My clothes hang in heavy, sopping folds as I stand up on my skis. “Pole!” Tyler hands me a ski pole so I can step away from the water and yank my sled onto the ice. We scramble away from the apron to where the ice is thicker. “Dry clothes!” Sounds roar in my head.
Tyler is one step ahead of me. He is already into our sleds, digging out dry clothes. I shout out the names of articles I need as I peel them off. My mittens come off, then my outer layers. Tyler grabs a sleeping pad for me to stand on as he helps me pull off my boots.
I’m pulling my sopping wool underwear top over my head when it becomes stuck. I wrestle with it like a drunken man as the wind blasts my bare torso like a subzero blowtorch. Then I realize my watch is strapped to the outside of my sleeve, pinning the shirt to my wrist. It’s all I can do to pull the rapidly stiffening shirt back on. I try to undo the clasp, but my fingers don’t work.
“Watch!” I’m down to one-word sentences. My hands and feet feel like daggers are pressing through them. I know frostbite is near. Tyler fumbles to remove the watch. Finally, he takes off his liner mittens to undo the clasp. The cold metal against his thumb sears the skin. Once the watch is off and my final layer of wet clothes is on the ice, I begin putting on dry layers. Tyler lays down another pad for extra insulation and pulls out a sleeping bag. I slide into it and sit there with my knees drawn up to my chest. He wraps another sleeping bag around me. Then he hands me chocolate truffles, our instant energy source. I stuff them into my mouth.
Mentally, I’m shutting down. I’m no longer thinking about Tyler’s rant or the race to the Pole. I have to get warm and fuel my body. Even after wolfing down the truffles, I feel like I could eat every last crumb of pemmican left in our pulks.
For the first time, I feel completely helpless and unable to contribute. My only job now is to stave off hypothermia and frostbite. Tucked into my armpits, my hands come back pretty quickly. But I’m worried about my feet, which burn with cold. I take off my socks and insulated booties and hold my toes in my hands, trying to conduct heat into them. The wind continues to howl, buffeting my little cocoon of pads and sleeping bags.
Tyler has found a good place to set up the tent about forty yards away. When he returns fifteen minutes later, I jump out of the bag and sprint in my booties toward the tent with Tyler jogging after me carrying the sleeping bag and pads. I slide through the round tent door, relieved to be out of the wind. Tyler reaches in and passes me a few more truffles, which barely ease my raging hunger. I crawl into the sleeping bag while Tyler leaves to take pictures of our near catastrophe.
I savor the shelter of the tent until he returns to light our two stoves. We hang my boot liners and mittens up to dry, but the inside of the tent is an icy mess. It’s as if someone has dumped a gigantic Slurpee on the floor. Since we’re on a tight ration of fuel, we’re worried about dipping too deep into our reserves.
continued on next page. . .
