I get all kinds of big ideas. I tell myself to keep up on this blog as a record of what I’m doing in my life, but then everything seems too mundane to write about or else I’m so deep in the middle of it that I forget. Or it could be I’m in places without internet to upload anything. So what I do upload is usually to Instagram because then my mom will see what I’m up to.
I started this post on July 13, a week and a half into an adventure driving bus for fire crews. Then I got stalled due to lack of internet and mental bandwidth. I know, not the best reasons, but life has a way of flowing on.
This post started life as a photo dump with planned captions. I will just add to it. Enjoy!
Late June there was a lot of smoke in the air, first from a wildfire down near Delta Junction (100 miles south of Fairbanks) then from fires much closer. The Minto Lakes fire got started northwest of Fairbanks and was working its way up along the Chatanika River. Transportation was needed to get fire crews out to where their work was. A friend of a friend knew a guy who needed drivers. He has a fleet of buses that he supplies to the Forestry department, but they can’t go out without drivers. I had the qualifications and the ability to say yes to the opportunity. The first crew assigned to me spent time on structure assessment, then one evening got the call to respond to a different fire. There were plenty of dry thunderstorms to spark off more spot fires. This one was not easily accessible, so once we arrived as close as the bus could get we had to wait for logistics to work out how to get them there. This photo was taken at 2am, when the crew finally bedded down to get some rest. The next morning a helicopter came to fly them to where they could work the fire. The thunderstorms didn’t stay completely dry. We had some good, thick, wet clouds come up. Later that day there was a big, heavy storm that blew over a few trees and soaked the crews. I missed it because I was on another adventure, delivering a second crew to the spot fire.The first crew I took got in by helicopter. The second crew were able to access the fire from the far side of the Fort Knox gold mine. We drove 10 miles through to get them to where they needed to be. That haul truck is so big that we drove in a single wheel track. What is a four lane road to normal traffic is a two lane road to them. It was a pretty cool experience. My accommodations weren’t fancy, but I was comfortable enough. In the morning I would fold up and stow my bedding and the crew could fill the cargo cage with their gear. I never had to worry about getting rained on.This was the main campfire at the drop point where I was stationed. Most crews had their own sites, but this one served the smaller groups like the dozer crews, medics, and single fire trucks. I love the way they set up this firepit. It made it easy for multiple people to cook their dinners at the same time, and there was almost always a pot of hot water available. Skip forward a month into August. Sunset rainbows are awesome. I wanted to make a joke about how there probably is gold at the end of this rainbow if you are willing to do the work, but then I realized that isn’t a joke. It is a simple truth. Back to the regular job… This is a taste of the good life. The last Saturday before we welcomed guests we had a staff only sunset cruise in the Haglund. We bumped our way up the fire break to the top of the ridge in this beast. There we had smores, beverages, and good conversations while the sky lit up. A wind storm made trail maintenance necessary. It was a great reason to go out and make sure that nothing would get in the way of guest adventures. Fortunately there was only one tree across the trail. I do love watching the sky up here. Sunsets are the best. This was just a couple of days ago. Staff did another after hours ride along the trails. Look at that fall color! Enjoy it while it lasts because the snow is only a few weeks away. Riding along the pipeline you don’t want to be overheight to make the turn. This was today. I should have been able to finish the quilting on this one this morning, but I managed to break my last two needles. Such aggravation! I’m determined to finish both this and the green version before the end of the year.
That brings me up to date for now. There’s a lot that I might have missed, but I tend to live in the present so I probably won’t go back unless I get a good enough reason to.
I’ve started another notebook journal (again) and I’m hoping it will help me develop some ideas that make it out of the notebook and onto the website. So hopefully that means more content for people to enjoy and interact with.
Most places already have spring. Up here in Fairbanks we kinda skip spring and go straight from snow into summer. No, that’s not quite right…let me explain the seasons of interior Alaska.
Summer is green and bright.
You have Summer. That one is pretty easy to recognize because there’s no snow on the ground and even though the sun does set the sky never gets dark. Summer runs from around Memorial Day through mid August. The first night it gets dark enough to see the stars is August 14th or thereabouts.
The first dusting. Winter takes hold.
Then there’s Fall. This goes from late August until there’s snow on the ground. I have been told that the latest date on record for snow was October 19. Last year we got our first good dusting on September 19 and our first 6 inches on the following weekend. It was just in time for the wedding that rented out the entire property up at Basecamp. Those must have been gorgeous photos with the golden birch trees in the snow.
Noon at the solstice. Watching the aurora is the best part of dark winter.
Snow means Winter. Winter means darkness. Well, at least for the first five months or so. The darkest part of dark winter is the winter solstice. Here in Fairbanks that means that the sun doesn’t rise until around 11am and sets at about 2:40pm. Even though the sun is only above the horizon for 3.5 hours though, there is over an hour of pre-dawn light and twilight, which gives us around 6 hours where the sky isn’t totally dark. Every minute of that time has color in the sky. I love it!
