What Actually Matters

A Great Quote

I read a talk yesterday that made me think so much of Per. The wife of the man I read about got quoted saying, "the man they have in mind is very different from the man I know. The man I know is a kind, loving husband and father whose greatest ambition in life is to make his family happy". She said that the public saw his stern side-one who followed rules, but his family saw his soft side-one who loved.

Comparing Americans and Swedes

A long time ago I heard a comparison between Americans and Swedes, it went like this: Americans are like peaches. When you first get to know them they are soft and sweet and easy to know. But the longer you know them, some are hard as rock in the middle and you wonder if they are really your friend. Swedes are like coconuts. Swedes are hard to get to know and tough to crack. But when you get into their hearts they are soft and sweet in the middle and a friend for life. When some Swedes trust, they are very loyal.

That comparison rings so true concerning Per-a Swede. He's hard to know and often get's misjudged. (For example, when he's quiet some people think he's snooty when the truth is that he has nothing of value to say. He's not the kind of person that babbles or says something to break the silence.)

The Truth

What matters about a person is who they really are-not who people 'think' they are. 

Sweden Vacation 2013

We had a lot of fun in Sweden. We were there July 3 (Wed PM) - July 11 (Thurs AM) and time flew! Here's a synopsis of what we did:

7/3 (Wed PM) - Per met us (Bryan, Kimbra, Andrew and me) at Arlanda airport (it's the first time we've traveled w/o Per-and the last time as far as I'm concerned: I feel more comfortable when he's there,) drove for 3 hours (from Stockholm to Väse) after already traveling for 16 hours, stopped in Kristinahamn to buy stuff & snacks at the store, met family at Lövås (Tore, Monika, Ann-Sofie, Sandra, Little Nils,) ate dinner, rested

7/4 (Thurs) - Went to a couple of stores in Karlstad (Willy's and Rusta,) ate Swedish pizza in Karlstad for lunch, celebrated the 4th of July at dinner where we ate Monika's yummy deer roast and mushroom sauce and a delicious American flag cake that Ann-Sofie made (sheet cake/cheesecake - haha!)

7/5 (Fri) - Day trip: Met Peter and Kerstin at their home (3 hours away) near Göteberg, met Per's friends (dinner at Torbjorn's house), (Erika and Torsten arrived from Gotland and Nils arrived from Göteberg)

7/6 (Sat) - Picked wild berries in the forest, celebrated birthdays at dinner (Tore 85, Monika 80, Nils 50, Me 45, and Andrew 20 this year) where we had a seafood feast including shrimp, red crawfish, and huge ocean crawfish from Göteberg

7/7 (Sun) - Looked at old things in the attic (Per looked at his China,) ate bbq steaks (horsemeat that the guys said was better than beef,) played Kubb at Lövås, posed for a family photo

7/8 (Mon) - (Erika and Torsten went back to Gotland,) ate dinner at a restaurant on the warf in Karlstad with Per's friends and spent the evening with them

7/9 (Tues) - Ate a smörgåsbord lunch

7/10 (Wed) - Left Lövås and drove to Stockholm, took pictures in Örebro, drove through the city of Stockholm (not the freeway) to avoid traffic and to find parking, walked in Stockholm for a second but left because we were hungry and cold, ate yummy Swedish pizza at a nice place after accidentally driving in the hood, checked into a nice hotel (Radisson) at Arlanda airport

7/11 (Thurs AM) - Per left early to fly on another airline, ate a delicious smörgåsbord breakfast, check out of our hotel, went on a bus to Arlanda airport

In my opinion, the second best thing about Sweden was the food (the best thing about Sweden was seeing a lot of the people I love.) Back to the food...everything we ate tasted yummy! From the chocolate to the water and in between, it all tasted great.

