Syttende Mai Sacrifice

I shall tell you how things dribble off into the Sonoran sand: today is Syttende Mai--that is to say, May seventeenth--and Mari is listening to Pavarotti.

On May 17th in 1814, Norwegians gained a Norwegian constitution. The Danes relented, and have still not repented of it, allowing Norway to more-or-less govern themselves, at least until the Swedes took over. That whole, dark period in Norwegian history did not end until the Norwegians discovered oil under the continental shelf, and the Swedes were reduced to selling Volvo to the Chinese, although some historians say independence happened in 1905.

Mari and I--both detritus from Norwegian immigration into the United States--have lived in Norway, and in towns and cities in this country where the air in May still hints of cod fish and goat cheese. At our home in Decorah, Iowa, we almost always celebrated Syttende Mai, sometimes discovering that traveling Norwegians had heard it was so, and showed up at the door. At this moment in Tucson, a Hoosier cabinet at my back harbors Akavit (or aquavit, if you will): "the water of life"; potato liquor. And Mari is listening to Luciano Pavarotti!

I am going to make what is not an ultimate sacrifice. We are today going to help a very talented young man celebrate his commencement from the University of Arizona, and I am going to give him one of the two bottles of Akavit that I own; the lesser full of the two. I will be damned if I will give him the other! Maybe someday, if he finds a job.

Anyway, Pavarotti has stopped singing, and the Ink Spots are singing, "If I Didn't Care". I still care.

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