As 1993 dawned, Jim and Jennifer Stolpa were a typical young couple, living from paycheck to paycheck and dreaming of better days.
Then, they and their infant son got lost in the Nevada desert in a howling snowstorm for eight days. Stolpa walked 50 miles in deep snow to find help. He and his wife lost all their toes to frostbite.Now, after 12 months of surgery and negotiations over a TV movie, they hope to get on with their lives.
"We've just been at a standstill," Jennifer Stolpa said in an interview at the family's modest apartment in the east San Francisco Bay area. "We're both really anxious and hopeful that once the movie airs, we'll just kind of have that part of our lives over with and we can just go on."
The CBS-TV movie, "Snowbound: The Jim and Jennifer Stolpa Story," airs Sunday night. Their deal for the movie is rumored at $500,000.
The movie retells the tale that began Dec. 29, 1992, when the Stolpas set out for a family funeral in Idaho.
Snow blocked the main east-west roads through the Sierra Nevada so they swung north on a little-used road. Eventually, they turned onto an unmaintained gravel road in northwestern Nevada. Their truck became stuck and they were lost.
After a night in their truck, the two set out for help, carrying Clayton, then 4 months old.
Concern for Clayton kept them going. So did the meals they fantasized about ordering at a restaurant they believed lay just ahead. Thirst became the biggest problem as the dry, powdery snow failed to satisfy.
"The biggest thing we thought about was eating and drinking. We thought we were walking to this restaurant . . . just order everything they had to drink, orange juice, apple juice," said Jennifer Stolpa, 21.
Seventeen miles later, Clayton and his mother took shelter in a small cave while Stolpa went for help. He walked more than 50 miles before finding a highway worker.
After a series of operations, the Stolpas now walk well enough to fool the casual observer, but the disability still gives them trouble.
"We'd give it all back to turn the clock back a year and a day and make a few different decisions," said Stolpa, 22.
Both are unemployed.
Stolpa got a medical discharge from the Army, leaving him "anxious to do something."
"I feel kind of useless," he said. "I want to go to school and I want to work."