Every time a Swede doesn’t know what a biscuit is, I wonder how the hell I could live here.

Today a colleague approached me and said that my lunch — leftover biscuit-topped pot pie– had looked good. “What was that, some kind of polenta on top?”

It’s like the twilight zone, where everyone *thinks* they’re happy but I’ve seen another planet and know the limits of this sub-par, biscuit-less world.

The problem is, I am not good at being a biscuit ambassador.

“No, it wasn’t polenta, it was biscuits. They’re these little breads that are common in America. They’re SO GOOD. You can have them with soup, or with…dinner.”

“Ah ha.”

“Oh, yeah, I love them!”

“Are they like tea cakes?”

“Um, kind of, yeah,” I agree because I’m searching for connection. “Except they’re SO GOOD.”

“Yeah, wow, they sound…good.”

This conversation goes even worse when it’s dumplings.

“They’re boiled bread balls!”

“!”

II.

Yesterday I forgot how old I was. Not in a disingenuous “Jeez, I can’t keep track anymore!” kind of way. I actually could not remember if I was turning 33 or 34 this year. I asked Erik and he couldn’t remember either. We had to count. And because we are bad at math, it took us a minute to come to the conclusion: I will be 33.

This is because I never say my age anymore. It’s not that Sweden is a post-age society or that I’ve become uncharacteristically coy. It’s just that I stopped being my age when I moved here and started being my year.

Here I am not 32. I am ’79.

This was confusing for the first year or so, when people would say ’73 or ’82 and I’d be like, “Ha ha, seriously.” And they would be like, “?” And I’d remember. Oh yeah, the year thing. That’s what people ask. Not how old you are, but when you were born.

This makes sense for a while, because it’s about what class you were a part of in school. But nowadays, when old high school references rarely come up, the focus on years just serves to make me feel senile. Somewhere around 31, if you’re not keeping track of your age, it morphs into a wrimpled blob of “somewhere north of 25 and south of 40.”

III.

The first day of the week in America is Sunday.

The first day of the week in Sweden is Monday.

Discuss.

In eight years of living here, I have never talked about this with Erik (and am too lazy to see if I’ve blogged about it). Either this is a missed opportunity for small-talk (it met with mixed enthusiasm at lunch) or it’s a totally uninteresting bit of trivia that’s on the far edge of the field of foreign factoids. I thought Wikipedia could help me decide that this was actually very fascinating, but it just confirmed the fact of it. Yes, the world is split into countries whose week begins on Sunday and those whose week starts on Monday (Europe). Except Iran. They kick things off on Saturday.

But I don’t know. I still think there might be something here that’s at least worth one more round of small talk with the right people at a party. Isn’t it possible that the day your calendar week starts would have a psychological effect? Erik said last night as he lay in bed, “See, I’m totally still in the weekend.” There was no energetic, fresh start vibe going on with him, whereas I had ironed a dress for today and talked about the coming week at dinner. My week had already begun. Of course, this may have nothing to do with country and everything to do with my tendency to think about tomorrow’s biscuits over today’s toast.

Last Thursday, we visited a couple with their new baby, in their new row house — new to them, anyway. The house wasn’t really what they thought they would buy. Their dream house would be similar to our dream house. Something old and charming with plenty of patina and no need for renovation. Ours are not, we agreed, relationships that could withstand crumbling walls and too much water damage. Erik and I were both on the edge of nervous breakdowns when we paid other people to renovate our kitchen. So, no, there will be no finding the charm in a hovel in our future.

Old houses that don’t need renovation are hard to find and even harder to afford. With a second baby on the way, our friends chose lifestyle over style, floor plan and practicality over beauty. Sitting in their warm, clean kitchen, which is located at a perfect distance from the living room, which is right next to the laundry room, which is right next to the stairs, which leads to four bedrooms, I got it.

Yesterday we went to a birthday party at the house that was the one I could most see myself living in. Old on the outside, new on the inside, bright and warm, and still in Malmö. It also helps that this couple has the exact same blend of IKEA meets 60s furniture that we have. Being in their house felt just like being at home, were our apartment to be stretched in all directions and pushed down two flights. It was a great house.

So many houses these days. We apartment dwellers are a dying breed among our friends in Sweden. We parents of one child a strange breed.

