It had been a dizzying week. Nine days before Christmas, your humble scribe awakened feeling lower than a snake in a wagon rut — and sorta like not two, but three drill instructors at Parris Island had worked my body over with pugil sticks. Dadgum puny aptly describes it. Teresa took me by the doctor’s office where I tested negative for COVID-19 and the flu, but possibly had RSV — the trendy new virus.
Oral steroids and antibiotics, and next day I was on my way back into the game.
Good thing. We had kinfolk flying in from Virginia that included two young grandsons, and after a post-church Christmas party on Sunday we grabbed two more older grandsons. However, on Monday, Gran tested positive for flu and quarantined herself. Normally family times mean hiking trips, but my work schedule excluded me. Then the airline texted my stepdaughter Rebecca, letting her know if she wanted to get back home they’d better fly out a day early.
The other two boys had already left, so in just a few days it was back to just Pop and Gran, although I spent Thursday winterizing some properties and wrapping up Christmas shopping. With a winter storm on the horizon, traffic everywhere resembled a zoo on the lam.
Although we had not exactly been cooped up all week in our Beaver Forest home, I get cabin fever fairly quickly — especially when weather experts tell me not to go outdoors. So I put on some layers of clothing and went outdoors.
Well, it didn’t take long to realize 11 degrees with a stiff wind is extreme even for the North Georgia mountains. Quickly, I began to search the dusty bins where my memory cells normally lie fallow before being aroused — “Who, us? LOL!” — and thought back to the time decades ago when I went jogging at four degrees. Running gear included ski gloves and a scarf around my lower face (and some extra clothing in other strategic areas).
Right at the four-mile turnaround point, a couple of pals I played pickup basketball with rolled by in a van and hollered out, “You’re crazy!” Far from disputing their assertion, my thumbs-up response verified it. By the way, did I mention the gloves were a bright green color? Presumably, they were for finding me when I veered off the ski slope into the woods.
Speaking of which, that reminds me of the coldest clime this Southern boy has ever experienced. The driver of the aforesaid van — my longtime friend Tim Trew — and I were part of a group skiing in western North Carolina. We were finishing up at Seven Devils and the temps had not only plummeted but the wind picked up dramatically — they told us at the top of the ski slope the wind chill was 28 degrees below zero. The rest of our contingent had retired to the lodge and a roaring fire, but there was still fun to be had on the slopes.
If you want to call it that.
A crosswind had blown all the snow off the course, leaving naked ice — akin to skiing on marbles. Back then, I had a mustache. The exhalation from the downhill exertion to stay upright moistened the ‘stache, and on the ride back up I could feel it slowly freezing. That was weird. (Earlier this year, I tried to regrow the hirsute appendage, keeping it cut to a Jimmy Buffet-inspired song “Pencil Thin Mustache” — but when more than one person pointed out I had a red worm on my upper lip, I gave up and cut it off. I get no respect, I tell ya!)
It was all we could do to stay vertical on our skis — you had to dodge “ice balls” in your path and if you veered into the blast of a noneffective snow machine your goggles got frosted over. Eventually, I fell face down and was too exhausted to get up. Tim pulled up behind me checking to see if I was all right, then grabbed my parka to turn me over.
“Man, you’re bleeding!” he yelled. I had fallen on my ski pole and it broke my goggles, cutting my cheek. With the cold I didn’t even feel it, and just laughed. Ah, the recklessness of youth and gracious willingness of personal angels to work overtime.
So these memories rushed to the fore Friday on the first day of our truly polar Christmas weekend. Walking into the wind on Matrix Circle put my face in the hurt locker, so I held the new felt gloves my wife had bought me over my cheeks and let my breath do the warming. The way back was more uphill, so some exertion heat helped. Topping the last hill, two deer turned to check me out before bolting. Guess they figured anyone dressed like an Eskimo was out hunting for meat.
Twenty-five minutes later I was back in the house. Ironically, while shedding layers of clothes my gaze fell on a photo of the late Fred Bailey with two backpackers on the winter day we went to check on a guy in the Springer Mountain shelter on the Appalachian Trail. In the intro to that story, I mentioned getting out of the car and how the wind instantly made your face feel like it had frozen and fell off in pieces onto the snow.
The thing about winter in the Georgia mountains is you can live with it, or you can leave heading south and in just a few hours be considerably warmer. Lord willing, that’s going to be our plan.
Y’all hold down the fort for us.