We stayed at Pirran's house (a smaller house by Lövås which we called her house although she didn't live there.) It was nice to have our own space. Bryan and Kimbra stayed upstairs where Per and I always stayed, and Per and I stayed downstairs where Bryan and Andrew always stayed. We swapped (and I didn't miss walking up and down the steep [and potentially slippery] stairs.)

Dinner at Ankdammen in Karlstad with Per's friends

Visiting at Peter and Kerstin's house

Peter, Kerstin, Kimbra, Bryan, Andrew, Jade, Per

Kimbra and Bryan

Andrew (and the best cheese doodles in the world!)

Per and Jade

Picking wild berries in the forest

The table is set for birthday celebrations at Lövås

Seafood Feast for birthday celebrations

Playing Kubb, a very fun game that originated on Gotland

Visiting between Kubb matches

Kimbra and Bryan

Lövgren Family
(Nils, Andrew, Per, Jade, Bryan, Erica, Ann-Sofie,
Monika, Tore,
Kimbra, Sandra, Nils, Torsten)

Smörgåsbord lunch

Smörgåsbord location

Lövås Gård (Gård=farm)

Lövås Gård sign

Per driving in Stockholm

Some buildings in Stockholm

Thoughts About Sweden

This is Per's family: Tore, Monika, Ann-Sofie (Ahlqvist), and Nils Lövgren. They all live in Sweden. My family lives in the U.S., in Kansas, 3,000 miles away. I like to go visit them in Sweden, but we only go every few years because it's expensive. We usually have to take three or four airplane rides to get to Sweden (Kansas to Minneapolis to Zurich to Stockholm) then it's another four hours from Stockholm to their home in Väse. The entire trip takes about 24 hours and their home is seven time zones ahead of what we're used to, so we have jet lag when we get there.

The longest airplane ride is about nine hours on a 747 (Minneapolis to Zurich.) In the past, this plane ride has been fun for many reasons including that the airplane is big and I get to sit with my four family members. (On 747's, in coach, two seats are on the left side, two seats are on the right side, and four seats are in the middle [the place my family always sits].) Now that we have five people in our family, I imagine three of us will sit in the middle and two of us will either sit behind, in front, or to the side of the others. In any case, the trip will be fun.

The last couple of times we've gone to Sweden, TV screens have embedded the backs of each seat. I've thought of this as convenient because each person could put their headphones on and watch their own movie. Usually, the airplane had about nine movies to choose from; so if a person couldn't sleep they had something to do.

Flight Attendants usually serve two meals on that nine hour ride: dinner and breakfast. The food tastes pretty alright. (One of my memories of that airplane ride is: As little boys, Bryan or Andrew would inevitably spill their drink on Per.) After flying for a while, the air on the plane gets pretty stale and the throat gets dry. About that time, a flight attendant walks down the aisles and asks awake persons if they'd like some water. (I always feel glad to drink it.)

When we finally get to Per's Swedish home, some kind of food always awaits us. Sometimes we eat dinner, other times we eat something light. No matter what we eat, we always have Knäcke Bröd (cracker bread) with butter and yummy cheese. I love Knäcke Bröd with butter and thin slices of cheese. For some reason, it tastes even better in Sweden (probably because the butter and cheese are different [better] than where I live.) In any case, I love to have Knäcke Bröd in Sweden. (I especially like it when Per makes it for me [probably because he uses more butter than I do].)

Per's mother, Monika, is an excellent cook. We've had her deer roast, moose meatballs, smoked salmon, pancakes with pea soup, and fresh strawberries with vanilla sauce to name a few things. The deer roast is amazing. When Per asks her how she makes it she says "I just do a little bit of this and a little bit of that." (She made the roast one time when she visited us in Kansas, and my house smelled just like Sweden.) She has told me how to make it but I'll never be able to make it like her. If I practice a few times, I'm sure it will be good but not as good as hers. 

