I'm A Sucker For A Pretty Tree

 You might have concluded that from all my posts that include pictures of trees,

 and pictures of things framed by trees.

Artificial trees

that hover over darling little play-pretties

and trees with snow-hooded artificial lights threaded throughout.

But I think my favorite Christmas tree so far this year is the floating tree I can see right out my north-facing window when I'm watching and waiting for my turn to finally see the ever-tauted Aurora Borealis.

Go And Tell My Friends That I Remember Them

Just in case they've forgotten me way up here.

I do have to say, though, that even at this time of year, the homesickness is bearable.  It must be the Alaska air.  Couldn't be that I'm old enough to have lived long enough to understand enough to know enough.  Could it?  Actually, tonight it is less bearable than it has been and I think it's because I broke down and decided to do some holiday cooking.  We're having a party at work tomorrow.  Since I've been here I haven't brought any of my mad culinary skills to light.  Have felt neither the need nor the desire. 

But I brought with me on my trip up here some of the jars of green tomato mince pie filling I canned in Utah where I could get all that fresh and hearty local produce.  I'm pretty sure my rustic pie will not be completely consumed at the dinner tomorrow because people just don't know good pie when its set before them.  Because it's not pumpkin.  Never mind that it has great Willard Montmorency dried cherries and Meyer lemons with zest and peel and Aunt Yvette's pears and apples and yes, even green tomatoes in it.  Freshly ground-from-whole spices.  Riverdale Gideon's honey and brown sugar.  Why, I think it's even better than homemade Amish apple butter and that's some statement coming from me.

(Remember, I said it was rustic.)

I bought a Tur-Duc-Ken, too, for the first time.  Hooo-eeee, but that was spendy!  I might even have to like it at that price, whether I want to or not.  We'll see.

It's not just the food, of course, that heightens the awareness of my being "all alone" up here in this frozen land.  (I have never heard such noisy snow, by the way.  Walking on it cancels out any other sound.  Driving on it sounds like the gears are grinding.  Is it because it's such cold snow?) 

The fact that I am all alone up here has at least a little to do with my flashing melancholy.  I miss Katy and Jon, probably the most...and the little kids in the family...and the big kids, too.  I miss my mom and my siblings and in-laws. Old friends. I miss the neuroses that burst upon the scene at this time.

Right.  I'm not really all alone.  I have friends.  I have invitations.  I have those interesting voices in my head.  I'm happy. 
It's Thanksgiving.

I Saw The Harbor Lights

On The Road To Glennallen...Or White Is A Color, Too!

It is now after 10 PM and I sit comfortably on the couch of a stranger's home. It's the B&B side of their duplex in Kenny Lake. She's a professional who works in this area where I have come to do some of my own "working." I'm on a work junket, I guess you could call it. It's the rural outreach part of my "Rural Outreach Coordinator" position.

Last night I left Talkeetna and Willow, stayed in Wasilla/Palmer and got on the road this morning bound for this area that I don't know what to call.  Maybe I'll call it "Almost Perfect" or "All This And Heaven, Too?"  Almost made Talkeetna seem passe'. 

I'm a happy little miss where I live in Anchorage, still discovering so many jewell-toned comforts and surprises. But when I found Talkeetna the other day, I had a deep desire to find a way to move up there and stay forever. It was dusk on Hallowe'en, downtown shops were staying open for trick-or-treaters, people of all ages, sizes and costumes were happily wondering down the streets, alleys and roadways--didn't see a lot of sidewalks. Snow was falling, and I found my way into the lodge I posted pictures of a couple of days ago--or was that yesterday?

I met people at Sunshine Clinic in--hmmmmm, was it Sunshine? They let me stay in the cottage up the hill that used to be the clinic proper.  It got scary after everyone went home and I was the only one staying in that dark, dark area...milling around the big two-bedroom cottage by myself...hearing sounds that I didn't think should be there, looking for but not seeing any neighbors.  More scary than living in my so-called "higher-crime" neighborhood of uptown Anchorage.