There was a time a few months ago, when all of these people were getting pregnant and talking about back doors, that I was swept along. God, why is our apartment so stupid? Why haven’t we framed that poster? What’s up with this piece of shit MDF kitchen cabinet? It is so annoying to have to go down stairs to get outside! Ugh!

We started looking at listings, emailing each other pictures of houses with depressing wallpaper that only looks gross in the ad probably! We even went to see a house. Because it was my dream house and if we didn’t go see it we would surely regret it for ever and ever and especially every time those damn blue IKEA shopping bags fall off that too-short nail in the closet. It was good that we went to see this dream house, because the second I walked in, the dream went scurrying back to our apartment and has not poked its head out from under the covers since. That house was a very expensive dump. It looked like a gingerbread house but its staircase was a deathtrap, its arch in the living room ugly, and its mold no joke. To think I almost spent the rest of my life thinking about it (those bags fall off that nail all the time).

After that, and once all of our friends actually had those babies and moved into those houses, I stopped letting myself get swept along. They have all made good choices, but Erik and I have to remind ourselves, their choices are not our choices. Their choices are not our choices. Sometimes we have to say it a few times.

We are building our own house. Metaphorically speaking, of course, hell if we could ever build a house (see above).

There are many reasons we do not want to move right now, all of which could have a post of their own. Then there’s the reason that’s as simple as this: we just don’t. When a group of people start doing something in droves, say moving to houses or having children, their choice makes it seem like you’re making an opposite choice. Suddenly you feel like you have to motivate a lack of action, as if it were a stance. The thing is, we’re not taking a stand against leaving the city. We’re not making a statement about parenthood by not having a second child within three years. We’re just doing our thing.

Today is Sunday, the day of the housing supplement in the newspaper. I love looking at it with a cup of coffee. But I’ve learned that doing that is a little like sending an email to an old love just to say “hey, I’m thinking about you.” It’s exciting while you’re doing it, but it leaves you feeling out of step with your chosen life.

I didn’t look. I chose to think about the window in my kitchen instead. The one that I can see out of when I’m rolling pie crusts on the counter.

I really love that window.

This is my favorite Christmas memory. It took place not at home in front of our cozy fire, or at my in-laws in front of their cozy tree. It was Boxing Day, and we were at an American sports bar in the train station. It’s the kind of place that we would usually avoid, but that during the holidays, with a toddler, suddenly became the only place any of us wanted to eat. There was something about beers in the afternoon, a 3pm lunch after a long nap that was sure to keep Sigrid up far too late, leather booths and English football, sloppy veggie burgers, baskets of french fries for lunch, and refills of popcorn that felt just like the vacation you dream about at Christmas but never really get, what with all the cooking, wrapping, cleaning, hustling. It was also one of those rare times when adult wants (beer, veggie burgers, not cooking lunch, conversation) and kid wants (crayons, popcorn, big screen TVs) were both perfectly met. And yes I am aware that I am talking about a sports bar in a train station. Blame it on red and green colored glasses, or the pounds of shortbread cookies gone to my head, but damn it if that hellish place wasn’t a little slice of Boxing Day heaven.

The fact that popcorn in a train station was my Christmas highlight might lead you to believe that we had a pretty sucky Christmas. Do not believe that. There are many moments vying for favorite memory this year (English football won in penalty kicks). There was rolling, cutting, and decorating cookies with three generations of bakers: Sigrid, me, my mom. There was also kicking my dad out of the kitchen for encouraging straight icing eating and finding Sigrid in the living room eating sprinkles from a bowl, but it would have been too precious had there not been some naughty with the nice.

The Christmas Eve meeting with Tomten (Swedish Santa Claus) was a huge success. In Sweden Santa comes to the door on Christmas Eve to deliver presents. I have always been secretly of the opinion that this tradition is 1) creepy and 2) indicative of a certain dimwittedness in Swedish children that they do not to recognize their father/grandfather/family friend in the red coat. Had it been only up to me we wouldn’t have done it. Thank God things are not only up to me. Because hearing Sigrid ask me again and again if Tomten was coming soon had already increased the size of my heart, only to have it burst upon seeing her little legs swinging in patient anticipation and the same little legs jump onto the floor and run straight for the front hall at the sound of the doorbell. Pure freaking magic. Point, Sweden.

