Reykjavik

I was reading an Icelandic murder mystery, wondering exactly what the streets of Reykjavik look like. Then I remembered why I don’t know.

Sometime after her 80^th birthday my Grandma Vi went to Rekjavik on her own (it was some kind of group tour). A few days after she got back, when my mom’s cousin asked if she could see the photos, Vi answered a little louder than necessary. “If you want to see Iceland so bad,” she told Cousin Patty, pointing, “you save your own money and you go there yourself. That’s what I did. And I’m not showing you any pictures.” Nobody mentioned Iceland again that summer.

It wasn’t the first time Vi had said something a bit harsh. Earlier that summer I’d gone to pick her up and she’d come to the door of her condo, camera in hand. I looked at it and she told me “I was going to take your picture. But not with your hair looking like that.”

By the time my Grandma Vi died she had quite a reputation for her sharp tongue. I can’t excuse all of her comments (that time she insisted her legs were nicer than my friend's was just plain rude. And when she went to the premiere of my first play she didn’t have to say “Sara [my sister] is writing a movie, you know”.)

But I understood a little better this past July when another cousin said, “Your Grandfather took so many pictures, but I don’t think Vi ever figured out how to run the camera after he died.” When she lost my Grandfather, Vi lost her husband, her friend, her travelling companion, and her photographer. Suddenly there was a little more meaning behind her outlandish outburst about Iceland. And my hair.

I don’t know if I’ll ever get to Reykjavik. But I hope I’ll always have someone to go with.

 

Comments

[Maureen]

I share your sentiment in your last sentence.

We both have sharp-tongued grandmothers! My grandmother once called my dad "fat" within 2 hours of arrival for Xmas! No wonder he didn't like her much!