On a dark winter day I woke up earlier than usual. I was asleep at my father’s house but he was not home. He was away, as usual.

I did not, as I usually did, call for servants or walk to the kitchen. There was snow outside my bedroom window and I could see the glow of reflected early morning light come in through the window. So I did what I have never really understood why.

I put on my clothes and shoes and moving quietly I opened the window and jumped out. It was a six foot drop to the ground below and I rolled with it feeling both the exhilaration of doing something illicit and the bite of a morning chill that was sharper than usual through my thin clothing.

I felt the snow bite, melt, freeze and then I was running.

Running in snow is hard. The snow was about two feet thick. You can’t see the ground so you constantly have to adjust your balance as your foot strikes down and because the snow was high you lift your knees up high as you run.

You run for five minutes like that it kills. I ran for an hour.

Then there’s the cold. The cold air hurts your lungs. It makes the lining of your nose hurt with each breath. It rasps against your throat. You breathe like that and all you experience is pain.

Pain.

Pain.

My one hour turned into two.

I ran there. I had to run back.

No aim. And no purpose.

Except when I got back home. Sweat dripping off me. Lungs screaming in pain. Muscles exhausted and my brain dancing in a soup of black spots brought about by exhaustion and hyperventilation I had an answer which I had not possessed before: I liked pain. Pain was the key I used to unlock myself.

The snow had brought that to me.

In just two hours.