Читать книгу On Time and Water - Andri Snaer Magnason - Страница 7

I’m at Grandma Hulda and Grandpa Árni’s home in Hladbær. We’re sitting in the kitchen: the Ellidaá stream meanders in front of the house and people jog along the river path. A few snowdrifts linger on the slopes of Bláfjöll yet the garden is in full bloom. I open my computer and load a video so I can show Grandma Hulda and my mother a film no one has seen in decades. I’d discovered an old 16 mm cassette in their storage room and had converted it to digital. It was a movie Grandpa Árni shot in 1956, black-and-white and silent; the picture quality is perfect. Well-mannered children sit in the dining room here at number 3 Selás, this big white house my great-grandpa built on the banks of the stream. The children have little bottles of cola; Grandma Hulda appears, smiling, with a magnificent pavlova decorated with lit candles. At the end of the table, ten-year-old twin sisters sit together, laughing and blowing vigorously at the candles. Great-Grandma is there, too, dressed in traditional Icelandic fashion, watching it all. The next shot shows the children dancing in a ring in the yard; no doubt they’re playing the game “In a Green Hollow.” Mom and Grandma Hulda watch the video and name the people the images have preserved. A child’s birthday from 1956 captured on 16 mm film is truly something. There isn’t even footage of the Icelandic government from that time.

And here we are in 2018, sitting in the same kitchen more than sixty years later. Mom is over seventy, Grandma Hulda is ninety-four years old, and my youngest daughter is ten. Grandma Hulda has hardly changed from how I remember her: she’s only just given up golfing and her memory is still intact. A few years ago, a man who was trying to sing her praises to me commended how sharp she was. I acted half offended: sharp? What do you mean, sharp; she’s always been a quick thinker. She certainly doesn’t think of herself as elderly. Take her sense of humor. That’s a beautiful shawl, I once remarked about a blue shawl she was wearing. Yes, an old lady crocheted it for me. Old lady? I asked. She laughed and replied: Oh, yes, she’s probably ten years younger than I am!

The phone rings and Grandma Hulda runs to answer it. We sit down to eat pancakes as the radio hums low in the background. I ask Hulda Filippía, my daughter, to do a little math puzzle.

“How old is your great-grandma if she was born in 1924?”

“She’s ninety-four,” Hulda replies immediately.

“Fast math,” I say.

“Well, I know how old she is.” She grins.

“All right, but now you’ll really have to calculate. When will you be ninety-four?”

“So it would be the year I was born, 2008, plus ninety-four?”

“Exactly.”

She takes a piece of paper and a pen and looks skeptically at the sheet. She shows me the result as though it must be a misunderstanding.

“Is that really right, 2102?”

“Yes, hopefully you’ll be just as energetic as Grandma Hulda is now. Maybe you’ll even be living in this same house. Maybe your ten-year-old great-granddaughter will be visiting, sitting with you in this kitchen in 2102, just like you are sitting here right now.”

“Yes, maybe,” says Hulda, sipping a glass of milk.

“One more equation. When will your great-granddaughter be ninety-four years old?”

Hulda writes some figures on a piece of paper, with a little help.

“Would she have been born in 2092?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Okay, 2092 plus ninety-four … 2186!

She laughs at the thought.

“Yes, can you imagine that? You, born in 2008, might know a girl who will still be alive in the year 2186.”

Hulda purses her mouth and looks into the air.

“Can I go now?” she asks.

“Almost,” I say. “I’ve one more puzzle. How long is it from 1924 to 2186?”

Hulda does the math.

“Is it two hundred and sixty-two years?”

“Imagine that. Two hundred and sixty-two years. That’s the length of time you connect across. You’ll know the people who span this time. Your time is the time of the people you know and love, the time that molds you. And your time is also the time of the people you will know and love. The time that you will shape. You can touch two hundred and sixty-two years with your bare hands. Your grandma taught you, you will teach your great-granddaughter. You can have a direct impact on the future, right up to the year 2186.”

“Up to 2186!”