Mastodon Trails

by

Jerry D. McDonnell©2012

Published in Cirque Journal: Volume 5, No. 1, December 21, 2013

        Skiing into the snow and wind-swept eternity of the Bering Sea at 10 degrees below zero Fahrenheit my strength quickly reduces to routine. I soon fall into a kick and glide trance across the width of winter on a solid, adjourned Sea. Brantley Harbor and Port Clarence north of Nome are far distant set pieces in this landscape of ice ridges, wind-packed snow shaped by a willful wind that artfully imitates a permanent landscape. Only the occasional seal-hole interrupts the illusion of a desert bleached by sun. The Bering Sea’s boundary is noticeable only by skiffs imprisoned by drifting snow and small cliffs that one can visualize as land. Inland, snow coats the rolling hills with a sensual texture interrupted only by the white pointed heads of ice wedged polygons jutting up like alien creatures. It is not too difficult to believe one has left the earth and landed elsewhere.  

Distances are difficult to judge, one mile could be five . . . or ten. Perspectives of time become dim. Fantasies occur, broken by occasional realities. A fox on the shore watches as I pass. I change course with thoughts of communication. As I approach, the fox sits down like a person watching an event. As I near, it disappears into its tundra tunnel like a character from Alice in Wonderland. Peering into the hole I hope to see a small nose and ears peeking back, but only my inclinations surface.

What else is under this ice encased ground; the lost city of Atlantis drifted north with tectonic plates from equatorial regions?  How many bones of the saber tooth tiger, the camels, the small horses, and other extinct species now lie hidden from time beneath this ice and frozen ground on what was once a grassy plain instead of the present Bering Strait?  The skis move me in steady rhythmic inertia. Time halts. One could meet a mastodon and consider it to be the normal scheme of things.

Industry wears a different grab in the wilderness of the north. Survival is the God.

Survival is the economy. Industry means finding food, finding a place of warmth, finding shelter from the wind, finding other creatures that breathe and metabolize. 

A young boy from our Inupiat village of Teller was once with me on a day past when we approached a fox that looked at us with trepidation.

“That fox would make nice hat,” he said.

“I suppose so,” I said, having no reason to deny his culture.

“That fox live close. Maybe someone could catch him,” the boy said as he turned back toward his home village a scant mile or so back.

 The fox, having learned well that most two-legged creatures have a predictable temperament about them, quickly ran toward its shelter. Powerless over the boy’s intentions, I continued on.

I don't know how far I will ski today. The kick and glide will determine my distance and my mind. A contented joy powers my legs, my lungs, my heart.  The only sound is the glide of skis, and the below zero chill of wind against my face . . . occasionally the comment of a raven. The physical effort binds me to the moment, the place. There is no future, no past. There is only now. It is a grand knowledge . . . comforting.

My vision attempts to comprehend the vastness of space and time. Twelve miles south of Teller, a huge, deserted ship, surrounded by ice, sits like a mirage. Once converted into a fish tender, it sits abandoned on a permanent cement foundation, the Bering Sea its captor. Standing next to the hull, it towers far above my head like a colossal ghost, its spirit cold, alien . . . now so useless. The monumental effort of construction and placement briefly comes to mind while I stand dwarfed under the hull looking hundreds of feet up to the railing and hundreds of feet from bow to stern. Viewed from a distance the ship takes on a more realistic image. It is a wart on the earth's skin, a monument frozen in time as rust does its methodical task marking the ephemeral passing of humanity . . . much like the bones of extinct species.

The village lost to my sight hours ago, I am alone on an ocean without a boat. It briefly occurs to me that Russia is very close. Again that feeling of how geographically high I am on the planet, like flying yet my feet are on the ground. If I were a mountain could I see the shape of something with color over the southern horizon?

I am soon again lost in the kick and glide, my glide becomes longer, my kick smooth and effortless. The thoughts of miles being covered are forgotten: neither time nor miles exist any longer. I ski by the breathing hole where a seal's nose has just disappeared as if I’m strolling in the neighborhood. My bones will soon enough join those of the other creatures whose spirits now carry me with them. I shall never have to ski alone. 

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