Inktrails from Alaska

Fire: The Good News and the Bad News

The bad news first. The Boundary fire is now 3 miles from Chena Hot Springs Resort, which is at the end of the road on which I live. The good news is that the resort is 60 miles away from us!

On KFAR 660 AM they announced that there was a "stand by to evacuate" order for my neighborhood. I got on the phone and talked to two humans at two different fire departments. The first one said, "Yes, there is an order, you should be getting ready to leave, but call this number 356-xxxx for more details." So I called that number and was told there was NOT a stand by to evacuate order. And they were the ones who said that the fire had nearly reached the resort. The man I talked to also said that if the fire starts burning down the Chena Highway (otherwise known as Chena Hot Springs Road, which is the road I live on) then we will have to evacuate most likely. So, he said, it wouldn't hurt to start getting ready, because evacuation could happen, if it is going to, in about 72 hours or so.

The neighborhood telegraph is up and running. We are calling each other and sharing information. Taking care of each other. No matter what happens, I think we are all going to be okay.

The other bad news is that even though we are near to having 24 hours of sunlight, it's getting DARK outside.

I've gotten together a few things just in case, and have stuff already loaded in the truck.

I still don't think we'll have to leave. But we'll see.

Alaska Burning

Last night there was ash falling everywhere. There are fifty-five forest fires burning in Alaska right now. Thank goodness Alaska is so big (you can fit more than TWO Texases in here) or it would be just a cindery crisp. As it is, there's lots and lots of Alaska left.

I've heard that the closest fire is either 25 miles or 40 miles from my cabin. There is no fire protection in my area, so if it comes by here our only option is to RUN! My gut-level feeling is that it will be fine, that we aren’t going to have to evacuate, but the creepy End-of-the-World bilious yellow sky last night did bring that thought to mind. The flat, orange ball that was the sun (while it was visible at all) yesterday didn’t seem encouraging.

On the radio I heard that near Birch Lake the moose are coming out of the woods and hanging out on the roads, as they are trying to find clearings where they can both see and breathe.

Children, the elderly, and folks with respiratory problems (like me with asthma) are supposed to shut all the windows and stay home. Luckily my place has an air-exchange system, which means I can do that. It’s over 80° in here, but I can deal with that if I can breathe.

When I went to work yesterday, the old, leaky building where I teach was full of smoke. A storm a few weeks ago took out a window in the room I use, and it has plastic over it now, just stapled into place. This old house, that is now a music store, is at least sixty years old and as creaky and crooked as they come. The door doesn’t close to my room because the doorframe is so deformed from years of settling. All the windows are rather a formality, being that they rattle in their frames so loosely that the wind blows freely and cheerfully through the edges. So when I came to work yesterday and saw, in a 12 x 15 room, smoke hanging in the air, I wasn’t surprised.

It’s so thick out there that it’s like very dirty fog. Particulate levels are off the charts. I saw some breeze at the tops of the trees (the few trees I can actually see, these are the ones right by the house) but it has stopped. Reports are that the Steese Highway is closed, which is my way into Fairbanks, but they also say it has been open and closed and open and closed, all depending on what the fire is doing at the moment.

The fire closest to my home is the Boundary Fire.

The only way for me to know if I can get into town is go to and see. I’m betting I can.

Winds are supposed to become gusty today, up to 30mph, which I hope will blow AWAY from my area.

I’ll keep you posted.

Water Sports

It's been extremely hot here. Not as bad as 90-squared, but it's been 90 plus 60% humidity, which is bad enough for me. Makes you just want to lie down. Turns your spine into rubber. Just walking across the room to get a glass of water brings on a sweat and you have to go lie down again. Then the mattress on the bed gathers all the heat and starts par-boiling you from underneath. Suddenly you know that if you don't get up you are going to be cooked to death.

We got the great idea to go out to Olnes Pond last Tuesday. Take the dogs, go swimming! Picnic on fancy schmancy sandwiches from Alaska Coffee Roasters! Play a little music, relax and cool off!

I have to take a side-track here, and tell you about the Amazing Stevie the Wonder Dog. If you have been a reader of this blog for a while, you will know that sometime back in April he was diagnosed with chondrosarcoma, that is, cancer of the cartilage. Stevie had this in his sinus cavities and was giving one to six months to live. We didn't think he'd live more than two months, as he was bleeding from the nose a lot, having a terrible time breathing and was in so much pain that at one point I was giving him morphine every day for a week. I thought the time was coming soon that he'd have to make that final trip to the vet hospital. I cried a lot. Stevie is at least 16, but looks and acts like a much younger dog. We did tests, all his organs were functioning perfectly. I know he has to die of something, someday, but this seems like a particularly nasty way to go.

