Gondolicious!

I can tell from the forecasts that the winter rains are still washing over Seattle. I know though in a couple of weeks the cherry trees will start blossoming and the tulips will be out, pointing towards summer. That time of year used to make my whole body ache for Seattle. Not so much now.

For two reasons. It is too early for me. My body is still busy aching from my back problems. Only the idea of getting myself from Umeå to Seattle is impossible. And even thinking six months from now I feel that it’s not doable. I have to stop myself here though: I’ve had those feelings a couple of times before and what do you know, suddenly I find myself crossing the ocean after all!

The other reason is the feeling I now get thinking about Seattle. It’s a choking feeling. It’s a feeling of being stuck. It’s the feeling of not being able to move. It’s the feeling of a big sigh and a deep breath planning on getting from point A to point B. It’s the feeling of traffic in Seattle.

Okay, Umebor, the following few paragraphs will be about Seattle, but way too cool not continue reading, so do, and I am hoping they will be a great inspiration to us!

This is what’s happening: I am applauding the new and uplifting idea of gondolas cheating the intolerable traffic monster on the Seattle ground, transporting people above it’s head! Ha!

Moving above ground isn’t new to Seattle. The Monorail between Seattle Center and Downtown was built for the Worlds Fair 1962 and became an important part of the Seattle silhouette as well as functioning transportation. And it still is!

The main gondola idea is to move people up in the air in East-West directions. Hallelujah! Imagine going from Belltown or Queen Anne to Capitol Hill without even thinking about the Denny Triangle and the on ramps to I5, hallelujah!!! It’s genial thinking!

Seattle has to be ideal for this type of transportation! The city is built on hills declining towards downtown and the waterfront. So, one suggested route is from Capitol Hill to Olympic Sculpture Park, serving that whole area. Others are up Queen Anne Hill, one climbing Yesler Way all way, another spanning the water at the Montlake Cut, or others even reaching West Seattle across the Bay, or Ballard!

This is so cool, it’s beyond cool! And who knows what will come out of it? Hal Griffith, who owns pier 57 and built The Great Wheel (a ferries wheel) there last year is proposing a gondola from Downtown to the Waterfront, making it an easy access. Tom Rasmussen, chairman of the city council’s Transportations Committee is positive, especially since Griffith would put in the money himself. And as The Great Wheal has become a huge success, why wouldn’t Hal Griffith go on succeeding?

Some years ago a proposal about a monorail in Umeå was turned down. The idea was a rail with “taxis”, smaller vehicles making the monorail more flexible. But it turned out not being flexible enough for the city, they expressed concerns about a too fix transportation situation.

Umeå is a mostly flat city, but I could definitely see gondolas working here! Although it’s a small city, about 117 000 inhabitants, we aren’t proud about the traffic situation and the pollution is pretty bad, especially during cold winters. The University campus is located on one of the few heights in town and together with the University Hospital it’s the biggest work place in town. Picture commuting University – Downtown soaring above in a soundless glass bubble! And there is the Umeå River dividing the city, which we are constantly crisscrossing on the bridges. Let’s add the treat doing it in gondolas, watching the running stream under our feet!

And while we are at it, throw in a ferris wheel somewhere at the water: the Waterfront, The Island (Ön) or Bölesholmarna! I tried the brand new Great Wheel in Seattle this summer, and it was an absolutely wonderful, pleasant and beautiful experience, I could do it over and over again! The wheel ads an interesting silhouette to the skyline image, and it works for everyone in the family, what can go wrong? Let’s rise above, it would be nothing but gondolicious!

Comforting couch company

My friend Katta and I met at the public service TV-station here in Umeå in the early nineties. We both worked for the Swedish National Television (Sveriges Televison), she as a script coordinator, I as a reporter.

I loved working in television. Television is the love of my life professionally. I love the creative process, the teamwork, the nerve during live broadcastings, the excited and extremely focused feeling in the control room everyone doing their utmost. The fact that the chain is no stronger than its weakest link, and there can’t be any weak links at a live broadcast, each and everyone rising to the occasion bringing their professionalism into the room and the production. Wow, my pulse is rising, just thinking about it.