Sunset and snow means gorgeous color in the sky.
Light winter kicks in around Valentine’s day. That’s when you suddenly realize that it isn’t dark before dinner time and you might leave the house with the sunrise. It’s a great relief, but it also signals time to find your sunglasses. The sunlight reflected off of all that snow gets pretty bright.
Light winter gets bright. At least the roads start clearing up.
That brings us to Breakup. Our version of spring. The roads are finally clear of ice. Mostly. The ones that aren’t yet clear are either slushy or polished shiny as glass. You have to be careful driving still. The snowbanks get plowed one more time to push them off the shoulders of the road so that meltwater doesn’t run across the road and turn to ice overnight. Parking lots are getting scraped clear and the thick chunks of ice are piled up to the side to melt. People bet on when the river ice will break up and move. Really! Look up the Nenana Ice Classic. I think it’s too late to buy in though. Pretty soon the creek will start to thaw out also. It’s a great time of year.
Soon. It’s getting warm enough that we’ll see this soon.
Spring? Yeah, I guess we get that too. The trees green up and the birds and squirrels get more active. Locals don’t talk about Spring though. It’s Breakup and Mud season. That’s because the ground thaws more slowly than the snow and the water doesn’t drain away very quickly. It takes until June to be fully out of Mud season and by then we are firmly into summer.
AK Tuff boots are a favorite for good reason.
That’s the year up here. Was that clear enough? Clear as mud, right? That’s okay. The seasons, like so much else up here, are hard to wrap your head around until you experience them. It’s worth the visit.
It has been two months exactly since my last post. I never mean to go that long between posts, but life is kinda weird. Either I feel like it would be just another weather report or things are so crazy that I have no energy to put words together at the end of the day. Ideally I would get into the habit of a weekly or even a daily post. We’ll see if I get there.
So the first thing on my list is that I want to acknowledge what should have been. I had a FB memory pop up this morning.
Today is what should have been my 27th anniversary, but this year will mark 10 years that he has been gone. I keep wondering what George would think about this crazy adventure we’re on. If he was here we would have made a lot more progress, that’s for sure! He had more energy than any ten other people I know. But I don’t know if he ever would have been on board with coming to Alaska. The month he spent on a longliner ruined his opinion of the frozen north. At one point he swore he would never come up here even for a summer vacation trip. Maybe that’s part of why I like it up here. It’s my adventure. I’m living my dream, not his. I certainly don’t feel the weight of dates so much anymore.
Here’s my annual reminder for everyone. Life is finite. When they put up a tombstone they put two dates and a dash in between. Everything you are and everything you will do is contained within that dash. Make the most of it. Tomorrow is not guaranteed, so make sure you live today. Find adventures small and large. Work to live, but don’t forget to live. Make that phone call, give hugs, share smiles, have no regrets. Second chances are few and far between.
Sunsets are the best! Try to zoom in and find the mountain silhouette in the background. Last night’s midnight bathroom run was above average.
Now for the adventure!
December rolled along mostly smoothly. It was cold. There was snow but it was thin enough that people were worried about their septic systems freezing up. About the only thing I remember was that on Solstice day I could hardly keep my eyes off of the sky. It was gorgeous all day!
January has been the month of crazy. We had a day where it got ridiculously warm and poured rain on top of ice roads. Then the temperature dropped and we got nearly 2 feet of snow. That all got packed into a thick layer of ice on the roads that they’re still trying to scrape off. It is not fun to drive on!
Then we had some mechanical issues to work through. The alternator on my truck died and we had to drive home on just battery power. They lasted just long enough to get us into the driveway, but the lights got dimmer and dimmer as we went. Talk about nerve-wracking! No moose were struck and we made it in one piece. Thank you God! That night the temperature dropped to -40° again and stayed in that range for nearly the next two weeks. Even though we had a replacement alternator in the back seat, there’s no way anyone wants to touch tools at that cold. The metal will burn you. Trust me. We needed to figure out how to get it to a heated shop. In the meantime we made arrangements for riding to work with our friends across the creek.
Now if having the truck go down wasn’t enough fun, when we got home from work on Sunday it was to discover that our brand new generator had gone out. At first we thought it was just out of fuel, and maybe needed some time in a warm place. No. It started sucking oil through that rubber breather tube into the carburetor. Nothing anyone did could make it stop happening. It simply wouldn’t run longer than a couple of hours before the carb was too fouled to run. The generator it replaced had quit due to a suspected electrical problem. It would give an overload warning even without things being plugged in. To top it off, our friends started having generator struggles as well. Cold may have been a factor, but not completely. We ended up moving in with them for a week until some of this could be resolved. Our RV was frozen in the meantime. Even the propane stopped flowing. Sometimes you give in for a little while and do the minimum for survival. That includes getting a couple nights of good sleep without shivering.
