Today is the first day of Spring!
No one has any idea how happy that makes me. I am a gardener. Yes we grow some tomatoes, peppers, zucchini in the summer which I enjoy (both growing and eating!) but my true passion is HOSTAS. We are suburban people but I have an area out back, under a 200 year old burr oak tree devoted to perennials, mainly hostas. I have already been out there searching for those first few pips poking up from the dirt. I love the smell of spring rain and the smell of the damp earth getting ready to explode just to give me the inner joy that is Spring. But as usual I digress.
How do the Scandinavians stand the long dark winter? I always visited my grandmother in Norway in the late spring or summer. She lived in Skien and I just loved the way the sun didn't go down until maybe 10pm and was up again about 2am. And it never really went all the way down it just sort of dropped low on the horizon in the west and skimmed around to the east where it again rose. I always thought I could never stand a dark dark winter. I hate Chicago winters! The dark evenings do depress me some. How in the world do the Scandinavians stand their long dark winter?
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| Tromsø, Norway - mid-winter at high-noon! photo from "My Little Norway" |
"My Little Norway, discover the kingdom of the north" is a new favorite blog of mine. Telling how the Norwegians not only survive but actually enjoy their winters! This blog is going on my favorites list.
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2 comments:
Sorry for the mess...
Lovely blog you are pointing to. I read the following article just a few months ago, which actually gives a scientific base for what the bloggers are saying.
To a great extent it has to do with mindset. "Det är inte hur man har det utan hur man tar det" we've said in Sweden for long - literary translated: It's not how you have it but how you take it". But to say it is one thing, do it is another. The better you learn this in the school of life, the better off you will be, even in the dark winters.
http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2015/07/the-norwegian-town-where-the-sun-doesnt-rise/396746/
Cheers - Ingemar
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