We agree only to include one specimen of each species, irrespective of sex or age. We won’t, then, write stallion and mare and foal. We keep it simple, and write horse.
I’d rather we drop the animals everybody’s seen. Otherwise we’ll have to list all kinds of ordinary and boring animals. Dog and cat, for example. And cow.
But Børre doesn’t think we ought to differentiate.
An animal is an animal, he reckons. You can’t blame the dog for being ordinary.
No, you can’t, I say.
Børre and/or his dad have seen these animals.
– Horse
– Snake
– Hen
– Whale
I stop him to ask whether it was he or his dad who saw the whale.
It was his dad.
I ask Børre if he’s sure.
He nods and goes on.
– Pig
– Goat
– Swan
– Elk
– Reindeer
– Roebuck
– Deer
– Cod
Wait a minute, I tell him. A cod’s not an animal. It’s a fish.
So what, says Børre.
I groan and say that then we’ll have to include all the other fish as well.
Of course, says Børre.
Was I thinking otherwise?
– Haddock
– Coalfish
– Salmon
– Shark
Come on, I tell him. Now you’re kidding. Your dad saw a whale OK, but a shark … Hardly anybody has ever seen shark.
But Børre’s dad has naturally seen a shark.
Where?
Australia or somewhere like that, Børre says.
I wave my arms. There’s not much I can do.
Has he seen kangaroo as well? I ask with a certain sarcasm. Yes, Børre says.
– Kangaroo
– Eagle
– Turtle
– Hedgehog
– Musk ox
– Crab
– Sheep
– Squirrel
– Otter
– Hamster
– Woodpecker
– Cat
– Owl
– Frog
– Fox
– Hare
– Wood grouse
– Stag
– Badger
– Little birds
I should never have started this. Fortunately it’s beginning to slow down now. I am grateful Børre doesn’t know the names of all the birds.
– Cow
– Grouse
– Ferret
– Dog
There’s silence. A long one. Børre is thinking now. I can see he is a little unsure.
Then he says another word.
– Tiger
Tiger? I ask him.
Børre nods.
I don’t believe you, I say.
But it’s true, Børre says.
I ask where he saw it.
In Africa, Børre says.
But I’ve got him now. Everybody knows there are no tigers in Africa. Everybody except Børre.
I tell Børre that he ought to run upstairs and ask his dad if he’s seen a tiger. Fair is fair.
Børre walks towards the door. Discouraged. He is doubtful.
After a few minutes he comes back down. He is happy. His dad hasn’t been to Africa. He hasn’t seen a tiger, but he’s seen a polar bear. In Spitsbergen. And Børre shows me a photograph his dad took of the polar bear. It looks dangerous. Faced with a dad like that I can’t do much.
I strike tiger from the list.
Why did you say tiger? I ask.
I knew there was something I had forgotten, Børre says.
I think that’s quite a good answer. He took a chance. It’s a straightforward case. Now I’m adding the last animal to the list.
– Polar bear.
That’s it.
Now we’re on to animals I have seen.
I go through Børre’s and his dad’s list. I’ve seen everything they have, except shark and whale and polar bear and kangaroo and otter. Why on earth haven’t I seen otter? But I’ve seen beaver, besides more fish and birds, but so has Børre’s dad, probably, if we start going into detail. I can’t be bothered, so I shut up.
Børre and his dad have won.
Børre holds both arms up high.
Out of curiosity I ask him which are the animals Børre has seen. It turns out it’s not that many. He has seen horse, cat and dog, cow, fox, cod and coalfish. And some birds, whose names he doesn’t know. Eight animals and some birds.
Børre is pleased that I have seen fewer animals than he and his dad. He asks if I want to come up with him and play with the race car track.
It sounds fun, but I’m tired. And besides, I don’t feel like meeting the travelled dad.
I tell him I’ll think about it. We could maybe do it another time. Børre says we can do it anytime.
Four
Now I’m watching a music video on my brother’s TV set. I hardly ever watch TV, but now I’m watching a music video. It’s a great video. The woman singing is called Alanis something-orother. She is singing while driving a car. In America. She’s got three girlfriends with her. They’re on a trip.
Alanis is dressed in a brown jacket and a dark red cap, the one in the passenger seat has a dark red sweater, and the two in the back seat are wearing a green sweater and a yellow sweater.
The song is great. It seems to be about how we have very little control over what’s going to happen to us.
The verse is quiet, but the chorus rocks. I sit bumping my back against the chair in sync with the music. Here comes the chorus again.
Suddenly, I discover that all four girls are the same. They’re all Alanis. We only see one at a time. She has changed sweaters and become each one of them in turn. She’s on a trip with herself. And she meets her own gaze in the rear-view mirror when she sings. It’s very charming. It looks like she’s really having a good time. The Alanis in the front passenger seat is the cutest one. She’s the kind of girl I want. She doesn’t worry. She’s just having fun. Taking things as they come.
While I’m watching her, I think several thoughts.
