Finger on the Polse

Our family has a long connection with Scandinavia, started by my mother moving to Sweden to work just after the War and continued with her daughters and grand-daughters working, skiing, walking and living sporadically in Norway. I can’t remember who brought these straw pigs back, but they come out of their shoe-box sty in the loft every Christmas and look very seasonal and jolly over the fireplace. They commemorate the rise of the household pig in the 19th century, fattened up all year and then eaten at mid-winter. Today pig cards, marzipan pigs, cookie pigs and piggy decorations hark back to that time as a symbol of feasting and plenty in the midst of parsimony. Terry Pratchett fans will have read the strange and dark story of the Hogfather and I suppose, if you were a pig, these ornaments would be pretty strange and dark too, a mantlepiece reminder that you are destined to become dinner. Scandi noir at its best/wurst.