from October 19, 2008
Today Paul and I went to watch the sockeye salmon swimming upstream. Bright spears of red beneath the riffling waters. Through binoculars, a jutting head - a hooked snout - a golden, prehistoric eye. Their fluid shapes exhaled both strength and exhaustion. Every movement of their bodies a great effort and a great ease.
We walked along the path flanking Cavanaugh Pond. On the pond, a faded glitter of sunlight. Widgeons paddled and dipped underwater. A kingfisher flew, rattling. We lit our small propane campstoves and cooked our canned pork & beans, drank tea, and sat on the dusty hump of the shore. Sunlight slanted through the reeds and caught in sparkles on small insects beating the water. Tiny fish hung in the water column; a heron hunched on a far log.
Volunteer docents bustled along the path, leading tours to the salmon. One gentleman, a visitor, with a small bevy of children, paused to talk to us after the children, three boys, came to ask us questions.
"Are you seeing anything?" he asked.
"Well, there's some ducks," I said. "And a kingfisher. You hear that rattling call? That's the kingfisher."
"You hear that rattling call?" said the gentleman, in a strong English accent, emphasizing the word "that". He was portly, with black hair and a moustache. We looked at him in confusion.
"You hear that rattling call?" he repeated, pointing to the smallest boy, who was scrambling back up the slope. "That's called a grandson."
We chuckled. Then we all strolled along the path toward the salmon at the end. He was talkative, the gentleman. He calls Yorkshire his native ground. He told us he had lived in South Africa for ten years before returning to England. And shortly following South Africa, he moved to the United States. I foolishly did not ask him what all that moving was for. I wanted to be quiet with Paul, on the shores of the pond watching ducks and looking for frogs, and soon turned with him off onto another side path. The gentleman and his grandsons, and the grandsons' father, I presume, continued toward the creek with its salmon.
Later, we encountered them again, returning as we arrived on the creek shore, but it was too late. We had time only for a few short words. "There are lots of them down there," said the swarthy gentleman - meaning salmon, of course. Then he and his son and his grandsons were gone.
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Monday, December 22, 2008
Alaska
from Sept. 16, 2008
One tends to think of rain as something that happens to the land; to be endured a little while. In southeast Alaska rain is something that is. The clouds, great foggy wreaths, lean on the mountains. They move in the sky like vast dark sheep. Sunlight feels almost like an interruption. These mountains are made for the fog and wet: the occasional sharp peak thrusts upward, visible over a knot of cloud. The earth takes on a solemn gray dimness; the hillsides are mantled with spruce, cedar, and hemlock, a deep and endless green.
Arriving. We climbed aboard the floatplane on the small dock in Ketchikan. Its big skiis jutted forward, it sat like some big insect on the water. The workers, a woman and a man in street clothes, passed our baggage upward; we helped them. Then we all climbed in. I made some expression of nervous delight.
"Go sit in the cockpit!" said Gary - "really?" said I, - yes, go on, Gary encouraged, and then there I was, copilot. The big windows, the nose of the plane, that I had to crane to see over, the elderly pilot with his slightly splotched face. "I hope you don't mind Willie Nelson," he said. And then Willie Nelson's soft tones played all the trip long through the earmuffs. The dials and meters and gauges spread out in front of me. I watched the pilot move the levers and the steering bar, relaxedly, with his practiced ease.
The plane flew slowly over the islands and the water like an automobile, only far higher, floating on air, its big feet thrust forward. The rain and fog hung, lingered. All was grey, an endless peaceful grey world. The rain streamed the windshield and the windows.
So the little plane hummed over the water. It was so peaceful, barely a bump. The pilot was from Washougal, Washington. He played his Willie Nelson and announced to us that we would not be able to fly through the mountain pass to Craig - too foggy. So we touched down in a town across the island, the skiis bouncing lightly off the water, the water so still, still and black, until the plane furrowed twin tracks in final descent. Down we climbed. To stand on the dock, peering down the sides into the black water, looking out at the mountains, taking photos of ourselves by the plane - hunched into our raincoats against a steady drizzle - it was lovely.
I must describe the driver of the van who took us to Craig; I must describe his little wife. She wasn't so little, really, a buxom American girl, hair straightened, eyes rimmed with eyeliner. Her little spoiled daughter wailed on the Alaska Airlines plane from Seattle. "Ow, ow, ow!" she cried out repeatedly when they buckled the seatbelt around her, though she felt no pain. Her mother and grandmother fussed over her, cajoled her, tried to distract her. At the end of the flight, when the little imp peered around the seat at me with her enormous brown eyes, her blond hair straight and wispy, I understood better. Such a beautiful little creature would be easy to spoil.
The girl's husband was the driver of the van to Craig. He picked us up and we all pulled ourselves into the big red vehicle. The little baby - she couldn't be older than three - kept saying, "Hi Daddy!" over and over. Before he had entered the vehicle, she had looked at us appealingly, saying either "Hi," in a breathy little voice, or "my Daddy," until we were coaxed into speaking with her. Then her Daddy entered. "Hi Daddy!" she said. "Hi Baby," said her father, cajolingly, reaching back from the driver's seat to touch one small foot.