The first one is that I ought to go to America and drive a car. It looks so cool. To just drive.
The other one is that I dream about meeting an Alanis-girl and living in a house together with her. It’ll be the two of us. Me and her. We go for walks at low tide and turn the rocks over, and we will, after a while, when it’s time, have children.
The third thought is that I am a BA and don’t know what I’m going to become.
This is a problem for me.
I’d prefer to become someone who can make the world a little better. That would be the best thing. But I don’t know if it’s possible. I don’t know what it takes to make the world better. I feel uncertain that it’d be enough just to smile at everybody I meet.
The next-best thing would be to become someone who doesn’t make a difference. Someone who makes the world neither better nor worse. It might not be totally fulfilling, but I think there are many in this category. I wouldn’t be alone.
The worst alternative is to become someone who makes the world worse. I am going to try to avoid that. At almost any price. But I don’t think it’s that simple. Maybe I’ll get mixed up with some bad and dishonest people. It can happen to the best of us. And then I’ll be stuck. And the world will become a little worse and I’ll stop meeting people’s gaze on the street.
It can happen, just like that.
The fourth thought is that Alanis most likely has a boyfriend, and that he is probably very cool.
The Board
I am thinking about Ferdinand Finne. The artist. The guy who is pretty old, but who always looks damn good and who seems happy all day long while he stands there painting his pictures of the sea and flowers and whatever.
Someone told me they’d seen a TV interview with h
im. It was several years ago. He was asked how he would describe his life. If he stopped to look back, what would sort of be the essence? Finne thought about it for a long while, and then he replied that not so long ago he had begun to notice that life, in a way, was a bit like a journey.
I hope it’s true. That I’ve had it told to me correctly. That Ferdinand Finne really said that. It’s really wonderful.
I assume Finne knows how to read. That he knows a thing or two about the world. If that is the case, it could mean that things are less complicated than I think.
I hope I’ll be able to say the same if someone asks me to summarise my life in sixty years. That I can just mull it over for a while and say that I think life can be compared to a journey. And feel that I’m having that thought for the first time. That I came up with it myself and that I mean it.
So far, I’m absolutely unable to say something like that. There are too many confusing elements present. Things I know. Thoughts I have. Sarcasm. Things I think I ought to be doing and places I ought to be going. Always other places.
Sometimes I envy the goldfish. Apparently, they only have a few seconds’ worth of memory span. It’s impossible for them to follow a train of thought. They experience everything for the first time. Every time. As long as they themselves aren’t aware of their handicap, life must be one long happy story. A party. Excitement from dawn to dusk.
This is what I would paint if I were a painter.
– Bicycles
– Deserts
– Balls
– Girls
– Clocks
– People who are late for the bus
Now the phone is ringing. I answer it.
It’s my bad friend, Kent. I have known for a long while that it would be only a question of time before he found me, and it is with a certain apprehension that I’ve waited for him to call. He has been in touch with my parents and they’ve obviously given him my brother’s phone number. There’s little I can do. He’s on the phone. He’s wondering why he hasn’t heard from me. The truth is, it’s always him who calls. Sometimes I think he’s not aware that that’s the case. Maybe he believes that we phone each other.
Kent works at the Central Statistics Bureau. He knows how many litres of milk Norwegians drink per annum and how often people have sex. On average, that is. And he is a member of Mensa, the club for the two percent (or whatever it is) of the population who have an IQ higher than some number or other around 140.
He loves exercises that are meant to define the intelligence quotient. Patterns that are meant to fit together. Association tests. How many litres of water run through such and such cylinders, and when the trains will meet if the southbound one starts in Bodø and travels at 80 km/h, and the northbound one starts in Lillehammer and travels at 84 km/h, but stops for 27 minutes in Trondheim. Sometimes he brings those kinds of tests to parties.
He keeps trying to convince me to take the Mensa test. He says I am probably not dumber than he is and that I’ll pass with flying colours, but I know he hopes that I’ll fail. I am never going to try.
Kent is a really bad friend to have. Useless. I have indicated several times that I don’t think he’s anything much, but he doesn’t seem to take it seriously. I’ve known him since primary school and we have done fun things together, a long time ago. He’s not so easy to get rid of. I also feel a bit sorry for him.
Kent’s world is full of what I don’t want my world to be full of. When he opens his mouth, there are almost invariably stupid or unpleasant things coming out of it. He is a human being living in disharmony with almost everything. What he talks about the most is girls and what he fancies doing with them. He subscribes to the most bizarre forms of sexual practice and seems to have no clear means of separating right from wrong. Things that are demeaning and vulgar to me are fine to Kent. Fortunately, I see him rather seldom, but the sad thing is that he is even less in touch with himself than he is with me.
To me, Kent represents everything I try to get away from. The dark side of man. If Kent had a part in a Die Hard movie, he would get crushed by a car or an elevator during the opening titles.
