Stranded Ch. 02

Another time I was having a bad day. Going down into the store room, I'd tripped and hit my head. The fire in the stove had gone out and starting a fire wasn't easy. Some of the plastic sheeting came down, letting in the cold wind. My mood was grouchy and I yelled at her. She snapped back and we were arguing again. I had to go out side to calm down.

When two people are thrown together from different backgrounds, into a situation where neither one could leave, arguments will happen. So some guidelines needed to be set.

We made an agreement on how to disagree without getting angry. We'd give the other one some space when they were in a bad mood. If we disagreed, we'd lower our voices instead of raising them. And we developed a 'time out'. This'd mean the subject of our argument was to be dropped for at least half a day. Not all of our days were peaceful, but generally we got along; there were some unpleasant times too.

Over the next several days her feet improved. I think it was 9 or 10 days after the big storm (as we called it) that she was able to stand and put her weight on them. We'd continued to soak them, a couple scabs remained but the rest was new flesh; badly scared but healed over. She placed her feet over on the floor, and using me to steady herself, stood up. I stood beside her as she took a step. It was obvious they hurt, but she was walking.

I got a second pair of that man's boots, plus several pair of socks. Initially we used 4 pair of socks on her feet. The large boots put on and tied. She stood and walked across the room and back.

"Ma'am you look pretty enough to dance with but I'd be afraid those clod-hoppers would trample me to death."

She playfully slapped at me, but delight was in her eyes. As she came back towards the cot, she walked right up to me and I put my arm around her in congratulations.

It was another two days before she attempted a trip to the outhouse. I followed along to assist if needed, I wasn't. On returning to the room, we checked and found one of the scabs had broken loose and was bleeding. Two days later she walked outside. Never again did I carry her because of her feet. Her other cuts and bruises were gone, or very nearly so.

My arm and shoulder were better, but their strength was diminished. I was using it but favored the right side. You could say we were healed. I was thinking about walking out of here to civilization; I dropped that thought on the next day, a second storm arrived and added an additional 6-8 inches of snow. This was followed by a steady wind which whipped the snow into drifts, higher than the cabin.

We worked together to clear a path to the toilet. What was funny, the building was completely buried under the snow. The path later blew shut. The snow was heavy on the roof, so I spent a day shoveling it clear.