Essentials
On a short winter trip to my Adirondack cabin.
This past weekend I did one of my favorite things—bought a few gallons of water, gathered a few essentials, eggs, bacon, bread, chicken, salad makings, got down my “pulk sled” I made with cordage and some PVC a few winters ago, my cross country skis, snowshoes…—and headed north. The further north I drove, the less ice-crusted, fluffier and deeper the snow got, so when I arrived lakeside and hurriedly changed into windproof pants, ski boots, and loaded and readied the sled I would tow along behind me, I could tell the forests were covered in the deepest snow I’ve seen in the Adirondacks in some time. I need to go back to my high school days when a few mountain-going friends and I would ski up (and up and up) to Rainbow Falls in the High Peaks, then blast back down the hiking trail; and if you fell, how you’d tumble a few times before vanishing into thick powder, ears and nostrils plugged with it, not knowing at first which way was up or down, everything gone white.
Already as I strap the waist band around me (I cut it off an old, no longer used backpack) and attach the PVC poles to its sides, feel the weight of the sled behind me, I feel myself sinking into an altogether different mode of being, my thinking suddenly centered on certain essentials, life distilled to its essences—find shelter, stay warm, eat, sleep… All the shiny objects of life that distract us so mightily vanish away behind me with each push-glide of skis as I slide across the frozen lake towing behind me my small cache of essentials. It is a cold, high-teens, low 20s, bright-sunny-sunglasses-required winter day, and I end up pulling on an extra layer, my efforts not quite strenuous enough to fight off the chill. I pause mid-lake for a selfie and try my hand at a short video to try to capture some semblance of the experience, the only person for miles around, a small dot shushing across this expanse of utterly flat, cold white, the sound of the wind, the scratching of my skis on the wind-blown crusty lake surface, my own breathing, my heart pulse in my ears, windblown tufts of snow skittering along the surface, occasionally swept up in torrents of white, coating my sunglasses before quickly melting, fogging lenses, keeping myself pointed toward the V in the far mountains north of Owl’s Head, the bearing I take when zipping across this same surface in my small aluminum boat, back past sunset from a canoe-fishing trip, having fished up until the last possible moment, letting that notch in the far hills backlit against the evening ski be my guide. I look there now so as to not waste any energy, to remain Euclidean-straight-steered toward my target, my small cabin just out of sight, up in the woods above the shoreline…
.In what always takes a little longer than I had anticipated, I reach the other side, can just make out the edge of my lakeside deck, knowing the taller heaps of snow there are the sections of my dock we stacked when we pulled it in last November. If you leave your dock out on this side of the lake, the thawing, receding ice would unleash its tremendous forces, twisting aluminum, steel into pretzels. Now the real work begins—the last 100 feet or so uphill to the cabin through three to four feet of dense snow. The lake had only an inch or two of fresh powder atop an icy crust, (then the foot and half or so of ice above water beneath that). In the woods, my ski poles sink far in, and I can’t use them to give leverage. I shape my skis into a big V as I “duckwalk” uphill, working hard to keep the tips from going under. I stop frequently to catch my breath. I’ve been cycling on my indoor trainer a lot this winter, and I’m in the best shape I’ve been in for awhile, but none of that seems to matter much. Finally, cabin-side, I step out of my skis and sink in nearly to my waist in snow. It has been so long since I’ve seen snow like this; on the cabin roof I can see the layers of the many storms that have come this winter. Snow gathered onto the small front deck rises well above the windows. It takes some doing to get back to the sled and unstrap my snowshoes and get the bindings snugged around my ski boots—but then they delightfully do what they are supposed to, keeping me suspended in the top four inches or so of powder, allowing me to—almost magically—hover atop this otherwise impossible to traverse substance. I retrieve the shovel from the woodshed and begin the daunting task of clearing a passage from woodshed (fuel source) to front door. As I lift shovelful after shovelful of snow away, I am again struck by the essential, absolute needs I am facing, especially now, a mile or so across a frozen lake, all alone, limited cell phone reception…to clear this passage, gain access to the cabin, light a fire, subsist.
