High Five

I know it's not quite the right issue, but it *is* springtime here.

#readeverywhere

@ParisReview

Welcome to Season 5.  Somehow this time it feels I was only gone a month or so.  The familiar scenery, setting, sunlight, smell, the sourness of the yogurt: this place I know well, and even marking its changes solidifies and reaffirms for me its character.

We have a fun, diversely talented Shuttles crew this season, amongst whom I am the least-experienced professional driver.  But my knowledge of town and its arcane customs and jargon, and at times feudal interrelations, make me a sort of tribal elder.  Whippersnappers a decade younger than me, who have driven big rig semis across country, listen as I ride shotgun and describe where to park at the Tower of Power, how best to approach Sausage Point on a windy day, and the specific door at which to drop off NASA Roy at the Golf Ball.

It was a busy/not busy first week -- meeting new people, endless training sessions, hours of chit-chat while we wait for vehicles to revive from the near-death of wintering outside, and a barrage of activities and freshly effervescing enthusiasm.  I've already trained as a guide for the historic huts and ice pressure ridges, sung with jazz folks, consumed several pounds of cheese, and submitted my three-years-procrastinated literary journal fan mail pic.

Up close delivering some important stuff to the C-17.

Back Again!

Taylor's Mistake, NZ

sundae with frendz

Oct. 20

And we're...offfff...I think.  You really never know for sure.  Five days ago, with perfect weather on both ends, we giddily (and rather sleepily) bundled ourselves onto the C-17 and flew to Antarctica.  It's a loud, tedious plane ride featuring a mediocre sack lunch, but everyone's excited to get to the Ice.  Just 80 miles shy of McMurdo, already into our descent, a crew member came over the PA to tell us that the anti-icing fluid they deployed had caused the windshield to crack(!).  Not in a dire fashion -- blizzard winds were not screaming into the cockpit -- but to a degree that required us to turn around and fly the five hours back to New Zealand.  I'm now part of the boomerang club.

Aside from the long plane ride, I've been grateful to have a few extra days to bum around Christchurch, hike the cliff shores around Sumner, and enjoy perfect eggs benedict and Thai food and negronis.  Time spent in the real world with Ice people is invaluable: quotidien experiences like getting coffee and waiting at the bus stop build surprisingly strong ties.  The quality of time and conversation depth during the past few days will morph in the coming months.

Here I am again, leaning back in my jump-seat, cozy in my Carhartts and enormous insulated boots.  Now, after a sunny day to cure the epoxy on the new window, we're sitting on the runway, carry-on bags full of apples and avocados and booze, minds and hearts again fixed on that far, cold destination.

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Oct. 22

We made it on that second attempt, and I'm happy to report that it is quite cold and appropriately Antarctica-y here.  This year's Shuttles crew seems like a good bunch, and I lucked out and got a great random roommate.  No one could ever fill your shoes, Will -- with midnight coffee, manic crafting, banana stashing, and indescribable character -- but my new roomie is nice and smart and doesn't snore.

Lake Span

Byron? Bryan? I don't remember your name, lake, but you're pretty.

A freighter beyond some old pilings at Whitefish Point.

The Antarctica => Alaska seasonal migration has embedded itself in my inner ear, or magnetic compass, or biological clock—whatever it is that innately compels our peregrinations, be they routine or otherwise.

Alaska was deeply into autumn as Sam and I wrapped up our travels.  Up by Denali even the lower mountains were dusted with snow, and I opted to sleep in the rental car rather than wake up in a frosted tent.  (Actually, it rained pretty hard, and poor Sam was rather damp.)  An evening at the charmingly down-at-heel Chena Hot Springs was pretty nice, though.

And now a couple weeks in Michigan somehow melt by.  I met my brand-spankin'-new-three-day-old niece!  My friend Jen brought me along for a north woods cabin weekend, in a spot incredibly rich in placenames and literary references ("by the shores of gitche gumee" and "rushing Tahquamenaw," on the "Big Two-Hearted River," near Paradise).  We spent a few days exploring Lake Superior beaches, cooking everything with bacon, and gossiping/psychoanalyzing by the wood stove fire. 

Back in TC, I've crossed off almost all the items on my to-do list (exchange lifetime guaranteed socks; try better earplugs; get fancy hiking backpack with hip-belt heat-molded to my waist; procure several pounds of dried cherries to buoy my spirits when the food gets rough at McMurdo).  Long-put-off projects like cleaning up old emails and figuring out how exactly to move music from my aging laptop to my ancient iPod have filled several afternoons.  (This is what I get for hating technology.  If we'd all just stuck with Walkmans I'd be fine.)

Northland

Sam studiously taking notes from her reading while I sip cocoa.

gem-like waters of lower Reed Lake

cuuuuuuute Mint Hut

another impossibly gorgeous glacial lake

After countless times packing and unpacking, evacuating and returning, I remained skeptical that the season was finally ended.  Because even after the final mopping, last breakfast, and my walking tour to bid adieu to favorite trees and flowers, there was just enough time to watch “Point Break” one more time.*  And then a bunch of us rode in a van together for a few hours, and a handful even stayed the night together in Anchorage.  If there’s a better way to ease a transition than Ethiopian food with a dear old friend (love you, Jams!), I don’t want to know it.  Also in the wildly helpful category: a fun hiking/travel buddy, and a decadent late night picnic spread in your cozy cabin.

Mountains and rivers and glaciers and clouds of fog like dragon’s breath have enveloped Sam and me in a chilly autumn embrace.  It sounds like a fairytale—go up Fishhook Road almost to the pass; follow the winding stream past gnarled willows and enormous mossy boulders tossed there as though by giants; try not to slip on the gooey muddy footholds climbing to the ridge; then, if you’ve been deemed worthy, the mists will clear and a squat red hut will materialize on the mountainside.  There you’ll find lakes of the bluest blue, smooth valleys of granite below jagged shale peaks, and, in spite of the crumbling and shifting and rushing waters filtering through the glacier’s terminus, a deep stillness.

