A Winter's Tale
by Rob Olason
~~~~~
Thingeyarsysla, Iceland
Winter 1889
1
Snow fell all day in Reykjadal valley but none of the valley’s residents could see it. Had they gone out in the storm with a lantern or candle, they would see a flurry of snow a few feet around them disappearing into the darkness. Yet faced with the biting wind, the light would soon be extinguished. But no one living in Reykjadal valley would be foolish enough to go out in this storm. Instead, huddled together in small earthen farmhouses, they were more concerned with staying warm and keeping their sheep from freezing in the bitter winter cold. They saw little that was magical or delightful in the snow falling on the valley. It was just one more aspect of winter they must endure, like the darkness.
On 20 December, the Reykjadal valley was dark all day long, as it had been for weeks before and would continue for several more weeks. This winter darkness was the price the valley paid for its endless daylight of summer. The inhabitants of the valley and their forefathers had learned to accept these dark days of winter during the millennia they had inhabited this land that reluctantly gave them sustenance from the thinnest of soils, the roughest seas and the shortest of growing seasons.
The windswept Reykjadal valley had been the home of generations of farmers who had grown to accept the harsh conditions the valley offered. They started each growing season preparing the home field in Spring, driving their flock of sheep to the summer grazing and hoping for a good enough Summer and harvest time to sustain their families through the darkness of Winter so they could again find hope in Spring.
While these dark winter days had tested the will of generations, the challenge had become more acute the last half-century. Danish merchants used their monopoly hold on the country to keep prices high on the goods they sold and low on the wool, tallow and fish they bought from the farmers and fishermen. Fourteen winters earlier a series of volcanic eruptions across the country blanketed much of the farmland in ash, forcing families off their unworkable farms. A number of summers that followed were cooler than normal. Hay crops were smaller, sheep were thinner, their wool shorter. Proud families whose farms had sustained them for generations in Reykjadal valley now had little to eat. Farms that had been the source of family identity for generations became stone and turf walled prisons, trapping its occupants in poverty and starvation.
Farms were abandoned. Families turned to the district Reeves for assistance. The Reeves looked at the few resources available and saw a solution that was harsh but inevitable. The remaining farms would need to absorb the families that had abandoned their farms. Each farm could only take one or two workers. This meant families would be split up among farms. The strong, healthy and young men and women were placed easily, the elderly and the very young were the Reeves most perplexing problems.
Fourteen years earlier, in Reykjadal valley, the Reeve Bjarni Baldvinsson, was pleased that he had placed Sigurbjorg Kristjansdottir and her oldest daughter Sigridur with a promising farm in the district. The problem he then faced was placing the youngest daughter, five-year old Marja. Most families would take an elder before agreeing to take such a young child. After much searching and conferring with the district council, he had found a home for the five year old on the upper valley farm of Pall Magnusson and Elina Jonsdottir, a childless couple. Bjarni Baldvinsson was glad this problem was resolved. As he walked the path that served as the road through the valley, he knew that by the time he reached his home tonight, there would undoubtedly be another family at his doorstep waiting for the Reeve to divide them up among the district farms. Oh these times, he grumbled to himself.