He also talks too loud. And now he is on the phone waiting for me to say something. An evening with Kent is the last thing I need right now. One beer, I tell him. We can have one beer.
While I am tying my shoelaces, a fax comes through from Kim. I am grateful that something is taking my mind off Kent.
Kim has also seen some animals. Not very many. But at least some.
– Dog
– Cat
– Pig
– Pigeon
– Seagull
– Crow
– Sparrow
– Robin
– Titmouse
– Cockerel
– Hen
– Fish
– Crab
– ‘O’ shell (Kim’s drawn a line through this word)
– Horse
– Cow
– Donkey
– Dromedary
It’s quite a pathetic list. Kim must have lived a rather static outdoor life. One day I’ll take him to where the elks are. I know a place.
When I arrive at the cafe, Kent is sitting there with two guys whom I don’t know. Kent tells me one is about to finish his doctorate in physics and the other one is a graduate physician in the process of becoming a psychiatrist. I greet them.
Kent asks me what I am up to, and I tell him that I have left university and started throwing a ball because everything suddenly seemed so meaningless to me.
This is evidently an item of news that Kent is unable to take in properly. He lets it pass and asks whether I’ve met any girls lately. I tell him I haven’t met a single one.
Kent is silent. I sort of start chatting to the two others. The psychiatrist is asking me whether I see my choices as waves breaking. I ask him if it’s doubt he’s talking about. Whether he means that I’m in doubt when I am faced with choices. He means what he says.
Do I see my choices as waves breaking?
I guess in a way I do. I say yes.
The psychiatrist nods and says that’s good. If I didn’t, I would have been psychotic.
We toast my not being psychotic.
I tell the physicist that I’ve been reading a bit in a book about time. I mention a few quick key words: Einstein, the theory of relativity, gravity, that time doesn’t exist.
Exists, doesn’t exist – what’s the difference, he says.
I tell him not to make jokes. I explain that this is important to me.
The physicist says this thing about the theory of relativity is something he hasn’t been particularly occupied with. Not beyond what was on his syllabus a few years back. There aren’t many people who understand the theory of relativity, he says. But he has heard those that do think it’s a beautiful and elegant theory.
I ask him if he understands about time passing slower at the top of the Empire State Building than at the bottom.
He shakes his head. He doesn’t understand it, he says. But he doesn’t doubt that it’s true, and he has learned to accept it. He’s learned to live with it. Most of the time he thinks about other things, and he feels I ought to do the same.
Without warning, Kent begins to talk about a girl he has been seeing. It’s a dirty story. I listen until it’s finished without commenting on it. Afterwards I ask Kent how he’s doing at the Central Statistics Bureau. He’s quite content and I say fine.
Then I say I’m going home to sleep.
You could always give me a call some time, Kent says.
Sure, I say.
The next morning I wake up early, feeling that I have to buy something that can redress the damage done by my contact with Kent. I feel as though I’ve taken two steps backwards.
When the toy store opens, I’ve been standing waiting a good three-quarters of an hour. And I’ve got my list ready.
I want something that:
– can help me release aggression r />
– has striking colours
– can be used over and over and over
– makes a noise
– makes me forget about Kent and time
This is a lot to demand of an object in a toy store. It would be a lot to demand of an object in any store. But it might still work. I am taking my time. There are no other customers in the store. The staff follow me intently with their eyes while I walk around among the shelves. I’ve already told them I don’t want any help. I must do this on my own.
The breakthrough comes at the Brio section. There is a toy that I recognise from when I was little. It has the potential to fulfil all the points on the list. It is a Hammer-and-Peg.
The box is nice and red and the board is pictured with a little boy hammering. The board is yellow and says Brio in large, red lettering. The pegs that you hammer down are yellow and the legs on the board are blue. The hammer is red and green. I feel a good sensation throughout my entire body. I remember the hammer-and-peg as a very satisfying toy.
When all the pegs are knocked flush with the board, a sense of cohesion arises. Things join together. They have meaning. Then you turn the board over and hammer the pegs down again. It is an infinite-action machine that provides its user with a sense of cohesion.
I don’t demand more from anything. Neither people nor objects.
If I hammer for a sufficiently long time, I may be able to achieve a sense of meaning on as much a global as a personal plane. Anyway, I have nothing to lose. Now I’ve bought the hammer-and-peg, and I’m cycling home. Today will be The Day When I Begin to Hammer. Here I go.
Vacuum
The last few days I have hardly done anything but hammer. I’ve hammered morning, noon and night. It is an exquisitely monotonous activity that fills me with pleasure. The thoughts stop coming. I am full of gratitude towards Brio.
Finally I’m on my way somewhere. I am gaining a certain extra energy, and I feel stronger. I’ve even gained courage to read on in the book about time. Now I’m reading about light. That it’s fast. Almost 300,000 kilometres per second. In a vacuum. It is a bit slower in the atmosphere. And a metre is defined as the distance covered by light in the space of one 299,792,458th of a second. In a vacuum.