Alongside my owner I trot the trails of the bone-chilling Yukon. My paws press softly into the snow creating a trail as I tramp through the snow blanket draped over the ground. My fur coat is much thicker than my owners; therefore, I cannot imagine how frigid he might be. I believe the man underestimated how severe the weather was going to be. My owners tone in voice changes and he shoves me forward shouting at me to advance forward. Unsure of what he is attempting to force me perform, I halt and take a moment to ponder. After continuous shrieking I decide to trot forward. The ground begins to have a glossy and shiny coating and in one step I plunge into the icy water. Luckily, I could easily escape only getting the bottom half of my legs …show more content…
I do not quite grasp why my paws are inside of his mouth, but it makes them warmer. I long for my owner to build a fire because I love the warmth of a fire. Fortunately, he builds a fire after he realizes how frigid his fingers currently are. I reluctantly leave the fire after being yelled at countless times. Why is my owner so angry all the time?
My companion and I set off again into the bone-chilling trails of the Yukon. During our journey the man steps on a soft and unbroken patch in the snow, showing no signs of water underneath. But this time, it was his turn to plunge in the icy water, but he wets himself halfway up the knee. He shrieks unhappy about breaking through the soft and unbroken snow. He starts to build another fire. I am ecstatic for another fire, but unhappy that the man is even more irritated than before. Unfortunately, the lovely fire goes out due to a bundle of snow crashing onto the orange flames. Frantically, my companion begins waving and clapping his hands like a maniac. Oh how cold the man might be. I am bitterly cold with my large fur coat. All the man has is a wimpy jacket and bed-time slippers. Desperately the man is attempting to rekindle the fire. The
The freezing wind had chilled my hand to the bone. Even as I walked into my cabin, I shivered as if there was an invisible man shaking me. My ears, fingers, toes, and noes had turned into a pale purple, only starting to change color once I had made a fire and bundled myself in blankets like ancient Egyptians would do to their deceased Pharaohs. The once powdered snow on my head had solidified into a thin layer of ice. I changed out of the soaking wet clothes I was wearing and put on new dry ones. With each layer I became more excited to go out and start snowboarding. I headed for the lift with my board and my hand. Each step was a struggle with the thick suit of snow gear I was armored in.
He is very unprepared because he doesn’t have enough equipment to finish his trip because it’s too cold. The traveler does not have proper clothing to keep him warm in the cold weather. ”The frozen moisture of its breathing had settled on its fur in a fine powder of frost, and especially were its jowls, muzzle, and eyelashes whitened
The short story "To Build a Fire," written by Jack London, is a tragic tale of an overconfident, inexperienced man traveling through the brutal, sub-freezing conditions of the Yukon with only the companionship of a dog. The man, un-named in this story, arrogantly decides to break from the main trail to take a less traveled route against the advice of the seasoned old-timer of Sulfur Creek, who warns of traveling alone in such severe conditions. The man is described as being without imagination and not aware of the significance of the things around him, how frail his life is. As his journey prolongs, his confidence builds as he continually cheats nature, but the temperature extends lower and lower below freezing. He inevitably is caught by the fierce cold when he breaks through some ice and is wetted, in dire need of warmth and to dry his moccasins, the man must build a fire. Successful in his attempt, the man’s ego grows but the unforgiving antagonist of the story steps in and snuffs out the flames, as melted snow falls from the branches above. The man’s overconfidence starts to dwindle as his hands become unresponsive due to the extreme cold, and the cruel reality of death sets in as he fails to ignite another flame. As his limbs become rigid, he wrestles with the idea of killing the dog to thaw his unmoving hands, but once within his grasp, his frigid hands prevent him from drawing his knife. In a last ditch effort to not freeze to death the man begins to run in a panic, fighting the cold for his life. Then it happens, the realization, in an epiphanic moment the man comes to grip with the fact that his end is near and rather than flailing about like a fool, he decides he wo...
After the man had built one successful fire that was put out by snow falling from a spruce tree above them, he attempted and failed to build another (1819). He decided he would kill the dog to warm his hands by keeping them hidden from the cold in its carcass, and so he tried to lure it close to him by speaking softly to it (1820). The dog however noticed that this was suspicious, since the man only talked to the dog in a harsh way, and so he knew not to approach the man (1820). At this point, the man's confidence is not as prominent as it was when they began the trip. After his multiple failures of not paying attention to the climate around him and failing to build a fire to save himself, he is acting out of panic. When the man tries to call the dog to him in a softer tone, the dog takes this as a warning sign, since it is different from how the man had always acted before. The dog knows what to do in these situations, while the man is blinded by his confidence until it is too
Should prairie dogs be protected or exterminated? People around the world are stating prairie dogs should be treasured. However, in the articles, “Denver’s Street-Smart Prairie Dogs,” and, “Prairie Dogs: A Threatened Species or Public Health Nuisance?” provides evidence that prairie dogs should be exterminated from urban areas because of their destructive impact on the environment and how because their population are thriving rapidly they are becoming an inconvenience to humans.
