Five Years in Motion: Summer in the City
- 2 days ago
- 5 min read
Five years ago this week, I officially resigned from the career I had spent nearly two decades building.
After months of downsizing and preparing, including ending the lease on the apartment where I had lived for 13 years, my resignation was the final major step before I sold my car and boarded a one-way flight to Norway in September 2021.
I knew I was taking a leap, and I couldn’t see where I would land.
But I jumped.
That one-way journey brought me here, to Oslo. It was September 2021, and under the pandemic rules then in place, I went directly from the airport to a quarantine hotel. I can laugh about that arrival now.
Now I have surfaced here again, nearly five years later.
I arrived at the tail end of a heat wave, at least by Norwegian standards, and only a few days after more than 100,000 people filled the streets to welcome Norway’s World Cup team home.
The celebration was over, but the energy still hangs in the air.
I am house- and cat-sitting in Hovseter for three weeks. I have an apartment, a cat named Thor, a Ruter transit pass, and most of my days free until I begin my regular work in the evening. I am trying to slow down, catch my breath, and have something resembling a summer break.
I need it more than I realized.
For most of the past five years, I have been in some form of go mode: finding places to live, navigating permits and deadlines, gathering documents, crossing borders, watching calendars, making backup plans, and trying to build a sustainable life in Norway while living with a great deal of uncertainty.
I can feel the accumulation of those years in both my mind and body. Even when nothing needs my immediate attention, I find myself bracing for the next deadline, complication, or decision. After this long, I am not entirely sure how to switch that off.
This time in Oslo is about giving myself permission to step out of that mode. Even though the larger question remains, I have done what I can for now.
This summer also marks ten years since I first came to Norway and nearly two years since I submitted my current residency application to UDI. Several timelines are meeting at once.
The Norway I first arrived in is changing, too.
Emma, the dog I first came to Norway to care for as part of my WWOOF stay, died in May. In June, the family farm in Marifjøra passed to the next generation. These were two of my earliest connections to Norway, and both had remained remarkably steady while so much of my own life was in motion.
I have spent part of this summer returning to people and places that have been part of the journey.
Before coming to Oslo, I spent a week and a half back in Geilo, helping my friend Torild at Hakkesetstølen, the mountain lodge where I lived and worked during my first winter in Norway. It was good to step back into a familiar rhythm: waffles and rømmegrøt, guests coming in from the trails, changing weather over Hardangervidda, and the steady work of keeping a mountain lodge moving.
When I first arrived in Geilo in November 2021, I had recently left my old life behind and was still trying to understand what it meant to build a new one. I am still working some of that out.
Everywhere I looked held a memory: seeding the roof, painting the exterior, feeding the rabbit, cleaning the toilets, and sometimes wondering whether I should give up and go home. My application for a six-month seasonal work permit was rejected, and I waited four months for the appeal to be approved. It was a difficult period.
This time, I returned with some distance from that period. I was proud of what I had accomplished there and what I had made it through.
From Geilo, I continued east on the Bergensbanen, watching the mountains gradually give way to forests, farms, and eventually the outskirts of Oslo. Somewhere along the way, “Summer in the City” by the Lovin’ Spoonful lodged itself in my head. It followed me for the rest of the journey, an increasingly appropriate soundtrack as the train carried me out of the mountains and toward a few weeks of city life.
By the time I arrived, I had spent weeks moving between Skånevik, Bergen, Geilo, and points in between, carrying my work and most of what I needed with me.
Slowing down does not come naturally at the moment. There is always work waiting, along with emails to answer, projects to finish, and questions about what comes next. After so long in go mode, it requires more intention than I expected.
But Oslo feels like a good place to practice.
A city may not seem like the most natural place to slow down, but I am beginning to realize that rest does not have to mean being still. I like the energy here, and I like being anonymous. The T-bane is just outside the door, and I can ride it somewhere unfamiliar, walk for hours, sit in a library or museum, and get a little lost in the city for a while.
I am finding my way around the T-bane, the waterfront, and Deichman Bjørvika, which I suspect will become a regular base while I am here. I have books to read, writing I want to return to, museums to visit, and neighborhoods to explore. For once, I do not need to fit this city into a weekend. I have visited Oslo a few times before, but only for brief stays or while passing through. This time, I am here long enough to develop a routine.
On Sunday, I wandered off course and passed what I thought was an art installation, with preparations underway for an event. I later learned that Norway’s new national memorial to the attacks of 22 July 2011 was being opened that afternoon in a ceremony attended by Crown Prince Haakon. This July 22 marks 15 years since the attacks on the Government Quarter and Utøya, which killed 77 people.
My residency application is still moving through the system. On the online checklist, all but one of the checkmarks are now green, although that does not guarantee any particular outcome. That is about as much as I want to say about the details for now, but I expect to know more by early fall.
Until then, I am trying to live with the uncertainty without letting it consume the summer.
But I am tired.
In early August, I’ll fly back to the west coast to spend time with friends visiting from Wisconsin. At the end of August, I will travel to Marifjøra with my friend Tone, who was my WWOOF host when I first came to Norway ten years ago. We will stay in a treehouse not far from the original family farm. It will be my first visit since the farm passed to the next generation.
Ten years after my first summer in Norway, I will return to Sogn og Fjordane and to one of the places where this story began. It will be familiar, but it will also be different. There is more to say about that trip, but I will save it for another post.
Beyond August, the calendar is intentionally open. I have registered for the A2 language course in Bergen, but I do not yet know whether I will be able to attend. I also expect to visit the States later this year, although I have not made any concrete plans.
For now, after five years in motion, I am in Oslo.
In the summer, in the city
In the summer, in the city…
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