The unsexy truth about Boring Girl Summer

We need to rewrite the rules of what a successful summer looks like

Would you say that summer is melancholic? For the longest time I didn’t really know what it meant, melancholy. I tried asking my parents even, to get a sense of the word. The way my nephew sometimes does when I talk in Swedish to him (he’s 2 and speaks Danish) - what does that mean?

If you google it you’ll read that melancholy is “a feeling of pensive sadness, typically with no obvious cause”. So I guess Lana beat me to it when she sang that she had the summertime sadness. Actually, I wouldn’t say I feel a sadness. But there is definitely a pensive something. Living in Sweden means there’s never a guarantee that summer will be endless days of sunshine, swimming and other outdoor activities. We are born with a sunflower’s urge to turn towards the sun so as soon as there’s a blue sky we feel a certain urgency to get outside. I’m not even exaggerating. More than once has a non-Swedish person asked me about why Swedes will stand lined up against a façade with their faces turned upwards towards the sun. We can’t help it.

All of this results in a certain degree of stress around the concept of summer. We typically celebrate midsummer about a week after the summer holiday starts which is the official inauguration of Summer with a capital S. Relax! Sunbathe! Go swimming! Eat pickled herring! Bake rhubarb pie! Go biking! Make love! Pick strawberries! Enjoy! Hurry up! Don’t miss out!

The epitome of a perfect summer, no? (J.Crew 1998)