While I was house-sitting for a friend in town, Stevie had a terrible episode of nose bleeding, and he literally blew out disgusting tissue from his nose for three days. It was horrifying. But after that he recovered, stopped needing pain medication, and has gradually gotten better. And when I say better, I mean BETTER, 100% bouncy dog better. No trouble breathing at all. No nose bagpipe rehearsals when he tries to sleep. No choking, no gagging, nothing but healthy dog! He plays, he runs, he's great! He's still a little weak in the hindquarters, but that's to be expected at his age. He's been all better since May. Is it just remission, or is he cured? I don't know, but I'm very happy about it. When my boyfriend suggested we take him and Sofie to Olnes Pond, I had no problem with it.

So we did exactly that, and even took our bathing suits just in case there were other people there. The dogs rode behind the seats of my little extendo-cab Nissan truck, panting all the way and as we drove a stream of dog hair marked our passage.

Upon arrival it was easy to see that there would be no skinny-dipping today. It wasn't crowded, but there were enough people around that someone might be blinded if I bared my winter-white-Celtic body. Just my legs showing under my shorts were causing people to slap sunglasses on and shoo small children back into their RVs. So I put on my neon-yellow one-piece bathing suit. Why I thought that would be an improvement I have no idea.

Putting Sofia on a 50-foot rope, and cutting Stevie (Doberman/Rottweiler) loose, we all stepped into the water.

AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH.

Sofie was running back and forth, plishy plashing with her feet. Stevie was following along with her, not going in too far. But after a few minutes, he waded in to his belly.

Rottweilers don't like water. Stevie, when he lived in New Mexico, was legendary in his hatred of water. If I opened the door for him to go outside, and it was raining or wet, he'd walk backward rather than go out there. And cross his doggy legs. He wouldn't mess in the house, but he also wouldn't go outside in the wet, either.

Since coming to Alaska Stevie has decided that snow is pretty fun, and he will go outside in the rain, too. Perhaps being friends with another dog (who was more of an outside dog) helped him decide these things. But it certainly was a different behavior from a dog you could herd with a squirt gun.

At the pond I decided to go for a swim and headed out, slowly breast-stroking my way. At a shout from my boyfriend I looked back, and sure enough, there was Stevie, following me, all four legs flashing under the water. When he reached me he looked at me wide-eyed and turned around, looked at me again as if to say, "You stupid human, what are you DOING out there? You force me to save you!"

So we both swam back to shore. I never thought I'd see Stevie swim!

Then, to top it off, he found a large log and towed it back to shore. We tossed it in the water. He swam out to it and towed it back to shore.

Hmmmmm.

Never in my life have I ever seen Stevie look so Labbie-like. Because he has red-doberman coloring, people would often say "Oh, he's lab and what else?" But he's NOT. I SWEAR! He's doberman and rottweiler! He's a hard-wired watch dog, all his behaviour has always been exactly that.

Except here he was, jumping into the water and retrieving. True, he didn't really bring things back to us so much as to try to drag them back to the truck to pile them there, like he wanted to take them all home. This looked pretty funny, Stevie walking along with a big, old, wet, mushy log by one end, slowly but surely heading back to the truck. Apparently he likes his new toys.

We spent about three hours in the water and got cooled off and had a great time.

Yesterday we went out to Chatanika and took the dogs, the goal to hang around one of the little ponds there, let the dogs swim, draw, cool off, relax. Now that Stevie swims, we thought he'd have a great time.

It was a long walk over lots of rock. Hot rocks. We passed the gold dredge and kept on going. Heat was radiating up from the rocks, the dogs were panting like locomotives. I was beginning to worry about Stevie gettinig heat stroke. We kept walking. We came to a low spot where he could get a drink from a somewhat scummy pond, but he wasn't interested. We kept going.

Finally we found a nice, shady spot under some birches next to pond. These ponds were created by the dredge going through, and all the rocks I've spoken of were pulled up by the dredge buckets.

Close to our spot there was a small corner to the pond and it was filled with old boards and algae. I didn't want the dogs to swim in there, because the thought of wet, stinky dogs all the way home wasn't a good one.

We kept Sofia on a long lead again, (it was like holding onto a fishing rod with a big fish on the line), and let Stevie go loose. He toodled around, we lay in the shade and went "Ahhhh." It was idyllic.