We managed to keep things relatively sane, present-wise, squirreling some things away for Sigrid’s birthday when we sensed present overload. This left us with a girl who got a few main things: a heap of frilly dress-up clothes, a plethora of plastic foodstuffs, and two best-friend dolls. (note to self: trucks and dinosaurs for birthday, trucks and dinosaurs.) I knew we had chosen and advised wisely when the next day Sigrid was to be found in her fairy dress, feeding her new dolls plastic hot dogs. This was before “He who shall not be named because he gives Barbies”, aka my Dad, gave her a Snow White Barbie-type doll, which had been purchased at CVS, and quickly put all other gifts to shame. Man, does she love that thing. The only problem is that she wants me to voice Snow White all the time and if I look away for a second Sigrid will look up at me, put on her saddest voice and say, “Snow White isn’t talking to me.” Cue: insane high-pitched voice saying things like, “Sigrid, I would like to go outside, can I ride next to you in the stroller for a walk into town?”

But what would a holiday recap be without mention of the food? We got home around 9pm on the 24th after a full day’s festivities and had that most traditional of Christmas meals: two boxes of Annie’s mac and cheese, split between my parents, Erik, Sigrid and myself, who all had to admit we were a little hungry even if we shouldn’t be after stuffing ourselves on a real, actual delicious meal in the afternoon. This ridiculous Christmas “dinner” was another of my favorite moments. So much thought and planning goes into Christmas, that even when things are a success, like the dresses and the cookies and the Tomten, there’s a certain sense of relief mixed in with the joy. It’s in the unexpected times — the boxing day sports bar, the cozy, quick dinner and recap on the couch, the December 30th extended lego session next to the soon-to-go tree – when it’s just the joy you feel.

After years of sporting a parentally chopped mop-top, maintained mostly by quick snips in her sleep (this after many failed attempts at making haircutting FUN!), Sigrid had her first haircut at a salon. I would not say she was a fan of the experience, but she made it through without a tantrum, even if the promise of a cinnamon bun afterwards helped. (Whatever, the promise of cake or wine is how I make it through many unpleasant events too.)

After the salon, we went to a Christmas family crafting event at my office, then to dinner at a friends’ house. At both events, I watched Sigrid get over her initial shyness in groups and make her own way, bopping along to Christmas carols at my office and coming hesitatingly to the dinner table in a princess dress she had found in our friends’ daughter’s room. On Sunday she “hosted” some of her friends from the baby days for a pre-Christmas gathering. She seemed to listen to my lecture earlier in the day about sharing toys with her guests, and once they arrived she corralled them all into mine and Erik’s room for a session of bed jumping.

The very social, new experience filled weekend seemed to signal a new era. An era of being more able to go with the flow, to deal with shit, even if you don’t love it.

And then came the hysterical crying at the daycare Christmas performance, then lice on Tuesday, vomit on Friday, and suddenly our perfectly cosy weekend felt very far away. There’s nothing fun about seeing your baby cry when you leave daycare. There’s nothing fun about knowing your child feels like shit, and cleaning up vomit at 4am. And there is really, really, nothing fun about combing for lice every night, dreading more new cases at daycare, and feeling a constant phantom itching in your scalp.

The week wasn’t as joyful as the weekend, and it definitely wasn’t free of drama, but it followed the same general pattern. I’m still able to look back on the past week and say that I love the horizon of three and all of the understanding that comes with it. Whether it means we’re able to talk about the fact that Santa is coming in a week, or that I’m able to look my hair-washing hating daughter in the eyes and say, “You have bugs in your hair and we need to get rid of them. Have an m&m.”

One of the benefits with having a young child is that everyone accepts (at least in Sweden) that you have to leave work at a reasonable hour. I must get home to my girl, end of story. Except, as anyone who works in a team knows, there are times when that’s not the end of the story. When if you didn’t put in a few more hours you would be an asshole. That’s when you look back on life before a child and realize that there’s something to be said for pulling a late-night or two with colleagues and just getting shit done. Something to be said for the collective vibe of overtime at the office as opposed to overtime at home.

Instead of pulling a few really late-nighters at work, I stayed as long as I could while still getting home for dinner, then worked after Sigrid fell asleep until I fell asleep, which is really not my thing. I’m big on work/life boundaries. I’d rather stay late at the office and be free for real at home. That’s why I couldn’t work in academia and why freelancing scares me. When I don’t have working hours, I am a ball of “should I be working instead of baking?” stress.

