Mother Tongue: Notes on memoirs, maps, and magical thinking.

As my stay on Norway’s Lofoten Islands comes to a close this weekend, I keep thinking back to my first trip here last year—a quick jaunt lasting only five days, which ended in an altogether unexpected way. It was a cold, dark Friday in February, my final day on Lofoten then. My plan was to catch the 7 a.m. ferry back to the mainland...