Alexandersmap

    Tag: Sweden

    • Practicing Lagom: Moderation and Balance

      “Lagom (pronounced [ˈlɑ̂ːɡɔm], LAW-gom) is a Swedish word meaning ‘just the right amount’ or ‘not too much, not too little’.
      The word can be variously translated as ‘in moderation’, ‘in balance’, ‘perfect-simple’, ‘just enough’, ‘ideal’ and ‘suitable’ (in matter of amounts).” — via Wikipedia

      I try (sometimes successfully) to live by the maxim, “all things in moderation”. So when I came across this Swedish word, lagom, that means roughly the same thing while awaiting a large latte at a cafe last week, I had to look into it more. I’m guessing that cafe has seen its share of over-caffeinated zombies shuffling in. A little art to remind us to chill was appropriate. When the student is ready the teacher will appear.

      Life is simple when we allow it to be. We ought to practice a routine of self-regulation, which also serves as an act of self-preservation. Like anything we hoard or overindulge in, it can overwhelm us if we let it. We can’t have it all, so why try to grab it all? It will drag us down and drown us if we don’t let go of the non-essential. What is essential? It’s really not all that much when we really think about it.

      My bride spent hours on a slushy Saturday cleaning up the attic, bagging used clothing to donate, throwing away things that couldn’t be donated but were no longer of use and generally getting things sorted for the new season. It was a good way to spend a wet and raw day. We accumulate things, and if we’re not careful those things end up ruling our lives.

      In that spirit of spring cleaning, springtime is also a good time to clean up some habits we’ve accumulated along the way. Perhaps we eat more than we should, or indulge in a bit too much wine or coffee or social media outrage. Perhaps we’ve grown lazy with a habit or two we thought would make all the difference in those heady days leading up to New Years Eve. Why not use this time to clean out the old and introduce something new?

      If life seems pretty tense at the moment, it may be a sign that we need to find a way to self-regulate. Stop over-indulging in the non-essential. Spring is a great time to reset and embrace the things that make us healthier, happier and more resilient against the stressors that are out of our control. What is “just enough” for us? Consume less, carry less, and lighten the load we bear. Stay in that lane awhile and we may find we have more spring in our step.

    • Kalmar Nyckel

      The Mayflower is famous as the ship that brought the English Pilgrims to settle in Massachusetts Bay in 1620.  Less famous (in the northeast anyway) is the ship that brought Swedish settlers to the lower Delaware River (roughly where present-day Wilmington is) in 1638.  This began the wave of Dutch settlement in the region, largely focused from Philadelphia to Manhattan (New Amsterdam).  This morning I watched a replica of the Kalmar Nyckel motor down Buzzards Bay on her way to visit the Hudson River Maritime Museum in Kingston, New York.  That prompted me to look into the history of this ship I should have known a lot more about.  Sometimes you need the world to remind you of what you don’t know.

      The Kalmar Nyckel was built in Sweden in 1625 and named after the Swedish city Kalmar.  She had two moments in her history that should make the name more familiar than it is.  The Kalmar Nyckel’s most famous moment occurred in 1637, when Governor Peter Minuit negotiated the purchase of land from the sachems of the Delawares and Susquehannocks in the cabin of the Kalmar Nyckel on the shore of what is now Manhattan.  This transaction transferred ownership of the most expensive piece of land in North America from the Native American population to the Dutch, and lives in infamy as the most one-sided transaction ever.  The next year the Kalmar Nyckel sailed to Fort Christina (Wilmington, DE) with that first group of settlers, marking her as the first ship to bring Swedish settlers to America.

      The Kalmar Nyckel was sunk by the British Navy off the coast of Scotland in 1652, in the early stages of the First Anglo-Dutch War.  Her most famous passenger, Governor Peter Minuit, died off the coast of St. Christopher the same year that Kalmar Nickel was delivering settlers to Fort Christina in 1638, either the unlucky victim of a hurricane or a murder plot, depending on who’s account you believe.  Either way, the Kalmar Nyckel would outlive the governor by 14 years.