happiness

The First Hard Frost

I anticipated the first hard frost here like an innocent youngster anticipates a chance meeting with their first crush, not really knowing the depths of what it meant or what it would bring. I was simply excited. I thought it would mean that Winter actually was on her way instead of just threatening to be, that our town would quiet down and the berries would sweeten up and off I could go to harvest them, a small feat which I’ve always turned into something larger and one which I’ve always set myself up to fail at.

You see, one of my own little personal Julia recipes calls for:

a bit of a procrastination

with a dash of self-doubt

mixed with a large serving of an uncanny expectation to do things right the first time.

(There are many more uplifting recipes, of course, but I might as well be honest about the collection).

This here concoction has set me up for failure more times than I can count but it has also done something worse: it has set me up to do nothing at all.

And so, this year I promised it would be different. I watched the weather and waited and when the first hard frost hit, I promised that out I would go to reap the benefits of the fruit sweetened overnight by the harsh conditions. Harvest and enjoy instead of again missing them. But like a first crush, I didn’t think about what else the first hard frost would bring. I was just excited.

And then I awoke, to the first hard frost. We’d had a frost a couple of weeks before and the buzz over thermometer temperatures had spun through town.

“I had 25 when I woke up this morning.”

“25! I had 29. Wow.”

Fall is coming.

And then she did. She blew right into the valley, down the 60 miles of dirt road and into our backyard (and presumably into many of back and front and side to side yards of others). And I awoke and immediately realized the fault in my young crush desires.

Because the first hard frost meant something I didn’t anticipate:

While the berries may have sweetened, most of my plants, the plants I had grown for months, some from seeds started in April, were now dead.

Before and after.

The plants that I have spent more time than ever before loving and trimming and thanking as I picked them and placed them about the house or into our food. The flowers that have brought me such joy when I return home to their shiny faces.

The plants that I have too slowly been harvesting because although I was anticipating her arrival, I hadn’t hurried enough for Fall’s approach or realized the (now obvious) tenacity with which she would arrive. It was a juxtaposition of wills and wishes that ended in an equation I didn’t quite add up.

Some plants survived and I immediately made a mental checklist of all of the preserving that I needed to do. Preservation? Canning? This, like berry picking and processing, is a major mental block of mine. My girlfriend had visited from California and the one thing she wanted to do in Alaska? Teach me to make fermented foods. I couldn’t bring myself to do it consistently on my own and so, we whipped up an entire batch, 12 quarts of beautiful sauerkraut adorned even with local juniper berries we’d harvested on a hike. It was glorious. And then, as fate would have it, The Chief and I promptly left in a state of emergency with Cinda and returned a week later without her to a house full of spoiled kraut. My first endeavor.

So yes, I have a bit of a block about it.

But this was the year to change that and now, it is time to get a move on. Perhaps this is where the procrastination part of my recipe, paired with a serious deadline from nature will come into play and our shelves will be lined with krauts and kimchi and pickles to boot from cucumbers and cabbages and berries harvested.

Perhaps,

perhaps,

perhaps.

I tried to revive the plants that didn’t survive the night but their shriveled leaves and broken cells were far past repair. I tidied them as best I could and then went to chop some wood to try to overcome the persistent cold that had settled into the house with the frost. I returned inside to see The Chief making pancakes.

Pancakes, people. Pancakes.

In case you don’t know, Pancake is my middle name (well, second middle name: Julia Elizabeth Pancake Page) and the last few months have been utterly devoid of the fluffy fantasy that is eating pancakes.

And so, one would think I would be overjoyed, for the only thing better than eating pancakes is eating pancakes you didn’t have to make yourself.

But instead of the elation that follows the presentation of a present as perfect as pancakes made by the man you love just for you, what followed were tears.

Big rolling alligator tears, slip-sliding down my cheeks and chin and down onto my robe (it was Sunday afterall) that soon slipped and slid down onto The Chief’s robe as he held me in our kitchen, pancakes pancake-ing in the cast iron next to us.

I had spent the morning in and out of sleep, waking to my worst memories of Cinda, of the moments when she was in so much pain that the only words that describe the sound she would make is a bone-chilling scream. I was preyed upon by the memories of the hope we had repeatedly being crushed by the weight of obscenely unlucky circumstance. I was paralyzed remembering watching her try to walk and not be able to, trying to move and howling in agony. It haunts me though I try to shove it away. And so I had tried to shove it away this morning, the morning of my highly anticipated first frost, but when I walked outside and saw all of the beauty of my favorite distractions gone, I lost all ability to shove the haunting away.

The plants and flowers I grew had two purposes:

One: Joy. They made me happy. They greeted me as Cinda would have when I came home and made coming home to The Quiet a little easier.

Two: Food. They provided sustenance and flair to our kitchen. Fresh food that we didn’t have to buy. Fresh food I could be proud of.

But when Cinda died, they served another purpose.

Three: Ritual. Every day or so, I would walk to Cinda’s grave to add to and take away from the bouquet of home-grown flowers that I’ve kept for her since the day we put her in the ground. As I walked out into the frosted landscape to see them all shriveled and dead it hit me: we are moving into the next season without her. She truly is gone.

Recently someone asked me how it is that I decide upon what to write about each week. I told her my favorite image of myself writing: an idea comes when it decides it’s ready and then I circle around the idea like a dog trying to get comfortable enough to lay down. I circle it and circle it until it feels just right and then…I sit down and write it just like a dog finally settles in and stays put for hours, so do I. But recently, the only thing I’ve been able to circle around is Cinda and for the first time ever, I’ve not allowed myself to write about what it is that comes up for me. I’ve censored myself. And so last week, with the censorship in progress for fear of becoming a broken record even I don’t want to hear, I instead wrote nothing.

The thing is, writing is how I move through and eventually forward. I tried to censor my feelings during the first hard frost morning and out they came anyway and so, if I want to continue writing, there she will be, as she always was. I can’t censor her out.

And today, I miss her, more than usual and it won’t let me go. It’s what’s on my mind, it’s what I’m circling around. It’s the idea that won’t let up until I release it.

And trust me, I know I have it good. I know that, in fact, I have it great. I have a beautiful house in the middle of the woods in which I awake daily to a wonderful, handsome man who loves me deeply. We have loving friends and family and all that we need. I know we have it great. But just like I told my girlfriend who is going through her own feelings of loss now, it doesn’t matter what you have, you can still be sad.

It’s hard to take one’s own advice.

A death or a loss doesn’t just occur and end in that same instant. It is the shape that keeps shifting and just when you feel a grip, it slithers through.

And so today, I allowed myself to write about her because I want to move through remembering the pain and to remembering my baby, as she was, fuzzy eared and smiling, watching over me, ready to set me straight, ready to love me in even my worst moments. She was my starting point, my anchor and she’s gone.

And so, I will take a walk without her as I have done more times than I ever hope for in this past month and despite my personal procrastination recipe, I will go out and pick berries. I will harvest the fruits of my anticipation. The fruits that were only brought on by conditions too harsh for delicate life. The harshness that makes them sweet.