Katta used to express how she liked working with television because TV often means a lot to people out there who are lonely. That TV becomes a friend, a comfort, and she felt good about being a part of that.

At that time, the early nineties, I had a family with to young sons, an extremely active lifestyle and a huge social life. I practically didn’t watch TV. For two reasons. There wasn’t any time for it. And I wasn’t that interested. I watched the news of course, I was a reporter after all, and working on different shows and programs I watched those, but other than that… not really.

I always felt bad about that. I mean, I loved working in television, why wasn’t I interested in watching?! The truth is, my love was for the creative process. For finding the story, the pictures and words to tell it, the music enhancing the feeling of it, and oh how I loved finally being in the editing room putting it all together, creating the ultimate expression of it. I can feel myself expanding right now, just putting words on it!

I never really got my friend Katta’s very humane angle on our profession. The whole thing about lonely people. Because I wasn’t. I wasn’t lonely in that sense. I hardly had a minute by myself. I was in my early thirties and my life had always been busy with people. I just didn’t get it. Because I didn’t know. I had no clue.

Since five years back I am spending a lot of time on my couch. My back problems have put me their, with a little help from a cancer experience. I know now what it is like to be lonely in the sense of spending most time by myself. And the TV has become an important part of my life. A real friend. I am looking forward to the evenings and practically know the TV schedule by heart, although this winter it is so packed with goodies that it’s actually hard to keep it in my head. And lucky for me, bringing a lot of nice company into my home!

A very fortunate thing about spending September in Seattle combined with my back being out is that I am allowed watching the Emmy Awards and all the season premieres and the new shows coming up! This fall (2012) I fell right into the high-tension drama Scandal, a White House intrigue created by Shonda Rhimes. I liked it a lot and hoped it would find it’s way to Sweden. As Nashville, the story about one falling and one rising country singer which didn’t even go on air before I left, but there were high expectations, so was I happy that both of them showed up here only a couple of weeks later! But let’s not get ahead of ourselves; want to know what my whole TV week looks like? Well, here it is!

Let’s start on Sunday. Boy, that’s actually the busiest evening of the week, which is a bit frustrating as Sunday is also my blog writing day, stressful in a nice way. Sunday evenings Swedish National Televison (SVT) rules! Starting out 8pm with the acclaimed Australian drama series The Slap (Örfilen), followed by the Swedish drama “En pilgrims död” (The Death of a Pilgrim) about the unsolved murder of the Swedish prime minister Olof Palme 1986, ending the evening with the excellent Showtime production The Big C. How is that for a start for the upcoming week? And as that’s all public service and no commercial breaks there is hardly any time even to sneak away to the bathroom!

Monday comes with Nashville  (Channel 3) written by Callies Khouri (Thelma and Louise) which I have to say is holding up to the expectations. And the music signed Elvis Costello and Lucinda Williams among others is great, some is painfully beautiful! Channel 4 delivers right after a Danish crime series Dicte, those Danes, they know their crime!

Tuesdays is Maestro (SVT), a BBC format where six celebrities learn how to be conductors, quite fun if you are into music or have insights in conducting. Channel 3 brings the sit coms The New Normal and The Mindy Project, also new acquaintances from Seattle in September. And then SVT did the right thing: they are the network broadcasting the already highly praised Girls!

Wednesday is my absolute favorite with two Shonda Rimes in a row on Channel 5: first Grey’s Anatomy and then Scandal. Wednesday is also my choir rehearsal evening so I am recording those for watching later. Although my evenings are so packed with good programming that I hardly can find time to squeeze them in! About Grey’s Anatomy: I could fill one single posting on that item and I probably will some day…

But we need to move on! Thursday, there is actually some space. By coincidence I found the American crime series Person of Interest on Channel 5, a former CIA agent contacted by a computer nerd/billionaire - sounds like Bill Gates but isn’t. Together they are monitoring people intervening in the right moment to prevent crime. I can’t find any hard facts about this series, but it’s worth watching, if not only for an extremely handsome CIA agent…

Then there is Friday with the Swedish/Norwegian talk show Skavlan on SVT, often followed by a movie that works. And Saturdays right now is the Swedish tryouts road tour for the Eurovision Song Contest (actually not that fun watching alone, it needs company), followed by Mr. Selfridge, a British drama series that has to do as we will be out of Downton Abbey for a while!

