by Tory Bilski
Eve explains about the snafu at the car rental place. The station wagon we reserved was too small but the people who reserved the SUV thought it was too big, so we switched. “It all worked out. See, the universe takes care of us.”
Margot talks about her equine-assisted psychotherapy, and the influence of the positive psychologist Tal Ben-Shahar.
Viv talks about her tai chi trip to China last year, which segues into Sylvie talking about Iyengar yoga.
“Finding the perfect balance is nirvana,” Sylvie says. “I think it’s like Freud’s ‘oceanic oneness’—a religious energy, the sensation of being one with the universe. There were some good things about Freud, not many, but some.”
I want to hear more about “oceanic oneness” but Margot, who is brimming with news, jumps in with: “Guys, can I tell you how this trip came about for me? I was sitting around with Sylvie and we’re drinking beer . . .”
Sylvie says, “All good stories start with this line . . .”
“And she says, ‘Why don’t you come to Iceland with us this year?’”
Sylvie says, “Can you believe she hasn’t been back in five years?”
“And so I finished my second beer . . .”
Sylvie intakes air: “That was strong beer, a stout . . . 9 percent . . .”
“And I went online and just impulsively bought my tickets . . . Oh, and this is the best part . . .”
Sylvie: “Yes! Tell them about that . . .”
“The next day my horoscope reads ‘you will travel far and fall in love.’ So, guys, listen up, I’m supposed to fall in love on this trip.”
Eve squeals. “You’re gonna fall in love with an Icelandic guy. Maybe he’ll have horses!”
“That’s what I was thinking.”
“Wait, Margot,” I say, “it might not be a guy you fall in love with. It could be a horse. We often fall in love with horses in Iceland. Look at Eve, she’s bought five horses.”
Margot thinks about this for a second. “I’m good with either. Preferably both. A horse and a guy.”
This is a cheery thought for everyone. When Margot first moved to the Berkshires she was getting over a bad marriage and her ex was stalking her. He worked for the government and had high security clearance, so who was she going to report him to . . . the local police?
And like Sylvie and her crush on Ólof, this is how we do men in Iceland: it’s all projection. Our imaginations quickly run to cheery visions of a mate and horses. We’ve got it all figured out in the next ten minutes: Margot’s Icelandic boyfriend, his farm, and his horses, the back and forth between Boston and Keflavík.
Viv jumps in with an astute calculation: that Margot will collect so many air mile points that every fifth trip would be free.
“That would be great, it would cut down on costs,” Margot says. “I could keep my life in Massachusetts but come over once a month to be with my boyfriend, and then in the summer stay longer.”
“You could do that, and we could visit Helga first and then you and your boyfriend’s farm.”
In our minds, it’s a done deal and we are all very happy for Margot and her Icelandic boyfriend and having a new farm to visit. All we have to do now is find him, meet him, and get this thing going.
“I hope it’s up north near Helga’s,” Margot says, somewhat wistfully, as if she’ll miss us all if dumb luck would have it that her boyfriend’s farm is in the south.
Farther down the road, Eve and I start debating, defending, the reasons for liking Game of Thrones so much. “I know it’s horribly violent, and I hate that, but the story is riveting. I can’t stop watching it,” I say.
“It’s such a great story. Jack and I are so wrapped up in it,” Eve says.
The others are squirming. Viv says, “Not for me.”
“It’s filmed here. The Wall scenes at least, and others.”
“In one scene you can tell it’s in Iceland because they are all riding Icelandic horses and tölting,” Eve points out. “It’s not like they can import other horses.”
Margot says, “Maybe I’ll start with the book first.”
Then we are on to people we all know. Brittany is getting a degree in social work. Lisa’s mother has died, and Lisa has moved into her house. Eve brings up her sister, Maggie. “She’s into roller derby. She’s joined a team and they dress in sequined outfits and she competes regularly.”
“Maggie must be sixty by now,” I say.
“Something like that,” Eve says, cagily, as if I might be doing some quick math—unlikely—to figure out her age.
