CM*D33: Margie returns to the scene of her injury; Rex and his sailboat, Willow the dog, Alaska Dispatch and potential young citizen journalist

Margie had a therapy session scheduled at the Alaska Native Medical Center in Anchorage today, so I drove her in, dropped her off and then headed straight over to the Merrill Field offices of the Alaska Dispatch to chat with the editor, Tony Hopfinger. 

I then rushed back to pick her up, after which I took her to lunch at Cafe Europa and then to a movie at Century 16. During my stays at home, we used to go to a movie almost every single week, but it has been a long, long, long time since we have.

I did a search in this blog and the most recent movie I came up with was one we saw February 25 - and that was our first outing after she originally broke her left knee and right wrist on January 20.

We have been out since she broke her knee for the second time on July 26, but not to a movie - just here and there to get a bite to eat, a cup of coffee or an ice cream come.

I fell asleep in the movie about five times. Not because it was boring; it wasn't - it was fun: The Informant. There are some gaps in the story for me, but the thrust of it all came together.

The fact that I could fall asleep five times during what may have been my first movie outing in eight months kind of gives me a clue as to why I am having such a struggle completing my project.

Afterwards, we returned to the place where she fell on July 26 - which is now owned by our daughter Melanie. Her fall happened right after she stepped through the door to her left. Later, as we were leaving, I was going to take a picture of her atop that step. I got it framed and everything, but when I pushed the shutter, the battery died. I got no picture.

A couple of nights ago, I wrote about the dog that was given to me by the Norwegian Iditarod musher, Ketil Reitan. I told how I put her in the back seat of my airplane and flew her home from Kaktovik on the Arctic Coast at the top of ANWR - the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. 

I mentioned that she is now buried in our backyard, along with some other individuals dear to us who wore fur all the time.

In comments, a reader let me know that I had slipped up and had not named her.

Well, this is she, Willow. I took the picture in the spring of 2005, right after she found a chunk of bone that I believe to be moose. She was very pleased.

Rex felt real bad after her death, so I made this print for him.

By the way - seasoned readers are familiar with my lament about Serendipity, the subdivision that robbed me of the woods that I used to roam - and so often with Willow.

This picture was taken in those woods, which died right along with the dog.

And on the fridge were these pictures of Kalib, Rex and his Grandpa Hess, my late dad. Two years ago, right about now, my Muse, Soundarya, wanted to know about my dad and asked me write up some stories about him and email them to her in India. So I did.

This past summer, when I was in Barrow, she emailed and instructed me to put those stories on my blog. She felt that readers would enjoy them. I promised her that I would. Sooner or later, probably during our next trip to Utah and Arizona, I will, and I will introduce the whole family, mine and Margie's. Time and money permitting, I want to go to the Navajo Nation and introduce Lavina's as well.

The very first image that I posted on this blog was of the tiny sailboat that Rex had made. He is now making a bigger sailboat and this is it. There is a much larger story here, but I cannot get into it just now.

As you can see, this bout of unusually warm fall weather is continuing. It got well into the 50's today. It feels like we live someplace else, but we live here.

Meanwhile, I see more reports of snow at various places in the Lower 48. This is very embarrassing.

Now I will back up to earlier in the day. I mentioned that I stopped at the Alaska Dispatch to visit the editor. I completely forgot to take any pictures while I was there. I don't know why, I guess because we had a fast-paced conversation and when it was over, I had to race off to pick Margie up.

I forgot even though Alice Rogoff's big Cessna 206 on floats was sitting in the hangar, and it was the cleanest looking airplane I think that I have ever seen. It filled me with desire and want and still I forgot to take a picture.

Alice, by the way, is the very good woman who helped us out in Washington, DC, after Margie got hurt following the Obama Inaugural. She put us up in her very fine Bethesda guest house and told us to stay until Margie could travel. We did. I do not know how we would have coped without her.

She also bought into the Alaska Dispatch and that is why they have their offices in a hangar at Merrill Field.

Tony and I spent some time talking about how online journalism is changing everything. We talked about the emerging roll of citizen journalists, ordinary people with cameras and cellphones, documenting and reporting on life and getting it out to the world in a new way.

And then I took Margie to lunch and the first person that I saw when I stepped through the door of Cafe Europa was 17 month old Luca, looking very much like a citizen journalist.

His mother said that this was the first time that he had ever held a camera. He was still figuring it out. I told her that if he got something, she should email it to me and I would share it with you.

No promises.

We will see.

The kid's got his own mind. He will do what he will do.

*Cocoon mode: Until I finish up a big project that I am working on, I am keeping this blog at bare-minimum simple. I anticipate about one month (obviously, now, more than a month. Perhaps forever, it feels like) Oh, hell! Let's face it - I did not keep myself within cocoon restraints. This does not qualify as a cocoon entry. But I will leave it as one, just the same. It was supposed to be. 

Comments

[debby]

Nothing worse than a reader who nags.

It is good to see that Margie is getting back to some semblence of a normalacy. I'm sure that it has been a long and discouraging few months for her.