I hope that in turn, that this harshness too makes me sweeter.

Thank you to the seasons for your abrupt displays, for your jarring leaps into the next step, whatever that may be. Alaska, you shake me, you tumble and break me but thank you for extending a hand to help me back up again.

Goodbye Summer, The Summer of the Dogs, you were a tenacious beat I couldn’t always dance to.

Onward, towards Fall.

Onward towards Winter.

But right now, onward towards berries.

**Update: I did, in fact, harvest berries and I did, in fact, take a very much-needed walk. But I didn’t walk alone. Our neighbors’ dog Benny joined along and even warned me off of a seemingly impending bear encounter and by the end of our walk, we had two more pups in tow and a hat full of berries to share (processing to come. Probably).

Thank you to the dogs and people of our town. Your company means more to me than you can know.

So…what are your favorite canning, preserving, pickling, etc. recipes?

Please, do tell…

La Mama: Part II: The Day All Hell Broke Loose

After twice snoozing my alarm I finally pulled myself from sleep a few hours post my Mom’s departure.

Her leaving had me feeling a little lonely but the hustle of the day before me (and a pooch at my feet) gave me the gusto to get going.

I jumped into the shower (ahhhhhh, showers) and as I did, I noticed my throat was a little raw. Hotels will do that to me occasionally, all the recycled air puts my throat in a tizzy and so I wrote it off. Despite a sinking sickness suspicion, there was too much to do to cry over a little tickle.

And what was there to do?

Well, since our arrival the night before had been about 3 hours later than planned (surprised? No, me neither) the list I had hoped to split into two days would have to be jam-packed into one (plus, driving home).

It read like so:

Drop the truck at the mechanic

Do laundry

Go to BB&B for soda stream CO2 replacements (one for us and two for other families. The bubbles of The Valley were on our shoulders)

Recycling

Take Cinda to the vet

Speed through Costco

Quick trip to Home Depot

A drop-by fly-in at Natural Pantry (a local health food store)

Drop-off my girlfriend’s truck

Leave Anchorage

Drive for 45 minutes

Shop at Fred Meyer

Get fuel at Fred Meyer

Drive the remaining 7 hours home.

Done!

Easy peasy. All in a day’s work, right?

And so it started.

By 7:45am Lou and I were fed (or at least she was) and headed for the mechanic. The truck’s transmission issue was becoming less of a suggested “Look at Me” and more like an “I’ll Leave You Stranded if You Don’t Take a Look at Me”. I had to bring Lou with me because the hotel wouldn’t allow her to stay in the room alone and so started our day of Anchorage Taxi try-outs.

We dropped off the truck for their earliest appointment with the (discussed) idea being that they would assess the situation and have me back on the road in an hour or so to do our chores. Lou and I bid a short farewell to the Blue Beast and called a taxi.

Taxi #1.

He took us back to the hotel where I knew I should do anything other than this but I couldn’t help myself.

I had to take a bath.

It was the most glorious jacuzzi tub I’d ever seen. There wasn’t a chance in the world that I was going to pass up that kind of opportunity.

30 minutes later, I was out and prune-y and ready for…

a nap.

The sore throat I’d awoken to wasn’t quite quelled by the soothing warm vapors of the bath. Instead, it was feeling worse.

I was feeling worse.

I felt exhausted and so I allotted myself a 15 minute nap. I was sure I’d feel better after.

Right?

Post-nap it was time to plan. My girlfriend called me from her hotel around the corner and we agreed to pack up and leave together to take Cinda to the vet. Since it was already 10am and the mechanic hadn’t called, we figured we’d use her truck for transport until our truck was ready or until her appointment to have her truck fixed at noon.

Two trucks, two shops, two girls with lots of baggage and a dog needing to do copious amounts of chores and get home the same day.

What could go wrong?

It all started with the recycling.

On the way to the vet, we decided to quickly stop by the mechanic to get all of the recycling out of our truck (and to give them a gentle nudge to help the process along). In the process of prepping for Anchorage at home, I’d forgotten to pack extra clothes (and a toothbrush or toothpaste and jammies and countless other things. It seems I always think of Anchorage as right next door, instead of the 16 hour round trip that it is, complete with an overnight) and so donning my dirty clothes from the day before, I worried little about soiling them further from transporting from my truck to hers the now dripping from rain recycling. We headed to the recycling center and there we found the omen of our day.

30 minutes after we had arrived, as I emptied the final bag of our combined recycling effort I noticed unbroken glass. Beautiful glass. It was a vase, completely intact, without flaw that someone had just put to rest. I pulled it from the pile and showed it to my girlfriend.

“Look what I found!”

“What? Really?! Heck yes!”

Like finding a gem (among gems) in the forest…

Riding high off the vase find (a vase is a luxury and a delicate find that I don’t often allow on trips home) we were certain the day was off to a good start. We headed to the Vet where she dropped us off and then left to fill the Town bubbles. We were multi-tasking our way to success!

In perfect synchronicity, she returned just as we were finishing up paying. And, to make things better we were leaving with good news: Miss Lou was down to 77lbs. and in good health. That’s over 20lbs. lighter than when I met her three Summers ago. I was stoked.

With no call from our mechanic still and the 12 noon appointment right around the corner, we decided it was best to just drop her truck at the shop and head for laundry.

Taxi #2.

When we arrived we started to get our things in order and as my girlfriend started to move things in the backseat, I heard it.

Crash. Boom. Shatter.

The brand new (to us) vase tumbled out of the truck and splintered into all of its pieces onto the pavement below.

And that was our omen, our indicator of the Day When All Hell Broke Lose’s beginning.

But we didn’t see it that way.

We laughed ourselves silly. The vase had survived the rough and tumble of Recycle Land only to shatter after an hour in our care.

Once we composed ourselves, we loaded all of our laundry, ourselves and Cinda into the taxi and headed for the laundromat, which just so happened to be next door to amazing Thai food. Perfect! We waltzed in to the greeting of the owner who cooed over Lou and led us to the back where we could tie her up. However, her leash was just short enough that it created a standing only situation. This would not do. With a couple of hand gestures and shoulder shrugs we negotiated with the owner to bring her in/walked her in and hoped to not get kicked out.

It was laundry time.

8 machines full and $60 in quarters and we were off! I went to order us Thai food while my girlfriend flipped the loads. You know you’re good friends when you do one another’s laundry.

Half-way through our meal in a sunny spot on the grass behind the laundromat, the vase omen started taking effect when the mechanic called.

Bad news.

“You should probably come in and we can talk.”

Well that’s never a good thing to hear from any sort of doctor, car or otherwise.

I asked for further information and he rattled a list of issues with prices to boot that left my Thai spiced mouth hanging wide open.

And so the obvious question came up: “Can we drive it home tonight?”

They paused.

I gulped.

“I wouldn’t.”

Fantastic!

But we had just gotten our permanent registration! Which, of course, is non-transferable.

I asked them what would make the drive less of a hazard and they said an oil change (since apparently there was a leak and all of the oil had drained) with a possible patch was the best they could do in the time they had (it was already after 3pm) and they didn’t even know if they’d have time for that. They’d let me know. With heaps of laundry folding ahead of us, I told them I’d be over ASAP and we’d decide from there.

