I remember the parades and my parents getting up early on Sunday to save our spots on the curb. I remember the run, two miles every year. I always took the first hill too fast. One year, I ran with a fever. Afterward, I’d have an apple from the recovery tent. I have a quilt made out of the colored t-shirts I collected.
The canoe race was on Friday evening and one year I participated with my dad. I wore jean capris, a bandana, and a custom Uffda running shirt that, a decade later, belongs to me permanently. Every other year I remember meeting Zia there in the crowd, on the bridge or by the river. It marked the start of the weekend.
At the craft fair, we bought stuffed toys or filled glass bottles with layers of colored sand or had our caricatures done. Those pictures still hang in my parents’ garage.
I remember gathering at Aunt Shirley’s house after the parade. We’d eat lefse and look at the picture where Shirley and her husband Al were Syttende Mai Queen and King.
I remember the dancers. Women in bunads performing Norweigian dances. They were in high school but, to me, they were all grown up. I wanted to be them someday and wear the one dress that was light blue, different from the others.
I remember the plays in the small theater on Main Street about Ole and Lena and Lars getting into very Norwegian, very Stoughton shenanigans. I remember what the actors looked like. I remember the lilt of their voices. I remember the intermissions where the chorus stood up and sang in Norwegian.
I remember how damn good the corn on the cob was, dipped in butter before we ate it salted in the parking lot. And the cheese curds. You haven’t had cheese curds until you’ve had them from that food truck during Syttende Mai. Deep-fried, golden, addicting.
Next year, I’ll go. It’s been a long time. Some day, I’ll go to Norway today and see how it’s really done. This year Zia and I text Happy Syttende Mai, as we do every year, and a thousand little moments flash through my head. The rosemaling, the mini flags, the kids’ dance by the river with the asphalt-covered in silly string, the year I took a nap on a graveyard hill in the middle of the afternoon, the games of capture the flag running around my grandparents’ house . . .
Happy Syttende Mai – With Love,
Natalie