Ambiance

My husband, Kory, retired two weeks before our son was born, so for over ten years we had no schedule, no alarm clock, no rushing out of the house in the morning. Most every day we’d sit at our dining room table, look out over the Skagit Valley while leisurely drinking a cup of coffee and talk about what the day would bring. Sometimes when Kaleb and I homeschooled, we’d stay in our pajamas all day. Our lives in Norway were everything BUT that. Everything had to be planned out ahead of time. I had to double check to see if we had clean clothes for the next day and enough food to make lunches. I had to put a clock in every room because I had to catch a bus and Kaleb had to get to school on time. Kory even had to go back to work to off-set the high cost of living there, so two days a week he was a carpenter again. We were on a schedule with very little time to relax.

One day soon after starting work, Kory discovered they don’t have sani-cans on the job sites in Norway – so he had to drive all the way home to use the toilet. He said his co-workers just head for the nearest bushes, which is OK under certain circumstances, but it wasn’t going to work too well for him that particular day.

About the same time Kory was rushing home to use the bathroom, my Norwegian class was heading off to a concert by Ålesund’s finest string quartet. Norwegians are very much into culture and ambiance. Each morning my school day was started off with a little soft music to settle everyone down. There were always blooming flowers in our classroom and little doilies with candles on the tables in our break room.

In America we often associate candles, flowers and music with relaxation and romance, but in Norway, it’s an everyday thing, even in the workplace. At least in office jobs, anyway. My bus passed by several office buildings and I always saw employees sitting in their break room – complete with flowers, table clothes, candles burning, and I imagine, music softly playing in the background.

At his job, I don’t know that Kory would have cared so much about the ambiance of candles, flowers or music, as much as he would have just liked a toilet to sit on every now and then.