There was a time (in my twenties) when I felt it my personal duty to jam-pack as much life into my days as possible. Enter unwise decisions, glorious travel, alcohol, and yes, work, but that was a necessity. Working on cruise ships really got me out of my sheltered, introverted, innocent self and had me saying YES to a lot of things, some good and some bad. The only thing I vehemently said no to was marriage and settling down. The horror of it all! To become boring was akin to giving up.

So here I am ten years later and I guess I’ve given up because I am now thoroughly boring. I’m married, have three kids, a dog, and am quite settled. And guess what? I (mostly) like it. I like that I experienced a ton of new things and places in my twenties, and now I’m happy just living my boring life. Because you know what? If it’s boring, that means that there are no crises to deal with. Boring can be good.

When my husband and I decided to buy our first house at the ripe old ages of 34 and 37, we were feeling very grown up and also very scared. I mean, buying a house is a lot of money…more than we’d ever spent. While we felt very lucky and privileged that we were able to buy a house, we were also terrified. Because, again, money. We began house-hunting in the city we lived in at the time and quickly realized we couldn’t afford to buy there. Even the money pits were above our price range. And while I’d love to be some cool DIYer woman, I’m definitely not. I know my strengths, ok? DIYing is not one of them. So we looked further out of the city and found a fantastic house one train stop away in the small village of Brønderslev.

When Ian and I told people we were moving to Brønderslev there were choruses of “Why?! It’s so boring there!”, and the rather offensive, “The people there are blue collar. They’re just…weird.” Other acquaintances expressed shock that we were moving so far away. This puzzled my husband and I quite a bit. It was a 14-minute train ride to our previous city or a twenty-minute car ride. By U.S. standards it was nothing! But to some other people we might as well have been moving to a different country.

While those people were not correct with their assessment of the citizens of Brønderslev (who have been kind to and very patient with this American dolt), I have to say, they were right about one thing: Brønderslev is boring. And I love that. NOTHING HAPPENS HERE! Do you know what a relief and a privilege that is after living in the U.S. where there are mass shootings all over the place? It is incredible to live in a small and quiet town and feel safe walking around everywhere.

And yes, I did say walking. I know this is probably not a big deal to my European friends, but being able to walk to all my errands and appointments blows my mind! What a luxury! The pedestrian street is a three minute walk from my house which has the Apotek (pharmacy), a butcher, a baker, (no candlestick maker, but this is Denmark, so you can pretty much buy candles in every store), the library, the church, the gym, the doctor, the dentist, etc. Five grocery stores and the vet are a further 2-10 minute walk from there. While my kids will eventually attend the international school in the “big” city of Aalborg, the public school here is a two minute walk away. Apparently there is a saying that people who live in Brønderslev have 26 hours in their day because they save so much time commuting from place to place. I mean, who couldn’t use an extra two hours in their day?

Now, is Brønderslev the most aesthetically pleasing small village? Perhaps not. And does it smell like cow poo much of the time because of the surrounding farms? Yes. But it does have some charm…most notably the Rhododendron Park which reminds me of the parks in London. Rumor has it that some Brønderslev residents stole some of the rarer rhododendrons and planted them in their yard. You can tell who stole them by seeing who has rarer species of the flower in their gardens. As Danes are an extremely law-abiding people, I find it hard to believe that they would steal…but they also seem inordinately taken with gardening, so perhaps it’s true. And that is the only hot goss you’ll get from here.

BECAUSE NOTHING EVER HAPPENS.

And yes, the weather is crappy most of the time. And that kind of sucks. But I guess that’s not specific to Brønderslev. That’s just Denmark. Sometimes I’ll find myself staring out the window, watching it rain, trying to remember when I last saw the sun and hyping myself up to take baby, dog, and myself out in the wind and the downpour to run errands. And I’ll think, “I don’t want to run boring errands in this boring place with the boring grey clouds AGAIN.” But then I remember the alternative.

When I think about it, if I’m bored, it means I feel safe enough to be bored. I am relaxed enough to be bored. I am content.

Maybe that’s why Denmark consistently rates as one of the happiest countries in the world. It’s not because they are always ecstatically happy (that feeling I was trying to chase in my twenties), maybe it’s because they are content. Maybe it’s because they are safe enough to be bored.

Cheers to being bored in Brønderslev!