Of course there was room for blogging during those couple of weeks. Other people would have posted something. But when I’m writing a lot at work, I’m not chomping at the bit to come home and write some more. On the nights I didn’t work, I just wanted to watch Downton Abbey. Would that I were the kind of person who, when free time arises after a period of stress, runs immediately to a zumba class. But I am unalterably the kind of person that runs to cookies, TV, and books.

Consequently, I have let much slip. My driving lessons. E-mails. Christmas shopping. Cooking. But I didn’t let work slip, and I didn’t let Sigrid slip, and that’s enough for me. I don’t have the need to be good at everything all the time. Which is why it bothers me that I haven’t bought (let alone made) Christmas cards yet, but it doesn’t kill me. And while I’ve got high standards for myself in many areas, I’ve got pretty low standards when it comes to Friday nights and the ways I choose to relax.

Erik is at his company Christmas party, Sigrid fell asleep early, and this 300-word entry is about as productive as I’m interested in being. If you’ll excuse me, the Idol results are in.

There is an upscale, old-timey, leather-aproned blacksmith joint downtown, and they recently saved my stupid ass after I wore a pair of suede shoes in a storm. They also cleaned a pair of heels for my New York trip. Both times I felt good, but it’s such a fine establishment that I suspect they might laugh at me at their guild night for bringing such unchallenging cases. No, for the real high I prefer to go to the place in my neighborhood.

Instead of gold lettering, there’s a giant blue key on the glass window and sale signs on white printer-paper. I left my winter boots to get re-heeled there and they came back with a strange platform of a different shade. I eyed a pair of Italian heels in the window for a few weeks before finally deciding to buy them, only to discover that because the shoe guy had neglected to alternate the display shoe, it was sun-bleached and a totally different shade than it’s pair. But I still love going to this place, because the man who runs it is friendly and because quite simply, it’s the shoe shop in my neighborhood.

I support my neighborhood shops in spite of themselves. I buy baby gifts from the strange garden/baby combo store that has not changed their inventory in the three years we’ve lived here. I go to the office supply/art/book store whenever I need tape or a card or a book for Sigrid even though they almost never have exactly what I’m looking for. I buy shabby-chic hostess gifts from the bubbly lady who likes cafe au lait bowls for people whose style is Scandinavian modern. And until this weekend, I went to the bakery down the road for my weekend bread, despite the fact that it was really no great shakes.

On Saturday, I walked down my block and betrayed the small business by taking a number at the just-opened chain bakery from Stockholm. Because in the fight between local and sourdough, sourdough apparently wins.

When the small, dusty grocery store that used to be in that spot went out of business, Erik and I speculated nervously about what would move in. We had already seen multiple stores and cafes open and close in the neighborhood due to bad ideas (all white interior design anyone?). Please not another doomed venture, we hoped. And please not something totally useless, like the newly opened realtor with a piano player in the window down the street. We wanted something that would take the place of something in town for us. A good store, a restaurant.

When I saw the sign a few months ago announcing the new bakery, I nearly fell off my bike. It was too good to be true. Actual crusty bread in walking distance! (Those of you who think that crusty bread exists everywhere, you are wrong. For reference see: my neighborhood in London, Northern Ohio in the late 90s, and pockets of Malmö.) I wish this place weren’t a chain, I wish it wasn’t baked in Lund and driven here, but the line there on Saturday says this neighborhood needed it. And considering the price of a roll, I don’t think the other, traditional bakery has too much to worry about.

For my part, I’ll still patron the non-sourdough bakery. There are times when what you want is a non-artisanal cinnamon roll or a bag of marzipan chicks. I will take Sigrid there and let her pick out a pastry with gloopy cream inside. And then other times her food education will take a more serious tone, like on Saturday when her lesson was croissant: a study in flakiness.

We trekked out to be at the new bakery right when they opened, like the loyal customers we are surely going to be, and we walked home a contented little bunch, leaving  croissant flakes in our wake. As I ate my sourdough roll and drank my coffee at my table, my stomach was happy, but something was missing. It was that shoe-repair self-righteousness I had learned to feel when buying something nearby. This roll was good for my stomach and a lift to the neighborhood, but even if it came from down the block, I couldn’t really convince myself that I was supporting the local guy.

