It's Still Life

17.09.23

07:53 (Kerteminde Denmark)
There’s a man walking a small white dog on the beach – it hates waves and disappears into the long grass. Seagulls above, circling, searching for breakfast. Or the dog. Two women breast stroke against the Baltic waves.

8:20
Those two women still dripping of Baltic, walk down the street wearing bathrobes and gum boots. This is Denmark.

09:15
Water Safety: Lifesaving is do-it-yourself. There’s a red and white lifebuoy ring hanging from a white post on the beach. Next to the hot dog stand. Right where the small white dog disappeared.

09:27
Where are we going today, I ask. He’s looking at the tourist guide for his own hometown.

09:50
He and I hum songs on the radio. We’re both slightly out of tune. We were born that way. We are harmonic progression.

10:00
He knows these narrow hedgerow roads. Cycled them all, he says. To visit his farmor (father’s mother). It’s a boy’s life he remembers.

10:10
The hills are long and slow as summer. Soil turned. Seed sown. Crows in the field. Seagulls chasing after a tractor.

10:45
Fields give up their red poppies. Scarlet spatters in the wheat and rye. Hay in bales. It’s been a dry summer; it’s good for hay.

12:15
Lundeborg. Fishing boats are in. Flat fish today. Always mackerel. The old smoke house is busy. Queue out the door. The skipper says summer’s done here. Kiosk closed today until April, and nobody comes after the kiosk closes.

13:00
There’s an unwritten law here that everyone knows. You are not better than anyone else, and you’re not more important than anyone else. It’s called the Law of Jante. It’s supposed to be satire, but it’s real. Like really real.

14:35
This forest. This aged green. It’s peppermint refreshing. Once mantis green, It’s a chameleon change of colour. I want to surrender to its wonder.

16:05
This cold wind is making my ears ache. He says Viking women had more chutzpah. I had no clue he knew that word. He laughs. I’m not sure if he’s serious.

16:10
It is absolutely possible to keep falling in love with someone. Again. And again.

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©Misky 2023.