Professor Andersen's Night

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IT WAS CHRISTMAS EVE and Professor Andersen had a Christmas tree in the living room. He stared at it. ‘Well, I must say,’ he thought. ‘Yes indeed, I must say.’ Then he turned and ambled round the living room, while he listened to the Christmas carols on TV. ‘Yes, I must say,’ he repeated. ‘Hmm, yes, what shall I say?’ he added, pondering. He looked at the tastefully laid table in the dining room. Laid for one. ‘Weird how ingrained it is,’ he thought, ‘and so utterly devoid of irony, too,’ he added, shaking his head. He was looking forward to dinner. Under the Christmas tree lay two presents, one from each of his grown-up nephews. ‘If I say I hope I manage to get the crackling crisp, might there be a hint of irony in that? No,’ he thought, ‘if the crackling isn’t perfect, I’ll be furious, I shall swear out loud, even if it is Christmas Eve.’ Just as he had sworn out loud when he had struggled to set up the tree on its base, and afterwards to make it stand straight and not lop-sided, like a tree should indoors. Just as he had done when he fastened the electric lights on to the branches of the tree, and discovered that this year, as usual, he had gone in circles, all the business with the wires, getting them entangled, so that he’d had to stop and unwind them, take off the lights one at a time and start all over again, almost right from the beginning. ‘Damn,’ he had said then. ‘Damn.’ Loudly, and clearly, but that was yesterday. ‘Funny how Christmas Eve is so ingrained in us,’ he thought. The solemnity. Holy Night. Which will come to pass at twelve o’clock tonight. Not before, as many people in Norway think; this is the evening before Holy Night. Or Silent Night. He went out into the kitchen. Opened the oven door. Took out the pork ribs.

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