He was just an ordinary guy, bearded, with an earring, young, younger than me, wearing a hooded sweatshirt and a pair of jeans. What was so enchanting about him? The love in their small nucleus, his eyes, looking back in the rearview mirror at his wife. "Are you glad to be home?" he asked. "Yes," said his wife. He reached back to touch her calf with his hand.
"And you?" she said. "Am I glad to be home?" he joked. "Noo," said his wife. All this they said in soft tones, soft, private tones that both acknowledged that others were present in the car, and somehow also permitted those strangers entry into such a private and intimate sphere. "Am I glad you're back?" he said then, in a tender tone. "Yes. Very glad." Then he recovered himself before strangers and chuckled. "Now I have someone to cook for me." His wife laughed. "Oh, you jerk," she said, in a voice that made you disbelieve it.
By this time their little baby was asleep. She had spent the first part of the journey repeating, "Hi Daddy," or "Hi," to which he always replied, "Hi," in the same soft voice she used. Then finally she capped her repeated words with "My Daddy." There was a moment's silence. "My mama," she said. Then she leaned her little sweet spoiled head against her mama, and fell asleep.
One tends to think of rain as something that happens to the land; to be endured a little while. In southeast Alaska rain is something that is. The clouds, great foggy wreaths, lean on the mountains. They move in the sky like vast dark sheep. Sunlight feels almost like an interruption. These mountains are made for the fog and wet: the occasional sharp peak thrusts upward, visible over a knot of cloud. The earth takes on a solemn gray dimness; the hillsides are mantled with spruce, cedar, and hemlock, a deep and endless green.
Arriving. We climbed aboard the floatplane on the small dock in Ketchikan. Its big skiis jutted forward, it sat like some big insect on the water. The workers, a woman and a man in street clothes, passed our baggage upward; we helped them. Then we all climbed in. I made some expression of nervous delight.
"Go sit in the cockpit!" said Gary - "really?" said I, - yes, go on, Gary encouraged, and then there I was, copilot. The big windows, the nose of the plane, that I had to crane to see over, the elderly pilot with his slightly splotched face. "I hope you don't mind Willie Nelson," he said. And then Willie Nelson's soft tones played all the trip long through the earmuffs. The dials and meters and gauges spread out in front of me. I watched the pilot move the levers and the steering bar, relaxedly, with his practiced ease.
The plane flew slowly over the islands and the water like an automobile, only far higher, floating on air, its big feet thrust forward. The rain and fog hung, lingered. All was grey, an endless peaceful grey world. The rain streamed the windshield and the windows.
So the little plane hummed over the water. It was so peaceful, barely a bump. The pilot was from Washougal, Washington. He played his Willie Nelson and announced to us that we would not be able to fly through the mountain pass to Craig - too foggy. So we touched down in a town across the island, the skiis bouncing lightly off the water, the water so still, still and black, until the plane furrowed twin tracks in final descent. Down we climbed. To stand on the dock, peering down the sides into the black water, looking out at the mountains, taking photos of ourselves by the plane - hunched into our raincoats against a steady drizzle - it was lovely.
I must describe the driver of the van who took us to Craig; I must describe his little wife. She wasn't so little, really, a buxom American girl, hair straightened, eyes rimmed with eyeliner. Her little spoiled daughter wailed on the Alaska Airlines plane from Seattle. "Ow, ow, ow!" she cried out repeatedly when they buckled the seatbelt around her, though she felt no pain. Her mother and grandmother fussed over her, cajoled her, tried to distract her. At the end of the flight, when the little imp peered around the seat at me with her enormous brown eyes, her blond hair straight and wispy, I understood better. Such a beautiful little creature would be easy to spoil.
The girl's husband was the driver of the van to Craig. He picked us up and we all pulled ourselves into the big red vehicle. The little baby - she couldn't be older than three - kept saying, "Hi Daddy!" over and over. Before he had entered the vehicle, she had looked at us appealingly, saying either "Hi," in a breathy little voice, or "my Daddy," until we were coaxed into speaking with her. Then her Daddy entered. "Hi Daddy!" she said. "Hi Baby," said her father, cajolingly, reaching back from the driver's seat to touch one small foot.
He was just an ordinary guy, bearded, with an earring, young, younger than me, wearing a hooded sweatshirt and a pair of jeans. What was so enchanting about him? The love in their small nucleus, his eyes, looking back in the rearview mirror at his wife. "Are you glad to be home?" he asked. "Yes," said his wife. He reached back to touch her calf with his hand.
"And you?" she said. "Am I glad to be home?" he joked. "Noo," said his wife. All this they said in soft tones, soft, private tones that both acknowledged that others were present in the car, and somehow also permitted those strangers entry into such a private and intimate sphere. "Am I glad you're back?" he said then, in a tender tone. "Yes. Very glad." Then he recovered himself before strangers and chuckled. "Now I have someone to cook for me." His wife laughed. "Oh, you jerk," she said, in a voice that made you disbelieve it.
By this time their little baby was asleep. She had spent the first part of the journey repeating, "Hi Daddy," or "Hi," to which he always replied, "Hi," in the same soft voice she used. Then finally she capped her repeated words with "My Daddy." There was a moment's silence. "My mama," she said. Then she leaned her little sweet spoiled head against her mama, and fell asleep.
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