Man vs. Nature

The cold frigid air is all around, thrusting itself at you left and right. It's so freezing that it nips at any visible skin causing a tremendous pain. You're numb as could be, there's no feeling left from your face to your toes. You can’t stand the cold much longer, so you begin to run as fast as you can, but you keep falling and then you realize you will never make it back to camp. No man should venture out alone in the Yukon, no matter how brave he thinks he is, since nature is much more powerful than man.

In the short story “To Build a Fire,” by Jack London, the idea that nature can control man comes alive and can cause harm. Within this story there is a man who is trying to get to camp. Although it was 75 degrees below zero, the man still leaves the safety and warmth of Sulfur Creek. There really wasn’t much happening until, “it happened. At a place where there were no signs, where the soft, unbroken snow seemed to advertise solidity beneath, the man broke through.” The man’s dog had been walking in front, but he didn’t fall in. Therefore, nature was targeting him, torturing him with the cold and now the possibility of him getting hypothermia from being wet.
Forced to stop and make a fire so he could warm up and defrost his frozen feet, he pulled sticks off the tree. He set up his fire right underneath it, and then “high up in the tree one bough capsized its load of snow. This fell on the boughs beneath, capsizing them. This process continued, spreading out and involving the whole tree. It grew like an avalanche and it descended without warning upon the man and the fire, and the fire was blotted out! Where it had burned was mantle of fresh and disordered snow.” Even though the man caused this incident, nature had made all of that snow pile up on top of the tree, so he was set up. With this fire being put out, the man was sentenced to his own death, since he had to redo everything he just did. This time he would be much colder and he’d have more trouble lighting his match. At the end of the story, the man dies. Nature won over man, because the man was stupid for going out into the cold in the first place, but he was also being human.

Nature doesn’t only control the story; it also dominates in real life. During our current winter we had a huge snow storm with over a foot of snow. During the night nature took over and in the morning, it was nearly impossible to leave the house. Due to the snow storm, many businesses and schools were closed. All the roads were deserted and not many people dared to venture out into the snow. Most stayed safely in their homes and relaxed for the night. Those who had to be out risked getting stuck in piles of snow. Plows were out trying to restore the cities roads and get them ready for the next day, when everyone was back to their normal lives.

When it comes to nature, you shouldn’t risk your life, because it will usually be much stronger than you. If you get the option of whether or not to go our when the weather isn’t good, stay put. Don’t risk your life when you could be safe and alive. Your life is much more important than whatever else you would be doing. Wherever you are trying to get can wait until you can make a safe journey there.