The repetition of the man’s failure to build a fire eliminates his unforeseen survival. As the man begins his journey and builds his first fire he contemplates the old timers’ advice about never traveling alone. He thought to himself about the icy temperatures and the severity of the cold that’s freezing his cheeks and nose. The author describes “a fire, snapping and cackling and promising life with every dancing flame” giving the man aspiration to live (London 393). The repetition of the fire and the metaphor used in this quote shows the significance of the fire. The fire has life and the strength to keep progressing, so keeping the fire going is essential to the man’s endurance. The repetition of the fire represents the way the man will
He fig-ured that the normal half hour walk home might take as long as two hours in snow this deep. And then there was the wind and the cold to contend with. The wind was blowing across the river and up over the embankment making the snow it carried colder and wetter than the snow blanketing the ground. He would have to use every skill he’d learned, living in these hills, to complete the journey without getting lost, freezing to death, or at the very least ending up with a severe case of frostbite be-fore he made it back to Ruby.
When the narrator introduced the main character of the story, the man, he made it clear that the man was in a perilous situation involving the elements. The man was faced with weather that was 75 degrees below zero and he was not physically or mentally prepared for survival. London wrote that the cold "did not lead him to meditate upon his frailty as a creature of temperature, and upon man's frailty in general, able only to live within certain narrow limits of heat and cold."(p.1745) At first when the man started his journey to the camp, he felt certain that he could make it back to camp before dinner. As the trip progressed, the man made mistake after mistake that sealed his fate. The man's first mistake was to step into a pool of water and soak his legs to the knees. This blunder forced the man to build a fire to dry his wet socks and shoes so his feet would not freeze and become frostbitten. When the man began to build a fire he failed to notice that he was doing so under a large, snow laden spruce tree where he was getting his firewood. When the man had a small fire that was beginning to smolder the disturbance to the tree caused the snow to tumble to the ground and extinguish the fire. "It was his own fault or, rather, his mistake. He should not have built the fire under the spruce tree. He should have built it in the open."(1750).
Obviously that was not the situation which was meant to occur. The cold served as a lesson to be taught to all explorers who would set foot into the never-ending winter from that day on. The continuous efforts that the man made to start a fire symbolize his will to survive. No will however is match for mother nature. The suffering man took on the role as a great teacher and hopefully preserver of life for generations to come.
In “To Build A Fire”, the main conflict throughout is man versus nature although it would be inaccurate to say that nature goes out of its way to assault the man. The fact of the matter is, nature would be just as cold without the man's presence regardless of him being there .The environment as a whole is completely indifferent to the man, as it frequently is in naturalist literature. The bitter environment does not aid him in any way, and it will not notice if he perishes. In the same way, the dog does not care about the man, only about itself. Ironically enough though, as the man was dying he was getting upset toward the dog because of its natural warmth, the instincts that it had, and its survival skills and those were the elements that the man lacked for survival. It is ironic that the man had to die in order to find out that man's fragile body cannot survive in nature's harsh elements, regardless of a human’s natural over-confidence and psychological strength.
The book “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time” talks about a curious boy with autism whose name is Christopher John Francis Boone. Christopher tries to solve a case of Mrs. Shears,his neighbor, dogs skeptical death. Christopher lives only with his father. His father tells him that his mother died in the hospital, but she really didn't die. She is still alive and is living with Mrs. Shears ex-husband. The reason why Christopher’s mother isn’t living with him anymore is because she cheated on her husband with Mr. Shears. Christopher starts to slowly understand what was happening then he goes out trying to find his mom in London.
captive by a sheath of frost, as were the glacial branches that scraped at my windows, begging to get in. It is indeed the coldest year I can remember, with winds like barbs that caught and pulled at my skin. People ceaselessly searched for warmth, but my family found that this year, the warmth was searching for us.
Digging into the snow with my boots while stabilizing my body with the uninjured arm, I inch across the hill, lose my foothold, and plummet downward.
When I was nine years old my grandparents adopted a two year puppy named, maximilian. We, of course, called him Max. When we went to the kennel to pick out a new dog Max didn 't seem like an option. He was a scrawny little puppy tucked in the corner of the shelter. Max was a boisterous springer spaniel mix, and when we first got him he was black and white. Overtime his white fur was masked by black spots, similar to age spots, which made him uniquely mine. Max was suppose to my grandfathers new hunting dog when he was newly adopted. However, at the very first gunshot Max bolted and my grandfather spent a three hours looking for Max in the woods. After the hunting incident my grandfather wrote Max off and, he became my dog.
Some people may say a dog is just a dog, but for me they are extremely desirable. Dogs are a person’s best friend. They make me cry, laugh, and I wish never adopted one because they do smell. Although, dogs smell, it should not be a justification to not obtain one. I mean what does not smell? I never realized how taking care of a dog could change my life; until I saw how they sleep throughout the day, they are always there to comfort me, and how they provide a responsible way of living.