Back from Texas

     I am back from a conference in Texas and my mind is still traveling between worlds. 

     My flight out of the village last Friday was scheduled for 4:55 p.m., but I was not at all surprised at 3:45 when I heard a snow machine race up to my door and found Richard the maintenance man in his seal skin bomber hat hurrying into the kitchen to tell me my plane was ten minutes out. I zipped up my bag, put on my parka, and jumped into the back of the sled to fly up the hill to the airport. As we waited on the runway Richard asked if I knew what Krispy Kremes were and if I could bring some back for him. My mouth began to water as he described his desire for the donuts and I imagined myself traveling back on the planes from Texas with a box full of light in the form sugary pastries to bring a sparkle to eyes of everyone. Unfortunately Krispy Kreme never crossed my path. I did however bring back a light. 

     The travel from my village to San Antonio took twenty-four hours. I stopped in Nome, visited a friend who is an intern at the radio station, ate homemade split pea soup, and took a tour of the radio station. Then I went to Anchorage, Seattle, and Chicago- eating foods along the way that my stomach had not seen in six months. Mmm vegetables, mmm fruit. 

As the plane took off for San Antonio I remembered a dream that I had years ago… I was in Mexico, just South of the Texas border. I had just had a conversation with a shark swimming in a group in the ocean. I walked out of the water and sat in an open kitchen talking to an a healthy old woman. I felt like I was at home and felt like she was my grandmother.  We were speaking Spanish, as she made a dough. I can’t remember what she said, but perhaps is has something to do with a balance between nurture and devastation and the beginning of a journey I did not yet know I would take. I could taste the ocean in the air and the light was so warm and bright. 

     Those of you have read my blog for a while know that occasionally I talk to animals in my dreams. I think the shark is the first animal I spoke to. Since then I have talked with a frog, a bird, a whale, and a bear. The image of a wolf has been with all this winter, but we have not spoken. I appreciate the great symbolism in my dreams. They do mean more to me than just talking animals in my dreams, and I guess that is all that really matters… they mean something to me. 

     As the plane took off I knew I would be reconnected with light of the woman from my dream of the shark. I flew to San Antonio for a conference, but deep down I knew that in the randomness of this event I would experience more. 

     At this point you will not at all be surprised when I tell you that I ended up in the true heart of San Antonio… in San Pedro, near the healing waters of the San Pedro hot springs with an angel rich in love and light, symbolism, and strong in identity. As my angel and I stood late at night in the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center in front of his painting Madre Santisima I felt everything come together: my love for indigenous awareness, my own beautiful and individual identity, the power of destruction and the power of rejuvenation, and the awesome presence of love and light. Thank you David!

     On the return flight to Alaska I watched the lunar eclipse from the sky. I was somewhere over Canada at the time. 

     In Nome reality hit when I boarded a Cesna without a hat and gloves on… what was I thinking… it was way too cold. Just as I was thinking this and expecting a quick departure, the pilot announced that he forgot to de-ice the windshield. He jumped out of his window and spent the next fifteen minutes pouring red liquid on the front window. He took a second to pour some on the propellors before jumping back in and starting the frozen plane. I wondered whether a cold plane could stay in the air long? My next question was, “Did he remember the gas?” Someone leaned over and yelled above the sound of the engine, “This pilot once fell asleep during the flight.” The pilot of course had his noise silencing radio headphones on- not that it mattered. Chunks of ice flew from the propellors hitting the passenger windows with loud smacks causing survival response jumps in all of us every time. Relief filled my breath when I landed safely in the village. I hopped in the back of a sled and held on as we raced down the hill. 

     That night I ate fresh fresh local crab for dinner. 

 

…the Italians arrive in less than a week. 

 

…i was accepted for a master’s at university of colorado and was offered a contract for my current teaching position. i have two weeks to decide.  

Moose, Crab, and Italians

Moose hunting season just ended and so all the moose are out of hiding. At lunch time all week my students ran into our classroom yelling, “Moose, Moose, Moose… over there… they just crossed the river!” We saw a total of nine lunch time moose this week. They are lucky they are not our lunch. Many of my students have expressed how happy they are to have food again. Their fathers and uncles spent the last month tracking the testy giants, and now it is all you can eat moose soup time. The men have also been hunting seals and sitting on crab boxes. They don’t literally sit on the crab boxes: it is just an expression for catching crab (in the plural)… which is completely different than catching crabs.

Back to the former. There is about three miles of sea ice that currently extends from the coast out into the Bering Sea.  The fathers and uncles drive their snowmobiles out to a hole in the ice. The hole is usually marked by a tree branch or a small spruce. They throw down their crab boxes and wait patiently. They can also snag a seal or whale from the same hole, just like a mighty polar bear does.

By the way female polar bears hibernate with their cubs during the roughest days in winter, so that the males don’t eat their young. Polar bears are scheduled for extinction within the next ten years due to receding summer sea ice at the northern pole. Now that I am spitting out arctic animal facts, I want to remind you that penguins reside in the Southern Hemisphere not the Northern Hemisphere.

On a different note, the Iditarod starts March 1st. The Iron Dog has been vrooming through at high speeds breaking trail for the actual dogs that will have a mandatory eight hour layover here in a month. An Italian man, followed by an Italian film crew, will be mushing in the race this year. They will be sleeping in my classroom and apparently dining at my house. I am trying to figure out what to feed them. By the time they get to me their bodies will have endured quite a bit. I am going to keep it simple. Maybe I should find moose or reindeer steaks. They will be hungry burly men.

Global Warming

This is scary. I live in a polar region; it’s January and raining. This is the second time this winter that it is so warm the snow is melting and I have to wear my rain coat. The temperature is currently 36*F. It should be -36*F. I really hope it drops back down tomorrow.

I Met an Old Woman Who Lives in a Small House

On my way home from the post today I saw a tall and lean woman, who reminded me of an old blues singer, walking towards me from the Native Store. I waved, because that is what you do in a nice villlage of 150 people. She was a beautiful elder with strong cheek bones and I was surprised how straight her front teeth were and that they were real. I am used to toothless smiles. I am sure by the way I am describing this that you are having a very different experience than I had. Perhaps most of the people you know have most of their teeth. I was impressed with her. She said she lived with her sister in a house that her sister bought from their brother as she pointed to it. “It’s that one. It’s really small. It looks like an outhouse. It’s so small but we never bump into eachother. When we do, we say excuse me.” I appreciated her comical kindness. My experience was also hightened by the timing of my raised brows of interest during the conversation. Everytime I raised my brows she leaned in with a smile and sparkling eyes.

Grad School

As most of you know I just finished applying to graduate school. I applied to difficult schools and programs (Harvard, Columbia), rather than applying to places and programs I knew I could get into. I am always getting stuck on the possible part of impossible. This is usually a good thing… but not when it has to do with love. I will hear about my admission status in April.

I am losing motivation to write this blog. The novelty of the Alaskan bush has worn off, and my focus is elsewhere. I don’t really know what to talk about, so if any of you want to hear about something specific leave a comment.

There are new pictures at kristensredwheelbarrow.blogspot.com .