Free Breaking the Ice by Kim Baldwin

two makes ’em crazy, worrying about pipes freezing and doing without their Internet. Free yourself from all of that, you live a lot less stressful life.”
    “You definitely have different priorities than most of us.”
    “Won’t argue that. One of my favorite quotes is from the Greek philosopher Epicurus. If you live according to nature, you will never be poor; but if according to opinions, you will never be rich. Nature demands little, opinion a great deal. ”
    “No offense,” her passenger said, “but you don’t strike me as a philosophy student.”
    Bryson wondered, not for the first time, why so many outsiders perceived Alaskans as ignorant hicks. “Reading is a popular pastime up here. And you get lots and lots of time to think and reflect.”
    “Precisely what I don’t need,” Karla Edwards mumbled.
    The answer didn’t strike Bryson as odd or unusual. Many people who were constantly on the go were afraid of taking a long hard look at their lives and the choices they made. Some of the people she and Lars met had their first chance to do so during their trips to Alaska, and they weren’t always happy about what they discovered about themselves.
    “Lot of benefits to living here,” she said. “Hardships draw people together. Neighbors and friends become your extended family, ’cause you have to rely on each other. Can’t tell you how many clients I talk to who live in big cities, never even met the people living next door.”
    Her passenger was silent for a long time. “That’s true of me. I live in an apartment building in Atlanta, and I don’t know the name of anyone on my floor, even though I’ve lived there six years. I nod or wave sometimes at familiar faces as I come and go, but that’s about it. When news reports of local shootings, break-ins, and people stealing your identity constantly bombard you, you become leery of inviting strangers into your home. Afraid of people knowing too much about you.”
    “That’s just what I mean. Here, you got bush hospitality. Most people in the wild never lock their door when they’re away, ’cause you never know when someone might get lost, or hurt. Your home might be their only chance to survive. Gotta trust they won’t take advantage of that.” Bryson thought back to the time she and her father needed to enter a stranger’s unoccupied cabin because they’d had to ditch the plane in a sudden blizzard, when the wind chill was thirty below zero. They’d left behind some money for the firewood and food they’d used, and a note thanking the owners for keeping to the tradition of providing an open, well-stocked shelter for those in need.
    “I can’t imagine being that trusting,” Karla said. “Then again, I can’t imagine living so far out in the wilderness that such a thing could be necessary. How do you deal with the isolation? Don’t you get lonely?”
    “Sure. Doesn’t everyone, regardless of their geography? Do your location and luxuries mean you never get lonely?”
    There was a very long pause before she got an answer. And Karla’s voice, when she finally spoke, was melancholic. “No. They don’t.”
    Bryson had obviously hit a nerve. “Didn’t mean to pry.”
    “You’re not. Besides, I asked you first.”
    “But I didn’t have to think before I answered.”
    Another long silence followed. Bryson glanced in the mirror, but it was too dark to see Karla’s expression. The dim light from the control panel only let her see that she was staring out the window into the darkness. “You can’t run from it, you know,” she said. “It’ll follow you wherever, even up here.”
    “I’m not running from anything,” Karla shot back angrily.
    For a while there, she’d been almost pleasant, but the reprieve was short. The petulant child from the airport was back. “If you say so,” Bryson replied. “Then why are you here?”
    “Not that it’s any of your business, but I guess you could say I’m on a voyage of