Ice, White & Blue

Redhead Amok in Antarctica

Oh, And Since Then...

The day I learned of the birth of my niece I was also informed that my mother had lung cancer.

The next day Brad had to get on a bus and leave for Christchurch and then Oz, and I had to get myself ready to go home and figure out what the hell to do with Ruby. I was allowed one more week in New Zealand, and I immediately fled from where I'd heard the news in Invercargill (southern-most NZ city) to the comfort of friends (Rochelle, and then Pav) on the West Coast. I soaked in as much of the areas between as I could as a way of fortifying myself with memories of extravagantly beautiful scenery, of arming myself with the possibilities of joy when sorrow seemed such an inescapable future.

I have been home since then taking care of her. No post-surgery chemo or radiation necessary, just recovery of strength and stamina. We were lucky. One grapefruit-sized tumour and no metastases. Yes, she smoked for many years, but she quit in 1972. Still, it fucked her lung.

She's fine now. Down one lung, but doing fine. Gaining weight, and well able to care for herself. We await her return to the pool, so we can see if she swims lopsided now. No, really, I'm curious about that.

I have also been getting to know my infant niece, Ave, and trying not to carry her like my cat, or call her by my cat's name. I don't have any experience with infants, never having been interested in any up to this point. The day I get her to purr is the day I'll have figured her out. By then she'll be headed to preschool, I'm sure.

posted by: coldwish at 19:46 | link | comments (1) |
between 2008

Of Ice and Then

I had a shit season this year, from beginning to end.

There were a few mitigating graces: Brad, the marvellous day sleeper roommate who I adore for his unflappable, sarcastic honesty; Karl and Mark, my clever, foul-mouthed, supportive, irreverent weekly Hearts opponents who kicked my ass all season except once on my birthday and I KNOW that was a birthday gift; Jesse, my AM Pits partner who made a challenging week outside funner than it had a right to be; meals with the hilariously dirty-minded and truthful Marisa (and Eric who gleefully put up with us); the divinely intelligent calm of meals with Marty and Dean; Thomas's loan of hockey skates and directions to the "skating rink"; reconnecting with Shana despite our occasional difficulties as roommates last season; the Adelie who came to the Ice Runway; the blizzards; the startled Emperor; the climb up Hogback; getting to know the helo pilots at Marble; seeing Mike on the other end of the Herc hose during a fueling, the clouds and hoarfrost and snow.  There were so many small moments and actions and interactions that floated above the shit of the season, and for all that I'm thankful.

I wouldn't have survived otherwise. I could not develop calluses fast enough, to be anything but rubbed raw by the evidently casual hatefulness of so many daily interactions.

All together the wonderful moments and people were not enough to keep me from a thousand-yard stare of bewilderment and shock in the Galley from my very first week back on Ice, and thinking "Why don't I just quit this shit hole?"

It wasn't the hard work, the bad food, the lack of privacy, the cold weather. It wasn't even the corporate cheapskates who run the place.

It was the people. It was more than just my constant issue with Too Many People.

It hasn't been easy for me since my first season (and I may have been blinded by Ice Love to the worst of that season, or I was just hopeful in my FNG innocence that it was the exception to the rule). I've had to scramble for moments of peace and bliss at McMurdo, between the crowds of people and their very often juvenile, mean behaviour, exacerbated by the corporate stranglehold on the place.

I don't mean to tar everyone with the same brush, but holy crap, there are enough of that ilk to taint the best of times in McMurdo.

When some of them work in the same department, then it's a huge issue. You don't "go home" when you finish work there. They are in your dorm, in your toilet, in the same line for food, one table over in the Galley, in the same knitting group, volunteering for the same activities, on the same few proscribed hiking routes at the same time, in the store, hanging up their coats next to yours, on the next computer over in the computer lab, drinking at the same bar. There is no recovery time from the people who abrade.

You could not pay me enough to return to Fuels at this point in McMurdo. As much as that department was able to offer me in terms of travel and ineffably Antarctic opportunities, we were not a good fit. As much as I truly enjoyed the work and many of my coworkers, I wasn't a great Fuelie. We won't miss each other.

However, you could pay me less to return to the South Pole in a different job.