Finally inside, I’m struck with what I’ve always noticed when I make the trek here in the winter—how much colder it is inside the cabin than outside, how the cold has permeated everything, the floor become a dangerous skating rink, where the slightest bit of snow or ice on your soles sends you sliding, and that first fire seemingly doing nothing for the longest time, but that is the first, the most essential thing to do, and I’m grateful I left some wood in the inside bin, that there is some kindling and birch bark, that without too much fuss, a big fire is going. The next essential thing is to change out of my sweaty clothes before they bring on a chill I won’t be able to shake, and I’m always amazed, as I strip off layers of clothing, at how my whole body is steaming, a steady, thick mist rising from every part of me into the frigid air, as if I am disintegrating like the wicked witch melting away into nothingness… I take some clothes from the drawer of my bedroom dresser, which seem colder still than everything else, and pulling them on, there’s that first shock of cold, but eventually they catch the heat of my body and hold it, and I’m extremely thankful for such a simple thing—dry, warm clothing keeping me warm, safe, alive.
I get snow to melting atop the stove in the biggest pot I can find. I’ll have to scoop panful after panful of it to finally get a full pot steaming there, moisturizing the dry heat of the stove, ready to be used for various cleanup duties. I fill the whistling kettle with some of my drinking water and set it on the stove, too, hang my sweaty clothes on the drying rack we have suspended on pulleys high up in the V of the roof, where the most heat gathers—out of the way. I lay out my food on the counter, fill a dishpan with snow and place my bacon, milk, salad greens there, covered with an old towel (my refrigerator). When it’s not quite this cold, I will open the window above the sink, stack things on the ledge there and close the window down, but at these temperatures, my milk and greens would likely freeze.
Finally, I settle down for a much needed break, coat and hat still on, my director’s chair pulled as close as possible to the glass front of the stove. I can feel the heat on my face and my un-gloved hands. I can rest my boots on the ash-catch at the front of the stove and slowly feel the heat edging in toward my cold toes. But behind me is the cold. It settles along my exposed neck, presses into the back of the chair, my coat. Just by turning my head slightly away from the stove, and breathing out, I can still make a big streak of steam in the air. It will be some time before the cold is driven out, but even with just half of me comfortable, I pause and look around and marvel, yet again, at where I am, here on the edge of one of our last great wilderness areas.
Looking lake-ward, though, all I can see are the tremendous mounds of snow along the front of the cabin, and looking out the back windows is the deep-snow-covered rise of land that stretches up and away into miles and miles of roadless Adirondack park, and here in my cabin, cupped in a large indentation of snow, I’m struck with the sensation of being held in the very palm of the land, the Adirondack mountains, the earth, holding me, sipping hot tea now feeling its warmth combined with the growing warmth of my fire, thinking ahead to how I’ll cook some chicken in one of the big cast iron fry pans hanging just behind the stove, how I’ll fry eggs and bacon there, too, come morning, how I’ll ski the snowmobile trail then the hiking trail up to the base of Owl’s Head mountain tomorrow and listen for the near silent rush of owl wing I’m sometimes lucky enough to hear then turn and see their big-barred-exactly-the-colors-of-the-forest-bodies gliding hauntingly through the trees, how I’ll be sure to hear the cries and other-worldly echoey chortles of a pair of ravens as I try to mimc their cries and they, always curious, will come closer, swooping into nearby trees, how later when the light might be better I’ll go out on snowshoes with my camera and try to see if I can capture some slight facsimile of the enormity of being here again, alone here again, and how I’ll see the big top of the cherry tree that has fallen uncomfortably close to the cabin and consider when some storm will fall me finally, moving ever-closer to the still, deep winter of my time.
Some photos (by the author) from the trip:
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Bliss. Hiking into camp in the winter is a favorite of mine, too. I try to do it at least once each winter. I’m overdue and reading this was just perfect. Cheers, Neighbor.
The eloquent words of this piece meld perfectly with your remarkable photographs 👏👏 You’ve awakened in me my own snow bound memories of Switzerland and Saratoga Springs, as well as the epic Connecticut snowstorms that cancelled school for three consecutive days or more and filled me with a childlike thrill. Your adventures in rough living in survival mode are even more surreal to me from the vantage point of today’s gentle February breeze in my California desert oasis. Reading your piece is reconnecting me with my muscle memory of shoveling, scraping, defrosting over decades…I sense the primal joy you feel as you measure yourself against the elements:)