And next, Denali.  A visit to my original Alaskan foray.

*Our staff lounge contains VHS copies of almost every Patrick Swayze movie.  “Point Break” played on repeat for the entire week of staff training in May, and was screened regularly throughout the season.

Tidying

Lots of big ol’ jellies washed up in Seward 

fall time

more fall time 

After a few days of limbo in smoky Seward, we three kitcheneers hatched a plan to see the Alaska state fair.  In addition to record-breaking squash and pet-able goats, we were determined to see preeminent jam band/white reggae artists extraordinaire Slightly Stoopid.  The trip took us north past Anchorage, where we delighted in Vietnamese food and I rejoined the segment of the population that owns hiking boots.  

There’s probably one of those long compound German nouns, a word to describe responding to chaotic and trying circumstances by making and eating decadent food.  Friends evacuated and scattered to the winds, and a small corps of us returned to the wildfire zone to close up camp.  Of course it’s only natural not to let good things go to waste and to put extra care into meals with a more intimate group, but there’s also some ineffable force that goads us to elaborately affirm our humanity in the face of an inevitable terminus.

It’s been easy to overlook the yellowing leaves and crispness in the air, but fall is indeed here.  It gets dark, and it gets dark at a normal-world time.  The merest drizzle of rain combines with spent foliage to saturate the air with the scent of decomposition.  “And I miss you most of all, my darling/when autumn leaves start to fall.”

Smokemageddon Update

the rising river under my cabin

Part I (8/21)

So many bugs, so much smoke, so much guest food to prevent going to waste.  The bugs were stirred up by a massive brush cutting and removal to clean things up in case the fire reaches our front door.  The smoke is, I believe, hovering between “hazardous” and “highly dangerous” levels.  I should probably be more concerned about this, but it smells like a permanent barbecue/campfire and dims the lights so that I get a solid afternoon nap.  There’s not as much work for us cooks because management wisely decided not to bring guests into the inferno.  But we just can’t stay out of the kitchen, making extra treats, ornate sauces, and, in my case, croissants.  I appreciate the orderliness and relative quiet of the kitchen (all the common spaces are full of underemployed staff).  Also, we all get to stay in the guest cabins to get out of the smoke.  Also also, the triennial melting of a glacial ice dam means the grounds are flooding up to four feet.  A raging river plus a wildfire!!!

Part II (8/28)

I was really getting into the 3-hour work days and long euchre game series when the fire got within two miles of camp.  Our managers coordinated a preemptive evacuation plan so that we could get the maximum number of vehicles and high-ticket items out in an organized fashion.  That time came Monday evening, and before I could quite wrap my head around it I was driving a friend’s car full of hastily thrown together possessions south to Seward.  I’m chagrined that, in the scramble, I only packed pre-sliced provolone and havarti; thankfully, a more collected coworker packed logs of goat cheese and a round of petit basque.

Aside from some emotional discomfort associated with abruptly leaving living quarters with your life shoved in a few bags, things have been pretty nice.  Sympathetic hotel managers have accommodated us and it feels like an awkwardly-executed but well-meant surprise weekend getaway.  Our lodge might burn to a crisp, but let’s eat Thai food and check out the aquarium!

Everything is touch and go but supposedly we head back tomorrow to close up shop and winterize camp.  In a weird and great season it just gets weirder and greater-er.

Where There’s Smoke

I should have taken this thirty minutes earlier, but it’s still pretty.

Bye hot Sam, I’ll miss pretend swing dancing with you.

There are so many distinct burning smells—right when nuts go a little too far in the oven; autumn leaf piles; the metallic tang of welding; a smoldering cigarette; a marshmallow that kamikazes from perfectly golden and gooey to a charred disaster.  From flying sparks spring raging tongues of flame.

The forest fire got worked up again.  There was a bit of smoke, the air took on that campfire scent, but we didn’t think much of it at first.  Summer is winding down and people are leaving already, so a round of salutatory fun has been initiated.  A group of us went out on the river one evening to drink a few beers, catcall a few bald eagles, pretend to be thrown around by the minimal rapids, and (lucky us!) coo at a baby brown bear.  This week also featured our all-staff backcountry camp out/ping pong tournament/fancy dress party.  Sure it was getting smokier, but we motored across sparkling Skilak Lake to revel for a night at our sister lodge.  I sported a purple floor-length satiny gown that was slit and ripped (not by me) to my upper thigh.  I watched my first full sunset of the summer, the pinks and purples intensified by the thickening haze.  Despite a week of crappy sleep and force-feeding myself handfuls of raw ginger to stave off a cold, I tapped into a current of energy and caroused until the wee smalls.

Far too soon, a knock came at my cabin door.  The wildfire that smoked us out all of July has reignited, jumped the river and highway, and highway was closed.  A van and car load of costumed, hungover, wallet-less people headed for the nearest town, where we...went to a brewery and chilled all afternoon to laugh over our fate.  I was one of the lucky few who had spare clothes, ID, and even camping gear as I’d planned to make a weekend of it.

We made it back this afternoon to an intense but as yet unscathed basecamp with friends bustling about in masks clearing brush, and eerie yellow-filtered light of smoke-choked sun.  Grasping for a sense of normalcy, I retreated to the kitchen.  My coworkers didn’t really need help but invited me to chop some veggies, and I decided to make the strawberry-rhubarb pie I’d been hemming and hawing over all summer.  If the garden goes up in flames tomorrow, I’d regret not having made it.