed
it very much. I did wonder what happened to those other two boys... (!?)
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