Snow-Pocalypse Blues (part 3)

Extreme temperatures tend to make you delusional, I think.  (that's my theory at least...)

(or excuse...)

While I was sitting there.. watching trucks fly around me... others getting stuck... After hour #4, I was beginning to think that maybe this was in fact the apocalypse... And I began to imagine (or hallucinate about) what it would be like being home.  

A Fireman was walking from stranded car to stranded car with yellow (crime scene?) tape.

(appropriate..... as it felt like we had all been accosted...  Or maybe he was assuming we were dead).  

When he approached my car... I rolled down the window and finding out I was alright..... (he seemed surprised)... he asked if I wanted a ride to the shelter. 

No thank-you I said.  But I told him I could use a ride home (only 2 miles away).

No can do... my friend... He said.....  (everyone seemed happier than necessary considering the world was ending)... We're taking everyone to the shelter.  Right now that's all we can do.

My mind flashed with images of refugees.  Sad.. Hungry children.  Breast feeding mothers.  Appearances by Bono....
  
And so I told him I was gonna wait for a while and see if there was something else I could come up with (#7).  

He said that they would be making rounds again occasionally.... and if I changed my mind I could get a ride to the shelter.  After he left... I began to get serious about my plan to walk home (#8).

The first thing I did was prepare for extra warmth. I put my cold wet socks back on and wrapped my feet with ABD pads (Large Kotex-like Gauze dressings found laying in my car... left over from post-care of my tattoo).  I put every pair of gloves on I could find.. (2 pairs of my own... One pair of Lisa's left behind in the car).  I zipped up my coat and put 2 skull caps over my head (1 found in the car).  And then I took my keys.  Locked the door.  And launched out.  

At first it wasn't bad.  It was cold.  My feet sank into 6 inch snow.  Then 10 inch snow.  Then 18.  Then 28.  By the time I was off the highway I was treading through 3 feet of snow.  It must have taken 15 minutes to get to the feeder road but it felt like an hour.   My legs grew tired and I fell two times.  

I found that falling in deep snow is like sinking in quick sand.  (however with -9 degree windchill it's warmer under the snow.  I was tempted to stay there).   

By the time I got to the closed daycare up on the hill from the feeder road I knew I couldn't make it home.  I stood there looking down the feeder towards my house... in denial.  It took me about 15 minutes to catch up to reality... accept that I couldn't make it home (without dying).... And prepare to return to my car.

Before I began treading my way back though I stepped from public vision and pee'd near a 3 1/2 foot snow bank.  After nearly five hours of waiting, it felt like I pee'd for about 10 minutes.  And then I returned to my car.

(Fell twice and was so tired I had to role out of one snow bank.... down a small hill...).  

By the time I returned to my car... I was covered in ice... the bottom of my scrub pants were frozen-starched stiff like bell bottoms.  And when I returned to the warmth of my car, I took off my shoes and wet socks again and checked my I-phone.  It was still stuck on Facebook.

"hot cider and snowman cookies with marshmallow hats"...
-friends cheery wife.

With those words I gave up and began looking for the Fire department again.  

Within minutes the same dude was making his way from car to car checking to see if anyone was dead yet.  And when he saw me I motioned that I was willing to go with them and then he helped me from my car... to the back of a large fire department truck where there was already another man in the back seat.  We looked at each other sheepishly.  

As I said goodbye to my car on the highway, I wondered if I would ever get home.  And how.  And I wondered if I would ever see my car again intact.  And I wondered if this were infact the end of the world and if so, why Hell seemed so cold.  

Part 4 to come.