The Deep North: Northern Summer:
[ . . . ] we talked to a psychologist in Tromsø who was interested in seasonal affective depression, and she told us that there was no evidence whatsoever that it exists. What drives people nuts is trying to lead inflexible nine-to-five lives when the seasons are definitively against them. The cure for SAD is to embrace dimness, to walk in the twilight, to sit as long as possible enjoying the infinite subtleties of endlessly long evenings without putting lights on, adjusting yourself to the turn of the year. As the Finns have long since done; they have developed a whole aesthetic of twilight, or so we are told by our Finnish friends. Which suggests that, as with so many aspects of modernity, it’s not the weather as such but forcing people to live their lives like battery chickens which causes the actual grief.
This actually makes some sense: I have long thought if you’re not comfortable where you live, you should move. I hated living in the sauna that is the Southeastern US, but I never knew how much until I moved to the opposite corner of the country. We *like* watching the sun march across the horizon from equinox to equinox. The quality of light more than makes up for the difference in quantity, and the variety of wildlife, flowers, and edibles makes it a great place to be.