A House in Norway by Vigdis Hjorth

Author:Vigdis Hjorth
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Tags: epub
ISBN: 9781909408401
Publisher: Norvik Press
Published: 2017-04-12T04:00:00+00:00

Alma disembarked and it took her twenty-five minutes to drive to the island where she lived. It was so strange. Everything looked exactly as she remembered it and as it had been on the day she left, except that it was spring now, but even spring looked like itself. The Italian fishing village seemed unreal and dreamlike as she drove along Drammensveien. How could she hold on to the insight she hoped she had gained down by the sea? Those few, decisive moments when she thought she had seen the light, were suddenly reduced to useless memories because nothing in the world or in her had really changed, so what was the point? Or was it the case that the change was minute, almost imperceptible. That many, many such tiny changes in the same direction were needed before overall change could be felt. And then only if many tiny changes in many individuals happened at the same time could anything in the world be changed. She had to hope that it could and believe that the recent, tiny changes were real. She drove more slowly than she needed to, stopped at the shop and bought essentials. She knew that the house was still standing or someone would have called, the Pole, the police or her daughter. And indeed it was, she came round the corner and saw it and she felt her heart beat softly. But when she came closer, she felt bad about the house because the spring light revealed the poor condition it was in. The windows were filthy, the paint peeling on the windowsills, the front door was dirty; she thought the whole house was complaining. Random gardening tools were scattered around the house, rotting seat cushions, beer cans, the withered Christmas tree, everything which had been hidden by the snow. The leaves she had never raked up last autumn were rotting on the flower beds and plastic bags and paper had accumulated around the bins, and on the drive were twigs and branches from last year’s autumn gales. But the small path from the main drive, from Alma’s front door and to the apartment, was raked and swept. And the Pole had planted several thuja bushes below the terrace which she presumably hoped would grow tall in time and provide privacy, possibly from Alma?

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