Then Stevie jumped into the pond. Okay, we thought, he LIKES swimming. He swam back and forth for a minute, then headed straight to the boards that were in the corner. He grabbed hold of one and started paddling furiously. Obviously he wanted to repeat his play with the log, just like he did the other day. One there was one problem. This board was stuck, it wasn't moving at all.

He paddled harder. He gripped the board with his teeth and tried to pull it free. The board was stuck fast, and Stevie's hind end was starting to go down. I could see the whites of his eyes. He didn't know what to do. If he let go, he'd drown.

"What do we do? I can't swim!" says my boyfriend.

"I can!" I said and I jumped into the pond, knowing full well how dangerous this rescue action could be. Stevie was in a panic, we could both drown.

I swam the eight feet out to him and while treading water, grabbed his collar. He let go of the board and immediately sank completely underwater. Praying that he'd hold his breath, I grabbed him and hauled him to the surface. He was breathing! Then I grabbed onto the board myself, praying that if a 75-lb dog couldn't budge it, that neither could his master.

It held, and I held Stevie, who hooked his feet over the board, too. We rested for just a couple seconds, and then he got his hind quarters back up under him and I shoved him toward the bank, yelling for my guy to grab him. He did, and Stevie made it up onto shore. Then I needed to be pulled up myself, and was likewise hauled up the bank.

I realize now that it was semi-miraculous that I was able to grab Stevie when he was underwater, without going underwater myself. I knew at the time, though, that we were both lucky not to have drowned.

Even people panic when drowning, and sometimes drown their would-be rescuers. Stevie is a dog, and couldn't be grabbed in a regulation hold to keep his head above water. I had to improvise. If that board had given way, we'd have drowned. If I'd gone underwater, Stevie would have pulled me down.

My boyfriend said he was very much afraid that he was going to see both of us go down and not come up. It was a close one.

And yet, I saved Stevie! I'm so glad! I had to go back to the Chatanika Lodge and eat a second lunch because I was famished afterward.

The moral of the story is: Stevie remembers. If you take Stevie swimming, (his new favorite activity), be sure you don't do it where he tries to find his own toys!

The Physics of Cats and Dogs

I swear that Sofia, the husky/coyote cross, is defying the laws of physics.

Animals often defy the laws of physics. Anyone with a cat can verify this easily.

You are sleeping, all warm and cozy, relaxed and comfortable. And in the middle of the night you start dreaming that someone has lowered a safe, or perhaps a Steinway onto your chest. You can't breathe, your mouth is opening and closing like a carp but the Steinway on your chest (or maybe it's a Buick? is there an engine running?) continues to crush your lungs, breathing is impossible and you wake up suddenly, gasping and find you still can't breathe! The engine noise is louder now, and as you gasp your way to consciousness you realize that it's not a Buick, it's your 8-lb. cat sitting on your chest, purring his brains out. Somehow, through a special cat manipulation of physics, he has changed his mass, multiplying it at least ten times. Given time, a cat could probably become his own black hole.

You push the cat off your chest, and breathe for ten minutes to recover your brain cells. Then, exhausted, you drop back to sleep.

Not to be discouraged, the cat stealthily returns, this time treading on you with tiny little feet that are so heavy that they threaten to go straight through your body, poking holes in you as if you were the Pillsbury Dough Boy. This, of course, wakes you up and you happily throw the cat across the room, and go back to sleep.

There is a reason there is a song entitled, "The Cat Came Back." If you recall, the cat came back even after a nuclear holocaust. Your cat is no different. Being tossed across the room isn't going to hurt his feelings in the least.

You roll over in your sleep and find your bed has suddenly become shorter. You can't stretch out your legs all the way. There is a boulder on the bed right by your feet, apparently.

At this point most people just give up and sleep curled into the fetal position.

Many years ago I was at a party on the second floor of a house. A woman there had brought her dog, and this dog was used to jumping out the window to get into his back yard. After we had been yakking it up and listening to records (I told you it was a long time ago, CDs hadn't been invented) the dog decided, on his own, that it was time to go outside. He turned, leapt on the the couch and jumped through a closed window!

The window broke, and then the most amazing things happened in just a split second of time. It was one of those accidental events where time seemed to slow down. The dog, with a surprised look on his face, looked down, and saw that he was rather far from the ground! Then, in mid-air changed his trajectory with nothing to push on in order to change it, and jumped back into the house!

It's impossible. You can't jump in the air going one direction, and suddenly change direction with nothing but air all around you. You can't do that. But I saw this dog do just that.

