Miles to Go

McMURDO STATION, ANTARCTICA

I am leaning over the sink watching bright red droplets of blood fall onto the clean white porcelain. It's the second bloody nose that I've had in as many days. As always, it starts with the familiar trickle of blood inside my nose, a feeling just barely discernible from my constantly runny nose brought on by the cold. The frequent bloody nose isn't at all concerning, just an unpleasant side effect of living in the driest place on earth.

As I wait for the blood to stop, I look at my fingers, holding on to the edges of the sink. Every one of my fingers is cracked, some show the faint tinge of blood, many have fissures that have now grown rough and thick on their edges and I think they may never heal. Somehow my hands seem drier today than usual, my knuckles resembling the dried and cracked mud in a desert with no rain. I make a note to put on lotion as soon as I get back to work. I do a mental survey to figure out if I've done anything different lately: it is not yet lunch and I am on my third liter of drinking water. I'll down another two before the day is over. I remembered to fill my humidifier last night before going to bed, and set it on high so that in the course of the night, the entire gallon of water was pumped into the air. Perhaps the worsening cracks in my hands are just a sign of the season- it is time to go, head north to warmer, more humid climates.

Having grown up in Cincinnati, whose summers are reminiscent of a sweaty armpit, I am well accustomed to humidity. This does not mean that I am a fan of the thick sticky air, or frizzy hair, or the damp pages of a book left open. Three years in Colorado during college was a lovely reprieve from the humidity of my childhood, and even here I don't mind the lack of moisture. Even indoors, I can dry my clothes on a clothesline in less time than it would take in a conventional drier. I am quite content without the sticky film of too much moisture on my skin.

After four months, however, I am daydreaming of humidity. I am looking forward to my fingers healing, and the rest of my skin to stop itching because of the dryness. And I certainly won't miss the bloody noses. I can hardly wait for the world of smells again, something aside from diesel and fried food, anyway. Without humidity, and with very little life, Antarctica is a place virtually devoid of smell. Even the snow has no smell- when I was a kid, snow was a rare treat, and one of my favorite parts was the way the air smelled just before it snowed. But not here.

It seems that the last couple weeks of the season are the roughest by far- the end is near, but not near enough. It's like the last couple miles of a long hike- sure, if you had to you could hike a couple more days, but when you know you're getting close to trail's end, it is then that you realize how desperately you need a shower, and how your knees ache, and the way your backpack straps chafe. Just a few more miles to go....