I tried to stay calm and seek out the most positive outlook I could find. Maybe it would be fine and we would be on our way by 5, 6pm at the latest.

Right?

Yet, despite my intentional optimism, we both knew it was time to start making other plans. The truck my girlfriend had dropped off needed repair but was due to be done by close of business. I sheepishly asked if we could drive her truck home instead, a new potential plan that was not the plan at all.

You see, she had driven in with her husband a few days before to drop him off, leave the truck for him for when he returned 10 days later and she would come home with me.

If we took the truck and ours wasn’t ready for him when he returned he would be stranded.

Not exactly ideal.

Still, it was starting to look like our only option if we wanted to get home since we both had to work the next day (I had agreed in the midst of our vase excitement to cover someone’s shift, despite how much I was looking forward to getting home and finally resting for a day).

We finished up laundry and waved goodbye as we packed the fresh clothes into the next taxi.

Taxi #3

As we drove away I noticed the sign on the door: “No dogs allowed”.

Whoops!

We headed to the mechanic from where I called The Chief and put him on speaker phone so he could hear firsthand the bind we were in (and so I wouldn’t have to try to explain all the issues rattled off to me). He was at work, operating heavy machinery and had to strain to hear the details of our diesel’s ailments. It wasn’t looking good. Finally, we came to an agreement: they would let us store our truck there until they were able to look at it again in three weeks. Three weeks?! Then they would test the engine (at a cost of $400 big ones) to see if rebuilding the transmission was even worth it.

Oh joy!

I checked in with my girlfriend whom was patiently waiting outside amongst our laundry and the pooch. She had talked to her mechanic and he was certain he could get us on the road that night. The husband we would have to figure out later.

I went back in and confirmed the expensive game plan and went to empty out the truck. Before I could even get there, one of the mechanics started to drive it away, I ran up to him and he paused long enough for me to explain, at which point he asked if the truck was mine or mine and my husbands.

Smooth, very smooth.

Here I was, emptying my truck, unsure of when I would see her again and under what conditions and this guy was checking my marital status? The omen continued.

Finally, all gathered, I brought my belongings over to my girlfriend where we were waiting for yet another taxi.

Taxi #4.

And then…we started laughing. Looking at our current predicament, we couldn’t help it.

Completely invoking India Arie…

We looked like (laundry) Bag Ladies with a cooler and a pup to boot. I was sitting on the Igloo eating the rest of my Thai food when the taxi showed up, just as the crew was leaving for the day.

“Are you guys moving in?”

We laughed harder.

In we went to the taxi, cooler and all to the next location: the other mechanic to pick up my girlfriend’s truck.

It was just about finished when my girlfriend realized that the other reason they were leaving the truck in town was so that it could get new tires. They were bad. Really bad. The mechanic decided he couldn’t let us leave without a spare and so he rifled one up for us.

The Chief checking in. “How are you two?” Well honey, we are sitting in the middle of the road on top of laundry, scarcely avoiding cars, acquiring many strange looks and I feel like I am about to be sick. But Cinda is healthy so…all good.

Finally, an hour later, we were ready.

Time for grocery shopping.

It was already 6pm. Costco closed at 7pm and we still had Natural Pantry. The hustle was on. Screw Home Depot.

It was Go Time.

We flew through Natural Pantry where I grabbed all the cold remedies I could find. It was coming on strong. My eyes started turning red and the cold sweats began. This was not good.

We flew to Costco and realized that with 30 minutes to close the trip was pointless. In a last-minute Should We Take This Exit, Naw, Screw It movie-like moment we left town. We needed to get on the road and it was worth saving time to spend a little more money at Freddy’s.

And so, off we went.

By the time we made it to Freddy’s 45 minutes later the cold hadn’t just set in, it had moved in and I wasn’t so sure that it was a cold anymore.

It felt like last year’s tonsil attack.

Please, no.

We spent 30 minutes deciding what to do. It was 8pm and we had 7-8 hours of driving ahead of us. Best case scenario, we would get in at 3am and as we had pointed out to one another, we weren’t 20 years old anymore.

It was time to give in to The Day. We bowed our heads. We were beat.

We admitted defeat after an epic going back and forth game of ping-pong.

Should we try to push through?

Should we just stay in the town we were in and drive 7-8 hours tomorrow?

Should we try to go halfway?

Finally, I found a hotel two hours away that would take us and the pooch. It was a start on the drive at least and a move towards home that was feasible. We decided to go for it.

And then it was time for grocery shopping.

This pretty much sums up our whole day.

A fever had set in and suddenly the list I had kept so clear in my mind turned into a jumbled mess. I did my best to push through but the fog I was in was evident.

“You don’t look so good” my friend told me.

I didn’t feel so good.

An hour of delirious shopping later (did I need bread or bananas? I don’t know) and we were off. Thankfully, my girlfriend was up for the drive and after feeding trooper Lou a parking lot dinner (thank goodness I had packed extra food. Premonition?) and repacking the truck with our new booty, we were off.

Within an hour I started to realize just how in trouble I was. Despite the blasting heat my girlfriend was kind enough to endure on my behalf, my body started shaking so badly and my teeth chattering so hard from fever that I thought I was going to break a tooth.

Finally, we arrived at our mark for the night. The very sweet innkeeper gave me an extra comforter and I pulled it together enough to get into the shower. Tears rolled down my face as my achy body refused to warm until my skin was bright red from the scalding water 20 minutes later.

I fell into bed as my girlfriend suggested she try to make me an appointment for a doctor the next day.

Thank goodness for girlfriends.

I fell asleep immediately and then…

Awoke to the sudden need to vomit at 5am.

I am not a puker.

I crawled back into bed, my head pounding and my throat screaming until we had to leave at 8am to get to the appointment she had made for me at 9am.

Thank goodness for doctors and hooray for medicine!

They took one look at me and started ordering antibiotics. After a tonsil exam the doctor concluded that in fact it was strep throat I was under siege from, not tonsilitis, but he recommended that I have them taken out nonetheless as they looked like they had more battle wounds than a seasoned samurai, after which he told me that I was too old to have them out though, because it was going to hurt like the bajeezus.

Great.

Thanks, doc.

By the time I got out of there, one round of antibiotics and fifty cents poorer (thank you, Medicaid!) it was already 11am. I had slept in between the doctors comings and goings and hadn’t realized how late it was. My girlfriend still had to get to work.

Like a trooper, she drove the whole way home as I went in and out of sleep from pain and fever.

When we finally arrived she helped me unload my bounty and another hour later, after I had settled the house and cuddled the Lou, thanking her for her companionship and patience along the way, it was off to bed with me.

I settled in for two days of Rip Van Winkle like sleep for hours on end, only to wake and read for 30 minutes and then fall asleep again for another few hours.

After months of go-go-go my steam was gone-gone-gone.

I felt like this emo Dryas Drummondi

And so, for the first time since the Summer began The Chief and I had (sickness imposed) time off together.