For every year I’ve been here, Halloween has gotten bigger. My first October I was scoffed at for even mentioning it. Despite the orange window displays I saw everywhere, I was swiftly informed the holiday meant nothing. This year everyone around me seemed to have a Halloween party to attend. Some parents I know were bringing their kids to two. Yet for all the lines at the costume store, for all the jack-o-lanterns dancing on supermarket circulars, my Swedish brethren still haven’t decided when to get their fright fest on. Some go for the last weekend in October, siding with the Americans on the matter; some go for the first weekend in November, amplifying the Swedish holiday of Alla Helgons Dag (All Saint’s Day). There was plenty of Halloween in the air last weekend and there was plenty this weekend. Monday, October 31st was, however, just a Monday. “Why should it be anything else, American, we don’t care about your holiday!” said the Swede in the witch hat and fangs.

Speaking of fangs, despite the increase in Halloween, I still have to explain to someone every year that in America your costume doesn’t have to be scary. That in fact, most are not. Swedes think this is dumb. “Of course you have to be scary!,” they say before remembering that they’re not supposed to care about the holiday in the first place.

I don’t actually mind the Swedes’ dedication to ghoulish attire, it brings the holiday an innocent old-timey feel, and it makes it ever so slightly more their own even if they don’t realize it. It also means less pressure to be creative, which in a way is good, but then again without that pressure I never would have dressed up as “tarred and feathered” in college, which was an awesome costume except for the unfortunate fact that I forgot black lipstick and therefore looked a little like I was in blackface.

This year I had planned to host a party for Sigrid and a few of her/our friends, but with all the traveling in the weeks leading up to Halloween, I just couldn’t bring myself to send out an invitation. Luckily, for once in the matter of Halloween, Sweden had my back. One of the city parks hosted a Halloween festival, which was as kitted out as any haunted hay ride type place in the States. There were fresh graves and creepy sounds being blared, there were witches handing out marshmallows to roast over fires, there were endless orange balloons being handed out, a haunted house, haunted pony rides (led by ghouls, the ponies themselves were still alive), and the requisite festival fare of sausages and mini donuts.

Sigrid was really into the idea of going to the Halloween party in the park. She had been practicing wearing her Snow White dress around the house and the idea of wearing it OUT was magical. She loved her balloon and her mini donuts and her hot chocolate, and running around causing chaos with her friend during the children’s capoeira session (connection to Halloween? no idea). There was something a little off with her, though; she wasn’t full of energy. The puzzle was solved later that afternoon when she started pulling on her ear and screaming louder than any of the pre-recorded banshees in the park. Little Snow White escaped any poison apples only to be felled by a raging ear infection. We were completely out for the count on Sunday and Monday. All the more reason I am grateful for Malmö’s big Halloween party.

So thanks, Sweden, I know I gave you shit six years ago, and now I owe you one. Back then all I cared about was enjoying my apple cider without seeing an elf out of the corner of my eye. I didn’t know then that a little more Halloween in these parts would help a tired parent out. This year I didn’t manage to make any monster treats or put up any decorations, but I was able to keep my promise of a party.

I went upstairs and kissed Sigrid. A few minutes later, after catching up briefly with Erik and getting into my pajamas, I kissed her some more. I put my nose in her hair, breathed her in and cried (just a little), so happy to be back with her, so happy to not have my mind weighed down with thoughts of leaving.

The next morning the first words out of Sigrid’s mouth were, “Min mamma home.” I acted, somewhat melodramatically, like a soldier returned from war, “Yes, my child I’m HOME!, I’m HOME!” I basically wanted to dive into my bowl of Special K and relish in the normalness of everything. Watching TV with her in my lap was awesome. Changing diapers was awesome. Then having Sigrid fall asleep that night and me crash into bed was also awesome. Because after two long weekends away and two months of worry I was so bone tired.

Which is not to say Greece was not relaxing. It was the perfect mix of social time and lazy time. Because I knew things were going well at home, I could sip a beer on a Grecian beach without feeling pangs of guilt. I could jump up and scream answers during a music quiz with no thought other than winning. I could read for hours in my hotel bed on a lazy afternoon. Hours! I have not read for hours in years. That might actually have been the highlight of the trip. Yes, reading Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom uninterrupted was even better than the freaking Parthenon. And the freaking Parthenon is pretty freaking fantastic.

I promise, I enjoyed myself. But although I thought I was relaxing, and really was not consciously stressed, it wasn’t until my midnight cab ride home that I finally exhaled.