Viv talks about the necessary ingredient of friendship. “It needs a measure of grace. You have to be able to recognize shortcomings and move on.”
She might be aiming this at me for talking her into coming on this trip with Pippa. She is giving me, this trip, maybe even Pippa, a measure of grace.
Margot says, “Friendship is like energy attracting like energy.”
Sylvie, apropos of nothing, declares: “I have hypomania. I do!”
The engine light is on and the brakes grind and squeak, but Eve assures us, “the car rental guy said that was normal.” After a short pause during which we all stare with concern at the incomprehensible symbols on the dashboard, we pick up where we left off. Sibba will meet us at the bakery in Borgarnes tomorrow.
“Pass the gluten,” Margot says, meaning the McVitie’s and pretzels.
And then the dreary landscape, mile by mile, starts getting softer and greener. A farmhouse on the coast is illuminated by a burst of two A.M. sunshine.
Margot says emphatically, passionately, “I can’t believe I’m here, you guys. This is so beautiful.”
And it is.
I am with this group of women for another year in Iceland, and my heart is full of deep affection for them. Hurtling toward Reykjavík with lousy brakes and an intense camaraderie, there isn’t anywhere else I’d rather be, or anyone else I’d rather be with.
Ridiculous Women
Pippa’s car is already in the driveway when we pull up to Helga’s at Thingeyrar. “Huh. She wasn’t supposed to get here until dinnertime,” Sylvie says.
Viv is tense. I am tense. And the idea that pulling up to Helga’s makes us tense is all wrong. And Helga isn’t there to greet us, either, to defuse the tension.
As we drag our stuff into the guesthouse, Sylvie sees her usual bedroom has luggage in it. Eve sees her usual bedroom has luggage in it. My little bedroom has luggage in it. That leaves one bedroom for the five of us.
“Excuse me,” Sylvie says, walking into the kitchen where Pippa is drying a teacup. I am expecting to see a pale, wan, sickly Pippa from the way Eve described her visit last year, but she looks sturdy and healthy, even rosy colored.
“There are three of you and you’ve taken three bedrooms. There are five of us and you’ve left us only one bedroom,” Sylvie says.
“But it’s got two sets of bunk beds and one twin bed,” Pippa says. “You can all fit in there.”
“That doesn’t work for us,” Sylvie says. “I suggest you move out of one room.”
Pippa throws the dishtowel down and walks out of the room in a huff. Yep, she’s feeling her oats.
Karen, Pippa’s friend, comes out looking confrontational. Everything about her is tight and small. She wears workout tights, a tank top, and a microfiber jacket designed to show every inch of her muscular skinny body. She’s got short, light brown hair. She has a fifteen-year-old daughter, Madison, who follows not-so-closely behind her and looks nothing like her. She’s five inches taller, heftier, with thick black hair and dark eyes.
“I don’t understand,” Karen says. “Why do we have to move bedrooms?” Viv, Margot, and I have never met Karen or her daughter, but this is no time for introductions.
“Because you don’t each get your own bedroom,” Sylvie says. “You have to share, like the rest of us.”
Sylvie is in her cowboy stance, feet apart, hands on hips. She’s using her teacher tone—I’m losing
my patience with you and I’m done explaining.
Karen is in her barbell stance. Feet planted, knees bent, arms by her side, ready to lift a weight and throw it at somebody.
We’ve just pulled into town, our luggage is still in the stagecoach, and it’s a face-off, a stand-off, high noon for cowboy Sylvie and barbell Barbie.
“Karen, why don’t you share a room with your daughter?” Eve asks sweetly and we all look over at Madison, ready to coo maternally at the child.
“Are you crazy? I am not sharing a room with my daughter.”
Margot audibly gasps at her response. But Madison’s face has that blank bored-ness teenagers practice to perfection.
Sylvie says, “Okay, we’re going to go outside and get our luggage. You three figure it out.”
Outside, we huddle. Margot is shaking. “I hate conflict. I feel like throwing up. I’m not good with conflict. Maybe I’ll get a hotel room down the street.”