We spent two whole days inside listening to the rain, reading and napping. The weather cooperated with our efforts and remained cold and wet enough for two fires (and funky enough that sunshine guilt didn’t spoil our sleepy parade).

And so, despite a missing truck and a throat of fire and a propensity for sleep like I’d never had before, I felt more at peace than I’d felt in months, than I’d felt in seasons, than I’d felt since Winter.

It’s a Crazy Fun-Filled No Sleep Till Brooklyn kind of pace out here in the Summer and to have that moment of respite was a welcome relief, despite the no good, very bad, awful (but still giggle filled) days that we had to endure to get to it. At some points I felt like we’d never make it home…

But we did.

Home, sweet home. I wouldn’t trade you for a jacuzzi tub any day.

Stay healthy out there, and beware the omens for the days when all hell breaks loose or at least try to laugh yourself through them.

Here’s hoping…and wishing.

Slow n’ Steady Wins the Race (and Doesn’t Have to Buy New Pants)

You know what isn’t fun?

Tight pants.

Too tight pants.

Now don’t get me wrong, my wardrobe is as simple as a super hero’s, same thing, different day and littered with “yoga” pants which yes, you are right, are tight.

But not too tight.

This Winter, I returned to too tight pants.

I can hear the easy cheesey joke in the back of all of our minds right now…”Can pants ever be too tight?”

Well yes, jokester. Yes, they can.

And they were.

Apparently, California had been even more kind to me than I had expected and although I couldn’t figure out where it was hiding, some of California had stowed away. In my pants.

Wow, I am really leaving an opening for the sleazy jokes today.

Have at it.

Jokes aside, returning to our cabin in the woods felt like being reunited with a long lost love. I was in a delightful mood and absolutely in adoration of our little abode the morning after we arrived. I decided I wanted to see more of this place I had missed and venture out to see how things had fallen into Winter since I’d left.

I went upstairs to dig out my Winter Walking ski pants (a little less insulated than my super insulated bibs) from my Winter Clothes bin. Then, as I do every single Winter (and by every I mean one singular past Winter) I donned a pair of thick underlayers, top and bottom and went to put on my Winter Walkers.

…

Not so fast. In fact quite slow. As the pants approached my hips, I felt a sudden resistance I’d never felt before, as if a small child was below me, pulling the pants in the opposite direction. I looked around, searching for an answer to this opposition.

No answer.

I tugged a little harder and did the shimmy-shake-jiggle-wiggle-jump dance every woman knows (and based on the near legging like quality of men’s fashion these days, I can assume many men know this as well) and finally…

Up they went. I buttoned the double button in a hurry, as if the pants were about to split in all directions at the seams if I didn’t get them secured. And then, I just stood there, pondering my situation for a moment.

What in the heck?

When I had bought my Winter Walkers (which I had bought to use for solely that Summer in Alaska) it had been the middle of Summer (typically my heaviest time of year. Oh BBQs, how I love thee!) and still I had tried them on with a pair of jeans underneath and still I’d had room to spare.

I felt like a sausage and so I quickly decided it must be the leggings.

Off came the WW (Winter Walkers) and off came the leggings. This was sure to work. I donned the WW and…

Still tight.

What in the heck?!

I immediately huffed off to downstairs. Each step was less comfortable than I remembered as I bent my knee to make the journey. The knee and the bum simultaneously requesting space in the pants made for quite tight lodgings. I found the Chief.

“What in the heck?!”

“What is it?”

I love him.

Despite my sausage-y self, he was quick to see no fault in my appearance. I assured him that these pants had not been so tight before we left three months earlier. He assured me that everything was just fine.

And so, off I went on a much needed (emotionally and apparently, physically as well) walk into the woods to see how things in the woods had changed and to ponder how I had changed without noticing. As I unzipped the side pockets to give my thighs a little more breathing room I broke into laughter. This would be how things were until I slimmed back down again. We had just spent a huge chunk of change in Town to last us through the next few months and there was no way that I was purchasing a new pair of pants when these were perfectly fine (aside from the tightness factor).

They would have to do.

Mornin’, sunrise.

The funny thing is, just a few short years ago I would have spent the entirety of that walk planning. None of it would have been spent laughing with myself. My happiness would have been dependent upon my size. I would have decided what I could and could not eat on that walk, how much I had to workout and how fast I expected to lose the weight. I would have spoken unkindly to myself in my head, cursing the cookies and despising the desserts.

Instead, I thought back. Sure, I guess I had slowed down on working out the last few weeks we had been away. The weather had turned from Fall to Winter seemingly overnight and the rain had come and stayed. We were living in an Airstream which, while beautiful did not provide much space for my daily yoga/pilates/random moves to feel healthy routine and without a way to dry off I didn’t want to send Cinda and I off into the rain before work each day. In addition, our home cooked meals had been few and far between. Overall, our life had lacked ryhthym and consistency and the healthy traits it normally holds and thus lay the culprits of this too tight pants dilemma. Oh well. Lesson learned.

Upon returning home, I was grateful to slip out of the pants, and by slip I mean peel them off. And then…

I retired them.

Burn, baby, burn.

Just kidding. No fire pants here.

I switched to my roomier bibs (basically insulated overalls) and said “goodbye” to the pants.

For now.

In my bibs, I was able to make all the maneuvers I needed. Sure, the bibs themselves were even a bit tight but they were nothing like the second skin of the WW pants.

And so, the months went by. I started doing my Winter Chores, and living the Winter lifestyle and slowly but surely, the pants began to fit. I would pull them out of retirement every few weeks and check.

The first time, they fit a little looser.

The next time I could comfortably wear leggings under them.

And eventually, I donned jeans under them.

It took me most of the Winter to get to where I had started last year and if I had said that years ago, I would have been furious with myself. I would have ridiculed myself, wondering why I hadn’t tried harder, eaten better, eaten less and gotten fitter faster but this year was full of high-fives with myself and The Chief.

It had been a kinder journey. Without a mirror to gauge how I looked, I focused on how I felt and the process was slower because of it.

Snow mirrors // Shadow Cinda // Perspective

Some days I was ready to jump into an hour of sweat inducing, heart pumping exercise, other days I was in pain and didn’t want to push it. I had setbacks and steps forward but throughout, I was happy with myself, my worth wasn’t based on my weight. and eventually I got to a place where I felt myself return to my personal normal.

Slow and steady had won the race and hadn’t even had to buy new pants.

And I hope it stays that way but I won’t beat myself up if it doesn’t. 30 brings with it changes that I hadn’t expected and so, I am learning to adapt. I guess we will just have to wait to see what next Winter brings.

Hopefully some cookies (and I guess some exercise to go along with them).

Cheers to you, tight pants or loose. Either way, I hope you’re happy.

Mirror Mirror

Mirror, mirror on the wall…

A few weeks ago I saw what I looked like in a full-length mirror. It was the first time I’d seen myself in almost two months.

Up until last year, a stint that long away from a mirror would have been laughable, if not impossible.