I met more people at the Upper Susitna Senior Activities weekly luncheon. And I met even more, more people in their homes along the way between Palmer, Wasilla, Willow and Talkeetna. And when I say met them in their homes, I don't necessarily mean by pulling up along the sidewalk and going up to the door, I mean by following directions like this; "Drive to mile 89.6, but it's not marked, but when you get to that lodge-pole-pine sign put on your brakes because you're going to turn immediately after the sign, drive down the road for the length of about 2 1/2 city blocks, turn left at the first tree..."  One family I met lived at the end of a dead end street named after them!

My job is to find people who might be in need of the low vision services we can offer, but who might not know a center like ours exists.  Then I can work with them.  I depend upon referrals from other people or from community health centers or from people I meet at the Alaskan Federation of Nations Arts and Crafts exhibit who also volunteer at food pantries or senior centers or native health centers.

Sometimes I just go out and beat the bush---EVERY SINGLE PUN INTENDED! (Because, remember, that's what they call remote areas around here--the bush.) 

Tomorrow early my new traveling companion and I will set out for Valdez to go talk to people in clinics, centers and homes in that area.  We'll spend most of the day there, come back to Kenny Lake and visit Gulkana, Gokana, Something Lakey Lake or Tazlina or Some Such Copper Something Creek or River.  I'll get it down when I'm more used to it.  My colleague told me today that they don't really call things by official names, anyway--some people say one thing, some people say something else.  As a matter of fact that's what someone told me about Sunshine, now that I think about it.  It's the Sunshine Clinic because the area around there is technically or officially or traditionally called Sunshine, but some people just call it the Y because of fork in the road.  The Y area.

I went 25 miles past my turn-off to Kenny Lake.  (I only know I missed my turn when the mile markers for Valdez were just too close and I found a roadside place to pull in to ask for directions. It was closed but there was a man working in a shed who gave me directions.  As I pulled away, a woman on the porch called after me, "BE SAFE!")

And then I happened upon this scene (below.)  When I pulled over--well, I didn't really pull over, I just stopped in the road because, let's face it, where does one pull over on such a slick, snowy road out in the middle of no where--I got out of my car to get a closer look at it.  I couldn't tell if it had just happened and someone might be inside or if it had been there a while.  I got closer and heard the bing-bing-bing sound cars make these days when you leave your keys in the ignition.  I couldn't see anyone inside but I saw an official state car pull up from a side road.  I walked over to them to ask if this accident had been reported or looked into and there was a woman sitting in the passenger seat of the state car.  She said, "That's mine and I'm all right." 

Still Finding Gold In Alaska

First snowfall this winter in Anchorage. It was the Sunday before Hallowe'en and people were already trick-or-treating downtown. I always like to take a walk on First-Snow Days.

 

I also like to take a drive on First-Snow Days.   Here's a view from Turnagain Arm.

I wonder if someone should tell these turkeys they might need a bigger house, since it's going to be the two of them, now.

This is the Day After First-Snow Day in Talkeetna at a cafe/lodge where I chose a warm molasses ginger cookie over a slice of Granny's potato chocolate cake for my Hallowe'en treat.

PURE D GOLD.

You Say Bushcraft, I Say Splendid!

Before I came North, (yes, with a capital "N,") I went in search of blogs about living in Alaska.  I found quite a few and my favorites were about "living off the grid," and various other wilderness survival posts.  (Where was all this blogging about lashing your own snowshoes when I was doing that kind of thing back in the day?  Don't you dare make a comment about how long ago that was!) That search led me to two of my favorite blogs to look in on, and oddly enough, neither one of them is about Alaska. 

One is written by a wizard (I hope he doesn't mind my using that epithet to describe him) honing out a wilderness life in Seoul, Korea.  Well, if you know much about me, you know how this just carved it's way into my heart and psyche.  Manta was a mere college boy at the time I was falling in love with his country.  (They told me back then that living in Seoul would be like camping out in New York City.  I don't really know what that means, but it certainly was a huge adventure.)I know he was studying very hard, because getting into college in Seoul has never been easy, I think.  And he's a literature instructor or professor or teacher--not sure which--but if it's literature, it's smart.  I could be a bit biased about that, but not much.  This is one of my favorite posts of his, but check them all out--you won't be sorry.  He can turn anything into something better!

