Even here in “water, water everywhere.,” the day’s rhythm is like that of any…
Hyggelig 3: From Counterculture Colors to the Black Diamond
Christianshavn is a relic of 17th-century development. Thus its shape is that of a segment of a circle with the København Havn (the redundant “Merchants Harbor Port”) representing the chord and Stadsgraven Canal forming the arc. Originally a moat protecting the...
Books # 16 & 17 in 2018: Memoirs by Daughters Who Survived—Tara Westover and Jeanette Walls
Violence, incest, abuse of every stripe: such horrors fill both narratives by these relatively young writers. In the words too are moving reflections on salvation: the selfless love and sacrifice of siblings, the insight and enduring patience of peers and educators;...
Hyggelig 2: Bulls and Dragons
My Dear One pointed it out to me on our first stroll: “Mr. Softee.” The spire of the of Børsen, the Old Stock Exchange, with its quartet of dragons, tails entwined, does indeed look at first glance like an attenuated tower of soft-serve ice cream. Above the dragons,...
Hyggelig 1: Living Cozy
Apartment 1 in the Central Canal Apartments, Wildersgade, 15, in the Christianshavn neighborhood in Copenhagen is snug. No rugs for bugs and no room for much else. A rack accommodates clothes on hangers but stuff that would go into drawers must stay in suitcases. The...
Books # 14 & 15 in 2018: Stories in “The Weardale Sagas” by Elizabeth Gill
Y’know how it goes with social media. One thing leads to another and suddenly you are Facebook Friends with someone you haven’t seen or communicated with in forty-nine years. Elizabeth Gill joined the class of 1969 at Emma Willard School in Troy, New York, as an...
Book # 13 in 2018: “Meetings With Remarkable Manuscripts” by Christopher de Hamel
At the time I was about halfway through this wonderful book, my Dear One and I were watching an episode of Homeland, a political thriller starring Mandy Patinkin and Clare Danes. I’ll admit it—it’s the seventh season and we’re into it. At that particular moment (the...
Book # 12 in 2018: “The Good Good Pig” by Sy Montgomery
I read Sy Montgomery’s Soul of an Octopus (2016) and it permanently decreased my options on the sushi menu. The Good Good Pig: The Extraordinary Life of Christopher Hogwood (Ballantine/Random House, 2006) may not permanently put me off pork, but it will make me...