Sure, I’ve been without mirrors while traveling but inevitably a mirror would appear. For as long as I can remember my lapses between glimpses weren’t far off or few between.

All my life, I grew up with a plethora of mirrors. Big mirrors, small mirrors, full-length, magnified, you name it. In those mirrors I wasted a lot of time. I don’t want to paint the picture that I was some self-obsessed little lady smiling at my reflection. It was quite the contrary. I’d look into the mirror with scrutiny, wishing for change. I’d condemn myself for flaws and nitpick every inch. I’d change outfits twice just to go to the gym and I’d run through my whole closet for a mundane Monday at school, leaving myself with an overwhelming pile of clothing to put away and an uneven sense of self and a poor representation of what I actually thought was important.

I remember my Grandma Gam gently mentioning to me that I spent quite a bit of time in the bathroom getting ready. Sure, I was 13 (a little preening she could expect and would tolerate) but what was it, she wondered, that was so important to get ready for? Her beauty routine was simple and concise and freed her for other more important endeavors like reading and learning, helping others and exploring nature (to name a few). I on the other hand would miss whole family meals because of my mirror time and, in turn, would lose out on those important moments together. I scolded myself for these misses. Yet I felt trapped. Trapped by expectation and beholden to an image while simultaneously feeling disdainful of both of these things. The constant tug-of-war between caring and not caring exhausted me. My values didn’t line up with my actions and the dissonance made me miserable.

The younger years can be trying for any tyke and thankfully, age took hold and the battle lessened. I started to love myself in whatever outer packaging I came in. I moved into a career that forced me to be body positive and kind to myself since I was supposed to be a model to my students to do the same. I faked it until I made it. Yet still, even with a better outlook I highly doubt that without having mirrors removed from my life by chance, that they ever would have removed by choice.

Upon inadvertently moving to the woods I realized that The Town and the homes within it had a serious lack of mirrors. The sinks in the bathroom at The Bar weren’t even adorned with mirrors and none of the houses I visited had much more than a simple small mirror for the whole house.

My first glimpse at my new perspective.

At first, I was taken aback. At second, I was relieved. I would get dressed in a jiffy and check to make sure I didn’t have anything too offensive to look at (food in the teeth, etc.) and then I was out the door. Sometimes in Town I would see my reflection in a shop window and at times I had to giggle at my reflection – hmmm I didn’t realize those pants looked like that. I look like MC Hammer. Oh well, Hammer Time! Plus, the reflection was never the crisp image a mirror provides, just a vague Van Gogh style painting of me which allowed me to fill in the blanks with what actually matters. Do I look like a kind person today? Am I bringing joy to those I encounter? Am I open and noticing the beauty that surrounds me? Am I allowing the sheer enormity of this place put things in perspective?

What is really important and what do I want to spend time on?

Without being able to see outward I was forced to focus inwards, towards what I felt and how I made others feel. The focus wasn’t on me, but on how I walked through this world and the current I created for others. I felt so relieved, like my blinders had come off and I had finally joined in.

These days, my mirrors consist of one mirror, the same tiny old driver’s side mirror salvaged from a truck that sits in our kitchen on the windowsill above our sink. I’ve lived here for almost two years and we’ve changed so many things in the house together, but that I don’t ever plan to change.

Just like in the Summer, the only full-length glimpses I catch of myself are window reflections which come after sunset as the dark of night plays with the inside light. The image is distorted and fuzzy leaving me to rely on how I feel and how I make others feel instead of how I look.

There’s also a lot of perspective from shadows…like don’t take it too seriously. Since when did my legs get so long and my head get so small?

Now, don’t get me wrong, I’ve shared with you my propensity for an eyelash curler and blush even out here and I’ll take any excuse to dress up and when we are in California it happens even more. Tuesday? Oh, you mean Dress Up Tuesday. But now, it’s because I enjoy it, not because I feel required to do it or because I want to get away from just plain old me. It’s a change of pace, a costume for a day, a character but not a mask I’m afraid will come off and reveal the me underneath.

The other day we went to a dinner party at a friend’s house and on the way over, I realized that I hadn’t looked in our little mirror even once. In the (now becoming more distant) past, I would have spent an hour curling my hair or donning makeup, all in front of the mirror. That sheer break from tradition made me smile as we snowmachined across the river and through the woods to open arms and not a care as to how we looked, just that we were there.

Thank goodness for shifts in perspective and for places that force us into that shift. Thank you for chances to be completely stripped of all you’ve thought you needed to shield yourself in, in order to discover the soft underbelly that lies beneath.

And thank you for Grandmas who give us little reminders of who we really are, and what really matters, even if it takes almost two decades to hear her.

Roger that, Grandma. Loud and clear.

Right here, cake is important little one. Your hair looks fine.

The Long Way Home (Part I: The Mushy, Squishy, Tom & Norah Version)

Years ago, maybe 15 or so, a girlfriend and I went to a party out in the “middle of nowhere” (I have to use quotes for that one these days considering my current physical location in life). We were having a blast, way out in the hills of California only 45 minutes from our hometown yet still in a place we both had never been when suddenly…the parental units arrived.

Whoops!

Apparently our friend wasn’t supposed to be having a party.

Who knew?

I’d say likely us, we likely were the Who who knew.

The party dispersed in a flash as teenagers fled from all possible exits.

In all the rush, we had simply driven away, without getting our bearings and within no time we came to the realization that we were L-O-S-T lost. We were struck with panic. Technology wasn’t quite what it was today and let’s just say our pagers weren’t helping us any, though I swear we stared at them looking for answers. And so, without a map and with two poor senses of directions equaling one mediocre sense of direction, we just kept driving.

Retrace our steps?

Why, what a brilliant idea!

We opted not to and by opted not to I mean we didn’t even think of it, but if we had we would have been chasing ghosts. Retracing our steps in fields upon fields of high grasses cut through by miles and miles of look-alike dirt roads? Naw, no thanks.

And so, lest we confuse ourselves further we figured onward, onward ho!

In the stress of it all, we decided it was best to play Norah Jones (don’t judge me, she’s awesome and at the time she was the obvious and only choice in crises like these) to calm our nerves as we hazily sought our way back to home like naked mole-rats through an underground maze.

And it worked.

Through the confusion we were calmed by the tunes and comforted by the presence of one another. I remember thinking that even if we were lost forever, at least we had each other. And it turns out that we had just enough faith and fancy footwork to navigate our (probably obvious) route. We had made it safely home, even if it did take us cycling twice through the album.

As I sat down to write about our journey this December to our Home in the woods, this memory with my girlfriend suddenly came flooding over me and with it came the song on the album which struck me most that day: “The Long Way Home”. The song is a Tom Waits cover which Norah Jones performed on the album we twice listened to that day. The memory of that day and that song and our parallel journey this year compared to last all came tumbling down on me and as I put on the song while I wrote I was suddenly choked up.