I applied and was accepted and will be in Cargo/Materials next summer at the South Pole. I'm almost as excited about this as I was to be offered a position on Ice in the first place, 4 seasons ago. I LOVED my 5 week stint there the season before this. Watching the Polies transit through McMurdo to Pole in October was heartbreaking for me, because I wanted to go, too, where I fit better. I watched them go and was bereft, not only for missing them, but for being left behind in a McMurdo season that had already deteriorated to almost unbearable.

I couldn't get away far enough. I heal from people by withdrawing from the constant social pounding, by leaving the scene, by being alone. Though I had my dorm room blessedly and mostly to myself throughout the season, due to my and Brad's opposite work schedule, I still had to go to the Galley to eat, go the the loo to pee and shit. I still had to encounter the same people, and fake civility and sociability. By a certain point in the season, I was faking it with everyone. I felt like every time I left my room I skulked in the nonexistent shadows. Or that I was in drag and performing a sociable, happy, confident Genevieve that was simply not myself.

I bore it though, with gritted teeth and a greater need for the pleasure of working outdoors, preferably completely alone. But I was not in a good place, and was not able to achieve much of the inner poetry that Antarctica engenders in me, a rhythm to which I hum and vibrate when allowed the emotional freedom to do so. This season was heartbreaking for my inability to do much more than glumly notice the beauty around me. I was so trapped in my social misery the heaviness of spiteful, hateful people wore me down. And I couldn't share it, let alone allow myself the vulnerability to expose myself here. I hinted at the misery, I hinted at the beauty, but mostly I remained silent or spoke of less consequential things, like carrots.

But I am going back. But this time to the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, where I'll have no roommate, there's way fewer people, the food will be better, there's more space to get away from people even if I don't leave the elevated station, and the 360 degrees of curved white ice horizon will remind me just how much space there is in the world to get away in. Even if I don't.

posted by: coldwish at 19:24 | link | comments |
fuels 2007-08

Aunt Genevieve Presents

The arrival of Abigail Virginia Eberhart Ellison on February 28th.

She's a redhead.

Let's all wish my brother, Andrew, luck, as he is smittten already.

Let's all wish my sister-in-law, Karen, a quick recovery and a baby who sleeps through the night.

They are thinking Abby as her name, but my mother pointed out her initials spell AVE Ellison, so she may be a little Ave, as in the Latin.

Hot damn, but I'm an AUNT!!!!

posted by: coldwish at 11:38 | link | comments (4) |
nz 2008

Ruby & Me & Brad Make Three

I know, I know, I said I wanted to be alone.

My roomie, Brad, showed up last night at my backpackers, having just decanted from the cold place into green, humidity and darkness at night. I was so glad to see him, on impulse, I invited him to join me today when I got on the road south. We made such good roommates, I figure we'll be good travelling companions too. It saves on petrol costs. He's got no plans or intentions for travelling, so it fits with my wander south and check out whatever looks good mode. He's all geared up, so I don't need to take care of him.

I missed him. He's good company. And he doesn't take up a lot of space, mentally, like so many people do. He doesn't exhaust me.

I've told him if it gets too much I reserve the right to get rid of him through means less than murderous. He says he's fine with buses and trains.

Ruby is looking a tad dusty but sounds and feels healthier than I do. I still cough like I'm dying of emphysema, sniffle like the start of a bad head cold, but I am not made faint at the two block walk to the PO at this point. I'm quite well, this my 3rd day out of bed. Will fill 'er up with petrol, and be on my (our) way in a few hours.

I'm thinking Moeraki Boulders, Nugget Point, Balclutha, Stewart Island, Rob Roy Glacier...what do you think?

posted by: coldwish at 12:16 | link | comments (1) |
nz 2008

Ruby's On The Road Again

I, however, am not.

It is perhaps a good sign when the sound of one's cough shifts from that of a hacking up a wet sponge to the dry rattle of a seed pod. Right? At least I'm well beyond the cough so hard I vomit stage, or the break into a feverish sweat just upon blowing my nose.

Really, I am so much better today. But it's been a long sick. Too long and too expensive. Ruby is well again, however. She has had her transmission fixed and is on the way to me in Christchurch. I expect to be on the road with Ruby, iPod plugged in and blaring music, wind in my hair, all 4 windows down. South.

