Author: lizardek

25
Jun
2005

MIDSUMMER MADNESS

The weather cooperated and for one of the very few times in the 8 midsummers I’ve celebrated in Sweden, everything went off just right under a warm summer sun. Everywhere you looked, blue and yellow flags and pennants were snapping gaily in the breeze. We met up with a group of Anders’ old friends in Älmhult, a little village 2 hours north of us, and celebrated a compleat midsummer, rife with the smell of strawberries, wildflowers and sunshine. We joined the village celebration and were treated to accordion music, the sight of ladies young and old sporting flower wreaths in...

24
Jun
2005

SMÅ GRODARNA

Bathing suits, sunscreen, mosquito spray are packed. 4 different kinds of herring are pickled and layered in goodness in their mason jars. I’m drooling for strawberries and cream. Off to dance around the midsummer pole! It’s hot! I’m melting! Yay Sweden, for finally coming through on summer! Wonderful, Wild and Wooly Birthday Wishes to verian!

23
Jun
2005

LESSONS IN LOVE

What if I’d married the first man who told me he loved me too fast? He told me after just a few weeks of going steady, my junior year in high school…he told me he could see us getting married, having kids. He joined a bible study group and a choir because I was in them, despite his authority-snubbing long hair and worship of hard rock. He wrote nice things about me in the school paper and took me to dances. The thing is, I’m pretty sure even now that he was sincere and not just trying to get into...

22
Jun
2005

SUMMER SOUNDS

We’re starting down the long, darkening slope of the year as of today. It’s hard to believe that this is as good as it gets. When it’s this sunny and warm and light out, when the birds are chirping at 3 a.m. and the grass is growing at amazing rates, there is no possibility of winter, of long, dreary days of darkness. I’m a bit ashamed of myself that the lightest day of the year is a symbol meaning that’s it, it’s over now, and we’re on the way back down into the darkness. Of course, around December 21st, my...

21
Jun
2005

CALLING CALDECOTT! NEWBERY! PULITZER!

Martin Ek, aged 7.5, would like to invite you to an exclusive web premiere of his masterpiece novel. As his mother, I’m eagerly donning my best prodigy agent-slash-manager hat. My kid blows me away! Prepare to be blown away yourself! On the Road, or literally, “Out Traveling”

20
Jun
2005

:(

I’m so bummed out I can hardly see straight. Anders is allergic to dogs.

19
Jun
2005

I MISS YOU, DAD

My father, John Whitney Slaughter (1940-1996), with HIS father, Danely Philip Slaughter (1911-1970), c. 1941

18
Jun
2005

THE REAL MIRACLE IS NOT TO WALK EITHER ON WATER OR IN THIN AIR BUT TO WALK ON THE EARTH

Today = perfect. Perfect weather, so unbelievably perfect that if I could bottle it in a tiny, frosted, gold-corked decanter that I could then hang around my neck on a thin golden chain so that it nestled just so, and open the bottle whenever I was feeling a bit down to uncork some of the blueblueBLUE sky, sunshine, and sparkle, and take a BIG sniff, I would be perfectly happy forever and ever. Nicolai Tower Founded by Bishop Absalon, archbishop of Roskilde (and Lund!) in the 12th century, Copenhagen is a fascinating, beautiful, lively city. King Christian IV, the great...

17
Jun
2005

ADMITTANCES

As I was walking back to the car after dropping the kids off this morning, I passed a green corner of well-cared for, summer-leafed shrubs. No one was near me, but I could hear a snuffly panting low-voiced hih hih hih. I looked around, a bit perplexed. It was coming from under the shrubs. Perhaps the Toby lookalike that hangs out at the daycare occasionally was huffing up an early-morning hairball? I bent down and looked under the skirts of the shrubbery. 2 pairs of button eyes glanced my way before returning to their amorous activities. Hedgehog Love! Why can...

16
Jun
2005

ONE FOR MY INNER CHILD

I think that it must be some sort of parental overcompensation to want to buy your children all the things you never had when YOU were a kid. Especially the toys. I mean, I ALSO want to share with them all the things I had and loved, like certain books,* and Spirograph, and Etch-a-Sketch. But when I stop and think about it, who did I really buy that Slip-n-Slide for last week? We’ve been kicking around the idea of getting one of those gigantic bone-breakers trampolines for the kids for the last year or so, and I think if we...

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