That day with my girlfriend felt like the longest Long Way Home and so the song’s presence struck me, reverberated in my ears and made me laugh at our predicament. I read little more into it then than the title (I didn’t know any of the other words) and saw it as a sort of mocking, literal and perfunctory representation of our day. We were taking a dang Long Way Home but I’d always known we would make it some hour or another. We were still in the same County for goodness sake, but still I had been shaken.The presence of the music accompanied by the presence of my girlfriend, however, shook that shake right back and restored my faith that we would make it back, eventually.

Finally, that day, landmarks I’d seen all my life started appearing, landmarks I’d known as a passenger growing up in the cars of parents and family. Yet suddenly we were the drivers, brand spankin’ new at that, and it was up to us to decipher their code. And we did. Every few miles, a specific corner or noticeable rock outcropping or old barn would signal us to turn or stay from somewhere deep in our memories and those memories guided us. We were two newbies, finding our way into the beginning of adulthood.

And all along, home was nearby.

And for most of my life, it always has been.

Until last year. The year of Leap First And Look Later And Fingers Crossed It All Turns Out.

Last year I decided to move to Alaska after a Summer visit gone vibrant and well past its 17 day intended expiration date.

Life had other plans.

And so, last year, I left the land I knew. The place where after years of practice and memories like the one with my girlfriend that I could now navigate on my own while blindfolded and still find the quickest route through back alleys and hidden throughways.

Suddenly, all that familiarity was in my rearview mirror when last year we left my town and started our route to The Great Big North.

It was a truer than true, longer than long, Long Way Home.

The song’s literal meaning prodded at me again.

I actually had no idea how long it would be but it exceeded even my most exorbitant of expectations. Last year, coming into the woods at the beginning of December, I was walking into the unknown and though I held steady, I was shaken at the core. I had driven the route into the woods only twice before: on my first trip in where I was 1.) a passenger and 2.) had the attention span of a hummingbird and another time solo where I was more focused on getting the turns right than remembering landmarks. The land was unfamiliar, the stops along the way new and intimidating. The sheer vastness of the state tumbled down upon me all at once and though I was excited, I have also never been so terrified.

What if we came to find we just didn’t like one another? How would I leave?

What was it like to live in the snow? Would I get frostbite?

And seriously, what in the hell was I doing?

The year of The Leap was certainly the year of questions like that: what in the hell was I doing?

It turns out what the hell I was doing was heading in exactly the right direction which although I felt in my heart, I had to explain to my head occasionally.

We leapt into the unknown and took the longest ride home I’ve ever experienced in my life. 10 hours plus (and that’s only once we’d actually arrived in Alaska, the journey had started five days before) in what seemed like a snowglobe come to life filled with treacherous roads and sheets of ice fog and all without even so much as a radio to make a peep over the booming winds rattling the truck and the screaming worries bouncing around my rational mind. I didn’t know the route, I didn’t know the mountains, I couldn’t tell you how far we were or how long we had to go. I had no landmarks. I had little history. I was merely a passenger.

Yet with or without landmarks and with the smidgen of history I had eked out the Summer before, I knew I was heading home.

And I was right.

But I was still, just a passenger, still alone even in our togetherness because of all that was unfamiliar to me. We both were still doing it alone despite being in it together. Little did I know, the song had taken on new meaning.

The Song, to me as I’ve listened to it over the past 15 years, is about a man in the world clinging to his independence. Despite his love waiting for him, he always takes The Long Way Home and the journey to find their way is all up to him. He is alone, despite her presence. Yet in the end he asks her to come with him. His need to be alone is melted by his need for her. They both leave what they know and alone in the unknown they take The Long Way Home together.

Last year, The Chief and I were at the beginning of this song, we were both the individuals navigating our way through our own fears and doubts and The Chief had to find our literal Long Way Home for us as I was completely and utterly lost in the now snowy landscape I had barely remembered when it was completely bare the Summer before. I can see the leap we both took into the unknown now from the outside in all of its shimmering shining “are you freaking crazy?” glory. I can see how wild the leap must have seemed and I’m so glad we decided to do it anyway.

Our First Christmas

This year, the leap was a little smaller as we moved through the rest of the song. Yes, it was a new Winter, new ever lower temperatures awaited us and our neighborhood was deserted where last year it was “bustling”. But it wasn’t so completely and overwhelmingly unknown anymore. I knew how to avoid frostbite and live in the snow and I knew that we did like each other and that we did want to be together and we had made it through the crazy leaps and into one another’s arms. Sure, there were unknowns and uncertainties up ahead but something had shifted, we had made it through our first winter and now we were undeniably in it together; we were navigating our road home together.

As we glided this year over frozen highways I found my points of reference garnered from trips throughout the past year. I was still a newbie, like I had been while driving with my girlfriend those 15 years ago, but just like then, I was learning. I knew which place to stop for food and when (before it was too late and we were engulfed in mountains for the rest of the 7 hours), which mountains meant we were closer and which glaciers were my favorite, which were the best rest spots and which post office to mail our Christmas Cards from and together we navigated our way with equal input despite still differing knowledge (and priorities: I’m pretty much on Make Sure We Eat Before Hangry Sets In patrol).

No longer were we two people in a big ol’ truck in the middle of nowhere hoping individually for the best. Now we were a team. No longer were we navigating on our own, alone. We were on the same page. No longer was I following The Chief, both of us with our fingers crossed. Instead, this year we finished the song as we navigated The Long Way Home together, hand in hand, with our pup nestled between us.

And we made it.

Home.

“Well you know I love you baby

More than the whole wide world

You are my woman

I know you are my pearl

Let’s go out past the party lights

Where we can finally be alone

Come with me, together, we can take the long way home”

-The Wonderful Mr. Waits

Oh, but it wasn’t all whistling Tom Waits in the wind and high-fiving each time I recognized a glacier and skipping and snow angels and mountains of pancakes.

No siree bob.

But you knew that already, didn’t you?

No, this is Alaska, where nothing comes easy except change and not always the change you want and where you have to work the whole way just to make your way home. And all the love in the world doesn’t mean the journey will be easy but it does make it so much easier.

And so, with that, I tell you our Nitty Gritty, Non-Norah and Tom version of our journey to The Great North, our Long Way Home…

Next week.

With love, from Alaska.

The Glacier

Before arriving in Alaska I can’t say with much certainty that I knew what a glacier was. I’m only slightly sure that I was aware of their existence (but not entirely sure I didn’t just think they were large icebergs) and definitely sure that I didn’t grasp their many faces. And so, my first time on The Glacier was a complete slap in the face and every time since has been another awakening unto its own.

You see, my first time on The Glacier I went ice climbing.

Me. Ice climbing.

If you’re beginning to think I’m some sort of badass you can stop yourself right there. I can say for certain that I did not know what ice climbing was, but with my girlfriend’s encouragement (and the loan of her dog) I let her sign me up with her guides.

I’d never even been rock climbing before (a likely introduction) but there I was, gearing up with boots and crampons and an enormous backpack full of gear for a ten-hour day of hiking and climbing on our friendly neighborhood glacier, followed by crashing an ice climbing course meant solely for the guide company which I had no business attending (but was too afraid to leave on my own since it would mean traversing solo across a glacier which I had just met and then finding my way back to the trailhead and then back home. No thank you). And so I climbed, and despite the fear of heights that I thought I had, I felt safe and secure and successful, followed by completely out-of-place, cold and tired at the training but hey, at least I was in good company.