Per's home in Sweden is about 100 years old and on a farm. It's so quiet that when I awake in the morning I can hear the leaves rustling in the trees. If I look out the front door I'll see forest to the left, farm fields to the right, and a barn and a pig house down the lane straight ahead. The house has a lot of wood inside it, and when I'm there the smell of wood and the air tells me I'm in Sweden.

Sweden is the same latitude as Juno, Alaska. There, the sky never gets dark in the summer. But, it gets very dark in the winter. We mostly go there around mid-summer (the end of June) when they have the midnight sun. (During the midnight sun, it get's about as dark as dusk so it's hard to tell what time it is. The sun still rises and sets but it never gets dark at night. It could be 3AM and still light enough to see without a flashlight.) 

The food is one of my  favorite things about Sweden. We always get Swedish pizza while we're there. The thing I like is that no matter where I'm at, the pizza menus I've seen are always the same. I like that because, as a creature of habit, I get the same thing every time. My pizza is called Bussola: it has ham, shrimp, tomato sauce and cheese. There are two best things about getting pizza in Sweden. The first is that each person gets their own, which is about the size of a dinner plate. The second is that it only costs about five bucks per person.

Menu at Swedish pizza restaurant

The thing that strikes me most in Sweden is how old things are. The Lutheran church in Väse (Per's hometown) has saints buried under tiles (inside, at the front of the church.) The font used to bless newborn babies is from the 700's. The oldest thing I know of in America is from the 1600's. Sweden had vikings a thousand years ago when part of the country was under ice. The country had Kings and wars (they still have a King but politics are handled by the Prime Minister and they haven't been a part of a war for a while because Sweden is a neutral country.) I've seen ruins and walked through a castle that stands today. I've seen (in a natural history museum) the remains of a viking woman - her bones are at least 1,000 years old. I've walked the streets of cities from medieval times. Seeing those things has made history come alive for me. (I wonder if Swedish people have the same awe I do, or if something old is just another thing to see.)

Väse Church

Väse Church Font

Borgholm Castle ruin

More ruins on Ӧland

Kalmar Castle

Visby, once a medieval town

Skull in chainmail at the museum of natural history in  Visby

The cobblestone streets of Visby

I love Sweden. Unfortunately, I don't speak Swedish. Also, I don't go there often enough to feel like a Swede. (Almost everyone there knows how to speak English, but they prefer to speak Swedish.) I understand how people feel that come to America but don't speak English. I admire people who speak fluently in more than one language. I could go on and on about Sweden. It's a lovely place. My family and I have been there quite a few times.  It's always great to see family and I love to be in that foreign place.

The First Thing That Happened on My First Trip to Sweden

We went to Sweden six months after Per and I were married and right after we had moved from Orem, Utah to West Des Moines, Iowa. I had met a few people from Per’s family but was meeting the rest, for the first time, when we arrived at his house.

Just before we were about to get in the car, at 3:30 in the morning, and drive from West Des Moines to Kansas City, Per said “are you wearing that?” The airport in Kansas City was international and we had to fly from there instead of the airport by where we lived. I had gone shopping the night before and bought what the sales clerk had assured me looked cute. That’s what I was wearing when Per asked me the question. I didn’t know that the black leggings I had on were in fact tights and that my white underwear showed.

My shirt was a white rayon blouse that fell just below my hips. It had big black flowers, and a cute little ruffle that went around the bottom. No matter how nice the shirt was, it didn't make up for the fact that I had no pants on!

Per didn’t usually comment on my clothes. He may have thought things but he never said, and I never asked. It was unusual that he made a remark. He asked me the question and I was kind of offended. I knew how to buy clothes and I knew what I thought was cute. “Pfsh! Of course I’m wearing this!” I said. He didn’t say another word and we got in the car.

The outfit wasn’t what I usually wore. I wore things that were very traditional...and modest. It was the first time I was meeting Per’s family, and I wanted to look cute for them. Because of this, I had bought something new. The leggings and blouse were the “in” thing at the moment. The blouse was not the really long button up shirt of the 80’s and the pants were not stirrups, they were leggings. They went to the ankle and reminded me of something Madonna would wear. I was not trying to look like Madonna but look cute for Per's family.

