Heritage (tag: Vidar)
She hadn't intended to find a Scandinavian festival. In fact, she hadn't been looking for any sort of festival at all. Sigyn was, nominally, looking for a furniture store that had promised the chairs that she was seeking at a cheap price. While she wasn't terribly concerned about money, there was a principle involved: she was not paying twice what she thought things were worth just because somebody was trying to make more of a profit than they deserved. So she'd come all the way to Astoria, Oregon, just for this particular store.
And because sitting in Minnesota waiting for her husband to come home was driving her nuts. If she had to spend one more minute in the new house that she'd bought, that he'd never even seen yet, Sigyn was going to start throwing things. Big things. Heavy things. Through other things that would break and shatter. Imagining that she was aiming for his head.
She might have been a bit put out with Loki.
So rather than give into the anger and frustration, and yes, the fear, Sigyn chose to spend her days filling them with productivity. But there was only so much painting and decorating she could do locally before she began feeling a bit of cabin fever. They had spent too much time confined for her to be willing to continue to sit in one spot. Hence the search for furniture far afield. She probably could have found something closer, perhaps in the Dakotas or even Iowa or Kansas, but instead, she looked toward the far coastline.
When she arrived in Astoria to locate the store, however, she was greeted by a line of booths, and familiar scents and sounds. The music was a little more Germanic than Scandinavian, but Sigyn wasn't about to nitpick when she could smell the krumkake as it cooked on the griddles and the heavy beefy scent of slotsttek, and that alone was worth exploring. As her feet turned her toward the festival, she also identified a number of stalls selling fish, including one that was offering something they were calling Uff Da tacos. Sigyn made a note to come back to that one. And to go over and see what was happening at the various stages set up around the area. The closest one boasted the talents of somebody named Karen Torkelson Solgård, and she wondered just what the woman did.
Past the food booths were larger tents, and when she explored, she found them to be full of handicrafts. There were quilts and dolls and little wooden carvings. Sigyn was more than smug to see that not only were there the weavings and embroidery on sweaters and vests that she expected to see, there were several displays of rosmaling. Primarily bowls, but a few pieces of jewelry as well. It was really lovely to see that her “hobby” had become a tradition amongst Scandinavian peoples.
Then she stopped dead and stared at the next booth. Sigyn simply could not believe the sight that met her eyes. And yet, somehow, she knew she should be surprised. The mortals had always had a deep fascination with this legend that they'd created in their own minds. Sigyn had never met a viking that actually wore a helm with horns sticking out the side, and yet there were stacks and stacks of the plastic replicas. And lines of people waiting to buy one.
Then she shrugged and decided, when in Rome... and got in line to get a cheesy horned helmet for herself.