We all sat there with our mouths open. Everyone knew right away that we'd just seen a dog do something impossible. He'd broken the window, he'd had enough velocity to do that, he was definitely headed out and down, and yet somehow he reversed his direction.

A more common dog impossibility is my Sofia dog, who is a coyote/husky cross. She's a skinny little thing, and yet she has whole HERDS of dogs hidden under that thin coat. She has covered my car, my house, my clothes, my work space, absolutely everything, maybe the planet if I let her, with dog hair.

She sheds once a year, and doesn't shed during the cold weather. The thing is, she's a 45 lb. dog that is somehow carrying secret loads of fur that could fill the biggest dump truck on earth. I could brush her for a week and besides having a sore arm and having to buy more brushes, I still would be getting a St. Bernard off of her every fifteen minutes.

You'd think she was your typical sled dog, husky, Samoyed, Mackenzie River dog or something. But she's not! She's just a really skinny little coyote dog! She doesn't have huge clumps of fur hanging off her. Just small little tufts here and there. You pet her and you can feel her ribs. You can SEE her ribs, for heaven sakes.

Sofia's underfur is like the stream of scarves that magician's pull out of their sleeves, hats, coats, noses, etc. Only her stream of fur appears to be endless. It collects in all the corners, against every wall, and every hard surface in rolls. I'm going to get me some knitting needles and knit me a poodle. Several poodles. Maybe an Irish Wolfhound.

How to Dress Alaskan

This could be a short article. The answer is Carhartt. Carhartt, Carharrt, Carhartt. Alaskan men think women look sexy in Carhartt pants. Trust me on this. I can't emphasize this enough. Men look sexy in Carhartt pants, overalls, jackets, you name it. It's just the way it is.

Brown duck, double knee, riveted Carhartts. With pockets for your tools. Not fancy teal one-layer Carhartts. Heavy duty lined and padded Carhartts in the winter, with zippers up the side of the legs. Oooo baby! Or padded coveralls, all brown duck. Carhartt jackets, long in the winter, short in the summer.

I suppose we could branch out from just Carhartts. Levis are acceptable, but won't repel bear claws like Carhartts will. They also won't stand up in the corner by themselves the way Carhartts will, especially after your man has been wearing the same pair for a couple of weeks. Still, you need to know what NOT to wear as much as what to wear (Carhartts, did you get that?).

For one thing, real Alaskans don't wear Tourist Gear. That is, stuff that has "I (Heart) Alaska" all over it. That has ALASKA written on it right across the boobs (with little bears in between the letters). No T-shirts with "Alaska MOOSE" on them. No Alaska hats, socks, key chains, and no moose nugget earrings. Definitely no jackets with "I Survived the Alaska Highway" on them.

One day, while checking out the Mall (the Transfer Station, aka the dump station) I found a very nice, practically new, dark green sweatshirt with the words A L A S K A printed right across the chest. There were little diamonds between the letters. I was rather repelled by the tourist nature of the design, but the color was great and it looked nice and clean and warm and so I thought, why not? I brought it home and wore it to work the next day.

FIVE TIMES that day people asked me, "So, how long have you been up here?" Until then, everyone just assumed I'd lived here forever. I almost outed myself just by wearing that stupid sweatshirt!

I took that sweatshirt right back to the Mall and left it there for someone newer to find. Or maybe I should have just worn it inside out.

Your new boss from St. Louis might not like the fact that everyone in the office looks like they just came from a logging camp, but he's going to have to get used to it. That's just Alaska.

Fancy restaurants? Dream on! If they don't let you in with mosquitoes stuck in your hair, they won't have any customers!

All winter I wear Carhartt pants (especially the lined ones!), logger boots, (or Bunny Boots) layers of shirts, and either a Carhartt jacket or a parka. And a hat. You gotta remember to wear a hat.

In the summer it's tennis shoes, jeans or Carhartts, T-shirts or Hawaiian shirts, (or other thrift store finds), and a baseball hat. The hats keep my head warm in the winter and the mosquitoes out of my hair in the summer. When it is really hot I wear a sleeveless dress and sandals, but I keep a plaid shirt and tennis shoes around in case I need to go where the mosquitoes will eat my feet and arms.

I know native-born Alaskans who live in town who wear "city" clothes. But they always wear a hat, anyway. Even if you don't wear it all the time, you are going to need a hat.

If you are a city teenager, you dress like a teenager except your belly sticks out over your hip huggers.