I hate flying. I use to love it, back when I was little and liked anything that was either giant or miniature. A plane was perfect, because it was a giant vessel filled with miniatures: mini bathrooms, mini pillows, mini toilets, mini cheeses, mini magnetic checkers games. Now I’m big, less thrilled by the mini toilets and generally more afraid of the whole venture.

I’m not counting down the hours to take-off, but in less than two days that boarding call will come, and I’ll be there with a carry-on stuffed full of wedding attire (in case my  bags go missing during my layover), a page-turner of some kind, and a wish that the movie I want to watch isn’t only showing on routes to Asia. Then before I have digested my New York food, the weekend itself, which I am crazy looking forward to, will be over, my week back with Sigrid will be over and I’ll be boarding a plane to Greece with work. Then that weekend will be over, and Sigrid’s reaction to me being gone will come, and be over, and soon it will be Christmas.

Cue Steve Miller. “Time keeps on slipping, into the future.” Such a terrible song, such an uninteresting thought, and yet really, exactly how I feel this week. I’ve thought so much about these back-to-back weekends away, worried and obsessed and reasoned and rationalized, and then, as October came, I mostly just accepted. This is what’s happening, this is what I’m doing, and no matter how much I think about it, my thoughts are not stopping time. My thoughts are really doing nothing, except getting in the way of normal life. So I stopped thinking, mostly, and just let time sweep me along. And here I am. A little worried about the flight on Thursday, a little worried about the absence, but actually fine. Thank God for time, it picks up the slack and gets you on with life when your brain is just mucking up the works.

Time, time, time, it is on my mind. This week marked my eight-year anniversary in Sweden. I don’t know what to say about it. I don’t know what to feel about it. It doesn’t feel like an achievement, it just feels like life: eight years of my life. Eight years that sometimes feel short, like when I remember my going away party in Brooklyn, and sometimes feel long, like when I remember people from those early Sweden days whom I had forgotten.

I’ve been here long enough to forget. There it is, that’s eight years. I can’t remember everything about Sweden, because Sweden is no longer an adventure to be met, remembered and captioned. Sweden is, eight years is, flights are, toddlers are where babies were. And right now, in the middle of it all, there’s a weekend in New York, seeing my dear friend get married, which I intend to throw myself into and enjoy, before I’m right back on this bed a week from now.

That will also feel good, because this is not a bad perch from which to watch the time.

***

After I came home, the three of us sat in Sigrid’s room and she found her one and only Barbie. I would not have bought her a Barbie, but I’ve been ambivalent about her having this one. It’s from my dad, I had them and I’m okay, I will work against her thinking that she has to conform to that, etc etc. Honestly, I also felt that my not-that-super-girly-girl wouldn’t really take in Barbie’s “beauty.” But as Erik and I sat on the floor talking, Sigrid stripped Barbie of her stripper dress and heels (“pretty shoes!”). Her little toddler eyes almost popped out of her head when she got a look at the bombshell under the dress. “Long hair!” she said. “Long legs! Long arms! Boobies!”

Here was the moment! I scrambled to say something, “Yes, long legs! Most women don’t have legs like that. Do you know anyone that looks like that?” Sigrid was unsurprisingly uninterested in my Women’s Studies for Toddler’s lesson. “Long hair!”

Erik and I thought about hiding the Barbie after that conversation, but I didn’t, and last night she was found again and this time, she was taken into the bath. Sigrid has recently discovered that water makes hair even longer. Meaning that Barbie’s locks went full-on Rapunzel in the bath, “Long hair!” I tried again, “Barbie has pretty long hair. Short hair is also pretty. Blonde hair is pretty, brown hair is pretty, blah blah blah Mamma you are so boring shut up LONG HAIR!”

I should have hidden her when I had the opportunity, because tonight, when Sigrid was dilly-dallying about, not getting in the bath, I saw my chance and grabbed Barbie, still naked, fake hair still damp from last night. Want to take a bath with Barbie? “Yeah!” Then, let’s wash your hair, honey. No? Hey look, Barbie’s washing her hair!

***

I was thinking about long hair and short hair and hair in general today as I biked home and I remembered a crazy song I used to sing in school about Samson. “Samson, Samson, child of the sun (?), where did you get that hair? The strength you bear in the length of your hair, will set God’s people free!”

I grew up singing songs like that and playing with Barbies and didn’t end up completely fucked. So I’m thinking Sigrid should be fine. Barbie can stay, but if her long hair is going to be popular right now, I’m even gladder I’m shorn.