P is for Politiken

Politiken – Politics – is the last thing I imagined myself getting involved with. For years I thought that – had been steered into thinking – religion and politics didn’t really jive together. How misguided! In later years I am now discovering that they are extensions of each other. How do you talk about peace and justice and put your values into practice in abstract terms? Don’t you have to use your skills and gifts to help bring peace and justice and what you believe in about?

When I was invited to get involved in local politics in a practical way last autumn I decided to walk that path to see what it looked and felt like. Sure, as a politician you get a lot of stick from various quarters and you sometimes wonder whether anyone actually wants change for the better; or even change at all …. However, for me the path is leading in the right direction, and helping me to see that religion and politics – prayer and action – are totally intertwined. 

O is for Omgivning

In my Swedish-English dictionary the word ‘omgivning’ has different meanings. It can be translated as surroundings, environs, neighbourhood, district, environment, those closest to someone, those around someone, entourage, immediate entourage. It is a very useful word. It is a very encompassing word. It is a very challenging word.

My immediate surroundings are a mixture of the urban with the rural. We live a stones-throw away from a lake with a popular beach and are close to the woods. Opposite us is the former cigarette factory – now a health centre and home to many small businesses. At the end of our road is the former Windsor chair factory, which since its closure has served a number of functions. The mainline railway from Stockholm to Malmö (and Copenhagen) runs through the town. If we talk about class – which is not as common here as it is in England – my immediate neighbourhood could be regarded as working class aspiring towards middle class.

Those closest to me are my immediate family – husband and dog – with whom I live. Extended family includes those relative-based circles to which I belong. Those around me include the people with whom I worship (Quakers and Attenders in the Småland Worship Group and in Sweden Yearly Meeting as a whole), friends and comrades with whom I share a political interest, dog owners that I meet on the regular rounds, the neighbours.

All this means that I am connected: to my surroundings and to other people. They are also connected to me. There is a responsibility to care and to share. As Håkan Juholt said in his Labour Day (1^st May) speech here in Nässjö, we need to change from being individualistic, being suspicious of our neighbours, being careless with the environment. Rather, we need to think community, help each other to build a worthwhile future, share what we have, care for each other, care for our environment.

We cannot buy omgivning – although in many respects the prevailing system has led us to believe that we are customers; customers who pay up and shut up.  Omgivning is bigger and beyond that, and worth building up. Omgivning is indeed a word to ponder over.

M is for Mångkulturell (Multicultural); N is for Nässjö

[Two letters in one, here described in reverse order for historical reasons!]

In 1914 Nässjö was recognised as a Swedish stad (the Swedish word stad can mean town or city) and granted the accompanying privileges and charter. Nässjö’s Town Hall was formally opened in the same year. One hundred years on, in 2014, Nässjö is celebrating its centenary.

At that time Nässjö belonged to a new urban generation known as a ‘stationsamhället’ – a bridge between the old and the new, a merging of town and country. Its identity as a town was therefore not entirely clear.  

Nässjö is a railway town – an important railway junction for trains heading north, south, east and west. When the railway was first established, in the mid-1800s, Nässjö’s inhabitants numbered 43. Fifty years on, when the town received its charter, the population had grown to 5,949. With the railway as its mainstay and the explosion of various industries (cigarette factory, clothing mill, furniture factory) the town blossomed.

Today, Nässjö has a population of around 17,000, and in the municipality as a whole (including the surrounding communities) the population numbers 30,000.

The present population is mångkulturell – multicultural. The town works towards integration – the integration of native Swedes and new Swedes. The concept ‘new Swedes’ has been adopted in Sweden as a whole to include ‘immigrants’ from various corners of the world. Just as in 1914, the town is a bridge between the old and the new, this time in a merging of cultures. Similar to 1914, its identity is unclear and still emerging.

Multicultural Nässjö is a town in formation. Following its progress will be fascinating.

L is for Ljus

Here in Scandinavia ljus – light – is an important part of people’s everyday lives. In the depth of winter, when light is scarce, we long for it. We light candles in our homes to remind us that the light is always there. As the darkness lightens we rejoice at it, stand in it, sit in it, work in it and enjoy being ‘in the light’.

The light is important for Quakers too. In our Meetings for Worship in Scandinavia we always have a lighted candle at the centre of the circle. Early Friends were called ‘Children of the Light’. We talk about the inner light, the light within, the inward light and about being enlightened. We hold people in the light. We encourage people to let their lights shine. We wait in the light. We mind the light. We let the light guide us.

In his Journal, George Fox wrote: “I saw, also, that there was an ocean of darkness and death; but an infinite ocean of light and love, which flowed over the ocean of darkness. In that also I saw the infinite love of God, and I had great openings.” Much later, in 1904, Rufus Jones wrote: “The Inner Light is the doctrine that there is something Divine, ‘Something of God’ in the human soul.”

