These are five things that Jessica associates with me.  It’s always interesting, I think, to learn what tidbits stand out in other people’s minds about when they think about me.
1. Big family
This is something that many people associate with me, but to be honest, my family doesn’t really feel all that big to me.  I’ve heard it said in a few different places that big families are in vogue again, and that certainly seems to be the case in the small town where I live.  Off the top of my head I can think of three families I know with six kids, one with five, and at least a half-dozen with four, so we’re definitely on the smaller side of big!

Speaking of that, I think those six-kid families have really awakened Olof’s competitive spirit, and he’s been talking a lot lately about “the next one.”  Me, I’m more ambivalent … we’ll see.  In my younger years I never felt a burning passion to have kids;  I did want them more than not, but I felt–and still feel–that if they didn’t come along for one reason or another, I’d be okay with that.  I would have focused on getting more education and establishing a career in historical research and writing.  And gotten a lot of dogs, of course.  Once I started having kids, though, there was a part of me that thought I might as well go whole hog and make a career of that instead!  So, while I’d be perfectly satisfied to stop at four, I haven’t entirely ruled out the possibility of having more.

2. Grangeville
Ah, Grangeville … my hometown, a timber and farming hub nestled on a high-mountain prairie in north-central Idaho.  Its population is only around 3500, but it’s the largest town for 70 miles around and the county seat of the largest county in Idaho (and one of the largest counties in the entire United States, I’ve been told).

My mom grew up in Grangeville, and though I was born and lived my first several years in Montana, my mom moved us back to her old stomping grounds after she and my dad got divorced when I was almost six.  Actually, from the time I was six until I was eleven, we lived in Cottonwood, an even smaller town about 15 miles away.  The summer before sixth grade we moved to Grangeville, and I spent the rest of my school years there.

Over the years I’ve had a love-hate relationship with Grangeville, but it is still and forever “home” in my heart.  If I were ever to move back to the States, Grangeville is the only place that I’d want to be, not for the town or the people (most of whom I don’t even know anymore), but for the land.  I yearn, truly, for the mountains and the rivers and the prairie.  For the four distinct seasons, each more glorious than the last.  For the amber waves of grain, literally.  Where I live now is nice enough, but it really doesn’t compare.

Jessica associates this with me is not only because we’re both from small Idaho towns, but also because she has family who used to live in Grangeville.  In fact, her cousin, Melanie, and I were fast friends for a couple of years before Melanie’s family moved on to the colder pastures of Alaska.  Melanie and I were recently “reunited” on Facebook, having seen each other on Jessica’s profile, and I’ve noticed now that Melanie has found more old Grangeville friends through me, something that probably wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t moved to Sweden and met Jessica!

3. Northern Sweden
Northern Sweden is not unlike north-central Idaho, which is probably why I’m much more comfortable and happier here than I was in Stockholm, where we lived when I first moved to Sweden.  The town I live in now is approximately the same size as Grangeville (though we do have a bona fide “big town” ten minutes’ drive away!), and raising my kids here reminds me a lot of my own growing-up days.

I could do without the long, long winters and all of the snow, but having grown up in the mountains, I’m no stranger to that stuff.  In fact, the climate here isn’t terribly different from the climate where I grew up;  it’s colder for longer and there’s more snow, but the differences aren’t as extreme as you might think.

4. Writing Inspiration
I’m not totally sure what this refers to.  I mean, the “writing” part is clear enough, but the “inspiration” I’m less sure about.  I love to write, and on my more fanciful days even consider myself an actual “writer,” but I am sorely lacking in inspiration these days.  You know, that’s not really true — I have plenty of inspiration, but not much in the way of motivation to actually sit down and get anything written.

When I do write, what inspires me most is probably my kids.  There’s just so much fantastic raw material there, and trite as it sounds, it’s fascinating and magical to see the world through their eyes.  It’s difficult for me to capture that magic in words sometimes, which is why so much of the amazing stuff goes unrecorded.

5. Sofas
Ha!  This is all my husband’s doing … he’s got an unbridled love of sofas, which is one of the first things that new visitors to our house will notice.  These days we’ve scaled back a little, and now have a mere four sofas:  one in each of our two living rooms, one in Olof’s office, and one in the guest room.  There are a further two in the garage, however, so if we should find ourselves feeling the lack, the situation could be quickly remedied!