Ice Age

"Stations for takeoff" says the pilot. Fredric Chopin's symphonies play in my head. His airstrip is quilted with snow. The runway, craft, propellers, control towers are like foamed cheeks ready for a shave. I see just white. The white carpet fools my mind into a deafening silence. The windchill is -22 deg C. We cut through the blizzard at takeoff. Super snow soppers rake ice off the runway. The gray tarmac drafts a stray stretch on an otherwise bright sheath. The breadth of the surface along

its rim is over a couple of meters. Warming fluids gush out of fancy bulldozer like vehicles. Reminds me of a boxer being oiled before a clash. We rise into the clouds....