Julie\'s Nordic Island

Something sensible to do when the North Wind blows...

I awoke to one of those mornings when you don’t want to stick your little toe out from under the blanket. The skies were cloudy and the North Wind was blowing a right old gale. The wasps under our roof flew, one after the other, into our bedroom to take cover; their lovely hot oasis turned into a chilly, damp place more suitable for frogs.  I sympathized. All of us had been spoiled this summer. I hadn’t thought about those familiar chilly mornings in months.

“Time to collect the nets before it gets too windy,” my husband shouted up the stairs with glee. The house had smelled like coffee since 5 am and it was only 7 o’clock. I hadn’t recalled laying the nets the night before and, as it turned out, my memory was not playing tricks with me. Only my husband would be crazy enough to lay the nets in the chilly wind. He adores this type of weather and barely wants to sleep when it comes along each late summer. You guessed it: we are like yin and yang.

I pulled on the layers and brushed my teeth. There was no point in brushing my hair – the wind would annihilate the effects of any hairdressing this morning. That said, someone once asked me where I had got my hair done – it looked so impressive. I didn’t want to tell her that all I had done was to cross a windy lake in an open boat. An expensive way to get your hair done, I know.

I rowed against the waves as my husband pulled out one seaweed-covered net after the other. No fish in its right mind would bother hanging around at just this unruly spot when the winds set in. Thereafter we spent an hour untangling nets that had got into a royal mess in the wind. “This is what being a fisherman’s wife is all about,” my husband grinned, still gleeful at the coming of the chilly weather. “I don’t see any fisherman’s wife here,” I thought and imagined my steaming cup of tea.

As the day wore on, it improved (not the weather – just our way of handling it) and I was reminded of how cozy the North Wind can be when you’ve got a fire going on inside and are doing things together. The children were undertaking the annual task of bottling my hard-earned honey. I started them early and they are true professionals now, reminding me to keep my clumsy fingers out of their way as they carry out their specialized task. I put on some old pop music (not old for me but old for them) and I rocked around the kitchen for a while. “Oh stop, Mom,” they said, feeling embarassed on my behalf. “Can’t you bake or something?” 100 jars of honey later and I had baked a loaf of bread and a chocolate cake, an activity which they deemed to be suitable for a woman of my ‘ahem’ age group.

After all of the hard work, we crept into the sauna together. These sorts of days are the very finest of the year for a sauna. The water is cool but not unbearable and the soft heat of the sauna restores the warmth of the summer to one’s extremities. As I plunged into the chilling water I looked out onto the horizon. The promise of a little more summer was still there in the visible sun and a spot of blue sky. For now, however, I’d remember how to enjoy the North Wind.

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For more island adventures visit www.lettersfromtheisland.com.

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