#52 One Thousand And One Nights: The Lucidity Of Ice

I have a dear friend who rescued his friend on the River where my sisters and I spent much of our childhoods. he pulled the friend out of a frozen immersion through ice. thin ice. naturally... tho I imagine the friend didn't know that until he went through. I myself personally know someone who went out on thin ice to save a fine dog: who had gone running off across the ice on this very River: chasing an unseen animal far off: saved him out of the cold deep jaggeds of broken ice....I believe most people won't try the ice over a river. because you imagine that even under the deepest ice: the river is really alive and running its way to the sea or the big lakes far off. the power of that flow seems terrible. but very exciting too...maybe that's why some of us skate on such rivers....I love to pretend that all the ice I skate is that River...the Fox River...Illinois. winter.....

my sister Pat and I were ice skaters. I am still an ice skater. I have my skates, and they fit and are fit to skate on as well. sharp enough. tho the burrs could probably use a sanding. I last was skating with my son's triplets and their Auntie and her friend. one for each kid. we were at Iceland in Berkeley, California, which was a very wonderful old rink with old wood bleachers and floors and tables. and old concession automats for buying foods and hot chocolate. an ancient Zamboni to clear the ice. music piped in from across fifty years of skating on that rink: thousands of times to that very music. and old painted back-drops of conifers and snow and sky all around. adequate but antiquated lighting. in other words: the Perfect Ice Skating Rink. even the skates you could rent were old brown leather. nicely maintained and sharpened correctly...

Iceland is closed now. it's just sitting there. I guess some of the more desperate skaters have gone over to the big, heartless, garishly-lit Rink in Oakland by now. I bet a lot of people just stopped skating. like me...
we are waiting for Iceland to resurrect. any day now....

so there's Pat and I back in time far away. in Batavia Illinois. learning to ice skate... who taught us? I don't remember...maybe Dad....maybe we just kept trying and falling and trying until we got it.
anyway: we were nothing fancy. stopping was our chief skill. and was done effectively in time. but never actually with style. not that I can recall....we were maybe nine and seven? a little older?
we were bundled up in layers: so we were not actually athletic or graceful. we spent ample time in the Warming House. which also took the nip off our frozen faces and feet and hands...I have a great great fondness for Warming Houses....

Warming Houses are different than any other place on earth. they are not actually warm. they are Hot. Very Hot. there is always a big stove of some kind, or a fireplace. it's usually a pot bellied stove with wood. but it may be gas or electric...it is always always Hot in there. at first it feels necessary. then it just feels great. finally: it feels soporific. you just want to lie down on the sawdust over the ice. it feels right and proper to do so. you sit on the bales of hay or on the wooden boxes or wooden benches. you don't take off your coat. only maybe sometimes...only your gloves and hat...and you don't take off your skates. you sit until you're warm enough... but then you over-do it: you want some hot chocolate. which you have in a thermos. you eat the marshmallows before they actually melt. to get the sugar. sometimes you have potato chips. or cookies. or maybe an apple. maybe you eat those. the hot chocolate is a 'must' tho...now, you are too warm. full besides. and you don't want to feel so cold again. you're sweating because of the heat. it is very cold out there. anyway: the sun is going to go down soon....you bundle up and head outside again. you go around the rink a few more times. but your heart is no longer in it...so you sit on the bales in the Warming House again and take off your skates and put on your shoes and your boots over them. you have to search for your shoes under the benches or in a pile by the door. they are damp. you are damp. but you don't care anymore...you've been skating. you are done skating...out of the Warming House you go. with your skates over your shoulder bumping against your back with each step...trudging home in the quickly darkening twilight of a Midwest winter....

that is what a Warming House is for. every one knows that down to the cockles where their hearts lay...always waiting for warmth outside of the cold....

what besides ice is for is ice fishing. of course... and skating...skating around the holes in the ice the fishermen leave behind, hauling their ice shacks on and off the ice with their trucks and jeeps and old chevies and fords...they are all serious and sometimes drunk. quiet. we skaters are kids. loud. silly. make lots of noise. scare away fish...so we don't go near the holes until the guys are gone....we look into the holes...no fish. they are at least a foot-of-ice deep cuts in the ice. under is the black water flowing and eddying in the hole. usually they are deeper. maybe not now, but they were then. it was probable that we felt safe on that ice. it was so deep. but a crack in it could move fast. this truth we had heard about. none of us had ever heard a crack moving through the deep safe ice...we listened for cracks tho. sometimes we thought we heard them. Shhhhh. no. just the ice shifting its weight in its sleep over the river.

the trees on either side of the river bend over it with the weight of iced snow. sometimes a branch cracks sharp like a real rifle shot and the branch falls with its weight of ice and snow. That's Scary! but nothing much else can be heard...all cracks of Ice doing its shifty dance over water and trees and earth...and the sounds of our skates, trying to make a path through the heaves and irregularities of the living ice...trying to make one full and perfect glorious glide on the long wild river of ice....

mostly though: we skated in parking lots in Batavia and at Potowatame Park in St. Charles. round and round the rinks in the sun and on cloudy days or in light snowfalls: just as good as a river...the ice was perfect as a mirror. sometimes... but usually it had a thin film of water. or a thin layer of slush. slowed your skates somewhat. of course: if you fell: you got wet. everybody always falls... even the really good skaters. so: maybe not as good as a river. but good enough for us. being just kids....

ah: the 'falls': you fall to your knees or directly on your bottom. some people just fly. with their feet shooting out from under them and up into the air. still: usually it's a direct down and crack: hit the ice. sometimes people are hurt. usually kids cry about it. it always hurts a bit. or a lot. you get up. you start to skate again. you forget.

here's what every one does on the ice: goes around in circles. all in the same direction. then you break out in to the middle. meet you friends. practice going backward. practice twirling a little bit. practice stopping with more than a skier's snow-legs. practice doing toe-toe-glide. practice doubles-skating. try to keep your ankles still and upright instead of flopping into your belly-button-line in the middle of your balance. try to balance: period...glide and glide and glide without falling. for a long long time. then fall again. get up. start again....

here's what my head is doing when I'm skating......pretty much nothing.
there is the cold on my face. the heat in my muscles. the concentration on the ankles and where the skates are taking me. the delight of the frozen-ness of water. the sound of skates on the nature of ice. the trees and sky overhead in the cold cold day or night. night with the stars and maybe a moon. the lights on the ice. sunlight on the ice. moon light on the ice. the parking-lot lights. and the glow in the Warming House. the smells of trees and wood and crisp and frozen water. the smell of the wood smoke from the Warming House. the smell of cold air. of hot air and chocolate. the warmth of my own breath into my wool scarf over my lower face. the weight of my body on ice crisp cut and swirl of blade...

feeling the integrity of ice. trusting ice. enjoying ice.

my oldest daughter beautifully danced on the ice for years and years. you see: it is in her and in me....

my feet in the skates are: every time: new feet: more like wings...

I too can dance with such white wings on my ankles...

I can feel myself dancing down the winter on the River of my memories...

on this lucidity

of Ice....