Slides Around
On a recent trip to Fairbanks Alaska, Marie and I had an interesting insight offered on a pretty slick (couldn’t resist) form of transport….dogsledding. We pulled into our accommodation and there were loads of dogs and sleds, literally. As we burrowed in to the goings on, our education on the event began. It turned out all of the dogs, mushers, and their supporters were just finishing up a thousand mile overland dog sled race. Every sled team was comprised of 14 dogs, one musher, and their support unit. The support came in to play, mostly at check points, some scattered over 200 miles apart. This would leave the 15 mostly in transit, and enjoying one another’s company.
The goal of the game is to…make time, and of course live to tell about it. One of the most interesting rules was centered around the dogs.
If you had a dog “fall out” due to exhaustion, sore feet, or just losing interest, the dog could not be replaced. Furthermore and to this point, any teams with under 7 dogs remaining were disqualified.
I thought these rules truly spoke to the commitment of the musher. The underlying behavior derived from this spoke to me of human and canine supporting one another in a pack fashion, and conjured thoughts of ancestors in tune with their world slipping along under mystical and primordial lights, happily sustaining themselves by an understanding of their world and their role in it, and with no WiFi connectivity. Amazing!!
The human spirit is something incredible. These things that are unquantifiable like love, passion, and the spirit of freedom are deeply rooted in us. Our current condition becomes inconsequential when we recognize and feed that spirit, even if we don’t fully understand why, or how. We need to transcend; it is required to touch even fleeting joy.
Run and skate under the mystical lights. Howl, even if only in the privacy of your pack, and realize the chill in your blood does not belong to the frigid wind.
Cheers to you, Jack!
Edgar
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