Snow Day #4

There was an area near our house that was known as the pond. It was an expanse of grass with little islands of trees for part of the year, but slowly it would fill with water and become a full fledged pond. Frogs would hang out and we would find big sacks of frog eggs that would become tadpoles. And in the winter, if the water had hung out long enough, the pond would freeze over.

This was something that we always looked forward to, the ice on the pond. There would be apprehensive steps onto the gray ice at the edge in the beginning; testing its thickness, listening closely for the tell tale sounds of cracking. After that first brave soul (which was frankly rarely me) trekked their way across the pond, wintertime ice festivities began.

There were attempts at ice skating, but mostly the pond just became this large expanse to slide across after running down the snowy slope towards it.

One winter we were shoe skating out there, just running and then sliding across the ice. I was about thirty yards away from the edge when I had come to a stop and began to hear that faint sound, like branches snapping. I realized a little too late what was happening, and as that now horrifying snapping sound grew louder I started to charge for the shore. I got about a foot and a half before everything gave out from underneath me and I went into the water.

Luckily, the water had gone down before it froze over, so I was only in it up to my chest, and not fully submerged and doing some sort of claustrophobic freak out under the ice.

You don't feel that water at first, like your body simply doesn't believe what has happened - and so it doesn't exist. But that ice covered water is stronger than that sort of stupid parlor trick and quickly punches into you with knives. You cannot breathe, it's as if the cold has completely seized up your body, and even as you start to panic and attempt to thrash your way out of the situation, you are still simply not breathing.

I started clawing at the ice, trying to climb back up onto it and out of the water, which seemed to have developed black, gripping hands, but the ice just kept breaking wherever I would place my weight. The whole thing became like a bad Scooby Doo routine. I thrashed all the way back to shore, breaking ice in front of me until I was finally out.

The other kids, my brother included, were laughing at me now knowing that I was going to live. And I would have laughed out of relief along with them except for the fact that it was still hard to breath. And being out of the icy water was even colder than being inside it. I began to shake uncontrollably, but luckily I was close to home. I borrowed Tony's coat and shambled home for a hot shower, some hot chocolate and a surreptitious pull from mom and dad's Peppermint Schnapps bottle.

That was the end of that year's winter pond festivities, but I was back out there next year, only listening REALLY hard this go round and keeping an eye on the quickest way back to shore.