I think there are people who love to run, but I have not met many of them.
I think most runners are like me. They look out the window, observe that it is too hot, too cold, too windy, too rainy or whatever, and then they lace up and head out the door anyway. It’s never an easy start, but I almost always feel better after the run, sometimes even during the run.
Winter in Malmö is no exception.
Even with my hat, gloves, long-sleeve outer running shell and new running tights that cover my legs to the ankle, I still brace for the cold, especially if it is windy. And I find myself thinking about easier options.
Last week I tried an indoor gym a few times. Running on the treadmill was boring, although it offered me the unique opportunity to watch American reruns with Swedish subtitles. At no time in my previous life could I have predicted that in January 2018 I would be watching Murder She Wrote, picking through the Swedish words I know, while running on a treadmill — sweating inside to avoid the wintery elements outside.
They had free coffee at the gym, but not a single drinking fountain. When I asked the attendant where the water fountain was, he told me to get water from the toilet. That’s what he said, toilet. At least I have been here long enough to know that toilet is a general word for restroom, which is comforting, but when my free trial week ended, I decided to go back to outside running.
Earlier this month, when we returned from California and started running in the Malmö parks again, I noticed that the birds were standing in the middle of the lake. They were standing on partially submerged ice, surrounded by warmer water, and it looked like they were frozen statues floating on liquid.
But that was just one or two mornings.
Every other day that we have run the lake and ponds have been ice free. It is just not cold enough for them to freeze, and really, that surprises me. Here we are in January, one of the coldest months of the northern hemisphere, and it is so warm in southern Sweden that the ponds don’t freeze.
It has barely snowed this winter either. We had a dusting in December and last week there was snow mixed in the rain, dissolving on the streets below. People have told us that it is typical, but my Malmö friends also tell me that when they were children they remember snow sledding in Pildammsparken. I can’t imagine.
Is this what global warming looks like?
It could be. A few degrees difference would make a big difference in allowing the ponds to freeze and snow to fall. As it is, the temperatures have hovered just above freezing. No snow, just grey clouds and cold drizzle, but ironically, once you warm up, its not bad running weather though.
Today the air was the warmest yet, and deep fog hovered over the lake in an ethereal kind of beauty. Like so many things in this Swedish immersion experience, its different from what life was like before, different, but beautiful.
