Tuesday
Monday
Week 5, Week 55. Today we are enduring, embracing, enveloped by what seems to be the worst weather we have faced thus far in this frozen purgatory. A day spent indoors, I stare at, am stared at by what used to be a sweater, what used to be a scarf, what used to be the shirt I would wear when attempting a good impression; now, only wallpaper, now the jury, the peanut gallery; the silent audience unmoved by our desperation and hopelessness.
Friday
Tuesday
Monday
Groundhogs Day
The days seem to be getting longer, shorter, it seems that we have seen our own shadows and have accepted that we are not going anywhere. Depression and claustrophobia have evolved/dissolved into a sense of numb acceptance. This newly discovered lack of collective anxiety has produced a willingness to give into our own situation; we have begun to engage our own mirages, which seem to manifest collectively and individually, shifting it seems according to their own motivation. Some of us have begun teaching these apparitions what we have learned in this frozen abyss. They are loosely engaged but fast learners. Some applaud politely before disapearing again into the ice. Perhaps this engagement, the teaching of these "lessons" reflects a symptom of madness or a product of our determination to avoid it; I cannot determine which.
Friday
diary entry no. 2
I am beginning to wonder if consciousness is just a continual flow between past and present, a flow that has movement towards hoping for the future. In our situation imagination, memory and perception seem to involve a kind of placelessness in the misplacement of objects and people. This is the mirage. We are all beginning to see things that are and are not actually there.
Maybe this is intensified because of the stories we are retelling at night, before we sleep. We all seem to have a store of survival stories. And even thought they are sometimes bleak and unbelievable, there is hope in each of the situations for rescue. They seem to be giving us a structure to understand our possible future choices. I see that we are creating models from these stories, the kinds of models that build moral principles for our necessary collective.
There is also the absurdity factor that is taking over our afternoons. The uses we find for things have become both entertainment and strategy. By playing a game with the utility of objects we keep ourselves lucid.
Our lives in this environment are improvisational. Our civil habits have been altered and reconfigured. It is amazing what one will come up with, given the situation.
Maybe this is intensified because of the stories we are retelling at night, before we sleep. We all seem to have a store of survival stories. And even thought they are sometimes bleak and unbelievable, there is hope in each of the situations for rescue. They seem to be giving us a structure to understand our possible future choices. I see that we are creating models from these stories, the kinds of models that build moral principles for our necessary collective.
There is also the absurdity factor that is taking over our afternoons. The uses we find for things have become both entertainment and strategy. By playing a game with the utility of objects we keep ourselves lucid.
Our lives in this environment are improvisational. Our civil habits have been altered and reconfigured. It is amazing what one will come up with, given the situation.
Tuesday
Monday
Wednesday
Monday
Sunday
diary entry no. one
It’s been two weeks since we crashed into this absolute nothingness of a landscape. At one time I would have said how amazing it was, how otherworldly, how perfectly reflective. Now, it's only so cold we can hardly breath. At least most of the crew can lick the ice cubes that hang from their beards. Unfortunately I don’t have this gift.
There are many things I am still afraid to say out loud, even worse to say in writing. This journal is tucked into my clothes. I wear it. Around here we can only hide what is tucked inside the twenty layers of clothing we constantly have tethered to our bodies. And although no one knows about the peanuts in my pocket, I bet all of us have peanuts stashed in our pockets. Just ask. Follow the trail, like Hansel and Gretel. I wish it were that easy for us.
We're finally waking up from the fog of the crash, gaining a bit of clarity after the shock, the death, the injuries. We realize that physically hypothermia and frostbite are our biggest enemies. And psychologically learning to forge for food and sticking together as a group are extremely important.
Yesterday we buried the pilot at sunrise. I wish I still had the words and heart to say it was a beautiful moment.
It was a beautiful moment.
I felt our spirits rise after this event. It gave us all some courage.
Today we tore out the rest of the useless remains from the plane wreck and actually began to build something we can call home. Everyone gave up some clothing for insulation and we began to make pockets to organize and store what is important. At the moment this means a few tools, books, and the drop of whiskey left in the bottle. Our new insulation will help keep in what little heat is generated over night, with all of us curled up in a mash, breathing thick and heavy dreams of warmth and home.
Speaking of dreams, I keep having the same one, like a rerun every night. In the absolute dark I am out on the ice wandering around. The moonlight lights my way. Suddenly a small village of strange shacks floats up in front of me. All of them have warm lights glowing in their windows and mythological beings are singing karaoke. I am in there with them; their big carved horns and furry coats brush up against me. I am singing Joy Division and I wake up.The morning is the hardest reality. It is also the most beautiful light.
We held our first meeting today since the accident. Each of us agreed to take on certain aspects of daily living and to teach each other the skills we know and will learn. Now that we all have jobs to do our lives will be structured around survival. This will keep us going for a while. This will keep us strong and hopeful.
For a while.
I wish we had a croquet set.
Tuesday
12/20/07
The small crew of the pilot series "Mythologists: Investigate" departed the Crystal airport bound for Alexandria, MN to begin shooting an episode of their program. The series was to serve as a fantastical journalistic endeavor, investigating local mythology and folklore. Often, the series sought to explore the evolution or mutation of old world mythologies and how they have or have not adapted to or been influenced by contemporary American culture.
This particular episode was to investigate a central Minnesota-Nordic myth/prophecy involving the emergence of Niflheim, the Nordic purgatory of ice and mist, in a paranormal/geographic triangle falling on the winter solstice. In Alexanderia, they were scheduled to meet with several Runestoneologists, local amateur experts in the study of the mythic stones supposed to be left by Eric the Red in the 15th Century.
Their plane dissapeared from radar on December 20th, 2007.
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