all of Switzerland

Written by Cathoel Jorss, published 11 years ago

At the top of a very high hill yesterday, what in Holland or Denmark would be called a mountain, with a view over all of Switzerland ~ so it seemed ~ my friend taught me to peel dandelion stalks so that they spring into pretty green silvery curls. Behind us a family with very young parents were playing hide and seek. They had built a fire and the father, when we showed up, was juggling with three sticks. As we sat on our sedentary bench facing the green nation, he sprinted round in front of us and flung himself panting on the ground, his eyes gleaming, intent on the figure of his youngest daughter who was counting “eis, zwöi, drü, vier, füf…” Our legs and the legs of the bench blocked him from her and pure animal concentration blocked him from us. It was as though he didn’t see us. My friend gazed down the length of his back then flung her spooling dandelion out into the green. “We used to play that when we were children, too,” she said to me.