Now. Then there is the closing of every weekday. At 11pm The Killing is on air at Channel 4, a Danish story set in Seattle directed by Veena Sud who wrote the script. It’s such an odd combination. And I am watching every frame, amazed about how true they are to the setting. Grey’s Anatomy could be anywhere; there is only the Space Needle views and some ferry telling where we are at. But the Danish The Killing lives and breathes Seattle. The geography is right down to the point, the Larsen family really is located in Ballard, the Waterfront project is a player, there is the billionaire who wants an arena, the ferry ride actually has a purpose, even the area codes on a list in a 3 second pic are right: 206 and 425! The only thing I object to is the eternal poor down, even though I do understand the temptation. It rains a lot in Seattle, although more drizzle than rainstorms, but it works with the dark story. And I am also wondering about the casting of Joel Kinnaman as detective Holder, why choose someone with a Swedish accent? Anyway, it keeps me up late every week night!

So, you see, I am busy person! And I am thinking it would be very different for me working in television now than 15-20 years ago. I now know exactly what my friend Katta had insights in long before me. That good television can be a really important friend. Bringing you an imaginary but big, warm family to enjoy and be grateful for. Comforting couch company.

Oops, it’s time for the Sunday evening Swedish National Television marathon, got to go!

The Lundgren hug

-Always in my heart, best Dad ever!

At my arrival yesterday I see my sister and my cousin Per hugging. I know they haven’t seen each other in years, but the hug comes very natural. Let’s say the hug is a family tradition.

A couple of weeks ago my uncle Daniel passed away, 95 years old, and that’s the reason for the extended family getting together. Daniel was the widower after my father’s sister Ingegärd who died already in her mid fifties. Despite that, Daniel continued to live an active and rich life, and even though he had a stroke some years ago and it was hard for him to communicate in words, he still won the chess game played with his son Per, his head clear and sharp until the end.

It is Per posting on Facebook that his dad was the best one ever, always in his heart. And I am thinking that’s how I feel about my dad. And I would say all of us children who were blessed with fathers in the Lundgren family.

They were six siblings, the children of Johan and Astrid Lundgren, growing up only a few meters from the rushing Öre River 40 kilometers south of Umeå, day and night accompanied by it’s roaring voice. Grandfather Johan worked long weeks at the big sawmill on the island Norrbyskär in the Bothnian Bay while grandmother Astrid took care of the half dozen children playing next to one of the biggest rivers in Sweden, running to that very same Bay.

Sigrid was the oldest, my father Martin number two, his brother Bertil next in line and then “the girls”, Ingegärd, Gertrud and Barbro. They all grew up to be independent and self-sufficient individuals, yet all through life carrying a strong, warm and loving family connection. And a great loss probably made the bond even tighter: only in her early twenties, Gertrud was taken from them, if I recall it right, in sepsis.

Sigrid, Ingegärd and Barbro were tall young women with distinct and amazing natural colors: Sigrid the golden blond, Ingegärd the copper read head, and baby sister Barbro the brunette with the brown eyes. Their hair thick and curly. I still remember my mother’s envy of those hairs, wishing them for her daughters. That didn’t happen unfortunately, but my sister and I got the height and the body structure from the Lundgren sister and their brothers. And the low blood pressure that comes with that, making us rise up carefully from sitting.

Anyway, the beautiful Lundgren sisters from the beach of the Öre River all found their husbands in their village. Or maybe those young men found them; the search couldn’t have been too hard. Helge, Daniel and Lennart married Sigrid, Ingegärd and Barbro. The brothers were a bit more adventurous, my father Martin married my mother Kerstin who came from Umeå, and Bertil met his Fanny all the way from Jämtland! We are nine cousins originating from the handsome Lundgren brood, and yesterday, at the farewell of my uncle Daniel, seven of us got together again.