http://manta-bushcraft.blogspot.com/2011/07/private-natural-bathtub.html

The other place I love to visit is Buzzard's place.  Across the pond.  He mentioned something about Ulster in one of his posts--so you know what that did to me, too.  I don't know what a welig is, but I think I like weligs because of his post about basket-weaving.  He has a lot of other good stories and wonderful pictures of enjoying and employing the natural world, including, but not limited to worms in cod fish, diving gannets, snow-laden Lord Conway's limes, berries on bushes becoming berry jam in jars, among a myriad of other delights.

http://buzzardbushcraft.blogspot.com/2011/09/bolt-from-blue.html

Manta and Buzzard, I hope you don't mind that I am linking to your sites.  I can't even get permission from you because for some stupid reason, I have been unable to comment on your blogs.  I can't figure out why, because I used to be able to.  Maybe some day soon I will get someone more savvy than myself to help me with that problem.  In the meantime, I keep looking for your latest posts, savoring each word and image, sorry that I can't post comments about them..  I'm also going to post links to facebook, hoping you don't mind.

These are qayaks made at the Alaska Native Heritage Center.  I might have to do another post about this.  In the meantime, I wanted to include a picture of "bush crafting" without taking it off someone else's blog.  This is a picture from my own camera.

Of Moose And Bears And A Little Chapel In The Chugach

Isn't this cute?

I really want to take a walk up the hill and take some up-close pictures of this little charmer. I've even been given permission to go into the church offices down in the valley and retrieve the keys to get into the chapel from off the wall behind the door if no one is around to give them to me. The trail head that begins next to the wee cemetary looks oh-so-inviting. But look at this landscape. There could be bears! Or worse, MOOSE!

Well, actually there are moose in those hills. St. John's Cathedral and school and retreat and personal homes in this Antiochian Orthodox community are nestled neatly and sweetly down and around a peaceful country lane in Eagle River. And I've been told stories of moose clip-clopping along that same country lane. I didn't know until I moved here that I should be so cautious of moose. Even the bears steer clear of them.

There could very easily be bears in them thar hills, too. If they're not nosing around in some apartment building laundry room in Anchorage. (Yes, I know the woman who lives there--right off Muldoon.) Heard on the radio they had to herd a bear out of the grocery store produce department in Ketchikan just the other day. That's not Anchorage, of course, but still. Even in this city of more than 260,000 human residents, the wild animals often come to town for a visit.

They've told me at work that it's a legitimate reason to be late or even not show up to work if a moose ever gets in my way.   And that includes getting out of the car right there at work, because they have been known to lumber around in our parking lot.  A man I know who is blind was walking along the sidewalk looking for the bus stop and turned over his shoulder to ask the person a little further behind him if the bus stop was nearby. The stranger didn't answer him, so he just turned around to continue walking when people from across the street called out to him that a moose was following him! Stranger, indeed!  I blame his mom for not teaching him about the danger of talking to moose!

And then another man I know with very poor vision thought he was talking to his mailman out in his yard one dark, snowy winter day. Couldn't figure out why the mailman was traipsing through the trees in his yard instead of using the cleared-off sidewalk, until his neighbor clued him in on the visitor.

I've only ever seen moose on the loose from a car--once one was crossing the street from the mall to the filling station. There was that time many years ago when my friend and I went camping in South Fork of Ogden Canyon--last minute decision one early fall and we didn't have a tent. We were the ONLY ONES in the whole area. That was in the day when they didn't close off all the roads before summer was even over like they do now. We layed out our sleeping bags close to the car and also, unexplainedly, close to the garbage can. We must have thought it would provide a bit of extra protection. Not asleep, but with my head zipped into the bag, I lay listening to my friend snoozing away and then I heard movement from across the trail. It got closer and closer and I got more and more still. Tried to still my breathing, as a matter of fact. Whatever it was nuzzled and bumped my knees! I kid you not. It snorted and huffed and then I thought it growled. Rustled around the empty, tinny-sounding garbage can and left. I didn't move for hours! I still don't know what it was. Big. It was big.  Bear? Moose? Boose?

I told a friend I didn't want to do  much hiking these days because I don't have bear spray, but she said she has a couple so she can give me one of hers.  You never know where you might bump into an unsuspecting, easily-alarmed and therefore, dangerous boose.