The Blizzard

Shaking violently from the bitter cold, her extended right arm swung back and forth reaching, grasping for anything that might indicate where she was. The collar of her shirt pulled up over her head provided slight protection from the biting stinging ice. The front of her shirt pulled up over her nose with only a slit left to peer out. It did not matter. She could not even see her own hand extended in front of her.

Shuffling forward slowly she knew to stop would be death. Moving as quickly as the wind allowed she rehearsed in her mind the location of each building. She had reached the edge of town just before the April storm had struck.

Who would have imagined this yesterday? New to Wyoming, she had never seen this kind of weather in her life. An avid fan of the Little House on the Prairie books, and having lived through the Long Winter with Laura and her family she knew this was a blizzard. She also knew that such weather killed unsuspecting wanderers of which apparently she was one. Thankfully, she had warmish clothing on even though yesterday’s temperature had reached the 60s.

“Don’t stop.” she admonished herself.

Her terror increased, as with each step her hand encountered more snow and nothing else. The tiny building on the furthest edge of town was the library. She had walked only 10 minutes towards her home, about a 20 minute walk, when the wind and snow had struck her full force.

Staggering forward she realized she had a better chance of survival going back to town and so had turned around. Or had she. It had been at least 30 minutes now wandering aimlessly blind and her limbs were so cold they were beginning to feel warm.

Born and raised in Alabama this was all new. Her limited knowledge came from the books she had read or movies she had watched. Pa Ingalls survived a blizzard once by burrowing into a snowbank, but there were no snow banks around here, just biting swirling ice and snow. She walked on. There was no other option.

Legs growing numb she stumbled and landed on her hands and knees. She felt too stiff to push herself up and wished her mother was here to tell her what to do. “Keep moving!” she felt her mother’s voice whispering from the distance and so she crawled… The rocks tore at her knees but she did not notice. With head bowed she moved one hand, the other hand then a knee then the other knee. Sleepily she laughed inside, realizing this was not the right way to crawl. She had helped teach her younger brother how to crawl and this was not it. Slumping forward, her head grazed the edge of something. A board? Looking up, and putting her hand in front of her, she felt the corner of a structure. A house?

With her hands on the building she pulled herself up and felt around for an opening. When the wall finally gave way beneath her hands she fell inside. Groping around she felt hay and dirt. Well it was better than being out there. Turning around she threw her shoulder at the door and wedged it shut with a board. Still so cold she felt numb and warm she knew she was not safe yet. At least she was on her feet and out of the wind.

She tried stomping and swinging her arms trying to get some feeling to return. It must have worked because eventually they started to ache so badly she began to cry.

“Is this the day I’m going to die?” she cried out into the blackness.

Just then she felt a nudge on her leg. Looking down, she saw nothing in the darkness but she bent down, slowly due to the stiffness in her limbs and felt for what it was. She felt soft thick fur and as she awkwardly tried to pet the creature it pushed her towards the pile of hay. Crawling again, she moved in the direction the animal indicated. “Do you want me to climb into the hay?” she asked, “I don’t know what else to do. It’s worth a try, I guess.”

She burrowed into the hay as far as she could and the little creature climbed in right beside her nestling close to her chest and resting its head on her neck, after pulling a huge pile of hay over top of both of them.

She felt herself drifting in and out of sleep. “Sooooo cold.” but the warmth of the animal gave her hope. Her arms wrapped tightly around her new friend and possibly savior, she slept.

Startled awake she felt before she realized that the storm had stopped. Everything was so quiet. She wondered if she had dreamed the small animal as she shivered out of the pile of hay.

Pushing open the door with fingers so stiff she could barely feel them she gazed out into a beautiful snowscape. If it hadn’t been so cold, she might have noticed the beauty and the little row of footprints leading behind the ramshackled barn. Stumbling towards the town that she could now see in the light of the full moon she heard in the distance the voice of her mother calling, hoarsely, frantically. “Laura, L A U R A…” She was too cold to answer, but she walked stiffly in the direction of the voice, the town.

Stumbling forward, still achingly cold she fell again, but with that voice calling calling, she willed herself to rise again. Just when she felt she could not, she felt a gentle nudge and looked quickly around to see a black animal emblazoned with a white stripe from nose to tail pushing her to stand.

“YOU,” she gasped. “It was you. You saved me.”

The little skunk pushed her again and as she rose he turned and scurried back to his home in the dilapidated barn. With renewed hope, she stood tall and shuffled towards her new home town.