MY LIFE'S PLAYGROUND

A glorious day it was, and I decided to take a walk in the park. Before I knew it I found myself walking down memory lane - in this park that I visit almost once a week. I began reflecting on how big a part of my life it's been, and still is - and I became just a tiny bit sentimental.

The park is Frognerparken. It hosts the hundreds of sculptures by Gustav Vigeland, - and being used to walking around them for over fifty years and never really looking at them, I saw them today with new eyes.

Vigeland's sculptures often depict the human life span - illustrating man, woman and child in their many phases of life. I had never thought of this before, but walking there this afternoon I suddenly realised that my life too has revolved around this park. I grew up on the west side of the park, and my Mum often took us there, for a picnic, for playing, for sunbathing, for skiing, for sledding - or for simply running around - as I did many years later with my own children. There is a big outdoor swimming area, Frognerbadet, where I more or less spent my entire childhood. When I have visited it in later years, either with my own children, or at the Norwegian Wood Festival, which is held there - I get an overwhelming feeling of nostalgia. Nothing's changed since I was a child! I recognise rocks and grass turf! Bushes and slabs! Tiles and trees!

Norwegian band deLillos wrote a song about the outdoor pool area Frognerbadet, which captures my exact emotions! They sing: "This is a place where time has stood still."

Frognerbadet

When my husband and first I started going out - in May 1981 - he invited me for a date and a meal at an outdoor restaurant in - yes - the Frogner Park. The flat I was living in at the time was just south of the Park, his flat was just north of it. A year later we were living together in his flat a five minute walk away from the Park, and many a summer day was spent there on a picnic, or having a glass of wine in one of the cafés.

My daughters Johanne and Julie went to kindergarten on the north side, where they had unlimited access to the park, experiencing much the same as I did when I was a child.

Thaulow barnehage (kindergarten)

My Dad is buried at the cemetery which borders on the west side of the Park, which means we often combine a walk there with a visit to his grave. 

Another visit we often combine with a walk in the Park is to my Mum's nursing home on the south side. Like my daughters' kindergarten, the home is practically inside the park, and the nurses take the elderly out to enjoy the roses, the statues and the ponds when the weather gets better.

Freezing ducks

The Monolith

The Park is also Grete's and my playground. She lives next to it. We often go for walks round and round it - with digressions here and there, both in direction and conversation. 

Today I walked alone. In my life's playground.

Squinting against the bright March sun

Ah - that's better! Love those Ray-bans