walking on ice

i moved to germany almost a year ago, and it's been a lovely place to live. i have even enjoyed winter here a lot, going on daily walks with my boyfriend, and i will gladly bundle up for any amount of cold. 

the cold isn't really the issue—it's the ice. they don't salt the sidewalks here, so sometimes entire stretches of walking paths become treacherous sheets of ice, for days on end. 

sometimes it even extends all the way to our doorstep and all down the street, so that i can't leave the apartment without fearing for my life—and perhaps that's a bit dramatic, but it does make me truly scared.

i genuinely have no idea how anyone handles this. i've adjust pretty well to life in europe, but this is the first thing that makes me worried about my ability to stay sane here long-term; there is certainly no way i can adapt to walkways turning into literal ice! 

today, the ice was localized to our neighborhood park, so we only had to encounter if we really chose to. 

we did, in order to try one possible solution, which is these rubber contraptions with spikes on the bottom, that you stretch over your shoes to give traction while walking on ice (pictured below).

unfortunately, it didn't magically take away the fact that we were still literally walking on ice. 

it's difficult to describe how disorienting it is to suddenly not be able to walk in a way that i feel certain i'll be able to keep myself upright. i felt out of control and helpless. 

i will concede that we at least didn't have any near-falls like we had when walking on the ice without the spikes. 

i'm not quite sure how i'll face this moving forward. maybe i'll keep practicing, or maybe we'll find some better spikes. or maybe i'll just stay inside whenever the walkways turn to ice. 

Our shoe-spiked shoes on the ice.