People who work in some offices have their rubber boots in their trucks. Most Alaskans drive 4 x 4 trucks. We don't drive SUVs just to look cooler than the other soccer moms. We NEED 4WD. We haul bales of straw for the dog houses (and so many other things!!), we have to go up muddy, icy slopes just to pick someone up, or visit someone, or, some of us, to go home! So you slog out to your vehicle in rubber boots or bunny boots and when you get to work you change into your stupid high heels or flats or wing tips. Just so your boss, who just got transferred here from Omaha, won't freak out that you are walking around the office in your socks.

I'm not going to go into the various sorts of long underwear and all that. You can figure that out for yourself. We are talking about the outside layers, what people see, not your undies.

You may want to move up here and continue to live in a city, you may think you can pretend that you are still in Lima, Ohio, or Pleasant Hill, California, but the fact is you are NOT, and the first time you open your door with a bare hand at 45 below zero you will realize this. Which reminds me, you gotta have gloves in the winter to keep your hands warm, mittens for snowmachining, and work gloves for heaving stuff into the pickup in the summer--also known as Construction Season.

Mother Nature is in charge in Alaska and don't you forget it! Is there a moose or bear in your front yard? Get used to it, you are living in THEIR territory, not the other way around. The best outer defense against the rough nature of the Alaskan environment is....................................Carhartts.

But then, you knew I was going to say that, didn't you?

Turnaround Again

If you have been reading this blog, you will know that I have had everything except my job and my health fall apart within the last 2 1/2 months. Here is an update on how things are going. I'd like to write something more literary, but some writing is better than none, and I know some of you are wondering what's up.

Here's a basic run-down. Toyota Truck to Nissan Truck Toyota truck ruined by crooked mechanics, and major obstacles in the way of getting a new vehicle. However, all adversity was overcome and I was finally able to get another, similar-but-not-nearly-as-good Nissan pickup. (I need a topper for it, if you have one to sell let me know.)

Waterless cabin to Primo Duplex Cabin. I moved approximately fifty miles, to anoother rural side of Fairbanks into the best place I've ever lived! I went from sharing a waterless cabin without any possibility of unpacking all the way, to having a room for my office, a bedroom and a guest bedroom! And full water, bathroom, etc. No more outhouse!

Stevie Dying to Stevie Healthy! Stevie has gone into remission! He had a terrible bloody three days about two months ago, and ever since then he's been breathing just fine, no bloody noses, no pain, no problems! You would never know that we have a biopsy that says he has cancer. He's playing and bouncing around and being his same old self! Let's hope it lasts a good long while!

Grumpy, Erratic Boyfriend to Fun, Loving Boyfriend. Hey, can't beat that! What a difference! Happy happy joy joy! There's a saying in Alaska: You don't lose your woman, you just lose your turn. Yep, I'd say so!

Work keeps expanding (with some contraction: people take time off for the summer, so I lose some students) what with being asked to work with the Fairbanks Light Opera Theater, the Downtown Association, getting my band the Tanana Highlanders going... it's a lot of stuff and I'm extremely busy!

The Midnight Sun Intertribal Pow Wow is coming up July 3, 4, 5 and I'm involved in that, as well. All good stuff!

Home!

Remember this: if Memorial Day falls near the end of the month, and you have to move that month, give up. You are never going to find any friends available to help! They all have better things to do. Such as ferry family members around town, drink beer and eat hamburgers. And avoid doing heavy lifting.

I should qualify that: some friends heroically helped me empty my storage space out, so I got at least that much done! And another friend helped me with a couple of loads from the cabin, and we moved the big TV but no other large items.

My truck is getting almost 20 mpg which is a good thing, since I've put several hundred miles on it since starting this move. The dogs are starting to glare at me when I ask them, in a very happy, perky tone of voice, "Do you want to go for a RIDE in the TRUCK?"

The first time I brought Sofia back to the old cabin, where Kittymaomao lives, he ran out to greet not me, but her! And ran next to her (and back and forth and under and around and around) all the way up the trail to the house.

My new place is spacious, beautiful, and I can FINALLY unpack! It has enough room for all my stuff (which isn't that much) and I no longer have to pay for that storage space for things that didn't fit in the cabin. Not to mention that it has all the amenities that the other cabin lacked, such as running water! Wheee!

Still, in spite of lots of rain (and all open vehicles) and the 40 miles in between the two cabins, I have enough clothes and stuff to get along until I can round up more folks to really do the move NEXT weekend. You WILL be there, right? We can have a barbeque afterward and then a jam. Come on, it'll be FUN! (We only have to carry that computer desk up a few stairs.)