Eve says, “I just don’t understand what is going on here. Why isn’t she being reasonable?”
Sylvie blames herself. “I should not have invited her this year.”
“But why is she angry at us?” Eve asks.
I remember that all wars are turf wars, she’s fighting for her turf, and a sizable expansion of it. Sometimes it’s a few bedrooms in a guesthouse, sometimes it’s a country.
“Guys, I’m gonna get a hotel room. I don’t mind. I really can’t deal with this kind of stress.”
“I should not have invited her,” Sylvie repeats. “She’s trying to push us out.”
“I hate to say this, but Viv and I saw this coming.”
Sylvie takes in air. “Did you?”
Viv says, “We sure did.”
“You know, Pippa didn’t want you two to come. She didn’t want me to invite you. She doesn’t like you two.”
“She didn’t want us to come? Specifically, me and Viv? I’ve been here since year one. Viv since year two.”
Sylvie nods. “I should have known she was trouble from that alone. But I felt pressure from my friend who’s friends with her.”
Viv and I walk away together to discuss. “Wow,” Viv says, “wow. I can’t believe this.”
“At least they now see Pippa as we see her.”
Viv says, “Why would Pippa say that to Sylvie? Why would she mention that to us? This puts me right back to how I felt in middle school with the girl cliques.”
Unfortunately, this is one of the moments when I wish age didn’t seem so fluid. I am reminded of the day my girl pack dropped me. We went from sixth grade to eight grade tight as a knot, and then we all entered high school together. In the lunchroom, we commandeered the same long table every day. In a short time, we went from the girls who ran in the woods to the girls who ruled the cafeteria seating. One day it was Valerie who found herself on the outs—there was an “ew” every time her name was mentioned. And one day when she went to sit down, there was no chair for her. And one day it was me. “This is taken, you can’t sit here.” I spent the next three years of high school on a social ice floe. Who are the Pippas of the world who decide these things?
We move our stuff inside the house and leave it in the hallway. The five of us huddle in the big bedroom, waiting for one of them to move into a different bedroom. We repeat in a stage whisper what we said outside to each other: Margot feels sick from the conflict; Sylvie blames herself; Eve is ruffled by Pippa’s anger; and Viv and I repeat “we saw it coming.”
When we look up, Pippa is standing in our bedroom doorway. She waits awhile before saying anything. Eve smiles at her and says, “Hey,” and I know she is hopeful that Pippa is going to apologize and be reasonable and the universe will come together and attend to these human disturbances. But Pippa draws in air and stands tall. In her most British Queen’s English, her most matronly attitude, she dresses us down. “You are ridiculous women. Ridiculous women. I do not understand why you are making this fuss. I do not understand you at all!”
“Which bedroom are you vacating?” Sylvie unflinchingly drills home the important point.
Pippa walks away in disgust and we hear her bump her suitcases upstairs to the spooky bedrooms.
The Nights of Magical Thinking
When Viv and I take our midnight sunlit walk, we rehash the flare up and we get incensed about what Sylvie told us—that Pippa didn’t want us invited.
“Us,” I say, “the original travelers to Thingeyrar.”
“I picked up that personality trait on the second trip she was with us.”
“I picked it up the first time. She would not talk to me, and I really wanted to be her friend. I thought we would be good friends.”
We are quiet for a while, lost in our own hurt thoughts, and then Viv asks, “Do you wonder why she singled us out to dislike?”
“Because she couldn’t pick on Sylvie and Eve. They are her ticket here.”
“So we’re the easy pickings. Or were.”
“It’s turf,” I say. “It’s a fight over this beautiful place and who gets to share it.”
“But what does it matter to her whether we’re here or not? Why does she try to kick us off the land?”
“She doesn’t want to share it.”
On our walks with each other, Viv and I still talk about our lives in ways we don’t ever talk about in front of the others. Her son Jonathan is back from Iraq in one piece and looking for work and her son Eric is still looking. “You know the prefrontal cortex is not fully developed in boys until the age of twenty-five or even later. That’s the part that controls impulsivity, decision making, reason.”
