sixth archival post…The Boondoggle
“I will light the match this morning so I won’t be alone.”
Pearl Jam – Indifference
A boondoggle is defined locally as any trip off-station. Boondoggles
are highly coveted by the population at McMurdo. We’re all here for a
chance to find the Antarctica that we came here to see.
McMurdo station is on Ross Island. It’s not on the mainland of
Antarctica. When I was presented with the opportunity to go on a
boondoggle to a station located on the mainland, I jumped at it. My
destination was Marble Point, a remote outpost that provides
logistical support for research on the continent. The generator on
the station was down and my job was to get it running again. My
reward for my efforts was an experience so powerfully spiritual that I
fear my words won’t do it justice.
I arrived by helicopter, was greeted by Crunch, the station manager
and briefed on the problems the generator was having. It turned out
to be a relatively simple, albeit time-consuming fix. Long story
short; Will said “Let there be light!” and there was light.
The next day I took full advantage of where I was. I went for a walk.
Shortly after breakfast, I loaded my pockets with various
calorie-laden foods that were available, grabbed a radio and embarked.
I had walked less than 15 minutes when I suddenly felt completely
alone. By alone, I mean it was easy to believe that I was the only
person in the entirety of the universe. The emptiness of Antarctica
enveloped me. I couldn’t see, hear, feel, taste or smell any sign of
any living thing other than myself. This is the kind of emptiness and
loneliness that I had only envisioned in one of my favorite childhood
dreams. The only connection I had to the real world, the only thing
that made this experience real, was the song going through my head;
something by Green Day, “…I walk these lonely streets……I walk
alone……”
The destination was Hogback Hill. I had scouted it out on the map. I
pride myself on my map reading and land navigation skills. One of the
things that I have always preached to Cody is to check the information
on the map to see what units of measurement are being used.
Case-in-point I read the hilltop to be 734 feet high, in reality, it
was 734 meters. I was humbled to think that I was that tired climbing
a 700-foot hill. On my ascent, I noticed that it was so quiet that I
could hear my own heartbeat. I heard it! It sounded like when you
listen to an unborn baby’s heartbeat through a stethoscope. The only
sign of life was my own heartbeat. Lacking any outside validation,
the beat of my heart was the only proof I had that I was alive, that I
even existed in the otherworldly empty vastness that I was now
surrounded by.
I walked along the base of a glacier. The crunching of snow was like
thousands of microscopic caverns collapsing in a thunderous roar under
the weight of my boots. Like the report of a shotgun, the sounds of
the glacier cracking ripped through the flesh of silence. The
cacophony of dripping water sounded like a shower that the earth was
taking. Chaos theory started to make sense to me when I contemplated
the melting glacier before me. The ice towered above me for hundreds
of feet. The heat of the sun was randomly releasing molecules of
water that had been frozen for countless millennia. Some would
evaporate and blow northward to the ocean, others would refreeze only
to be locked again in ice for countless more millennia. I was there
to witness their re-emergence and their random dissemination.
Something senseless made sense. A landscape devoid of life caused me
to feel more alive than ever.
The hike ended eight hours after it had started. I arrived safely
back at the station. Tired, yet somehow refreshed. Self-aware and
ALIVE! Grateful for the chance to experience what I thought
Antarctica was.
Hi all! It’s been a long time since any of you have heard from me.
Nothing much new has been going on aside from my weekend retreat
described above. I did get some new pictures up, mostly from my trip
to Marble Point. There are some of the landscape and some that bring
things to light that nobody probably ever thinks of (read the signs).
The pictures can be found at:
here
kudos to anyone who gets the reference in this picture
(UNLESS is spelled in rocks, in case you can’t make it out-my rock
writing sucks almost as much as my handwriting). Something that I had
the privelige of seeing a presentation on tonight was the American
Women’s Expedition. Four women set out to ski across the continent.
They abandoned their expedition upon reaching the South Pole, but it
was a remarkable story nonetheless. Here is the best info I could
find on it:
I was impressed. You should be too!
That’s about all I have in my world. I hope all of you are doing well.
Later,
Will
