There are two kinds of Swedes in the winter. One kind is moody, depressed, melancholic, alcoholic, and as a result not too productive. But most people here are the opposite—aggressively positive—and it amounts to a victory over adversity, in any case over adverse weather.

[Insert jibe here about how if you really want a taste of winter you should move to New York, which is observing arctic temperatures this week while Sweden coasts along in solid positive single digit temperatures.]

But back to these Swedes and their mood-altering society. Aggressive optimism is the state religion here. Every single FM station has a playlist that rotates the same 30 impossibly boppy songs—the Ketchup song is still number one, a whole six months after taxing everybody’s sanity by being anointed Europe’s summer song; and the Russian lesbian teen duo Tatu has a popular ditty that everybody no doubt listens to for its complex rhythmic qualities.

And there are gobs of holidays. Besides Christmas and New Years, there is Santa Lucia, where a lucky child gets to put candles in her hair and light them. I’ve only recently heard the story behind it: Apparently, Saint Lucia used to bring food to fellow Christians hiding underground in Roman times. She had her hands full so she wore candles on her head to light the way in the dark catacombs. Eventually, she was caught so they tried to drown her, but couldn’t, so they tried to burn her at the stake but she wouldn’t, and this was the miracle that made her a saint. Eventually they just killed her with a sword. Some miracle.

Swedish—the language—also betrays a different approach to sexual mores (maw-rez). Whereas the sentence “Magnus loved his wife” is not normally considered ambiguous in English, a Swede knows better and will demand more information. If you say “Magnus älskade sin fru” you are indeed saying he loves his own wife; but if you say “Magnus älskade hans fru” you are talking about somebody else’s wife, perhaps his best friend’s, Petter.

But back to why anybody lives here at all. One reason I found out all by myself. Another I read about. First, I’d like to say what a wonderful world a world without rot is. Things here don’t rot, they don’t fall apart, they don’t get eaten by bugs or maggots or taken over by the jungle or disappear into a swamp or dissolve into rust. It does wonders to one’s quality of life. (The one notable exception is their fish, but that’s done on purpose. It must be a fetish—yearning for something you don’t have).

Second, it turns out that in the days before modern transportation, Swedes enjoyed a 6-month competitive advantage versus the rest of Europe in that their transportation was much, much more efficient during winter. Whereas the rest of us had to wade through muddy roads on uncomfortable carts, the Swedes simply sledded everywhere, getting to places with much less friction and effort.

Woops, it just got dark again.