The Year of Living Danishly (26 page)

It's getting cold now. My cheeks are burning, my fingers are tingling and my hair follicles are standing to attention,
Hellraiser
-style. So I'm relieved when Private School Dad spots me, waves, and tells me we're on the move.

‘Come on, they're lighting the rockets,' he says, wobbling towards me with roller coaster sea legs. He downs his bottle of Carlsberg and puts it into his toddler's nappy bag to recycle later on.
Living the Danish dream
, I think. We follow the crowd, now shuffling towards the open space at the end of the theme park, to marvel at the display. Or at least try to. In the rain. When only half of them will light.

‘
Oooooh!
' We make the sounds expected of us as I inhale the aroma of charcoal and sulphur.

‘
Ahhhh!
' A fountain of gold spills from the inky black sky and specks of rain (or are they pieces of firework detritus?) fall into our eyes. A few children start crying, either from the noise or the optical assault, and are bundled up and edged out. Catherine Wheels whizz, signifying that the pyrotechnics are coming to an end, and there is clapping and whooping before all is dark and still once more. The season is over. Legoland, the sole attraction in my particular corner of Denmark, is done for another year. All around me, parents are packing up their shivering children, ready to ship out.

‘Even the penguins leave for winter,' Private School Dad tells me, blowing on his hands to try to keep warm.

‘Are you joking?' I ask hopefully.

‘No, really – it gets
that
cold.'

I don't want a fight on my hands but I can't help pointing out that penguins are from the Antarctic. ‘Surely it gets a bit nippier there than in
Denmark
?'

Private School Dad looks at me, tilting his head to one side quizzically. ‘This is your first full winter here, isn't it?'

‘Yes…?'

He shakes his head and gives a slightly menacing chuckle: ‘Good luck!'

I wonder what's in store, and how on earth I'm going to get through it without wine.

Things I've learned this month:

1. Vikings are tougher than penguins when it comes to surviving the Danish winter
   
2. Healthcare in Denmark is high tech
   
3. …but that doesn't mean Danes are terribly healthy
   
4. …instead, they reserve the right to abuse their own bodies in any way they see fit, safe in the knowledge that the state will pick up the pieces
   
5. Midwifery in Denmark is Old School
   
6. My mother gave me a
   distinct advantage
   in life when it comes to sparkler spelling. Bad luck all you triple-plus-syllabled lot…
   

11. November

‘Here comes the Snow/Sleet/Soul-destroying Darkness…'

It's extraordinary how quickly it has happened. The air turned black, a cold wind shook what was left of autumn's leaves off the trees and huge, icy raindrops fell from the sky, unannounced.

Suddenly, the outside world has become menacing: brimming with
weather
that seems as though it's out to get you from the moment you open your front door.

The country has been dunked, mercilessly, into the new season and we're on course to experience our first full Nordic winter in its endurance-test entirety. It is bitter out there. The kind of brutal cold that makes your forehead freeze with the effects of nature's Botox and your eyes scrunch up to shield your irises from the chill. Driving home from the supermarket one afternoon, I wonder whether the thermometer on my car has broken as the needle droops despondently to the left and hovers around the minus twenty mark. I give the dial a tap (the universally accepted method of ‘fixing' any mechanical item, along with ‘hitting it' and ‘turning it on and off again'), but it does not move. As I drive along the harbour, I see children who look as though they've been inflated in puffed-up padded onesies taking tentative steps off the pontoon and
onto the sea
. One boy is a good twenty yards out, standing and waving from the middle of the fjord. I blink, in case the cold's playing tricks on me or I really am witnessing the second coming of the Messiah in an Adidas snowsuit. Then I notice the cloudy, opaquely swirled surface of the sea. Could it be? Is it now so damn cold that the
sea
has frozen over?

We're not in NW6 any more, Toto
, I think and find myself feeling nostalgic for the insulating smog of London in winter. As if to rub it in, the Danish public radio station starts playing Billy Idol's
Hot in the City
.

‘Is this some sort of sick joke?” I wail to no one as I follow the snow plough, careful not to stray from its tracks. I couldn't leave the house this morning until the tractor had been round to clear the roads, my red mobility tomato being ill-equipped to tackle two-foot-high powdery drifts, despite the winter tyres. Fortunately, there was plenty to occupy me until then, since all residents in Denmark are legally obliged to shovel snow from the area in front of their house in case someone slips over. Friendly Neighbour was kind enough to inform us of this fact before she sped off to Copenhagen to sit out the worst of the weather and asked whether we'd mind doing hers as well. Danes must clear the entire property-width of their pavement and keep it snow-free from 7am until 10pm (on Sundays you're allowed a lie-in and can wait until 8am to start shovelling). This, apparently, is a non-negotiable civic duty and the newspapers run daily pictures of the Danish prime minister doing hers – the implication being that if she can run the country and still manage to shovel snow, the rest of us have no excuse. Face burning, nose dripping, and ‘helped' by the dog, wearing a full white beard of snow as he attempted to
eat
his way through the drifts, I finally got our drive clear while Lego Man tackled Friendly Neighbour's. But no sooner was the snow cleared than a white blanket started to settle again.

