Thin Ice

(Please click on the title for a reading aloud by the author.)

Years ago my dad and I decided to pay Deke a visit. He and his wife Bea lived across the road from the Pemigiwasset River in Bridgewater, New Hampshire. It was a wooded area and on Deke’s acreage there were a number of small ponds. It was December, and while we hadn’t had much snow we had a couple of cold snaps - perfect conditions for the first ice of the season to have formed and thus for ice skating. Keen to give it a go, dad put his “Hans Brinker’s” in the trunk of the car.

The friendship between my dad and Deke started after WWII as the two men crewed transport flights together in the Air Force Reserves. My dad was a pilot and Deke was a navigator. They were the best of buds and had many adventures flying to every corner of the world. Deke was a true Renaissance man and had my admiration. He could hold forth on the constellations (north and south hemispheres), the fine points of using a sextant, the ecology of area rivers and lakes, the history of the American Civil War, and the care and feeding of antique automobiles.

Years previous Deke worked for the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department and had been given the task of gathering data on fish being caught by ice fishermen on the state’s lakes. Quickly realizing this meant covering hundreds of square miles of ice… on snowshoes?... he set to designing and building a means of higher speed conveyance. Modeled after an airplane, the contraption had an enclosed cockpit of welded steel tubular space frame covered with aircraft fabric perched on top of surplus military wooden aircraft skis. With a small aircraft engine in the back and a pusher prop, it was reputedly capable of doing over 100 m.p.h. I had a ride in it one day on the frozen Pemi and don’t doubt it. The experience is among my most wild and wooly. Suffice it to say, Deke had no trouble getting around to interview ice fisherman.

Dad and I arrived at Deke and Bea’s after lunch. The sun being over the yardarm, we decided a drink was in order. Deke drank straight gin out of a small Pyrex beaker, and dad and I probably got into some Scotch. Knowing Deke, it would have been a fine single malt, so fine you wouldn’t want to bastardize it with ice. Pour it in a glass and sip. With our spirits thus lubricated we set off for the nearest pond. I informed Deke I would sit it out. I didn’t know how to skate and didn’t have much interest to learn.

“God hates a coward,” he bellowed. “Come into the barn… we’ll find you a pair of skates.” I sputtered some meager objection but there was no resisting his good humored, mischievous nature. In the barn sat a box full of dusty, rusty, mouse eaten skates from which we extracted two, making more or less a pair. We three then merrily hiked off into the forest. My apprehension melted as the Scotch took effect and dad and Deke bantered back and forth about their double axels and speed skating on the Charles River and…

The pond was frozen over, all milky white and the ice was smooth as glass. Deke produced a hip flask of gin which got passed around as we put on our skates. The sun was shining, the air had a sharp bite to it. So did the gin which burned all the way down. We got onto the ice. Dad’s “Hans Brinker’s” were a pair of speed skates from his youth, with extra long blades coming to a rounded bullet point far beyond the toe of the boot. He pushed off, gliding easily, fluidly, turned a hundred eighty degrees and was skating backwards. He wore a grin from ear to ear. Deke took off with attempted gracefulness, initiated a spin and instantly fell on his back. His head hit the ice like a watermelon with a loud dull “thonk!” I stood there, a hobbled goat not knowing what to do, wondering if a mad dash to the house and a call for an ambulance would be next. But Deke got up, took a stride on the ice and went on his way as though nothing had happened.

I’d taken a few tentative steps away from shore. Before I knew it dad and Deke came up from behind, one to each side and whisked me away. They were gliding easily, we built speed as they offered words of encouragement. And then they let me go. I sped across the pond in a straight line. I just stood there as the blades and ice gave to pure fluid motion. It was exhilarating. But I was headed right for the place where the brook fed the pond.

“Watch out… thin ice over there!” Yelled Deke. I slithered to stop.

In this spot the ice, clear as glass, was much thinner from the brook’s current. A few feet away it thinned to… water. Ice cold water. I looked down. I could see aquatic plants swaying gently underneath me. I could see the muddy bottom. I could see myself going for a swim. Falling was not an option as the impact would certainly break the ice. Likewise it would not support the three of us, so I was on my own. With tiny little steps and pushes and glides I turned and skated back to the middle of the pond. Dad glided up to me.

“Well done Harry,” he said and gave my shoulder a squeeze. It’s amazing what we can do with the proper motivation.

Gordon Bunker