The Whole Wide World

It’s been a typical game of hurry up and wait down here. Everyday I wake up and check on the flight status. The first flight of WinFly was supposed to arrive here at the beginning of last week, but has been cancelled daily for almost two weeks, so until this evening, we were still a quaint little population of 144. I feel for Tom with his broken foot, who is top priority for that first flight. He is a trooper.

That said, the first flight of WinFly finally arrived tonight. It brought just over 100 new faces and took about 40. When a flight leaves, we have what is called hug line where we all gather at Ivan the Terra Bus, and form a line to give hugs to all departing. It’s an emotional thing, as goodbyes almost always are. This afternoons hug line made the feeling that winter is ending settle in just a bit more. There is one more flight scheduled for tomorrow which will take bring another 50 people and take some more of our winter overs with it. After tomorrows flight, there won’t be another for a few more weeks.

The weather this week was cold and the station bounced in and out of condition two, which is a no-go for the flights. Yesterday, it was -75F with the wind chill. Bit breezy. Despite the extra cold temps, we had some pretty stellar little sunrises and sunsets this past week. The sun is up for a little over an hour now. It’s something special to watch the sun rise and set in the span of an hour. There have also been some really clear dark nights with insane views of space at its finest. Satellites, planets, the twinkliest stars you ever did see. The whole shebang. Seeing the moon phases from my new back porch has been a treat. The move over to the 207 dorm from 155 has definitely had its pluses. The view over Winter Quarter’s Bay is everything. I am really soaking in, looking up.

I bought some trail runners online yesterday. With Starlink I have access to Poshmark on my phone. It felt noteworthy and I realized it was the first purchase I’ve made since May 3rd. And even that was a single purchase of a light up alarm clock that mocks daylight which I bought in an effort to try and keep some sense of normalcy with no sun over the past four months of winter. The trail runner purchase means my feet oughta be on a trail relatively soon. That’s exciting, yet still almost unfathomable at this point. Equally as exciting is the thought of the sounds of nature, warm sun on my face, and the smell of rain, beach and forest…I’m coming for you non frozen world! Just over ten months in, and less than two months to go.