Anders enjoyed his second birthday party today. He had both his grandmas, Grandpa Greg, and Anna and Jon there. Yes, Anders calls us Anna and Jon to wind us (Anna) up. He can fully enunciate "Grandma" and "Grandpa" too.
We had a 60th anniversary party for Anna's maternal grandparents. Congratulations to Dennis Lokken and Joyce (Ytterboe) Lokken. We found out that the minister who married them later became a librarian/professor at Luther and a member of our church in Decorah, First Lutheran. The Saab driving-leather jacket wearing-straight talking Leigh Jordahl. I must have told him around my sophomore year at Luther that I wanted to get a Ph.D. in history. Thereafter, every time I saw him, he didn't say "hi." Instead, he immediately started where he left off the last time trying to convince me that doing so was a bad career choice. He was also my friend Chris Hein's Paideia professor.
Tomorrow Mamie and Matt Airplane will come out to celebrate Anders' birthday. Anders still talks in hushed, reverent tones about his aunt Mamie Airplane.
We were going to leave on Wednesday, but our stuff has not left Ohio so we will stay in MN another day. Our stuff was picked up a week ago and delivered to a Columbus area warehouse, but it has yet to be assigned a driver. One would think that in the age of computerized logistics a complex algorithm would exist whereby our stuff would depart for Texas soon after it arrived in the warehouse. Yet, the way "Bev" at Atlas Van Lines explained the process, it sounds like our stuff will leave for the Lone Star State whenever Bill or Billy or Mac or Buddy decides to amble in and mosey down to Houston. So, we're going to cut down on the number of nights we camp in our house. I still have faith that our stuff will arrive, but Anna isn't so sure anymore.
"Nordic Dancers" aka "The Section Where I Reminisce About Decorah And Anna Asks What It Has To Do With Anders When She Reads This Post In Two Months"
Today is also the one year anniversary of the death of my old Nordic Dancers pal and DHS tennis doubles partner, Chris "Speez" Spilde. I've thought about him often over the past year. I remember in particular one dark summer night driving back from Chillicothe last summer I heard an obscure song from the 60s, something KVIK would only play late on a Saturday night and I felt his presence. It sounds weird, but it made the hairs on my neck stand up.
Then last week, I found out via Facebook that the two year old son of one of my old Nordic Dancing partners, Mary (Grimstad) ben Ari's son Arthur, had a brain tumor. The doctor thought it demonstrated characteristics of a benign tumor, but they won't know for sure until tomorrow. He had surgery on Friday and they were able to take most of it out. He will still have to have chemo regardless of whether it's benign or not, just to make sure they zap it.
I went to see them on Friday, despite not having seen his mother since our 5 year high school reunion. I know firsthand that it's nice to have visitors even if they are somewhat random. Arthur is a sweet kid, he insisted on shaking my hand even from his hospital bed. Mary was surprised to see me.
I carried a lot of Anders-related baggage into that room. On my drive down, I told myself two things: 1. Talk minimally about yourself 2. DO NOT CRY! These are the two worst behaviors by guests of sick babies/toddlers. It's about them not you, and the stressed out parents should not be the ones comforting anyone. While you might imagine that not talking about myself was the harder trick, it was actually not crying. The other person does want to hear tell of the outside world, but not ad nauseam. I welled up and one point, but I didn't crack.
I enjoyed dancing with Mary back in the glory days. Get ready for boring stories... We were postcardized under the Maypole as we marched in the parade during Nordic Fest 1990, a postcard that you could still buy in Vanberia as of last summer. We made it in the Decorah newspaper a couple times dancing the "Old Rhinelander." I had bad rhythm and was heavy on my feet, but my enthusiastic bull-in-China-shop antics were infectious to some people, including Mary. She appreciated showmanship as she later majored in theatre at NYU. I especially liked having Mary as my assigned Old Rhinelander (it's a dance we did at each performance, which is one of the best loved dances in all of Norway and one of my personal favorites (the inside jokes are pretty heavy in this post, especially for people who don't even know what a "Decorah" is)) during our sullen teenage years. I had the teen angst like anyone, but when it was time to perform, we had a show to do, damn it (If you don't understand, write a letter with a self-addressed stamped envelop and he'll explain it for you. Hi Dan!). A lot of the other dancers remained sullen or too cool for school, but since I wasn't cool or pretending to be cool, I owned it. Now, Mary was more sullen and cooler than me. We did not fraternize outside Nordic Dancers, but I could almost always make her laugh. I would do a funny face or tell her that I had just farted, something outlandish like that to crack the facade. Those sorts of things horrified most of the other girls, which is why I had few dance partners. I know it's a long digression, but my visit put a smile on Mary's face, which was all I was ever trying to do.