By the time I get home, it's a winter wonderland once more.

It's also dark.

Again.

Once I've made it inside and thawed out sufficiently, I peer out into the thick black nothingness for five minutes and estimate that it is now ‘evening'.

‘OK dog, this means it's probably dinner time … right?'

The dog nods and starts to dribble before prancing around, whinnying slightly and lashing his tail with glee as though he's pulled the wool over my eyes in some way.
Weirdo
.

I reason that I might as well start supper too and stare blankly into the fridge for inspiration before retrieving a raw chicken. I'm just holding its chilly pink carcass in my hands, frowning at the controls on the Danish oven, when Lego Man arrives home.

‘What are you doing?' (It's not his fault: he didn't have a TV growing up. He hasn't watched enough US sitcoms to know that ‘Honey, I'm home! How was your day?' is a more conventional matrimonial greeting.)

‘“Hello” to you, too. I'm making dinner.'

‘Now?'

‘Yes.'

‘You do know it's only 4pm?'

‘Oh.' I did not know this. I should really start wearing a watch. The bird gets a reprieve and we decide to walk the dog instead. Not as easy as it sounds when your dog is black, the sky is black, and you live in an area untroubled by streetlamps or defined paths. Add in a skewed centre of gravity from being eight months pregnant, some precariously icy undergrowth and a total disconnect with feet you haven't seen for weeks, and dog walking gets ramped up from ‘gentle activity' to ‘extreme sport'. One wrong step could send me tumbling into woodland/mud/sand/dog mess left by previous walkers. Torches don't really cut it against the all-absorbing darkness so we spend most of the time swinging them about, pretending we're Mulder and Scully in
The X-Files
or holding them underneath our chins and doing ghost impressions.

Our neighbours are nowhere to be seen (we establish this before any juvenile flashlight shenanigans) and the legion of retirees who spent the summer pruning rose bushes and swigging from bottles of beer in socks and sandals have now retreated to their homes following a flurry of activity where they all raked autumn leaves into trailers and drove them around, for days, or so it seemed. Now, we don't pass a single soul, and conclude that we are living in a ghost town once again. It's a little eerie.

The dog's confused, too. He has a wee and it freezes instantly. We get home and he trots obediently to his bed, assuming it's time to sleep. This is unheard of. I try to coax him back out and he takes a few steps before slumping down in the hallway with an audible ‘
harrumph
'.

‘Do you think the dog's OK?' I ask.

‘Yes, why?'

‘He's just been acting strangely lately.' I think for a moment. ‘Do you think maybe the dog's suffering from seasonal affective disorder?' I ask.

‘
Do
dogs suffer from seasonal affective disorder?'

Neither of us has a clue, so I turn to Google and find ‘
Do dogs get SAD?
' brings up 1,020,000 results.

Stanley Coren, dog psychology expert from the University of British Columbia, is first up, saying that 40 per cent of dog owners see a downturn in their pet's moods during winter due to melatonin and serotonin levels. ‘Melatonin, secreted when it's dark, makes you lethargic and serotonin affects appetite and mood,' I tell Lego Man. ‘It says you need
sunlight
to make serotonin … or Prozac.'

‘We're not giving the dog Prozac.'

I shrug as if to say: ‘
OK then, it's your dog's welfare you're messing with…
'

‘It's not as though the rest of Denmark isn't high on happy pills to get through winter,' I mutter, then read on. ‘Apparently, dogs sleep longer and want to eat more in winter. So he might be comfort eating. To cheer himself up…'

‘Good grief…'

‘He brought home half a pizza yesterday. And he's started gorging on acorns.'

‘Do dogs eat acorns? Isn't that Piglet from
Winnie the Pooh
?'

I'm not sure about this so I click on another link.

‘Dogs with SAD can also suffer from depression and social withdrawal.'

‘“
Social withdrawal
”? He's a dog! Does this mean he hasn't been attempting to sniff as many bottoms as usual?'

I have a think. ‘He did give that Alsatian a wide berth yesterday…'

‘Oh,
well then
, he's practically a canine recluse.'

Choosing to ignore Lego Man's mockery, I read on: ‘It's all related to light levels, which are particularly crap in Scandinavia in winter.'

‘Does it say that?'

‘I paraphrase. This site says that in Florida, where it's sunny all the time, only about 2 per cent of animals get SAD.' I'm just imagining all these giddy Florida dogs, tails wagging, wearing muumuus and ‘
I Heart Orlando
' visors, having the time of their lives, when our dog comes and sits at my feet. He stares up at me from beneath long, cow-like lashes and I picture a thought bubble rising from his woolly head:
‘Don't s'pose a trip to Disneyland is on the cards?'

‘Fortunately, there's also some advice to “help dogs battle the winter blues”.'

‘Oh good, I can't wait to hear it.'

