Molli in the Great Metropoli: Chicago and Deep River

The first thing I have to say is that everyone needs to get Skype 2.0 and a webcam. Voice-Over-Internet-Telephony is so five minutes ago. From now on it’s Live-Streaming-Video-Over-Internet-Telephony or bust, baby. Seriously. We live in a world where at one point this morning I was able to ask my mother to keep an eye on Molli Malou while I ran into the kitchen for coffee, and she was able to comply… despite being 5000 miles away.

Get Skype 2.0 and a webcam now, please. All of you. Even those of you who are thinking, “I know he’s not talking to me.” Yes, especially you.

In encapsulating our trip to the US, I’m going to try to be as concise as possible. (I can no longer use the word pithy without giggling. Okay, I never could, but I’m finally adult enough to accept that and move on.)

The flight from Copenhagen to Chicago went as well as we could have hoped for, although we probably could have set our hopes a little higher. In any case, we were lucky enough to be given an entire inside row for the flight, so that Trine and I were able to sit on aisle seats with two empty seats for Molli in between us. She had moments of pique but was mostly pretty well behaved. The family of four in the row ahead of us included a 3-ish half-American, half-Norwegian boy who stood up on his chair, smiled at Molli, then coughed all over the three of us. We were merely irritated until the brat’s father turned around jovially and said, “Ha ha! Now you’re sick!” We didn’t know it at the time, but he was right. Within hours of landing Trine was so sick she was more or less bedridden for 24 hours. And no sooner was Trine better than Molli began the illness that would haunt her for all but the last five days of the trip. If I ever see that smarmy Norwegian son-of-a-bitch again, so help my God…

(I realize that wasn’t concise, but it was the prologue. I had to set a certain tone.)

We were met at O’Hare by Mette and her friend Bonnie, who had brought a big car. The two of them loaded all our considerable luggage into the car and drove off to Mette’s, freeing the three of us up to hail a cab and travel light.

As a grandmother of three girls, Bonnie had also lent Mette some kiddie stuff. The rocking horse was a quick favorite.

And the booster chair came in very handy.

There are plenty of pictures from our first 36 hours in Chicago, but none of them are very good. Suffice to say that Moster Mette took full advantage of our exhaustion to avail herself of Molli’s company while we slept and recovered. They bonded instantly and adored each other. On our first real evening of the trip we lay Molli down to bed, then Trine and I went up to visit our friend David Kellaghan at his new home on the northwest side. After a brief tour of his house, we set out to find a place for dinner. Our wanderings finally brought it home to me: I was back in Chicago at last! The pet rehab clinic slash massage and acupuncture and psychotherapy and spa place we passed was one of the first giveaways (I took this shot through the window).

Another giveaway was the world famous diner on Clark whose sign had made headlines:

Yet another was the gargantuan “Jesus Saves” clock sign on Clark that had served as a beacon to me on many a drunken stumble back in the day:

We ended that night, of course, at Simon’s, where Matt was bartending. We arranged to meet him the next day at his own new house up in Evanston (everyone had a new house!). Although Molli was already exhibiting signs of serious illness, we thought the trip up in the fresh air would do her good. This was not the freshest of her fresh air moments:

Fortunately, however, she was pretty perky for most of the afternoon, and she had a lovely time being teased and taunted by Matt’s adorable almost-four daughter, Nina:

The next morning Molli woke up at about 11am—Copenhagen time. I spent the wee hours with her organizing a tea party in Mette’s living room.

Molli took her responsibilities as hostess very seriously and insisted on a roundtable seating arrangement.

I’ve now lost track of what day it was, but we’re going to fast forward to the Christmas lunch we held on Sunday. It was small by Danish standards (on account of our space and budget limitations), and we had to make do with a lot of workarounds, but it was a lot of fun and turned some of our friends onto the weird traditions of the Danish Christmas lunch.

(Working clockwise from the standing Trine, that’s Paul Peditto, Heather Moran, her husband Mike, Geoff Brooksher, his wife Austin Zike, Allison Cain, her fiance Manny (whose last name I think I remember but dare not try to spell), Mette herself with Molli in her lap, and Susan, an American friend of Trine’s family who stayed with them as an exchange student here in Denmark back in the late 80s or early 90s.

We tried to get pictures of Molli with each guest (or couple), but she got cranky after just two shots: the first with Pauly, the second with Allison and Manny.

