The Bolshevik husky

How do you explain the rules of capitalism to a dog? That’s the question we were pondering the day the river stopped.

We’ve been watching it for weeks. With the recent cold spell, the passing ice pans turned to chunks, and by Saturday there were sheets as big as tennis courts drifting past.

In the afternoon, the ice shelf began to rise as water oozed beneath it. We guessed the river had jammed somewhere below us and the water was backing up. We took a quick ski down to take a look but Neil bust a ski through into the seeping green slush and so we scooted back, faster and faster, the ice popping and buckling beneath us.

By dark, we could hear a continuous rumble as the moving ice sheets ground against the edges. We ran out in parkas, pyjamas and headlamps to peer at the slow, rumbling mass of jagged ice. At 30 below our breathing formed a fog of ice crystals in the beams, so we held our breath and listened. I wish I’d recorded the sound. Imagine a freight train of broken wine glasses grinding its way through a gravel valley.

At some point whilst we slept, bing! It stopped. Probably it didn’t stop with a bing! like a microwave oven, more likely a tinkle as the last piece of shattered ice fell into place, but we’ll never know.

Sunday am. River stopped

We woke to stillness and silence, for the first time since we arrived in September. No river charging by us, no swishing of passing ice.

No more beautiful hoar frost on the trees as there is no more vapour to create it

We will leave it a week or two before starting to put in our trails in case it moves again, but we should soon be travelling and that will be an end to our isolation. We’ve enjoyed this time. Aside from a bit of local tree felling, we can’t go anywhere or do anything. If we had more booze and a TV set it would be perfect.

The only thing that’s spoiled this peaceful time is our militant dog. Hence the need to explain capitalism.

Unfortunately he’s not a nimble-minded border collie, but a lumbering clod-headed husky. I spent a lot of time last winter trying to teach him “gee” (right) and “haw” (left) when we were out on the dogsled. Not once did any connection ever fire in his mind between my shouting gee or haw and us changing direction, so capitalism could take a while.

Until there is enough snow to run the snowmachine, we’ve been using Homer to haul our tools a couple of miles downriver so we can cut firewood. He doesn’t like travelling on the ice shelf. Even before the water started to back up, he could hear cracks and pops and all manner of things we couldn’t.

Bit slippery even for our intrepid action man here

He must think we are reckless fools but it was the only place smooth enough to run the sled.

Homer would prefer to be up in the rocks and willows on the bank where he feels safe, or perhaps just go home, so we’ve had some disagreements about the direction of travel and some canine industrial action.

On strike. Won't even look at the camera 

I’m giving up on gee and haw for now, but he will have to understand the capitalist system. I’ll put it to him simply.

Homer is labour. Homer likes kibble, we hold all the kibble (or the capital). Homer works for us and we give him kibble. His job, as a professionally trained sled dog, genetically selected for thousands of years to pull, is to pull the bloody sled.

I will not have a Marxist revolution fomented here on the Yukon, so if he wants his fucking kibble, he will pull the sled, dammit!

Oh yes, we are locked in a battle of wills with our dog. I think we’ve been alone just a teensy bit too long…

We had to bribe him with snacks and have one of us as “lead dog”, on skis in front of him, which gives him the confidence to keep going.

We travel in a bizarre procession of skier, dog, dogsled then one of us jogging behind and falling over occasionally as a foot goes through the ice, but at least we’re getting firewood. We are stacking it up the bank to collect with the snowmachine when there is more snow.

Tree tied off for safety as we weren't sure which way it would fall

But when it’s time to go home, our fearful worker is out on strike, reluctant to come back down to the ice shelf to be hitched up to the sled.

Here he is, devising a cunning plan to stay on the bank. Not quite cunning enough, as we just grabbed his collar and led him down.

Here he is being clever again. He’s found a nice safe place to sit away from all that chainsaw racket. Yes, under this precariously balanced, extremely heavy 100’ tree that we felled earlier.

Despite the revolution we are enjoying the end of our holiday and making our own fun.

Neil hates sewing and was in a real shit but I made him smile for the camera

I had some leftover beaver fur from the hat and mitts I made this summer so we are renovating Neil’s rabbit fur hat. There will just be enough to make beaver merkins too, which should cause a splash in Dawson City, when we eventually get there.

Rabbit stew and dumplings cooking on the woodstove

A friend sent a great recipe for rabbit stew so we decided to try it. I got this little snowshoe hare and completely amazed Homer who has been trying to get a rabbit most of his life with no success.

Opposable thumbs and an ability to make and use tools Homer, that’s what you need

It’s a high rabbit year. The rabbit population booms and busts, just like capitalist economies though perhaps for different reasons. In boom years, there are also more predators and we’ve had the joy of watching a massive lynx pad along the beach and a pine marten skipping around the yard. She just about leapt over our watchful guard dog as he snoozed on his chain.

I’ll use the fur for a rabbit cushion, another nicely lewd combination of words when you think about it

In the last few days we’ve had a bit more snow too. Just enough for this to happen-

Try renegotiating your pay and conditions now, Homer!

The machine’s running, the river’s stopped, Homer’s fired. We’ll sell his kibble and invest the money in gasoline and two-stroke oil. So much for your Worker’s Revolution, sled dog.