I walked through my house lighting candles. This stupid snowstorm knocked my power out, and I needed to see to be able to get the backup generator working. I live in the middle of nowhere on a mountain. I chose to live up there because I am an artist, and in this house all of my emotions are able to show through into my paintings, it also is a way for me to hide from people that are to painful to see again. I’ve lived in this house for about three years now, and my paintings have become world-renowned. It gets pretty lonely up here, but every once in a while I get a few visitors that get lost in the snowstorms that move in. I also went to a search and rescue class, and they use me now to find people when they are lost in a snowstorm up at the peak of the mountain. Because I don’t want what happened to me to happen to them. Anyway, I found the generator, and after some swearing and beating on it, I got it to run, and my power was back up. I blew out the candle that I held in my hand and got out of the basement. As I walked into the kitchen I heard my CB radio going off. “Taryn, Taryn, are you there? Over” I sprinted over and picked up the mic and hit the speak button “Yeah, I’m here, what’s up? Over.” “Well, five guys were hiking in the woods, and the storm came up really fast, they’re lost, the last contact we had with them was over by the lake, over.” “Ok, I’m on it, I’ll radio you back when I get in, over!” I put down the mic and sprinted to my closet. I pulled on my black shells (like snow pants without the padding) and I put on my bright red water proof down jacket. I ran down the stairs to the back door and put on a neck gaiter and a headband. I zipped up my coat, put my goggles on, pulled my hood over my head and tightened it. I then grabbed a key, and wrapped the band around my wrist. I pulled on my gloves and headed out into the storm. I walked a few feet, then came across my snowmobile. I made sure that the blankets were pilled in the toboggan on the back, then I brushed the snow off the seat. I sat down, put the key in, and started it. After a little bit of rocking I freed myself from the snow and sped up.
I needed to hurry because if they were lost for too long, there was a chance they could get frost bite, or even worse hypothermia and die. I made my way to the lake and started to circle it. “HELLO? IS ANYONE OUT THERE? HELLO!!!” I yelled as loud as I could to make my voice heard over the wind. I finally heard “OVER HERE!” I then yelled “KEEP YELLING THAT SO I CAN FIND YOU!” they continued to yell, and I made my way over to where I heard the voice. I saw a single person standing there yelling and jumping up and down. I stopped the snowmobile near them, and hopped off. When I saw the person I gave a little gasp, but managed to get out “I thought there were five of you!” “There are!” he said “Follow me!” He turned and started walking through the snow, which was know up to the top of my knees. As we walked I noticed that he was very underdressed, and that he was shivering and having problems walking. “Hey, stop!” I yelled. He stopped and turned around. I ran up to him the best I could, and once I caught up to him I took off my jacket and put it on him. He took it, no questions asked, then continued to lead the way. Finally we got to a big tree and he pointed to the bottom and said “Under there!” I kneeled in the snow and looked into the tree well. I saw four guys huddling together, each of them was also underdressed. Since the wind didn’t blow into the well I was able to talk normally. “Hey!” They all looked up at me. “I need all of you to crawl out of the tree well and follow me, ok?” They were too cold to reply, so they just nodded their heads. After some struggling they all managed to get out and follow me back to the snowmobile. Once there the guy that I had given my jacket too gave it back. I went to the toboggan and grabbed blankets, I handed one to each of the guys and they gladly took it. I instructed them to have two people sit behind me, and three sit in the toboggan. Once they were seated I started it, and had to stand up and rock it loose again. I knew this land like the back of my hand, so even though I could only see a few feet in front of me, I made it to the house in good time.