Let us walk in the light. Let it illuminate the darkness. Let it reveal our innermost truths.

K is for Kvalitet and Kvantitet

We often talk about kvalitet – the quality – of life, and the importance of it. In a just world quality would pervade the whole of life. It would be an unquestionable right. For every living creature.

Kvantitet – quantity – lies elsewhere on the scale. How often do we, in our Quaker meetings, bemoan the fact that we are not sufficient in number?

Why do we put quantity before quality? Quality is to do with whether truth is prospering amongst us – not how many bums warm the Meeting House benches. 

J is for Ja

In James 5:12 (Contemporary English Version) we read: My friends, above all else, don’t take an oath. You must not swear by heaven or by earth or by anything else. “Yes” or “No” is all you need to say.

Ja is Swedish for Yes. Plain and simple Quaker speech.

I is for Irma

Frihamras Irma La Douce and I have known each other since the summer of 2008. She was three years old at the time. I overcame my fear of dogs and stepped into Irma’s home for the first time to help her breeder with email correspondence in English. This is when I first became aware of a brown standard poodle – among the many others living in the breeder’s home – who constantly sought me out and indicated that for her I was someone special.

It was, in fact, the beginning of a ‘love affair’ that has continued and deepened. In December 2012 Irma became my dog. I bought her from the breeder and she and I have been joined at the hip ever since.

To backtrack, when I was four years old I had a traumatic experience with an Alsatian dog that continued to haunt me for years. Every time I saw a dog I froze, terrified to the core that it would attack me. It didn’t matter how often a dog owner told me that their dog would never hurt a fly. I simply could not believe them.

When we moved into the house next door to the kennel where Irma was born and raised, I told the breeder that I was afraid of dogs. She respected this and kept her dogs inside whenever I was went to the end of the path to collect our post. However, one day, she asked me if I could help her with email correspondence in English, because she had received a request from someone in Australia who was interested in buying one of her dog’s new born pups. Before I realised what I was letting myself in for I said yes, I would gladly help.

Into the house I went. I was met by a sea of brown doggy faces and bodies and didn’t quite know where to put myself. They didn’t seem unfriendly, although I hurried upstairs to the computer and busied myself with the task in hand. One dog followed me and lay at my feet while I was typing. The correspondence was intense and I found myself summoned to the house quite regularly. Each time, the same dog followed me and lay under the table, beside my feet. This was Irma.

A week or two later the breeder told me that her husband was to have a knee operation and would not be able to help her to walk the dogs as usual. I heard myself volunteering to help! Punctually each day I presented myself at the appointed time and was assigned to walk with Aida, Irma’s mum. She was the leader of the pack and the most docile. In fact Aida was a doddle, and I began to enjoy the daily walks. It did not escape my notice, or that of the breeder, that every time I walked up the path to the house, Irma raced to the door to be the first to greet me. As soon as the door opened to let me in, Irma was there to twirl around my legs and let me know that I was ‘hers’. The breeder was flabbergasted at this behaviour, because it was the first time that Irma had showed her feelings to any living person. I later learned that Irma was stressed in the pack and was a bit of a lone wolf. When I left the dogs after the daily walk Irma would gaze soulfully at me, and linger outside the door with her tail between her legs.

After a while the breeder asked me if I would like to take Irma home with me for an hour or two after the walk. I was reluctant at first, but soon came round to the idea. Just before Irma’s first visit I cleaned the whole house in her honour! To me she was an Important Guest, and everything had to be spick and span. The two hour visits soon turned into a whole evening and overnight stay. When Irma saw her doggy basket being handed over to me her eyes nearly popped out of her head! I can remember it clearly. She wagged her tail all the way down to what the breeder called ‘the hotel’ (i.e. our house).

I guess that Irma and I were meant to be a pair. When my husband and I moved to Nässjö in December 2010 Irma came with us, ‘on loan’. As the breeder wanted to take another litter from her (she had already had 10 pups in one fell swoop) I was obliged to take her back to the kennels for a 4-month stay so that she could meet her mate and have her pups. During those 4 months I thought that my world had come to an end. Life was so empty without her and I could hardly walk the tracks we had walked together without tears rolling down my face. When I could at last have her back, the breeder let me buy Irma out, so that she and I could live life together in peace.

Irma loves Meeting for Worship and is part of the Småland Worship Group. She has also been accepted as an Extra-ordinary member of Sweden Yearly Meeting. She comes with us to some of the meetings of the local Social Democrats too – especially if these meetings are one-day affairs. As long as she is with me she is happy.

I never in a month of Sundays thought that I would ever have a dog of my own. But Irma is not just an ordinary dog. To me she is very special, and it would seem that I am very special to her. She chose me, and we are inseparable.