That should have been the title of her auto biography; “Is You Is? Or Is You A’int?”. We probably suggested that several times. The Writers Club reviewed every portion if it several times including the pornographic portions! She and her family fished all over Southeast Alaska. Either living aboard a...
Back in the day and across the way unKupreanof lived retired school teacher, we will call Harry. Kupreanof then as now, is a grant-grabbing berg, a slip of a village. That upon incorporation outlawed motorized vehicles no the public thoroughfares. Then they outlawed public thoroughfares . Harry was the...
Others participated in the Parade of Lights. Others joined the crowd whose faces turned ghostly green lit by the glow sticks in their hand. They hymned their way down PFI Hill and joined the throng around the community Christmas tree like so many Whos in Who-ville. But I was...
Coming from the south on Mitkof Highway you pass over one of the two bridges that span Hammer Slough and enter downtown Petersburg. The road is named Nordic Drive by now. Downtown ends a few civilized blocks further north as Nordic rises up Five Sisters Hill. Most major holidays you...
The wide, rocky, shallow rapids lies at the end of a long estuary far from the green waters of the Wrangell Narrows. The wandering channel traversing the wide mud-flats there. Above the rapids lie the long still black pools of the Blind River. The Swan Observatory allows for the viewing...
Imagine, if you will, a California beach boy. His wavy blond hair back lit by the summer sun. (Well, actually May doesn’t count as summer as our story begins in Southeast Alaska. The seasonal cannery workers may have arrived but the sun still lies low on the Southern horizon.) His...
“What?” Her husband asked incredulously. “No, no.” she exclaimed. “We don’t have foundations here. Houses are built on creosote piling like the docks.” That too got a “What?” Her husband was a “Coastie” from down south. She marveled at the wooden archway between the carpeted living room and dining room...
I can still recall the surprising good things I discovered about living in a small town in Southeast Alaska. “You don’t have to use your turn signal, cause everyone knows where you are going anyway.” Twice, when I first moved here and no one knew me, I lost my check...
On winter mornings when the sun slumbers still and drifting snow hides all the muskeg holes and snowmobile tracks, maybe you should take the bicycle path to work. On the darkest part of the year, particularly if it is a Monday (garbage day) you step to the back porch and...
Five friends made that trip across the muskegs with me, have rent the veil of alder leaving behind the known and sown town for the wet and wild muskeg. When first initiated into the mystery of the muskeg walk I took the precaution, similar to Theseus of marking my way....
"With me along the strip of Herbage strown, That just divides the desert from the sown. (The Rubaiyat by Omar Khayyam)" You leave the house, walk the gravel road to a friend’s house, push aside the alder branches in her backyard that veil the creek. You step through the high...
"Back in the day Petersburg, AK needed five floatplane firms and a couple of helicopter companies." Our pilot ate a lot of rabbit food at lunch. Our pilot was always charming. Our pilot was part of our “Mosquito Fleet”. He flew his floatplane close to the water of the bays, channels, straits...
In the darkness of Alaskan mornings in the relative quiet of Scow Bay an odd alarm clock woke the residents each morning. The crunch of sheet ice as it shattered beneath the crew boat going out to the logging show at Tonka. Back in the day loggers played a large role...
The Lost Road to Lynnwood My previous duty station stood on the arid shores of Flaming Gorge Reservoir in Utah. One sunny and warm day, my German Shepherd and I checked out the remote and abandoned Antelope Flats in the wide open sagebrush flats at the northern end of the...
Mars “Tis a strange wind that blows on the edge of the forest.” I quoted. “Oh dad!” The future founder of Alaskan Seafood Guys responded. Then he felt the chilling breeze sneak into the old growth. We’d been climbing up Ravens Roost and finally made it to the clearing over...