Just south, with vague ideas of when and where to stop. I need to be away from Christchurch. There are too many Ice People decanting into this city, and I need to flee before the last flight arrives on Saturday.

I just need to.

posted by: coldwish at 15:44 | link | comments (1) |
nz 2008

Oh Crud

I am still sick in Christchurch.

Ruby is sick with transmission troubles on her way here.

At this point, I'm glad she's been delayed, because I am so fucking miserable I wouldn't want to be responsible for parking/driving a car in Christchurch with the whopping crud I have. Lungs rattle and pain me something fierce when I cough. My sore throat has just faded, thank goodness. But the sinuses have jumped on board and I am achy and drippy.

Meanwhile Ruby is having her engine dropped out in some gorgeous small town in NZ to find out why the hell she's leaking transmission fluid.

I wish I could afford a mechanic to drop my lungs out and figure out why they are tight and paining me.

posted by: coldwish at 09:49 | link | comments (2) |
nz 2008

Antarctic Export

I have made it safely to Christchurch, NZ.

I got goosed again by the dog at customs, sniffing for imported food items. But that's not what I managed to export from Antarctica. I brought one very nasty case of the crud with me. The morning of my flight off-Ice I went to medical with a sore throat and the start of a productive achy cough. By the time I got to the plane at Pegasus my lungs were burning from the cold air and I was short of breath, even with the generic Claritin and Robitussin the doc gave me. By the time I hit the backpackers (I prefer Thomas's on Hereford, 03-379-9536) in Chch, I folded myself gently into the humidity as heavy as whipped egg whites, but it was too late to save me. I am sick. The warm air makes a huge difference to my breathing, and soothes my dry throat, but still I am sick. On my own dime.

Ruby, my Subaru Legacy I bought last year, will be arriving at the end of this week. I will spend the time until she arrives sick in bed, crawling out of it occasionally to do chores at the CDC (Clothing Distribution Centre of the US Antarctic Program out at Christchurch Airport). There I will sort through all the Ice crap I hauled off Ice (4 seasons worth of stuff) and the camping gear I had mailed to myself to await my redeployment from the Ice, see where I have duplicates and lacunae and make educated guesses as to what I can mail home while I still have access to the subsidized military mail system (APO address) and what I may need in the next few months in NZ.

Once I am shed of that and Ruby and I are reunited, I am outa heah! South. No destination, no goal, no deadline, no scheduled mealtimes, no need to eat if I don't want to, stopping off on the side of the road somewhere to sleep.

I feel a desperate need to shed the ties that bind, slip away from the bonds of people who know me, and slide into solitude again.

posted by: coldwish at 16:54 | link | comments (2) |
nz 2008

Act IV Scene V: Exit Genevieve, Stage Left

I'm off-Ice as of Monday, February 11th, and can I just say...

PHEW!!!

It's been a harsh season and I'm ready to be shut of it.

New Zealand, ready or not here I come. Gird your loins. I'm quite a bit rough-edged at this point and humidity, greenery, Kiwi friendliness and generosity may not be sufficient to pull me out of this one.

I'm seriously contemplating a year off or not coming back at all. Perhaps a few months driving Ruby around the South Island will soothe me back to shape, perhaps not.

posted by: coldwish at 12:27 | link | comments (4) |
fuels 2007-08, nz 2008

Pending Tanker

So much of the Fuelies' year is aimed toward our biggest event: the advent of Tanker. The fuel tanker comes in once a year to provide us with a new batch of fuel. Offloading this tanker is an enormous task, requiring our department to switch to a 24-hour workday, split into two shifts of twelve hours. Back in town, the entire Fuels Department has been on this shift, has been sundered in two, for over a week now.

But the tanker is not here yet. First it ran into weather on its way down here, a "gale" at sea, which delayed it by a day or so. Then it got here, as far as the ice part of the Ice, and now it's sorta kinda stuck in pack ice on the ice edge. The Odin (Swedish icebreaker) has been sent out the shipping channel it has been keeping open in preparation for the tanker's arrival at the pier, to go crack this ship out of its trap. Or so I hear. This, to me out here at Marble Point, is merely rumour, but it is rumour fleshed out by its impact on me.

It is why I'm still here. Rotating me back to town during this forward leaning, anticipating, on the edge of our seats wait for Tanker, doesn't make sense at this point. Everyone in town has their appointed role in this performance, and I don't belong there. I was at Pole for Tanker last season, and I am at Marble this season.

