The snow in Slottsparken is about to melt away, and instead the paths are covered in mud and dirt.
Rigmor Galtung (54) rushes towards Dagbladet with a big smile. Behind her runs the 14-week-old pomeranian puppy Gismo on a leash.
IN FARTA: Gismo tries to keep up with mother. Photo: Morten Eik/Se og Hør
sea view
“The son” Gismo was not planned, she can tell Dagbladet.
– It was a neighbor of my sister who had these. I was just going to go see him. Especially! I probably left with the dog within half an hour. We had to stop and buy a cage on the way, laughs the 54-year-old.
FALL OVER: Rigmor Galtung fell completely in love with the puppy. Photo: Morten Eik/Se og Hør
sea view
30 years ago, Galtung became the first woman to stand on the stand-up stage. Soon she will be seen on the comedy scene again in Tønsberg after a break from the comic.
The show “På gravens rand” deals with a topic she became well acquainted with in 2022: death.
– The depression makes me a better comedian
Received a cancer notice at the shopping centre
We stroll from Slottsparken and into the restaurant “Den glade gris”. Galtung orders a sandwich with smoked trout and a cup of coffee.
She will perform the show after a year she has dubbed “annus horribilis”, Latin for “a terrible year”.
– 2022 was absolutely horrible. I have bipolar disorder with depression. So I managed to contract two depressions, acute glaucoma in both eyes and cancer, Galtung explains, when she accepts the sandwich and coffee.
– And then we topped the whole crap off with my father dying in December. And Shabana (Rehman editor’s note), whom I knew well, died two weeks later. Two weeks after that again, my former boss at NRK died.
She has had the title “On the edge of the grave” ready for many years. It came to her during a cabin trip with her comedian friend Shabana Rehman.
Didn’t get the test answer – had cancer
– But now it became much more relevant. Because when you go through the things that I went through last year, something happens. Especially with that word cancer. Just the word is deeply scary. My mother died of cancer.
Started hyperventilating
The same disease was to strike the comedian. Last spring, Galtung was irritated by a wound underneath that would not heal. She went to the doctor and it was decided that she should have a biopsy.
– Three weeks later she called while I was at the shopping center and I was about to go to the floor.
– I started hyperventilating. But she (the doctor’s note) said: “Now you have to relax. It is incipient cancer. This should go well.” She said that only about 40 get that particular type of cancer. As usual, there is nothing about me that is normal, laughs the 54-year-old.
The comedian was sent to Radiumhospitalet for a new examination. A tumor was discovered there.
– Then you get someone like: “Now I’m going to die”. I thought it must be much worse, even though they tried to reassure me.
Finally, the 54-year-old reached a point that made her change her mind. She found solace in the feeling of helplessness.
– “Now it’s been discovered, I can’t do anything from now on. This is as it is and will be as it will be”. There was something going on in my head. A kind of surrender to the fact that what happens happens.
Nightmare message: – Feared the worst
– So I had a very wonderful Easter. It was very intense. An intense presence when you have to deal with something that you know your mother died from. It was nice and intense in many ways.
– Been terribly afraid of dying
Then she got the good news: The operation was successful and the cancer had been removed.
Despite the good news that the cancer was gone, it wasn’t long before another crisis struck.
As autumn heralded its arrival, so did a depression. In the middle of the depression, Galtung’s father dies.
Again, the 54-year-old must deal with death.
– There has been a lot. Lars Saabye Christensen has said it so well: “life is the time it takes to die”. We must all die. And then we are so afraid to talk about it. And I have been terribly afraid of dying. The unknown.
– Normalizing it a bit. It is as natural to die as to live. We are born and we die.
Brutally honest: – A death sentence
Galtung believes that life must be filled with good experiences. She thinks about her late friend Shabana.
– There are centenarians who have never lived as much as she did, and she lived to be 46. Some sit their whole lives and haven’t lived, they’ve just been here. I think it is easier to fill your life when you can relate to the fact that one day it will be over. Life becomes more important when you have death, she says seriously.