My second time on The Glacier was with the encouraging girlfriend. We explored a bit, I got my first solid lesson in using crampons and we ate curry for lunch. It was a beautiful day and again, I didn’t have to hoof it alone.

That was last year. Now, I’ve lived here for a year. I’ve been through Winter in the cold, dark north. I can handle The Glacier solo, right?

Well, sort of.

It was a beautiful sunny day at the tail end of a wind event a few weeks ago and so, despite the sun and the sights, I was still feeling a little off-kilter from the ever-present gusts of dirt in my eyes and blow-back winds pushing me about. Still, when it’s sunny and you are free, it’s time to get out. Some friends only had a few days left in Alaska and they invited me along to go out on The Glacier. I hadn’t been on it all Summer and had been scolding myself for not having done so. And so, despite the blustery day, I headed out to meet them.

The Chief and I drove across the river into town with a friend to jump our truck (which I had been stranded with the night before) and she fired up quickly. All set. And so I sent a message up the hill to let my comrades know that I was on my way. Even though it was my day off I was in a bit of a hurry to get going. This town is notoriously slow going since things always seem to go wrong or take longer than planned. It’s not uncommon to hear someone come in late for work because their batteries were about to die and they forgot to run the generator and then the generator was out of gas so they had to pump gas and then spilled it and had to change and…you get the point. Things come up. And so I was trying to stay ahead of the game. The truck was running and I was on my way. Plus, I had a massage scheduled that day (best day off ever) and I wanted to make sure I would be back in time.

I helped Cinda into the truck and off we went. We were listening to our favorite Cocteau Twins song when the truck chugged to a halt. Thinking that the battery had given out again (the battery in it is a wee bit small for the truck) I called The Chief to see if he could jump it (again) with our friend’s truck. He left work and borrowed the truck and 20 minutes later, when I should have been arriving to meet my friends, The Chief gallantly arrived. He quickly deciphered that it wasn’t the battery. Thankfully he had a can full of gas that we filled our tank with and the new infusion in what we think is simply a bad fuel mix was enough to start the babe right up. He followed me up to the Hill Town even though he really needed to be at work because, well, he’s amazing like that. We bid adieu as I successfully glided into the Hill Town.

Finally, we made it. But where are they?

My friends were heading down from one friend’s house and after a few confusing texts and calls we found one another at the guide shack (I had forgotten that we would need crampons, remembering The Glacier as only being a sweet little thing requiring hiking boots alone. How quickly we forget). We all geared up and headed out The Glacier Trail. An hour and a few miles later we started to descend and I felt totally lost. The creek between the hillside and The Glacier had shifted enough that the “entrance” onto The Glacier, the spot where everyone would come off the hillside and find their way onto the glacier had completely changed from the two times I’d seen it the year before.

I wish I could say with certainty that if I had gone alone earlier this Summer to The Glacier that I would have figured this out and not just “cliffed out” at the old entrance but I’m not really comfortable with lying. I can hope that I would have figured it out, that my stubbornness would have helped me find the way, but as a serious creature of habit and lover of comfort I’m not totally sure that I would have pushed that hard. Maybe. I hope so. I think in reality that I hadn’t made it to The Glacier yet this year out of fear of the unknown and so a hurdle like that could have derailed me, had I made it that far.

We scaled down the hillside, the dogs far ahead of us and already begging from tourists camped at the base of The Glacier.

Our view from the base. The Glacier lay ahead in all its glory.

We stumbled immediately upon an ice creation.

Melted out ice caves

I ran in, excited to see it from the inside and just barely dodged falling rocks. Whoops! I forgot my glacier manners and ice cave rules. Look before you leap.

Little rocks (thankfully) and water falling from to top of the ice cave

Manners in mind and footing in place we headed up and onto The Glacier. One member of our group lost her manners quickly. My sweet pup decided to let nature call in the number two fashion upon the pristine glacier. I picked up her little gift with a newly available Costco sized M&M bag (we had to eat the remaining M&Ms in a hurry to free up the space, which, while delicious, kind of lost their appeal due to the situation) sealed it tight and placed it into my backpack. The backpack which held my food.

We were off to a good start.

Hiking up the first icy hill of The Glacier

And we actually were off to a great, albeit stinky, start. For the first fifteen minutes we were fine going simply with our hiking boots but once the terrain turned a bit tougher it was time for crampons.

I’m not a fan.

I know that they make it more feasible to hike up and down into places in the glacier which would otherwise remain unseen to me but they also make me feel like a toddler wearing platform shoes. It’s as if I’ve attached bricks to my feet, lost all flexibility and then, decide to attempt the scary stuff.

This was the part I had forgotten about. The scary parts. The year before when I had gone ice climbing we had hiked the mildest parts of The Glacier (the simple up and over route instead of into the depths) and put on crampons only to scale into the basin where we would set up camp to climb. I barely needed instruction because they were necessary for moments only and the fall would have been into a soft obvious location not into some wormhole into the heart of The Glacier. The second time, as I had conveniently forgotten, we had taken a more hilly route, jumped over little rivers within the glacier and climbed sheer sides. I had been afraid but I had forgotten that fear.

Key words being “had forgotten”.

Suddenly the fear came upon me like a whisper from behind as we veered away from the easy route on top of The Glacier and immediately started sidehilling down it. We stopped to put on our crampons and layers as the already present wind began to pick up and up and up. I watched Cinda’s fur blow in the breeze and then suddenly her whole body jolted back as a powerful gust of wind hit her. Everything had shifted in an instant. Suddenly, I had high heel things on my feet, extra disorienting wind and more challenging terrain.

Gulp.

Our first move in our newly acquired garb? Cross an ice bridge between two moulins (a tubular chute, hole or crevasse worn in the ice by surface water which carries water from the surface to the base far below, like a sudden sinkhole which appears with little to no warning). They were substantial holes on both sides, both tunnels leading in opposite and unclear directions into the stomach of the glacier. You fall in and…good luck. My girlfriend shouted to me through the wind:

“You might want to watch Cinda on this one. It’s a little sketchy.”

Just as I was about to grab her and find ourselves another route, she scampered across with the utmost ease and so, my excuse to find a better route now gone and my better judgement aside, I started to cross. My stomach dropped into my feet and my heart up into my neck as my body slowly and awkwardly carried me across. I did not feel centered, I did not feel competent. I felt like a wet rag trying to dance a tango. Not my most graceful of moments.

On the other side I caught my breath.

“That.

Was.

Scary.”

I told my friends and I nervously stopped to eat a snack. I felt like I was going to be sick. You see, I try and try and try again to fool myself but my body reminds me. I am afraid of heights. In my mind I see the path but my body reacts. Wanna look down into a moulin? I can’t. My feet literally won’t take me.

This I can handle.

Peering down into this? No thanks. These pop up out of nowhere.

