On Being Norwegian

To be mathematically precise, I am but 50% Norsk; my dad's genes and sunny disposition spring from the barely sunnier British Isles, with even perhaps a continental contribution from the likes of Germany. Please try to picture the guy on the top of the tall tower in Trafalgar square and add to it my dad's longing for green beer on March 17. My first draft of the annual Nelson end-of-year report is always religiously edited by my helpmate to remove dark Norwegian references. A major part of her religious inspiration is that line in Home on the Range, "Never is heard a discouraging word". One can inquire of Madame, (also designated as Ye Ed in that publication) why she eschews dark humor from one whose ethnic makeup comes from a nationality whose best-known work of art was captioned by San Francisco Chronicle cartoonist Bizarro as "I can't decide whether to call it 'The Scream' or 'I can't remember if I turned the iron off'".

Now for many Americans, their knowledge of Norwegians comes from PBS radio between 6 and 8 on Saturday evening. Garrison Keillor has captured the psyche of Norwegian bechelor farmers better than other public figure. Like him, they are shy persons, who require "Powdermilk Biscuits, to give them the strength to do what needs to be done". Keillor will admit that there are occasional examples of the extroverted Norwegian, who looks at your shoes, instead of his own, while he is addressing you. All of us from the rural Midwest can remember several examples of this life form. Your writer is moved to say that his own sister has raised up two examples. While both men eventually married, one cannot expect that ceremony to dramatically change their behavior. Of course one could accuse Garrison of at least a small amount of exaggeration; after all, he is in Show Biz, and if he fails to amuse, his audience may go off to Public tv looking for Lawrence Welk reruns.

A true Norwegian is apt to be a ver-r-r-r-r-y slow man with a dollar. Your writer's mother,(his
100% Norwegian parent) insisted he fill both sides of the stationery page while thanking her for the nice present, to deserve expending a 3 cent stamp. Such thriftiness sticks with one; professionally your writer wrote countless lectures on Electromagnetism on the reverse side of memos from the University president. Still, his speech, which has drastically influenced that of his offspring, is pure Midwest; He remembers his great amusement at the speech of a native Norwegian grad student colleague, who must have learned his English in England; he combined his Broad A's with the upward inflection which makes every Norwegian's statements sound like questi0ns.

In sum, after inspecting those Viking ships, seeming to have no area sheltered from the weather and were provisioned with dried codfish and sauerkraut as they set out to discover Greenland? and the New World, one is moved to say, "You don't have to be crazy to be a Norwegian, but it surely helps."