We have just received word that we will be leaving camp officially, weather permitting, if the other group, somewhere else on the island who also contracted "our" chartered plane doesn't cause us any further delays, on, Thursday, the 13th of November. Seven people are coming in to our little camp, four of them will stay. Then, seven will leave again for Kangerlussuaq on the west coast of Greenland via a twin otter turbo prop with skis. The twin otter will not need the skis to take off or land in Kangerluusaq, only here, on the ice cap covered with drifting snows which have been blown into rock hard formations called sastruggi. After a night in Kangerlusuaq, we will all depart for Copenhagen, Denmark where some of us may visit for a short time before returning state side.We are all very excited. We get along, we are not running out of things to eat or things to do or things to say, or read, but are well aware of being tired of eating from out of the freezer or from a can. We find it harder and harder to push ourselves, to keep active, (mentally and physically) or to do the dishes. Tonight, over lasagna, we talked about corn syrup, ( have you ever noticed that it is in everything) Agri- pork, bicycles, and Robert Falcon Scott, the famous, dead Antarctic explorer. He died because he arguably may not have had enough corn syrup.
I jest.
We then laugh at number one of the last two pineapples. It looks like it was run over by an ATV with green moldy tires. I cut it up anyway and we eat it.
The sun set tonight was a dramatic visual display of alto cumulus clouds ribboning through the various hues of the color mariners find comforting at night. Red. Beneath the setting sun's spectacular performance was another maritime shade, though one not so comforting: green. This horizontal pallor was intensified by a muffled, rolling ground fog that crept in underneath the awning of brilliance so slowly, so carefully it was as though it was intending to either not disturb the harmony of light or to ruin it quickly. But then came darkness and the stars.
We have all made lists of the things we must get done or hope to get done before the little plane arrives. I find myself giving pause to my normal chores. Relishing them for their strange detail. Giving them the significance they are deserving of. I toss large blocks of snow broken off from a corniced drift, by the sheer weight of the Cat, (having traversed nearby on another rendezvous earlier in the week), into the snow melter. I feel a previously cold sensation grow warm through my muscles working. The blocks splash into the scalding hot water and begin to melt, adding to the, always being in a state of depletion, camp water source.
The science technicians use paint brushes to delicately brush off the heavy rime ice which builds up so beautifully on their tiny, plastic, anemometers.
These feathery ferns of ice astound us by their resilience from the wind, indeed they are born of the wind. Prints, made by our boots last weekend, now stand several inches above the current level of the snow. Everything is buried or carved or etched or embossed or drifted in; sealed shut. Even the very surface of the snow itself is harder now. Nothing can be done without first shoveling.
But the four characters of ACT I are growing tired of having to go stumbling over new, sperm- whale- sized -drifts -of -snow parked daily, by random, in their front yards and of having to dig their way into buildings. They are beginning to remember, what their teeth feel when they bite into fresh, tree -ripened organic apples. They miss their soft, purring or wet, wagging pets. They dream of grass, leaf sodden forests and song birds. They prepare to exit stage left.
