I had almost forgotten how much I love it. Ice yachting. Must be some kind of self-defence mechanism. If I haven’t done something I really enjoy for a while, it’s like I forget how much fun it is, which then results in that I don’t really miss it anymore. Quite emotionally practical most of the time, and makes it even better when you suddenly get to do whatever it was you’d forgotten how much fun it was. Like ice yachting. Swooshing along the ice with the wind curling around your glasses to make your eyes tear. The water from on top of the ice, with these tiny, tiny ice pieces in it, splashing in your face, making you feel like you’re a convertible a hailstorm. Doesn’t it sound great? Not? Well…it is. Thanks dad for a great morning on the ice.
Got the same feeling around Christmas about a year ago, when I took the cross-country skis down from the attic for the first time in way too long. For a few weeks around Christmas and New Years, I spent hours and hours in the tracks. My hometown area had the best winter since the 80ies and I re-discovered my childhood cross-country skiing tracks. One track a day, with a bigger smile on my face for every mile in the snow landscape.
As I was enjoying all the different tracks around the area I kept meeting and seeing all these family out on for a winter holiday day in the wonderland and still, just like 25 years ago, they’d all fallen for the big orange mystery. It would be interesting to find out how it all started: Let’s see what we’re going to do here? Cross country skiing or ice skating for a few hours, with gloves and hats on and the lot. And let’s try to bring what we want to take along, in our pockets without big bulky rucksacks. Do we need to bring a snack? Sounds like a nice idea. After all it’s quite a full-on sport. So what do we decide to bring? Something, which is easy to keep in our pockets? Something, which is ready to be eaten without peeling, for example? Something, which can be eaten without making a mess? Something, which doesn’t really freeze if it’s really cold? Nah, skip all that. Let’s bring oranges! Of all the fruits in the world, except for coconuts possibly, oranges must be the most unpractical edible item to bring when going winter sporting. Since generations and generations back, Swedish families have always brought their dear oranges along though. And I don’t think anything will ever stop that. We love our oranges when we go cross-country skiing and without them it wouldn’t be a proper family day in the snow, would it?
