As summer draws closer, everyone in Lund knows what it means: tourist season. Our quiet little village is suddenly full of cars, boats and strangers; it becomes a very different place.
Depending on where your definition of Lund begins, there are anywhere from 200 to 400 people living here. But in the summer, we are the destination, or throughway, for thousands. It is a tenfold increase in how many people try to drive, park, get coffee, launch a boat or do anything else here.
While it is often fun and interesting to meet people from all over the world who come here, as with any other guests, it can also become tiring.
The other day, I had my first round of a conversation that I will inevitably have many times this summer. It goes something like this: Are you on vacation? No, I live here. Oh, you live here? Well, you must be on vacation all the time.
At this point I usually manage to resist giving the person a list of all the farm chores I did before they crawled out of bed this morning, but sometimes it is difficult. Or, maybe they say something like, “But what do you do in the winter? It’s so quiet.” Usually, my response is to say that if I did not like quiet, I would not live here.
People mean well, I know that. But it is jarring to be explaining yourself to city folks who think life in the country is one long day off, when all you are trying to do is get your mail.
It is usually pretty easy to spot the locals (just look for the gumboots) and a lot of visitors sometimes treat us all like a tourist-information service. In a place where everybody stops to chat and say hello to each other, having a stranger walk up to you and demand directions or information without so much as a, “Hello, do you mind if I ask you a question?” is something I will never get used to. What passes for the way it is down in the city can come across as pretty rude out here.
What always rubs on me is that city folks do not realize just how different things are out here and, furthermore, that we like it that way. Everyone thinks they know just what Lund needs to be more like the place they came from, without stopping to think that if they want to be in a place like that, they could have stayed there. Visiting a new place ought to be about experiencing something different, not just bringing all your familiar things with you.
When people come to visit us, I hope they appreciate our home for what it is, not what they think it ought to be. I hope we can all remember that there are a lot of places where things are fast, loud and pushy, but places that are slow, quiet and kind are becoming fewer and farther between.
Let us try to make a little bit of Lund rub off on the city, not the other way around.
