|
Forgettable Fire "Give a man a fire and he's warm for
a day, but set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his
life." The morning headwind snorted, even more bull-necked. "The sort of breeze that could pin you to a fence post," Sharon said. Without Vicky to block the wind, we shouldered the full brunt. The daytime high hit a whopping 12 degrees Celsius! Combined with the wind chill, it felt near zero. "Is it possible to snow in August?" Sharon asked. Where was the warm summer weather? Griping, we slogged on. After 15 kilometres, in Holden, we stopped to rest our weary bodies. Attempting to replenish our flagging energy, we bolted spoonfuls of crunchy peanut butter - straight from the jar. "At this temperature," I said, "it has no chance of going rancid." Fingers and toes like ice cubes, we prodded one another back onto our bikes and pedalled down the road to the community of Bruce, not quite 20 kilometres away. We stopped again and sucked back containers of sickeningly-sweet butterscotch puddings. At least it gave us enough energy to carry on. Into the freezing headwind, the kilometres ticked by. Slowly. Painfully. Painfully slowly. The only part of my body still warm were my calves - and that was only because it felt as if someone was branding them with red-hot pokers. The exciting prairie scenery didn't help matters. Boredom reached new lows. To pass the time, I counted telephone poles! My sampling indicated an average of 12 per kilometre. (Although I may have missed a couple ... I had my head pulled in as far as I could manage. "Turtles on Tour" Sharon called us.) Feeling like a couple of frozen cow patties, we shuffled off the roadway and into a picnic shelter a few kilometres shy of Viking. Tired. Cold. Hungry. Those three make a bad combination. Our grand total for the day? Less than 50 kilometres. "Are you as tired as I am?" Sharon asked. I groaned. "As sore?" she pressed. I moaned, wondering which part of my body ached the most. "Only hurts when I breathe," I rasped. Pedalling a loaded touring bike without training had its disadvantages. "This is depressing," Sharon grumbled. I rubbed her clammy hands. We were still doubting ourselves - questioning the sanity of unlocking the shackles to freedom. "A heated office job with a cushy chair is beginning to sound pretty good right about now." "Yeah," I nodded. "I remember you saying you loved every minute of your sentence there." Sharon tossed me a thin smile. "Quit trying to cheer me up." We were alone in the shelter, save for some feathered friends. A mud swallow's nest clung to a rafter. The mother bird heartened us, strengthening our resolve with her endless quests into the bluster to gather mosquitoes for her vociferous brood. Yellow beaks larger than their featherless baby heads, and bellies insatiable: those little tweeters were the epitome of touring cyclists. Chewing granola bars, we debated calling it a day. The ballot was split. Luckily for me, the weather cast the tie-breaking vote in my favour. It began to rain. Hard. Lightning flashed. An authoritative clap of thunder boomed nearby. Sharon jumped. "I didn't think it was warm enough to thunder," she said. "Um ... looks like we're staying," I said. "What about the no camping sign?" Sharon asked, pointing to a Camping Prohibited notice - so diminutive one could easily have missed it. Really. "Er, pretend we didn't see it?" That settled, I ducked out and scratched up an armload of saturated sticks from the nearly depleted woodbox. After several tries, Sharon managed to coax a tiny fire to life in the shelter's iron stove. Acrid woodsmoke tormented our eyes, and, unlike the cheery snap and crackle of dry wood, this fire squeaked and sizzled, emitting a feeble orange flicker that constantly threatened to extinguish itself. "Colder than a cast iron commode," Sharon termed it. We huddled close - palms outstretched, fingers nearly touching the quavering dull flames. I frowned. "Isn't fire supposed to be hot?" |
Book Info