Ever since the news about this research came out, every parent I know with a wayward son is talking about it. “What are we to do? The synapses haven’t connected yet!” I’ve said it myself. Boys make bad choices caused by lack of brain connectivity. They haven’t learned to be risk-averse. That’s why they willingly join frats and the army. But my son is closing in on twenty-five and Eric is twenty-six. Our boys are pushing the age limit of this theory.
I need these walks in the sunlight as much as Viv does. We pass the sheep and they safely graze; we pass the Steinnes farm where the horses notice us walking by and trot up to greet us. We walk down to the edges of the lake to pick up the magical red rocks. We have added another stop to our nightly walks, visiting the church on the property, Þingeyrakirkja. This beautiful little church, rebuilt in the 1800s on a monastery site from the 1100s, has become a popular tourist site. A few years ago, we watched as they built a visitor center, complete with a café and illustrations of the Vatnsdæla saga that was written here by monks 800 years ago. During the day, we watch the busses pull up and the people disembark at what we once thought of as our little, private church that only Helga held the keys to.
But at midnight, the church is empty. I feel like a pilgrim when I enter it, as if here in this sacred space some grand revelation will come to me. My eyes are drawn immediately to the midnight-blue ceiling with a thousand golden stars. Above the choir loft are ornately painted statuettes of the twelve disciples, brought to Iceland in the late Middle Ages. After sitting quietly awhile in separate pews with our own thoughts, Viv and I get up, put coins in the wooden box and light the votive candles. I know she’s wishing what I’m wishing for. I indulge in magical thinking more in Iceland than at home—the red rocks along the river are good luck talismans, yes, they are. They are. Lighting the church votives in this hallowed space will protect my children from harm and angels will watch over them. Because at the root of parenthood there is an unspoken helplessness to how things will turn out for your kids. Maybe when you’re a young mother you dream of grandeur for them, but as you get older and you watch the world and all its trouble, all you hope for is the absence of bad luck.
“What we are reduced to,” Viv says, lighting another candle, “is to request you just stay alive, kids. Just stay alive until you grow up more and those synapses form.”
That maturation process, it can kill you.
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The Sisterhood of the Ridiculous Women
The flare up with Pippa weighs heavily on all of us. We don’t like conflict. My husband likes to point out the difference between men and women when they fight: a woman’s instinct for conflict avoidance, he says, causes deeper and longer lasting wounds. He claims that guys just deal with it head on. When a friend of his acts like a jackass, he just tells him to stop being such a dick. And they come to their senses and they both forget the issue and move on. Supposedly. He doesn’t understand why women (like me) when confronted (by people like Pippa) can’t call someone out. That we need to obfuscate, deliberate, plant messages behind the enemy line. Or worse, that we debate whether someone else’s bad behavior was somehow our fault because we weren’t nice enough. I think of how we huddled in whimpering little circles outside the guesthouse, and only Sylvie had the nerve to deal with it bluntly. She was alpha mare enough to say to Pippa, “Which room are you vacating?”
My friend who is a divorce lawyer says, “Women never forget an insult. They remember every word.” I can attest to this, unfortunately. Some insults don’t register with me, but if an insult happens to hit a nerve, I remember every word and I remember it forever. I remember who said it and where it was said and if pressed, I can recall the time of day, the slant of the sun, and my usual mute response. “You had no comeback?” my husband would ask. “Why didn’t you let them have it?”
And even long after I’ve stopped brooding on the insult, which I eventually do, even when I have regained emotional distance from it, I still have total recall of the incident. “How do you remember that?” my husband asks me when I bring up something hurtful someone said to me twenty years ago. “I don’t even remember who those people were.”
Was anyone surprised when the #MeToo movement exploded and women remembered everything? (See Hallgerd of Njál’s Saga.) The women could quote verbatim what had been said ten, twenty, thirty years ago. The men who were called out were flummoxed. They had some vague memory, but could they recall a word that was spoken?