The Man Who Lives with Wolves. Shaun Ellis

It was a valuable lesson that space was not the most important factor. What was missing, I came to realize, was a rival pack. Just as human beings pull together in the face of a common threat or enemy, so do wolves. If life is too easy for them, food is plentiful and there is no immediate danger, they start to turn on one another.

      Once back from my dawn patrol I would go into the cooking tent and fill in the log book, noting any unusual findings. Then I’d pour myself a mug of hot black coffee, or if no one else was up, I would brew the first pot of the morning. Coffee was the only thing that was provided. Everyone bought and cooked food individually, but there was coffee ready throughout the day and for the first three weeks, I lived on black coffee and Jujubes, a sugar jelly sweet that I discovered I could buy very cheaply in the grocery store in Winchester. I used to go down there—the walk took about two hours—and buy three pounds at a time, which only cost a few cents, and which saw me through the coming week. They were packed full of sugar, of course, which gave me an instant high followed by a terrible low. It wasn’t an ideal diet to be living on when working eighteen-hour days in subzero temperatures, but I didn’t have enough money for anything else and I knew that it was only a matter of time before I wouldn’t even be able to afford the Jujubes.