Obviously the sales clerk wanted to make a sale and had told me what I wanted to hear. The fatal flaw was that I wore exactly what she said looked cute. She could have meant the blouse. However, that’s not what she said. She said “you" look cute. I interpreted her words to mean that “everything you have on is an outfit and it’s cute.” I had trusted her judgment and bought everything. When I had gotten home from shopping, Per was asleep. The first time he saw my clothes was that morning.

I didn’t realize my problem until we were in the sky. When I looked at my legs I could see through my pants. I mentioned it to Per and he looked at me with an expression that said I "told you so." I realized there was nothing I could do and looked at the seat in front of me like a deer looking in headlights.

Even though Kansas City was international, our plane stopped at another international airport (JFK in New York City) before flying to Stockholm.

Not only did we stop in New York City but we had to pick up our suitcases from the baggage claim and switch airlines - which meant switching terminals - which meant going outside. The problem I saw was that it was windy outside. I kept my arms to my sides as I walked so that my underwear wouldn’t show. We had no time to stop and open my suitcase. Our connection was tight and we had to hurry to make the flight. Per and our five year old son pulled all of our suitcases to the other terminal without any help from me. I was relieved when we boarded the plane and sat down.

As I sat in my seat, I looked at my legs again. Even though my shirt was longer when I sat, it was bunched up in my lap and I could clearly see my lack of pants. I wondered what I was going to do. Of course I decided to put some pants on when I could. I sat in my seat pondering how Per’s family would probably think that I was a country bumpkin when they saw me.

We got to Stockholm and Per’s home town was another four hours away. We grabbed our luggage from the baggage claim and quickly board another plane. Once again, we didn’t have any time to open my suitcase. At that point, we had been traveling for more than 24 hours and I didn’t care who saw what.

Per’s dad picked us up at the airport and didn't say a word about my pants. He just smiled and was happy to see me again. I let out a big sigh of relief when we got in the car. After Per shoved our luggage into the little trunk we took off toward his house.

When we pulled up, his brother and sister were waiting for us - and his sister’s boyfriend - and their little girl - and a neighbor lady that lived nearby - and his mom. “Come in, welcome” his mom said after she opened the front door. They hugged Per. His mom and the neighbor lady kissed him on the cheek then they gave me the same greeting and welcomed Bryan. Luckily, when we hugged, they couldn’t see my clothes.

I don’t know if anyone noticed that I wasn’t wearing pants. The next thing I did was open my suitcase, right there in the entryway, and grab the first pair of pants I saw.

The Lovgren Family in Sweden

This is Per's family: Tore, Monika, Ann-Sofie, and Nils. They all live in Sweden, and we live here, 3,000 miles away in the U.S, in Kansas. I like to visit them in Sweden, but we only go every couple of years because it's expensive. We usually have to take 3 or 4 airplane rides to get there (Kansas to Minneapolis to Vienna to Stockholm) then it's another 4 hours from Stockholm to their home in Väse. The entire trip takes about 24 hours and their home is 7 time zones ahead of what we're used to, so we have jet lag when we get there.

I wish we were going to see them this year. We haven't been to Sweden since 2008 when we picked Bryan up from his mission in France. I can't believe it's already been two years since we've seen them. Per went to Sweden for a few days last year when he went to Europe on a business trip but I haven't seen them for a couple of years. I wish I could get to know them better but it's hard to do because we don't speak the same language. Even so, we are still family and I miss them. I miss the smell of Sweden and the smell of their home. I miss Monika's yummy food and Nils playing golf outside with my guys. I miss sleeping there and waking up to the sound of wind rustling through the trees and birds chirping. Most of all, I miss the four of them.

I hope we take a trip there soon. Until then, at least I have pictures and memories.