At Home and Abroad

Reader mail on Norway, Utah, Michigan, etc.

The University of Michigan Marching Band forms its block ‘M’ (Photo by Ajay Suresh)

Do you want to do some mail every once in a while? Regularly? For many years—around 25, I would say—I have published reader mail, on all sorts of subjects. If you care to write to me, the address is mail@jaynordlinger.com. If you have another address for me (there are several), heck, use that. If you do not hear back from me, the problem may be technological. Hound me at the address given above.

Okay, let’s get going.

Last month, I had an Oslo journal, in three parts (here, here, and here). A reader writes,

Your journal brought back memories of my first trip to Oslo. It was in the summer of 1975 +/-.

Whoa—sounds like we’re doing math (not easy for me).

Our reader continues,

In those days, you found accommodations by going to the local tourist bureau where there was a listing of approved places. After a phone call, the woman at the tourist bureau gave my partner and me a map indicating the location of our new B&B.

An elderly woman answered the door and showed us to our room. She asked whether we wanted dinner later on down in the basement. We said yes, but I was skeptical of the whole thing.

After exploring Oslo, we returned and eventually went down to dinner. The cellar was dark except for numerous candles on this large dining-room table. There were four other guests. I forget the meal, but not the conversation.

This senior lady had been a costume-maker for early ABBA. She also told the story of how resistance fighters used her cabin in the woods for shelter while fighting the Nazis.

I asked her why she opened her house to strangers at this time in her life. She said that she could either watch the world pass by her window or bring the outside into her home. She chose the latter.

This happened about 50 years ago and I still remember it as a high point of my long life as a traveler.

Another reader writes,

I spent the summer of 1969 at the University of Oslo, Blindern, a 20-minute ride on the tram from downtown Oslo. As a bonus, my brother’s in-laws lived in Oslo and were wonderful hosts to me.

Your journal brought back some very fond memories. City Hall. Sculpture gardens. Museums. Beer gardens. We are talkin’ nirvana for a college student.

Though not as “cosmopolitan” as Stockholm or Copenhagen, Oslo was my favorite Scandinavian capital.

Watched the moon landing at 3 a.m. Read about Chappaquiddick in the International Herald Tribune. As an American, was heckled by Norwegians in a bar because of the Vietnam War.

I do plan to get back to Oslo with my wife of Swedish heritage and also to visit the places of her ancestors.

Sounds good.

A different topic. Writes Nick Chickering,

Jay, did you know my brother, Lawry Chickering, who spent a lot of time with Bill Buckley? Lawry died last year but was always part of Bill’s vast circle of friends.

Lawry, Bill, and Milton Friedman skied every year for 19 years in a row at Alta, Utah, the third week of January. I often joined them. It was four days of fun.

Below is a photo taken by Junior Bounous, the founder of the Snowbird Ski School, who always skied with us when we were there. Junior is now 99 and skis three days a week, still.

Marvelous. I did not know Lawry Chickering, I’m sorry to say, but I certainly knew of him.

Oh, and here’s the photo:

Writes a reader,

On a trip to New York City, I passed Mr. Buckley on the street. I recognized him, of course, and wanted to turn around and say hello. Unfortunately, my natural reluctance to bother people won out and I didn’t do it.

When I returned home to North Carolina, I wrote him a letter, telling him that I regretted not saying hello, and also telling him how much his work had meant to me when I was growing up. He wrote me back an amazingly kind letter, which included an invitation to visit him the next time I was in New York.

Sadly, I never got the chance to return to NYC before Mr. Buckley passed in 2008.

My contact with him was minor, maybe, but very meaningful to me.

Over the years, I have written about the arts and their boundaries—if, in fact, they have boundaries. Andy Warhol said, “Art is what you can get away with.”

A reader writes,

When my bride and I were dance students, we had to watch a film of an avant-garde choreographer’s work. The piece was ridiculous and had nothing whatsoever to do with dance. Call it “performance art,” I suppose. The piece consisted of people in what looked like white pajamas leaning on one another, falling down, getting up, leaning on one another, falling down . . .

I remember thinking, “This is not what I sweat at the barre for every day.”

Striking line, that last.

A reader begins his letter,

As a Buckeye born and bred, I find it difficult to admit about a Wolverine,
but . . .

Our Buckeye goes on to say some positive things about yours truly, born and bred in the state above. (I mean this in a purely geographical sense.)

Another reader says,

Jay, is a Michigander a Midwestern or an Easterner?

Oh, a Midwesterner (or an Upper Midwesterner, if you like). But do you know how the University of Michigan fight song ends? It was written in 1898 and it ends, “Hail, hail, to Michigan, the champions of the West.”

Americans’ concept of the West would move . . . westward.

A man writes,

Although a plaintiff’s lawyer and (therefore) a Democrat, I very much enjoy your columns.

I thought the first part of the sentence was charming.

There’s a lot more mail, on subjects grave and light, but maybe that’s enough at one go? Let’s have a quick, final note.

A longtime reader (but new-time correspondent) says,

You’re the reason my elementary-school children know the difference between being nauseous and being nauseated.

I think of a song:

If I can help somebody as I pass along;
If I can cheer somebody with a word or song;
If I can show somebody he is traveling wrong,
Then my living shall not be in vain.

To hear Bryn Terfel sing it, go here. And thanks to all.