So, I had already been thinking about the best dad ever. And listening to the recalls about Daniel I was thinking that the description would have been true for anyone of the men in the Lundgren family, born Lundgren or married to one of the Lundgren sisters. They were all likeable, sympathetic, generous, intelligent, and although not academic I would say intellectuals. And they took pride in at all times being very well dressed. I remember the sense of walking next to my dad, as a girl as well as a grown up woman, always feeling proud of his appearance and of being there. And I believe that’s something I share with my sister and female cousins.

They were also unconventional for that time. They liked cooking and baking (two of theme were actually professionals!) and spending time and taking care of us kids were as natural as rain to them, we all grew up in that embracing hug. The six of them were married to strong independent women and became role models for sons and daughters as well as grandchildren.

I am wondering what grandpa Johan and grandma Astrid gave their children, making them such nice people. It wasn’t money for sure. Was it only love? My aunt Barbro has told me how much her parents liked each other, how sweet they were together. And I’m sure they gave a lot of that love to their children in many ways. But there must have been something else. Shaping these people who have walked the earth with such natural self-esteem, such upright glow. Or maybe it was the hugs? Maybe they are that powerful.

The farewell to uncle Daniel was beautiful, warm, fun and sad. In the circle round his coffin there is only one of Johan and Astrid’s children left, the baby sister Barbro. Now grey, she is still as tall and beautiful as ever. And she, the loving matriarch keeping the extended family together, is the one clearing her voice, reading the poem, bidding the family farewell.  It was a painfully powerful moment.

I am a big hugger, not only within the family. I even kiss on the cheek when I feel like it. I know it’s sometimes confusing, but I also know that it’s empowering and disarming. I have often wondered why I do that though, where it comes from. But yesterday it became very clear to me. It comes from the beach of the rushing Öre River. And the circle around the coffin is wide. There are grandchildren, great grandchildren and even great great grandchildren originating from the love of Johan and Astrid Lundgren. The family tradition is secured and we will go on confusing and sharing outside the circle. The Lundgren hug will be spread, and who knows how big a family can get!

The purpose of Dálvvie

It was  -7,6 F  (-22° C) here at the end of the road this morning. Then the sun came up coloring the white and frosty winter landscape making tall blue shadows. It’s out if this world beautiful. The light is like Midsummers’, but the other way around. In the summer, there are tall golden shadows making a late night experience. In the winter, a blue midday one.

I am thinking about this weekend, a year from now. What will they think of this? How will they feel? Everyone who has come to this latitude from all over to attend the opening of The European Capital of Culture 2014? Because that’s how we are perceiving it: a big celebration with thousands of people from near and far finally gathering for this thing that’s been on our lips and in our minds for so long. This event we have been preparing for for years now. Sometimes I feel like there won’t be a 2015. It’s a number and a year that kind of doesn’t exist. It might be that 2014 will be the end of the world as we know it. Because I haven’t heard anyone talking about anything beyond that.

The European Year of Culture will be divided into eight seasons, according to the seasons of the Sami calendar. The first one is Dálvvie, Winter, the season for caring and nurturing. I like thinking that that’s what this demanding time of year is about. There, in under the heavy white comforter everything going to be awake in May is now peacefully at rest, waiting for it’s resurrection. Taking care of itself. Nurturing. There won’t be a spring without the winter. And our job is to appreciate that.

This is the fourth winter in a row that’s really cold, providing feet of dry whipped cream, making the Umeå region look like the perfect post card. Let’s hope for a fifth. Because, even if everything else fails, the opening of The European Capital of Culture 2014 will be set in scenery that looks like this is what we have been working on all these years.

And for Dálvvie 2013 I will try to remember my purpose. Being patient with the season. Caring for it and nurturing its’ promise for tall golden shadows.