And so, after crossing (sorry, I couldn’t take a picture but just imagine two huge tunnel slides to each side of you and a maybe two foot wide expanse to cross over them) and remembering the fear I had felt before, though not to this level (and never during ice climbing (perhaps the harness had something to do with it)), it suddenly dawned on me that I would be doing the return trip alone.

Since the truck had died and our meet up had been slow, time had been moving despite our still trying to catch up with it. We had been on the glacier almost 40 minutes before we even put the crampons on and now, I had 20 minutes before I needed to head back. We had basically just gotten there, just gotten to the “good stuff” (read: scary but more beautiful and worth the challenge) and now I needed to turn around.

We traversed a few more creeks within the glacier and went up and down hills that seemed impossible to ascend or descend any other way than on hands and knees or slide down like penguins but somehow I remained upright (and awkward). Finally, tucked away from the gusts in a little alcove I announced my need to depart in order to make it back in time for my massage (a statement that sounded unbelievably swanky and out-of-place while standing in the middle of the wilderness).

Beautiful Jess. Wanna come back?

I had already stated that, of course, they probably wouldn’t want to head back when I had to, but secretly hoped that someone might want to. At the same time, I knew the challenge would do me good and in a way hoped I would fly solo. It was divided 50/50. Though I was scared I said my goodbyes and whistled for my Lou and turned to head back the way we had come (though already planning to avoid the Ice Bridge of Doom) when I looked back and couldn’t decipher up from down.

The last views of my friends

Where in the world had we come from and how?

I had purposefully been paying attention (I thought) to our route but when I looked back it all looked the same and the hilly landscape seemed unrecognizable in reverse.

Oh well, they were moving one way and I had to head the other.

A last goodbye from the Buddha

I cannot explain how grateful I was to have our Cinda Lou with me. She was like a little ice fairy, floating along the face of the glacier, jumping over moulins like a professional hurdler. She made it look easy, and so, as I have done so many times before, I channeled her confidence and picked a route forward.

Lou smiling at the moulin

Within minutes we were nowhere we had been before and facing crossing fast flowing waters and climbing an almost 90 degree incline. I looked to the right: even worse. I looked to the left and could only assume that it turned into a sheer drop-off to the moraine (the rocky below) since all the rest to the left had been as such.

How had I gotten us here?

I had simply gone in the same-ish direction back and now, we were somewhere completely unknown, out of sight and alone.

That’s the thing about a glacial terrain, one minute you’re walking on flat ground, the next there is a sheer cliff at your feet. Another, you’re protected from the wind storm, the next you’re basically windsurfing, trying not to lose footing. Next you’re looking down a moulin into the mouth of the glacier and next you see a turquoise lake appear, calm and pristine. It’s forever changing and after two trips one year ago prior to completely different spots on the exact same glacier, I was feeling completely lost and completely out of my league.

Oh well. There was no other way but forward.

I found a narrower crossing and planted my feet in order to make the big jump to the other side of what now was become a river in The Glacier in order to climb up the face to the other side. I looked and then leapt and…

I made it. Safe and sound.

The water was 3-4 ft. wide

And solo.

Cinda did not follow.

Suddenly, my trailblazer was stunted. She didn’t trust the jump. I walked to the narrowest point and urged her to follow suit on the other side. I cooed encouragement at her and promised I would grab her. She didn’t budge. Then she started pacing back and forth, starting twice by trying to walk the divide, the water which would have been up to her shoulders and the current which would have swept her up and sent her who knows where in the blink of an eye lapped at her paws and she quickly retreated.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

We both let out a little whimper and I allowed myself a moment of panic. And then I grabbed my breath back and called her back as she started walking towards the ledge. We are doing this. You can make it Lou.

I called her to a different narrow spot and steadied myself to grab her if she didn’t land the jump. She gave me a look of utter displeasure but also of trust (yes, I’m anthropomorphizing but I’m comfortable with it) and then, she jumped.

And she made it.

And then she was off with me scrambling behind her.

She ran towards the hill. It was so steep that she had to lean as far forward as possible while still having to sidehill up the face it. I got down low and hands and knees and crampon toed my way up. We both stopped at the top, breathing heavily and looked at one another with a sort of It Can’t Get Worse Than That, Right? type of look. I hugged and kissed her and spent a moment more just breathing while trying to plan the remainder of our route (while still avoiding the Ice Bridge of Doom). I surmised that it couldn’t be much longer (though I couldn’t see the exit) and decided to hug the Easternmost route for the remainder of the return. Thirty minutes later we were off The Glacier and back to finding the elusive trail. I had created mental markers for myself but in the end, it didn’t matter.

A big rock (in front of the far away Castle Rock) was my beacon towards the trail

My Cinda knew the way (even though she had never taken it before that day). She led me back and up the steep hill, circling around every few steps to smile at me. I’ve never seen her do that before. One, two, three, four steps, circle, look at Mom and head forward for four more. She checks on me when we are out together but never in such a rhythm, with such consistency.

Four steps forward…

…one circle to look back.

For a dog whom isn’t always overtly forthcoming with expressions of love, this less than subtle check in warmed my heart. I felt like crying. I had truly been scared. Scared of falling, scared of picking the wrong route and sliding into a river of ice, scared of losing my dog. Seeing her look back to me I suddenly let it go. We were off the glacier and we had gotten off of it together.

Crossing over a raging creek and looking back at The Glacier

The rest of the hour-long hike back she checked on me every few steps. She even took a shortcut (which I knew and planned on taking) and when she realized I hadn’t made it to the entrance yet, she circled back to show me how.

Fall was in the air and the winds had started to die down a bit and an ecstatic calm (if that dichotomy can somehow exist) came over me as we hustled back.

We got back just in time to grab a snack and water us both before going into a greatly appreciated massage. I was physically tired from the hike but also emotionally tired and simultaneously elated by the journey.

We had made it.

To many out here, it would be nothing to simply turn back alone. It would be nothing even to go out alone and come back alone. To find a route and follow it with confidence. To me, it was a challenge. To choose my own route, completely on my own (or at least without other humans) is a new practice. To trust and to expand past the comfort of the known into the discomfort of the unknown isn’t my first choice, but in a way, at this point in my life it’s the only one.

I may not be the first to try a new route or to scale a mountain. I am still cautious and careful and perhaps overly so, using my respect for the grandiosity and potential danger of this place at times as an excuse. But that’s O.K.

I’m learning to stretch.

I’m so grateful to live in a place and among people whom share their adventurous spirits with me. People who prance across an ice bridge like it’s nothing, who find their own way when lost in the woods, who set out to summit a mountain they’ve never been to. This place and the people within it both intimidate and inspire me in such a combination that I consistently find myself a little outside of my comfort zone but in very good company, be it scenery or people or animals or, simply my new self who’s learning, day by day to trust again in the intuition we all have within.

I hope that next year and every year from now on that I remember the fear and embrace it rather than tuck it away. I hope that I push forward with or without invitation from others to see this land. I hope that as my confidence in myself grows the fear will realize it can start to let go.

Thank you for the endless challenges and chances to expand, Alaska. You sure keep me on my toes (and, when the going gets steep, my hands and knees).