When he’d filled the radiator, he turned and shook our hands, my wife’s shake being accompanied with a gallant bow of the head. ‘He gets a little bit over-excited on these jaunts.’ ‘You’ll have to forgive my younger brother,’ our escort said, flipping up the bonnet. Time was when it might even have been a bank robbery get-away car.Īs we approached, a small head appeared round the side of the passenger seat, followed by a small hand that waved at us. Or at the very least, one of those limousines they use in funeral corteges. At the side of the road, he’d parked what looked like a black Lincoln. I stuck my head back through the doorway and told my wife I was just going down the road, and why. My eyebrows reached what was left of my hairline. ‘Apart from the radiator, she’s in pretty good shape. ‘Spot of bother with the motor,’ he explained as he held the bottle under the tap. The language was Swedish, but the hyper-polite manner was über- English. ‘I couldn’t help noticing that you have a tap outside, but felt it only polite to ask before using it.’ ‘Terribly sorry to trouble you, but I wonder if you would be ever so kind and allow me to refill this bottle with water.’ Or words to that effect. No, it was still clearly a private cottage. Does this look like a 7-Eleven? I looked behind me to check. In its hands was an empty 2-litre bottle of Coke. Though without the inflated cheeks, probably down to the fact that it wasn’t blowing a trumpet. Blond hair, blue eyes and dressed in white, it looked like a pint-sized angel – a putto, perhaps. As it came closer I noticed that its face was level with mine, even though I was sitting on the steps. I judged it to be about 12 years old and of indeterminate pre-pubescent gender. Indeed, I didn’t recognise the figure at all. They’re not in the habit of dropping in, any more than the rest of Sweden is, without an appointment made several months in advance. Our nearest neighbours live a kilometre away. In the gap between God, the Devil and pagan curses upon Dispatch Managers as a species, I noticed someone coming up the drive. Since the middle of any given word is swallowed in its utterance, you are left to fill in the gap based upon the context and your knowledge of the world. That is, to approach it as you might a half-completed cryptic crossword puzzle. The answer lies in the key to decoding the language. Though if you listened to anyone speaking Danish, you might be left wondering where the ‘fucking’ had gone to. As usual, the Danes are way ahead and integrated a good ‘fuck’ or ‘fucking’ years ago. I don’t know why we Swedes choose to swear by something most no longer believe in. If you don’t believe in either, the impact is softened to a gentle chiding. Well, the Swedish came more readily, the English added more intensity, for the very good reason that all Swedish curses involve God and/ or the Devil. Perhaps this was what is called an economy of scale – that it somehow works out cheaper to send the thing in misshaped bits rather than adding a couple of centimetres to the package and a whole kilometre to customer-satisfaction, by sending the barrow ready-assembled.Īnd every now and then, I would give up the meditation and launch into an engaging blend of English and Swedish swearwords to the entertainment, and edification, of passers-by. As if the inhabitants also bloomed with the sunshine.Įvery now and then, I would reflect, philosophically of course, on why anyone should dispatch a wheel barrow as a flat-pack. To the blooming flowers, to the leafing trees, and to why the summer brought out the best in Sweden. A few years ago I was sitting on the front steps of our house, trying to assemble a flat-pack wheelbarrow.
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