So they wait, and I stay here.

Aww. Shucks. What a darn shame.

posted by: coldwish at 14:26 | link | comments (1) |
fuels 2007-08

I Ain't No Hogback Girl

This is why fools like me climb hills like this. Because for all the doubts and pain of the ascent, our curiousity gets the better of us. What will I see when I reach the top? I am, at these moments, an optimist, eager to see the new view, the changed angle, widen my experience.  I am also too ashamed to fail so close to the top, ashamed to give up, I push on against burning thighs, aching knees, labouring lungs. Even though I could lie to others and myself, the latter would be worse, and what would I be missing by not continuing up the last steep impossible climb? I am supremely alone in Antarctica, solitude surrounds me with vast vistas, wide open spaces for my doubts and joys to flourish.

I’m on top of Hogback Hill (734 metres, 2408 feet) at Marble Point: I started with a two hour casual hike north along the face of the Wilson-Piedmont Glacier, stopping for dessicated seal carcasses who knows how old, dead disemboweled Adelie Penguins, curious recce flights by a dozon or so non-aggressive skuas, stepping from stone to stone across mats of black algae and flowing water from the melting glacier, climbing the crunchy snow ankles of the glacier, listening to the everpresent sounds of water dripping and rice-sized ice crystals tumbling and tinkling down the face to where I gaze up enrapt.

That is just to get to the base of Hogback. Then began a grueling--(for this middle-aged woman), staggering, pausing every 10-20 paces upward for a half dozen panting breaths and a long reminder of the view at my back--climb over sharp boulders, remaindered snowfields, and vertical loose gravel. I can see north to open water, I can see all of Ross Island, and I can see the open water reflecting back Mt Erebus and the tabular icebergs floating therein. There is so little wind and I am so overheated that I resent its absence. At one point I raised my innermost layer and hiked barebreasted to cool my core off.

I broke for snacks, I broke for water, I broke for pictures, I broke to fart. Any excuse on the way up.

Then I was 20 feet from the top and I knew why I was an optimist, becuse the view over Hogback was just becoming evident.

When I crested all the pain and doubts flooded out of me in great gasping loud howls of astonished, pleased, unalloyed happiness. I cried, hugely, for a good few minutes as I turned in place, catching the entire panoramic view.

I was standing on a par (it felt) with the Royal Society Range to the South, snow-capped and jagged, at the entrance to Taylor Valley (the southernmost of the Dry Valleys), looking at glaciers cropped at the edges before they hit the dry environment of the valley floor. I could see the blue glints of crevasse fields revealing the shiny ice as the glaciers squeezed through the peaks of the Kukri Hills, or swooped around corners in their gravitational efforts to get down from the Asgard Range with their heavy slow weight of accumulated snow and ice, cracking under the pressure. Or the high valleys in the peaks of the Olympus Range, dry and brown, speckled with snow.

I can see Ross Island in its longest view, from Ob Hill like a dark pyramid above an invisible town--how tiny we are and how glad I am for the perspective when McMurdo can loom so overwheming--to the right most end, then lowly extending along the snow ridge with Castle Rock a wee brown button halfway to Erebus. This flank of Erebus is long and bleaker, barer of the soft swoops amd muscles of snow that faces town and the runways (my most familiar view). But Ross Island goes on norther with Mount Terror and it ends surrounded by glassy waters and icebergs.

But I, I have the Dry Valleys here, I am right on the verge of being there. I am so close that I can taste my dream of going there one day, in fact, it feels fulfilled from up here where my eyes water and sparkle with the smiles that blaze on my face.

Far off White Island and Black Island are small low lumps on the Southern horizon of the ice shelf. Between us the ice freckles with light and dark splotches as the almost mackerel clouded sky filters the sun in patches on the extended flat white. I can see forever and I am surrounded by that which makes Antarctica such a vibrant and miraculous continent, it is the snowy landscape of my innermost yearnings and I am stunned to be so damn lucky to be here.

I am glad now of no wind, now that I am still, becalmed and bewitched by beauty, here on Hogback Hill.

This is solitude.

This is joy.

This is my Antarctica.

posted by: coldwish at 14:01 | link | comments |
fuels 2007-08