When things got better they did so almost all at once. The weather warmed up to zero. The old generator let itself run again. (It’s still going. The new one went to get fixed by professionals.) Being indoors and warm may have helped. The truck batteries got warmed and charged. And finally, we made arrangements to bring the truck to a church friend who has a heated shop that is much closer than the only other option we could think of. The story of how it got there is the best part.
My son and my friend’s daughter teamed up to get the truck running. First they had to convince the generator to run long enough to warm the oil pan and engine block so it could start. They put in the batteries and hoped for the best. It fired up and the clock started ticking…
The shop is about 16 miles away. They only got halfway there before the batteries gave out and the truck died on the side of the highway. Ironically, it was right next to the NAPA in North Pole. They toyed with the idea of trying to borrow a charger for the batteries, but that would take too long. Then Nena saw the tow strap. It was perfect. The hooks were small enough to work with a hook on the back of her Prius. Yes, a Prius. She hooked it up to my big truck and pulled it the remaining 8 miles to the shop. Yes, a Prius pulled my Dodge eight miles on icy roads. No, nobody got a video of it. We have plans to recreate the situation just to get video proof that it can be done…at least on level ground. The poor thing didn’t quite have enough oomph to get it up the minor incline into the shop. They had to use another vehicle for that.
So we are now back to mostly normal. The old generator is working. The new one should be home soon as a backup. The truck works fine. And then someone was made a manager at Chris’ work, then promptly manufactured an excuse to fire him so he now has no reason to not find a better place with better pay. We’ll see how that shakes out. He has some great options that have come along.
That’s my month summed up. I left out a little bit, mostly because I want to see how some things work out before I share them. I’ll try not to wait another two months before the next post.
Now go figure out how to make the most of your dash. It’s a whole new year. You have 11 months left to fill.
I’ve been stuck in a rut. I’ve started and deleted a couple of posts. I have a bunch of things I’d like to write about but the words just won’t take shape. It feels a little frustrating and I haven’t been able to force my way through the block. I’ll need to find a way around.
It has been a year since I left Oregon behind. Right now I feel like I am in the same position as I was when I arrived in Alaska. I don’t have reliable transportation. (Chris is working and uses my truck. The Scone is still not working.) The cabin is still on hold. (We should be able to pull the sawmill off the property today so we can get it repaired.) I’m not working regularly. (Okay, I’m scheduled for two days a week, but they’re having their own roadblocks so it feels like no progress there.) On top of all that, when I do work my feet and body end up hurting so bad that it takes all week to recover so I can do it again.
I came across someone’s quote yesterday, “Don’t be afraid of failure, be afraid of being in exactly the same place year after year.” And that’s where my mind is. I’m seeing all the ways that I am not making progress. I feel like I’m going backwards, especially with my physical condition. It doesn’t help that I had a cold knock me down for a couple of days this week.
Forgive my whining. I don’t like to do it, but sometimes it’s like sweeping up the dust from the floor and starting fresh. My brain generates all these negative thoughts and they collect like dust bunnies in the works. You can sweep them under the rug, but that doesn’t make them go away. Saying them out loud and acknowledging them seems to work better. Bring them out into the open and cancel them with reality, then they can be collected for the trash. There will be another batch soon enough. It’s best to not let them build up.
So how am I in a different place than I was last year?
I have done a lot of healing. I don’t have nearly as much bitterness in my soul as I did last June. I know myself a bit better. I know some more of what brings me joy and I have been learning how to allow myself to settle into that. It seems simple, but it’s harder than you might think.
The cabin is actually started. The beams are in place and it looks like they didn’t settle much during mud season. That’s good. All we need is a working sawmill and a couple of days and we can have our stack of lumber. Then it’s a matter of getting the framing done and the roof on. If we put the RV on site I can even do some of the work while Chris is in town. I really should see about getting some gravel down in the parking area…
I do have a job that I like, even though what’s available over the summer is kicking my butt. I know they want me to be available for when the season starts again in August. It’s good to know that I’m wanted.
I have also learned a lot over the winter. I learned about my abilities and limits. (I can do more than I thought I could.) I learned that I can live well with less. I know I want to share some of that. I just have to get around that imposter syndrome crap! Why does it feel fake if I’m doing it?
Tamarack, or Eastern Larch,is a deciduous conifer. The needles turn gold and shed in the fall,then grow back for summer.
Life runs in cycles. Every year follows a similar pattern to the year before. I guess the question is whether you are on a track going in circles or if you are in a spiral. If you’re just making your run deeper then I hope you like where you are. I’d rather be working my way up the spiral.
I think that’s enough for now. I’ll try to make more posts and fewer excuses. And I hope you will talk back to me. Ask questions. Tell me what you’re curious about. Some things about living here are slightly surreal, like having daylight all the time. That’s a post for later. For now I’ll leave you with some flower pics.
Lingnon berry flowers. They grow like a ground cover all through the forest, and are especially thick at the edges where they get the sun.Wild current. I know someone who calls them high bush cranberries. Both these and lingnon berries taste very much like cranberries. The wild roses are now in bloom.
