Frozen Pond Water

I just wanted to win the prize. There are no easy ways to make money, at least not for me, and the prize money wasn’t a huge amount. But it attracted me as a way to get a little something for myself. I was full of anxiety about money having got myself into a bind.

I tried to be like my sister, Joan, and think of others even as I carried my burdens. “Take my clothes,” she said. When our house burnt to the ground on her birthday but she had thought to grab everything in her closet on the way out. But I was irritable, too obsessed with my own needs to think of others.

My first mistake was thinking I was important. Hey look at me, I’m climbing a mountain with twenty thousand dollars worth of sponsorship equipment on my back. Another burden I foolishly accepted was the trust and adoration of friends and family who took a risk to make it possible for me to compete for this prize.

At the time it seemed like the simplest way out: Take the Miami Ice Challenge. The prize money would get me out of debt, or at least make it manageable and I could go back to doing what I love. Every new business has cash flow problems, it’s how you handle it that makes or breaks you. But I didn’t have patience and I couldn’t lose face. Numbers, numbers can make you so emotional. Zeros in all the wrong places.

I paid a price. I learned a lot. I competed. I won. But the truth is a tricky cat. You never know which way it’s going to rub when you touch on it. Will there be purring or tooth and claw? It’s better to have a cat that’s aloof and half wild, keeping a distance from you. They report to universal cosmic intelligence at night like spies.

I got the ice from the frozen pond on top of Mount Smoke and brought it to the Miami headquarters, that much is almost true. The blue ice from the top of the mountain is traditional because that’s where the true blue ice is. The refrigerated transport team accepts ice entries as early as November and as late as February. The earliest and most most beautiful ice wins. The entries go into a refrigerated display vault. It’s a crazy tradition in our little town started by Rich Joe, in the ‘90’s.

But I didn’t get my ice at the top of the mountain. I found a little pond, at the foot of the mountain. Okay, I made my pilgrimage that far. And my ice was only water and not especially beautiful. I took it to my studio and added pigments and interesting debris. I created a beautifully formed silicone mold and froze my pond water.

The competitive, creative, yet unimportant activity, from conception, to journey, to lab, refrigerated transport and presentation was my obsession all of Fall. It didn’t take my mind off my troubles, but it did allow more trouble to accumulate unnoticed while my children grew up and my husband left. I guess I wasn’t that fun to be around when I was preoccupied and anxious.

The world was falling apart and I was an unimportant part of it. Square one was right there where I left it after the sea leveled Miami, I was divorced, my children angry and the prize money with barely a dent sailed through my cost of living.

But I’m still here and it’s never too late to turn around and face the music. Accept the way it was. Come clean. Let Jesus take care of the sparrow and me. Practice contentment. Just be here and be okay. Start to love others as Joan loved me even though I wasn’t the best sister.