After the Christmas lunch, Mette offered to look after the ailing Molli while Trine and I joined Geoff at a sports bar down on Division to watch the Bears-Falcons game. We drank five liters of beer between the three of us, and Trine and I ended up winning prize after prize from the bar’s promotional contests. We won a Bears shirt, a Bears mask, and two $25 gift certificates to the bar. (Two weeks later I won a Bears hat and Chris Peditto the Younger won a Bears comforter… as near as I can calculate, our party won about 75% of all prizes offered by the bar on those two weeks.)

It was very cold the next day: you can almost see the cold in this photo taken off Mette’s patio.

We woke up very early Tuesday morning and hailed a cab for the airport at a little after five in the morning. While the cabbie loaded our luggage into his trunk and Trine jostled herself into the taxi, I bobbled a heavily-bundled Molli in my arms and marvelled at the bone-chilling cold of the air. Molli gave me an impish look, smiled my own crooked smile back at me, and muttered, “Hot!” And then she laughed uproariously. I think it was her first sarcasm ever. I will count it as such.

Thanks to our early start we were at the house in Deep River by about noon local time. Molli seemed to be getting sicker and sicker, no matter how many analgesics we shoved up her butt. Just look at the poor wilting creature in her Pop-Pop’s arms.

That very evening we were visited by my Uncle Bob and cousin Pam, whose exact relationship to Molli involves “seconds” or “once removeds” and will therefore be left to the reader’s calculation. Pam is now 23 years old and was on the brink of a big move to L.A. After the holidays she was planning to load up a car with all her stuff and drive out west with a friend—it sounded very exciting and adventurous to me, and I was almost envious until I realized I’d done exactly the same thing, at exactly the same age, at exactly the same time of year… some 17 years ago. Then I really envied her.

But that has nothing to do with Molli. So here’s Pam and Molli:

And here’s Pam, Bob, and Molli:

The next night after that Molli woke up from a nap with what appeared to be high spirits. We realized she’d been lethargic and “droopy” for quite some time, but it wasn’t until she began racing around the house and tearing things apart that we realized just how down she’d been. We were relieved (but unfortunately mistaken) to conclude she was finally over her sickness and back in full health. It was good timing: we had to take her out to watch Nana sing at the Old Lyme Country Club.

Here’s Molli enjoying an appetizer and cocktail with her father in the lobby.

And here she is enjoying her Nana (and vice-versa).

The next day she still seemed healthy, so we made a family trip out to Old Saybrook to buy a Christmas tree. Here she is advising Pop-Pop on negotiating tactics:

In poker, a “tell” is when you give your competitors too much information by your unconscious behavior. Molli’s forced nonchalance as she inspects her nails here ought to have told the tree salesman that he’d just been snookered by an 18-month-old.

Mercifully, I think, you haven’t seen Molli’s hair in a lot of the preceding photos. It was pretty ratty. So either that same day or the next, Nana offered to treat Molli to her first hair styling. You can see how badly she needed it in this photo, taken as she waited impatiently for her appointment.

And here she is in the stylist’s chair.

Here she is hanging her first ornament on the tree, in a shot that gives a good perspective on her new coiffe.

And here she is signaling “Touchdown!” for no apparent reason. (Her hair is mussed, but that can happen to the best of us.)

(If she was indeed signalling touchdown in the previous shot, doesn’t it then seem logical that this would be her reaction to the TD being called back on a holding penalty? I just love that expression of disappointed resignation.)

At last! The Friday before Christmas, and Molli’s paternal aunt, uncle, and cousins have just arrived in the driveway!

It’s Uncle Gene!

And Sophie and Aunt Deb! (And Hannah, though she can’t be seen!)

It didn’t take Gene and Sophie long to find the shortest path to Molli’s heart.

And the girls bonded magically… here they are at Great Grandma’s, hauling Molli around the apartment for reasons of their own, impenetrable to a mere grownup like myself.

Molli didn’t seem to mind at all as they lugged her from room to room like so much oversized luggage. It was adorable to see them all playing together at last.

(Unfortunately I didn’t want to let Molli too close to Great Grandma because Molli was still clearly sick, and I didn’t want Molli’s illness to be our Christmas present to Great Grandma.)

The playing continued back at the house in Deep River.

And although she wasn’t as nimble as she’d have liked to be, Nana exerted a powerful magnetism over all three girls.