I sense a tone of sarcasm but plough on: ‘We should leave lights on for him when we're out. And the radio.'

‘But he doesn't speak Danish.'

We think about this before logging on to internet radio and selecting him an English language station. We wonder whether he's more of a Radio 2 or a Radio 4 sort of chap. I'm erring towards Radio 2 when Lego Man raises a crucial objection: ‘But what about Ken Bruce?
Pop Master
might be enough to push him over the edge…'

‘Good point.'

We decide to stick with Radio 4 (‘
everyone
loves Jane Garvey…') and resolve to leave it on whenever he's in on his own. We're just rewarding ourselves for having solved the problem with a cup of tea and a biscuit, followed by a Danish that's been lurking in the fridge and some crisps that were left open, when I look again at the SAD symptoms listed on my laptop. ‘
Increased appetite, craving for comfort foods…
'

‘Do you think,' I start tentatively, ‘
we
might have it too?' Lego Man isn't listening: instead he has his head wedged in the fridge, inspecting the designated cheese compartment. ‘Seasonal affective disorder, I mean?' He emerges with a matchbox-sized slab of cheddar distorting his left cheek.

‘Whaa?'

‘We went to bed at 8pm last night. And we turned down a drinks invitation in to stay in and watch
Orange is the New Black
.'

‘It's “must-watch” TV…' he protests through his mouthful. ‘That's why they
call
it that. We're
powerless
in its grasp…'

‘That's as may be, but we definitely tick a few boxes.' The more I read, the more convinced I am that we have all the symptoms: lethargy, social withdrawal, tiredness, addiction to cheese and TV box sets (the last two were more implied that specified by the scientific journals).

It turns out that Scandinavians hold the gold standard for SAD. The Finns have it worst (well, they
would
) but Danes don't get much respite during winter. A recent study from the Danish Ministry of Climate and Energy showed that there were only 44 hours of sunlight in Denmark in November. That's just over ten hours a week – less than an hour and a half a day. Of sunlight! I'm practically living in Mordor. It's no wonder I'm mainlining carbs and on a permanent builders' tea drip.

I text Helena C to ask her whether or not this is normal and she sends a smiley face in reply. Danes, as I've mentioned, are fond of an emoticon.

‘
No, but really?
' I write back.

‘
Of course! It's totally normal. Everyone gets it. You just accept that you're going to feel like crap when it gets really dark. We call it “vinterdepression”!
'

Excellent: it's been escalated from an affective disorder to depression.

She texts again, with the subtle Danish humour I've come to know and love:

‘
Loads of people kill themselves this time of year too. Try not to kill yourself!
'

The next day I come across statistics that show she's half right. Daylight hours or changes in the day's length are the most significant explanation for seasonal variations in suicidal behaviour. But it turns out that suicides and suicide attempts peak at two points during the year: November, when the days begin to shorten, and April, when the days get longer again.

‘Why is this?' I ask Bo Andersen Ejdesgaard from Denmark's Centre for Suicide Research.

‘People with severe winter depression lack the initiative to act while they are suffering from the depression,' he says.

‘You need some energy to attempt to take your own life. It's only when people are feeling rejuvenated by the return of the sunlight in the spring that people have this.'

‘So in winter, Danes are too depressed to even kill themselves?'

‘Something like that. Spring is also the month of “broken promises”. In the winter people look forward to the spring, associated with hope, activity and the rebirth of a new year. If spring doesn't live up to the promises it can cause suicidal behavior. But it's not all bad in Denmark – we have the same level of suicides as other Scandinavian countries apart from Finland – it's higher there of course.'

‘
Of course
…' Excellent news. ‘So, er, how do you recommend making it through winter?'

‘If you feel like you're experiencing a life crisis, then obviously contact a professional psychologist or psychiatrist.' Right. Thanks for that. ‘We advise getting some sun – either artificially or by going away somewhere hot,' says Bo. I tell him that I've seen a suspicious number of Danes sporting out-of-season tans without much talk of Caribbean breaks. ‘Oh yes, tanning beds are very popular in Denmark.' This much I've gleaned. Away from Sticksville, even the smallest town has a bakery, a florist, and a tanning shop. Danes may get the winter blues but by God they are always well-fed, floral and nut-coloured. A recent article in
The Copenhagen Post
showed that young Danes are the most prolific sunbed users in the world.

‘The third option is to get a lamp that can simulate sunlight,' adds Bo, and here I think he may be on to something. Flying somewhere hot is out until the sumo wrestler inside my stomach decides to put in an appearance and sunbeds have always been a no-no thanks to my mottled blue-white British complexion. But the fancy lamp idea could work. I go on a SAD-prevention, professionally-sanctioned shopping trip and buy an agonisingly expensive lamp that also doubles up as an alarm clock. Yes, it's ugly. Yes, it probably cost the same as a minibreak to Gran Canaria. Yes, Lego Man is going to despise it. But this lamp is going to change our lives. Or at least our winter.