Freeze Out Champion!

I guess everyone growing up yearns to be good at something. I was a reasonably good student without putting forth much effort. I could play baseball and made the all star team a couple of times. I could sing a little and ended up participating in music and academic competitions at various times. I was proud of all those medals hanging on my FFA jacket but none of these areas of achievement compared to my talent in my being able to deal with the cold.

I can’t be totally sure how I came to have this mind over matter skill when faced with bitterly cold conditions but I developed it over time and it became a source of some renown among a very small circle of competitors. I remember being able to lay on a ice cold linoleum rug floor to make my younger brother feel bad to the extent that he would beg me to get back in the bed. I also know that my granddad required us to stay put on a deer stand and I suppose I must have taken that literally because I did my best not to move even in very cold conditions.

We didn’t have insulated underwear or special protective gear. We might have two pair of socks and a couple of layers of shirts and a coat but that was it. This was little protection from the elements and it did require some amount of fortitude to enjoy hunting in conditions where you actually broke ice on the puddles as you made your way to your deer stand. Paw Paw Mac would always tell me that being cold was mostly in your mind, so perhaps that is where I learned to deal with it.

At any rate, in my teenage years we used to get a group of guys together and play freeze out going down US Highway 171 on cold winter nights. The game went like this. The driver was the only one exempt since he had to keep the vehicle under control at very high rates of speed. The rest of us would begin stripping down one garment at a time with all the windows rolled down to see who would be the last man standing. Like I said, we all want to be good at something and this was right down my alley.

Think about speeding down the highway at up to 100 miles per hour in thirty five degree weather with all the windows down while removing your jacket, your shirt, your jeans, and your shoes. Many times I won because in the end my buddies were reduced to shivering, blue lipped wimps. There I was wearing only my shorts and socks proudly hanging my head out the window as the official freeze out champion! No doubt this fleeting accolade made me not much more than a big fish in a very small pond.

I also was recognized for being the only one to have stripped down in frigid weather for a swim in the lake during a fishing trip one year. Several stripped down but only one actually went into the water. Oh yeah! It took the breath out of my body like I had fallen down some steps or something, but I came up out of that water and roared like the lion of the cold that I was.

Sadly, many of those who could validate my claims as Freeze Out Champion have passed on, and I would likely not find too many left who could even remember us having the competitions. So, I’m left to bask as a legend in my own mind but I’m proud to say I did find at least one thing I was really good at. More later……………..