Excerpts from
Neighbourhood
By Knud Sørensen
Study of a
Family Holding
She was grateful that it had been slides, so the room had been in darkness.
Grateful, too, that the picture hadn’t been one of the last ones, for now she
could manage to recover before the light came back on, and she could go out
into the kitchen to make the coffee, while back in the living room her husband
and her in-laws launched into a somewhat hesitant but knowledgeable discussion
with the photographer about the daily routines on the farm that they had just
been seeing.
She started putting cups out, but her thoughts were still on the screen in the
other room, and on the image which had somehow failed to be erased by the
slides which had followed it. She passed her hands over her hips, realizing how
agitated she felt. Jørgen hadn’t said a word in there, but she knew he had
noticed, too. As had his Evangelical parents, no doubt. She began to busy
herself finding a tray, pouring cream and cutting the cake.
Her thoughts began to drift once more. She would have to have a word with the
photographer. Surely that picture didn’t have to be put in along with the rest
of them. They must surely be enough as it was. And It would be immodest, in
fact quite embarrassing, if it was seen by someone who knew them. Jørgen
wouldn’t like it either.
They hadn’t felt exactly proud, but they had still been quite pleased the day
the farmer’s union had telephoned to know whether it would be possible for at
photographer to come and produce a series of slides about life on a family
holding in Denmark. They had said the series was to be used by study groups
across the country, and maybe even abroad.
She and Jørgen had talked about it, deciding finally that it couldn’t do any
harm. Some of the neighbours would probably thing they were getting a bit above
their station, but so what, Jørgen had said. They had after all been asked,
even encouraged, to do it. She too had been rather pleased that the people in
the union must have realised what they had done with the place over the past
few years. So the photographer had arrived. She came and went for a few weeks
and she was so agreeable and quiet that they hardly noticed her at all, and she
certainly wasn’t the type to come and tell you to pose for her. There had only
been one minor disagreement, on the first day she was at the farm. She and
Jørgen had put on their new work clothes, bought specially because they wanted
to look reasonably dressed now that they were going to be on show. But the
photographer hadn’t approved: she didn’t want it to be a fashion show, she had
said, and they’d had to go and change into their old clothed.
That was the only problem they’d had, and in the end they almost forgot that
the photographer was around. When she finally did take the occasional picture,
she never got in the way – in fact they hardly notices.
She supposed that was the problem, really. She passed her hands over her hips
once again, experiencing the same strange feeling inside. What the photographer
had done wasn’t really fait at all. It was almost a breach of confidence in
fact, she felt.
Someone came down the corridor and into the kitchen. Her mother-in-law, of
course, “Would you like any help?”
“I’ll be right there,” she said, “if you could just bring the try in”. She
passed it to her and turned around before the other woman had a chance to say
anything.
Then she was alone once again, her inner feelings in turmoil, wishing that they
had all just left.
She had been feeding the calves. Jørgen must have been mixing pig feed that
morning, that would explain why his hands had been so dusty.
She had been leaning forward, pouting the mil, and the photographer must have
come in behindher, unnoticed, and taken the picture. You saw her tipping the
buchet and caught a glimpse of the hungry calves, but on the seat of her
trousers, above the hips or rather just below her hips, you could also see the
two very distinct marks left by Jørgen’s hands.
She closed her eyes and could still sende the inner lids turning red. The same
inexplicable sensation welled up inside her again, the strange but familiar
feeling, like happiness bubling up to the surface.
Jørgen, her thoughts whispered. And then another thought came to her: “I can
just ignore it and pretend I haven’t noticed or it’s perfectly natural”.
Of course it was perfectly natural. The thought which had begun to form in her
mind scared her a little, but she let I develop nevertheless: That picture says
more about Jørgen and me and our life here that all the pictures of the combine
harvester put together.
She took the coffee put and went to join the others. As she entered the room,
she heard the photographer say that the series was going to be called “Study of
a family holding”.
She smiled knowingly at the photographer. “Anyone for coffee?”
Translated by Malene S. Madsen
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