Northern Exposure....

Words added soon....

Frozen Stuff

Grinding Deer Meat In The Kitchen

All this cold reminds me of the time that winter came early and froze the three deer that we had hanging in the shed.   At that time all seven of us lived in a 900 square foot house with one bathroom.   I went to work that morning and returned home that night to find three (3) - buck deer complete with heads and midsized racks (horns) - lying on my living room floor to flaw.  The living room measured 12 feet by 16 feet at the most.    The heads and horns of the deer were right in the walk path from the front door to the rest of the house.  Not over in the corner.  Not off to the side.   Not out of the way.  These deer were in the only walk space left in the room; the path from the front door to the dining room, rest of the stinking house, door.

I wondered in to the kitchen and asked my husband, “What’s up with the deer on the floor?”    To which he replied in slow deliberate speech like he was talking to an old person that could not hear well, “.....  (He took a big breath - then let his head drop down like Magnum PI then back up and began to speak)  T h e y   a r e   f r o z e n.    I   a m  t h a w i n g   t h e m   o u t   s o   t h a t   I  c a n   c u t   t h e m   u p.  .  .   s o   t h a t   w e   h a v e   f o o d    t  o    e a t”     After all they were laying on a heavy duty, blue, vinyl tarp.  What could possibly be the problem!   What planet was I from anyway?  Didn’t I want to eat this winter?

Now when a person has seven people in their family (six boys and one girl) a person is concerned about putting meat on the table.  Drawing tags, hunting, and getting three deer was good news and it meant meat for the next few months.     In order to eat said meat it would be thawed, butchered, ground into hamburger, packaged, and placed in the freezer.    OK, OK – I see that it is important and a good idea.

So as he was explaining and I was listening I took off my coat, put down my bags, untied my shoes, took off my socks and then remembered I had left another bag by the front door so I went to retrieve it.   Yes, you guessed it, back over the top of the frozen deer obstacle course that was in the way/on the way to my isolated bag by the front door.    When my right foot – my big toe – grazed and caught one of the deer’s horns.  The horn slipped perfectly between the nail and the toe and it popped the toenail off of my toe just like an old fashion bottle opener takes off a bottle cap from a old fashion Coke bottle.   

Wisely - no one talked to me the rest of the night and probably the next day too. 

Let's Start This One Like This.....

When I woke up this morning and checked the outside thermometer it was 23 below zero.   At lunch time it was 6 below...  the high of the day.  This time of year, and when it gets really cold like this, it reminds me of "Growing up White Trash in Oklahoma".    "Growing up White Trash in Oklahoma" is very different from "Growing Up White Trash in Wyoming".  In another post I will delve into the differences, in detail, but this post is about the cold, snow, and when White Trash Southerners move to Northerners regions and haven't got a clue.  

I moved north, from the South in the fall of the year, with a pair of high fashion patent leather Go Go Boots – black; a financially poor, very excited newlywed girl with this single pair of fashionable boots.  When the snows came - the boots went on the feet and off to town or hiking or whatever else I needed to wear boots for.   Did I mention that they were very cold?   Once the snow hit the patent leather it was the same as snow on socks or even colder.   The cold goes right through to the skin.   It made me whine and whimper within minutes whenever I went out in the snow.  

One day my sister-in-law gave me her downhill ski gear.  The entire package - skis, poles, and boots complete.   Her foot/shoe size was 8 mine was 6 1/2.    You have no idea how happy - over the top - excited I was when I got those boots.  Now my feet will be warm.  I can wear 3 pairs of socks because of the room in them.   (Did I mention we did not have snow in Oklahoma?  Well maybe we had it once in a while but it melted the next day and it was generally 32 degrees at the coldest. )

We planned a winter hiking outing....  my husband and I and another couple.   I wore the downhill ski boots.  D O W N H I L L     S K I      B O O T S.      We hiked across a frozen lake to a place in the trees for a little picnic.  We roasted some hot dogs, that we had packed in, over a fire.   A storm started coming in so we needed to high tail it out of there.   Half way across the lake I started to whine.   I was exhausted.  My husband - a Northern woodsman - turned to me and said, "We have to get out of here because of the storm coming in so let’s get going - NOW!”    I made it back to the truck.   I was sore all over for days.

We lived on a few acres on the side of a hill out in the country.  I could put on the boots, snap on the skis, and take off out the back of the yard and swish across country to the top of the hill where the road met up - just so I could downhill ski to our drive way.  I would do this exercise over and over and over and even though it was exhausting the reward was in the few minutes of downhill activity and the rush that I got out of it.  The slope or grade of the hill was a total of a few feet - maybe 5 – from top to bottom.  The distance of the hill from the top to the bottom, where the driveway met up, was a very long 100 yards.  (I had never gotten a chance to ski growing up in Oklahoma.)  So you get the point.  Not much of a ski hill.

Now you would think that I would figure out that these boots were not the right kind of boot to wear except on the DOWN HILL SKI SLOPE which happened to be 30 miles away from where we lived - but I didn't get it.  I never caught on.  Did I mention that I was from O  K  L  A  H  O  M  A?   

The end of January, or so, my husband invited me to go along with him about town.   It was a snowy, cold, wintery day so - yup - you guessed it....  I wore the boots.    One of the stops was at the airport.  I very loudly clomped into the airport office with my hubby so happy and proud of my warm feet.   I crossed my legs and swung my foot admiring my boot as it rose and fell over and over.    There I was the happy, goofy looking, little Okie with DOWNHILL SKI BOOTS on her feet when the airport guy, that my husband was visiting with, looks at me and asks me with a wrinkled puzzled brow like he was trying to figure out a very hard puzzle, " Do you ski?".   "No", I replied with a “duh” in my voice.   (You know – no, duh!   I really couldn't - I knew that my recent cross country activity did not categorize me as a "skier".)

My husband gave me real traditional hiking boots that year for Valentine’s Day.   I guess he got tired of waiting for me to catch on.