Two weeks ago my mother went back to
this house in Sweden.
My father is no longer alive.
The couple who used to live in that house
is no longer alive.
But my mother had good memories from
their lifelong friendship.
In the mid-fifties my father picked up
a young couple who hitchhiked with him
from Oslo to Moss on a Friday afternoon.
They were going to visit some friends on the
other side of the Swedish border.
They had brought along a tent and decided to
sleep that Friday night near Vannsjø Lake,
outside Moss. My father showed them a nice place,
said goodbye and went home to eat dinner.
But it started to rain, and my father was
concerned about the young couple in their tent
getting wet.
He went back to where he had left them.
They were there, and it was still raining.
First he brought them home to us, and they
slept in our home that night.
Next morning he decided that he and his family
would bring the hitchhikers to their destination
in Sweden.
I think my mother must have been very
spontaneous too, bringing along her two
very young children on this spur-of-the-moment
trip.
My mother told me today that on the way,
the young couple talked about how the couple
they were about to visit would react to such
an "invasion" of an additional four persons.
The man calmed his girlfriend that he was
quite sure it would be OK.
After a few hours, the car arrived outside
the little house you see on this blog entry.
Out came the owners who with open arms
received the young couple they knew and
probably expected to see, and in
addition, a young unknown family of four
from Norway.
Not only did we stay there the whole Saturday,
but the owners (who had three children of
their own!) insisted we must sleep over.
And that became the beginning of
a lifelong friendship between the two couples.
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