Comfortably Freezing

From the perspective of February 8^th, 2012

I found a body in the road last night. The man was just laying there on his back when I slid to a stop. I was coming home from a meeting down town, and the roads were slick with glare ice. The sun had been out during the day, so the snow had melted a little bit. When the sun set, the temperature dropped, and the melting snow had frozen into a smooth sheet.

Minutes earlier I had been debating about which route to take home: “Open Road or Sawmill, Open Road or Sawmill, Open Road or Sawmill?” It doesn't make much difference, really. I have to drive past more houses on Open Road, but I burn more fuel on Sawmill. The road split, and I turned left. I took Open Road.

From the top of Open Road, I saw a tiny red reflector at the bottom of the hill. Hmm, I don't remember seeing that before. I slowed down. My Jeep slid over the ice as I slowed; the ABS chattered. I crept closer to the reflector when I saw the man's blond hair in my headlights. I spiked my brakes and slid sideways to a stop.

I live in the boonies. The middle of nowhere. Timbuktu. My nearest neighbor is almost a mile away. I don't have electricity from the grid. Open Road is a dirt road – when it's not ice. Actually, four of the eight miles I drive from the edge of town are dirt, and Open Road is nearly the last stretch. There's no “traffic” where I live. Sometimes I see deer in my commute. I honk at them and it makes me laugh.

This man was lying on his back on the ice in the middle of nowhere. It was almost 9:00 pm. I had passed my last neighbor's house, and there was no reason why anyone else would be driving down this road – and I almost took Sawmill.

My first thought was to look for blood. Is he all smashed up? Is he dead? I thought back to my Boy Scout first aid training. Assess the scene – dude on his back, snowmobile twenty feet away right side up, motor off, lights off. (That was the reflector I saw.) Next, determine his level of alertness. I figured I would start by shouting, and if he didn't respond, then I would nudge him, and then pinch him. If he wasn't bleeding all over the place, I would check his airway, breathing and pulse. These thoughts flashed through my mind in an adrenaline fueled five seconds.

Then I thought about the time that I laid down on the snow as a kid. I was about ten years old. Our neighbors were going cross country skiing, and I was invited to tag along. I had snowshoes. I trudged along behind them for about two weeks that day, and was so exhausted on the final leg, I figured I could take a little nap and boost my energy for the last push. I reclined into the soft, fluffy snow and was just starting to drift off when the neighbor lady started shrieking and crying from 100 yards away.

Jeez, what in the world is going on? She was freaking out!

“Don't you know how dangerous it is to go to sleep on the snow? You could've died out here! You could've frozen to death! The cold makes you relax and slows your breathing and heart rate and you drift into death! Don't you know? You could've died! Get up! Get moving, don't just lie there, get up! You have to finish walking to the house!”

As we walked the last quarter mile on the driveway to their house, I learned why she was so upset. Her little brother had fallen asleep on the snow and frozen to death when she was a girl.

I flung open the door of my Jeep and did my best impersonation of the shrieking neighbor lady. My shoes slipped and slid on the ice as I approached the man – I was shouting the whole time. The man didn't begin to move until I was standing directly over him.

He opened his eyes as if awakening from a deep sleep. “Wh, wh, where am I,” he stammered as he struggled to sit up. No blood, no gashes, no bumps, no bruises. Moving slow, but moving. 

“You're in Chelan, in Union Valley, on Open Road.” 

I thought he was some dope from down town, or out of town, lost in the woods. At least he's not a dead dope. He asked me to take him home. Turns out, he was the son of my nearest neighbor – they're even more hermitty than me. He was in his early twenties and I'd never seen him before in my life. He was a dope from the woods, my neck of the woods!

As we picked our way back to my Jeep, he told me that he had been riding his snowmobile when he hit the bank and crashed. The snowmobile died, and he couldn't get it started again. He pulled and pulled and pulled, but finally laid down in exhaustion. “You could've died, you know,” I said. I told him all the things the shrieking neighbor lady screamed at me, but with a great deal more composure, I'm sure.

I noticed the smell as soon as he closed the door of the Jeep. 

“Smells like you've been drinking,” I said. 

“Oh. Yes, sir. I had two beers before I went out.” 

Right, and I'm Madonna. What do you think I am, stupid? 

“Well, that's probably not the wisest choice, is it?” 

“No, sir.” 

“You could've died, you know.” 

“Yes, sir.”

I dropped him off at home, turned around, and resumed my drive home. That guy would have frozen to death if I had not come the way I came at the time that I came. I promise. He would've died, and he would've been comfortable, too, not even knowing that he was slipping away.

I reflected again on my own little nap in the snow as a kid. It was cold, but I felt cozy, comfy – kind of like I feel right now in my life. I have a great job with great people, I live in a delightful log cabin in the woods where I could not be more content. I'm plugged in at church with the youth and life is pretty good. I have a nice car, a bright career future, and maybe someday I'll even meet a girl. I have no complaints.

And nothing to stretch me.

I can relax and enjoy the view.

Except for this doggone Bolivia thing! The idea keeps nagging me, keeps pulling on me, tugging, poking. Quit it! I'm not so sure I want to go now. I don't want to give this all up. What would I be getting in exchange? Am I sure this is even such a good idea? It's stupid, actually. There's no good reason for me to move to Bolivia. I have every reason to stay here in Chelan – I'm comfortable.

Comfortable. It kind of feels like a dirty word. How does "comfortable" mesh with these words of Jesus? “Then he said to them all: 'If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it. What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very self?'” - Luke 9:23-25

Am I asleep in the snow again? Am I drunk on material riches and intoxicated by the good life? I have the good life! I have the kind of life people who are struggling want to have! But is this the kind of life that matters? Sure it does, to plenty of people, I'm not a slouch. Yes, but is it the best? Is it what God has really called me to? Has my focus been drifting earthward? Do I have my mind set on heavenly treasure, or earthly treasure?

Because the latter will lull me to sleep and I will slowly and steadily freeze to death in comfort.

I could've died, you know.