I shouldn’t have mentioned magnetism out loud, though. Molli is afraid of magnets and believes the only way to protect oneself from harmful magnetic rays is with a tupperware helmet.

She made Nana and her cousins rinse the magnetic resiude off her later that night.

Hannah and Sophie disappeared shortly after Molli’s bath, and re-emerged to entertain us as “The Silky Sisters,” whose debut album is no doubt not far off thanks to the Karaoke machine they got for Christmas.

The Silky Sisters pose with their cousin and their mom:

We tried a duck-feeding expedition on Christmas Eve, but the ducks had already fled to warmer climes. There were just crotchety seagulls hanging around the landing at Essex, and they weren’t especially hungry. Molli’s first duck feeding was therefore not much of an event.

But her bath with the Silky Sisters sure was. Where were they when she was getting her hair styled?

I don’t know what Nana and Molli are looking at so intently here, but they’re clearly both concentrating on something.

Well, the girls finally went to bed after we set out some milk and cookies (and a note) for Santa.

And look what they walked into the next morning! That Santa—some pig!

We tried getting a pretty pose of the girls on Christmas morning, but Molli was too miserable with her cold too cooperate.

Happily, that didn’t stop the Silky Sisters from being utterly adorable.

In her sickly state, Molli seemed more confused than anything by Christmas. Here she is looking to cousin Sophie for some sense of what the hell’s going on.

Even in Hannah’s arms, she seems to be watching Sophie for behavioral cues.

…or maybe she’s just staring into space as she is here, and the fact that Sophie is occupying that space is beside the point:

But their happiness was contagious in the end.

…even if she still looked a little bewildered sometimes.

With Aunt Deb:

With Uncle Gene:

With Hannah:

With both Silky Sisters:

With Pop-Pop:

And suddenly finding something of interest while in Nana’s arms:

Something so interesting she even got Nana to look:

Although she seems to have been drifting off in this group shot.

Finally persuaded that Molli wasn’t going to get better on her own, we went to the doctor the day after Christmas. Turned out Molli had a sinus infection that could turn into a lung or ear infection if we didn’t treat it fast. We got her on antibiotics immediately and she began improving right away.

The day after the day after Christmas, we faced another very early trip to the airport. Nana wasn’t quite ready to say goodbye.

Neither was Pop-Pop, even though he got an extra 45 minutes of Molli in the car on the way to Hartford airport.

But later that day we were indeed back in Chicago, as incontrovertibly proven here.

Molli was feeling better by our second day back in Chicago. By the weekend she was in top form. Trine and I went out with friends and Mette babysat on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday nights, so by New Year’s Eve on Saturday we were all very ready for a quiet evening in. Molli went to bed at her usual time and the three of us stayed up playing Rummicube. The next day we went back to the same sports bar on Division to watch the last week of regular-season football. A lot of friends met us there, including the incredibly aged Chris Peditto the Younger, whom I first met when he was about a year younger than Molli is right now.

We spent that evening in, also. Molli amused herself with some of her Christmas presents, many of which confused her despite their simplicity. (Maybe she’s just analyzing the Nutritional Information?)

And now, finally, the end of our visit drawing nigh, we realized there weren’t enough photos of Molli with her Moster Mette.

In full health at last, Molli gave her best to the camera.

But soon it was time to head back home to Denmark. I’ve never traveled so heavy in my life.

Goodbyes were said. I took about 100 pictures at this point, but for some reason this is my favorite. (Others are available on request!)

We got to O’Hare nice and early, and Molli burned off some steam running up and down the terminal with her stroller.

The international terminal even had a little play area for toddlers that Molli found enchanting.

Okay, you couldn’t really see her enchantment there, but how about this shot?

We got back into Denmark early Tuesday afternoon and have been having a hell of a time adjusting to Danish time. Molli’s been sleeping until 11 or 12 every day and we can’t seem to force her onto a more appropriate schedule. We think we may have finally won the war tonight, having woken her at 11:30 and kept her up without a nap until 8:30. She’s woken up a few times since, but if we can get her to sleep through until tomorrow morning we ought to have things nicely back on track by Monday.

I’ve left a ton of great stories and anecdotes out, to say nothing of the 9,432 pictures I didn’t post, but be of good cheer: sometime in the next week or so I’ll be posting the videos from our vacation, so there’s still a chance that whatever I missed will be covered then!