Tragic Beginning

I have a friend who went missing in the Arctic. He was working in Greenland and went out during a storm and didn't find his way back. After hours and hours and more than two days, the storm finally lifted and they searched for him again. He was found alive. He walked right up to the search vehicle and got in.

Amazing.

58 hours out in it . . . flat white nothing plus storm. He didn't have gear or food. He built himself a cave to hunker down in to, out of the wind.

He is now back in the states. The news today is that he will lose his dominant hand, all his toes and some parts of both feet. His left hand will need a skin graft.

And tonight I am very sad about this. My friend is a young man. My friend is a very athletic and active man, who works with his body. My friend's passion are the poles and working at both year round. Most probably he won't be able to do this kind of work for a while, while he relearns to walk on newly shaped feet.

I don't know this friend well. I've known him for years, but not well. I don't know him well enough to enjoy his great company off the ice. I won't hear from him out here, but I may hear about him through other folks. And I will miss him very, very much.

I was thinking tonight as I was wiggling in bed, not falling asleep, that this passionate work he did ended up taking pieces of him. It killed pieces of him. He is going to have to leave these pieces behind now, and forge ahead in a new whole way. As a new whole man. I don't doubt that he will work to return to the Arctic and the Antarctic. Maybe. Or maybe this new man will find something else he loves just as much.

The whole thing makes me wonder about . . . well . . . everything. About what we sacrifice for loving a place and working there. What life takes from us. What we have to leave behind. How we forge ahead. What other parts of my friend might have died up there, too? What parts of him are now newly born?

I know this man is a strong, strong man with an enormous life force. I know he'll weather this. No doubt there. I just wonder who he will be now. How this will go. If he doesn't make it back to the ice, I don't know that I will ever have a chance to find out.

God speed, Mr. Speed. Hopefully, there's some truth in positive thoughts reaching their intended. I am sending all mine tonight.