As the Swedish winter begins to rear its icy head Kate Monson wonders how she will cope.
As I write, it’s coming up for 8am and the sky outside is blushed a baby pink. Skeletal trees puncture the horizon and a few thin clouds cling to the lower reaches of the atmosphere. I know it’s going to be a cold one. Last night when solid-rain-not-quite-snow, smeared my 6th floor window I thought: here it comes.
I’ve spent most of my life in London and I find winter there hard. Grey, wet, miserable (the people and the weather) and cold enough that you need practical clothes but never consistently cold enough that you would ever actually invest in them. In the various places I’ve tenanted – and the rented housing stock in the UK feels almost uniformly woeful at keeping heat in – I’ve been forced to wear three pairs of trousers (this includes long johns), five jumpers, two pairs of socks on my hands (I’m not good at looking after gloves as you will discover later) as well as three on my feet, a hat and a scarf all at the same time. I’ve hugged heaters that have confined me to corners of bedrooms for days; slipped red wine bottles into ski socks in a vain attempt to keep the contents at a palatable temperature; and woken to a nose so numb that for a moment I wonder whether it’s there at all. I’ve had pet hamsters get so cold in my parents kitchen they’ve gone into hibernation for goodness sake. (Loosely wrapping them in a soft towel and putting them in the oven on a very low heat with the door open tends to rouse them, in case you’re wondering.)
Now I’m not complaining; all these tales make up the rich tapestry of life and there are plenty of things I love about winter. Mulled wine, roaring fires, thick socks, watching fat ducks slip over on pond ice, snow. I just don’t seem to be all that good at it. So winter in Sweden was a looming presence in my life long before I actually arrived. And it’s been here for what, two weeks – maximum! – and I’ve already lost one scarf, three gloves and felt the return of a chill blain on my little toe.
But, I’m not going to let it beat me. By all accounts the Scandinavians are pretty good at winter and I’m determined to join them. I’ve been eating cinnamon buns by the armful; bought candles (and delighted in their steady flame – a sure sign that Swedish homes are as well-insulated as everyone says they are); watched my skin steam as I slip from sauna to sea and back again on a magnificent monochrome day at the Ribersborgs Kallbadhus; perfected the signature warm glow lamp-lighting effect in my room; and, most surprising to me, developed a taste for gummy sweets. It turns out that darkness bearing down on you from mid-afternoon doesn’t feel quite so bad when you have a pile of jelly beans in your pocket.
Ok, most of my clothes are still – and will no doubt continue to be – woefully ineffectual against the weather, I will probably lose at least three more gloves (not to mention a hat or two) before I bother to head to the haberdashers to pick up a needle and wool so I can attach them to a piece of string and loop them through my jacket toddler style, and there will be days when I curse the very orbit of the earth and wish I could speak Spanish well enough to go study there instead. But as I said, I won’t let winter beat me.
