How yesterday's fictitious post oddly foreshadowed today's true one; shoe in the wire, death beneath the jet trail, the street sweeper and the King James Bible
Tuesday, April 19, 2011 at 12:02PM 
Here's the truth - I completely made up that story yesterday about Margie wanting to eat Jim after she grew so hungry that she became somewhat irrational but came out of it after I fed her an orange. Yes - I hate to shock and disillusion my billions of devoted readers who dote upon my every word as absolute gospel truth, but yes, I made the whole story up.
But, leaving Jim out of it, that story in some ways became true after we went to bed.
Somewhere between 3 and 4 AM, she woke me up with these words, "Bill, what is happening to me?" A story that is a little too long and complicated for me to tell here in its entirety then unfolded over the next 45 minutes or so. To keep it simple, she had been so tired at bedtime that she had slept right through the symptoms of impending diabetic shock that would normally cause her to wake up and treat them before they became a problem.
When she awoke me, she was deep into that shock - worse than at any previous time in her life. So much so that I feared she may have suffered a stroke. She was completely disoriented, her torso hot and her legs and feet cold and hardly movable.
In the end, I gave her some orange juice. She drank it.
It took a little while for the sugar to kick in, but once it did, everything was okay after that.
As to the shoe in the wire, we saw this astounding sight in Anchorage, where we had stopped at a red light on the corner of "C" Street and Sixth Avenue. The light turned green, just as I took the picture.
On our way to Anchorage, Margie had called Charlie so that he could meet us with a jacket that Melanie had been keeping for Margie to take to Arizona as an 81st birthday present for Margie's mom, Rose Roosevelt.
Having been spoiled by Alaska's Kaladi Bros. coffee and left unable to enjoy the coffee they can get locally, Lavina's family had also requested that Margie bring some down for them. So Charlie picked up two big bags and brought that, too. Our intent was to reimburse Charlie, but he refused to accept the reimbursement.
Those two bags probably cost at least $20.00 bucks each, but Charlie said Jake and Lavina had fed him plenty and there was no way we could force him to take reimbursement.
Here is Margie, waiting to check her bags in at Alaska Airlines. There is another complicated story here that I am not going to take the time to tell - save to say that, when it comes to air travel, I miss the days before paranoia became official policy.
Anyway, thanks to the very helpful lady at the Alaska Airlines baggage check in, everything got worked out, Margie entered security, got through, boarded her plane and, after a layover in Seattle, reached Phoenix a bit before 11:00 PM last night.
Her original ticket would have put her there a little over two weeks ago and she would have come home this weekend. However, Mariddie Craig, the wife of my late friend, Vincent Craig, called me a couple of weeks back to tell me that they were going to hold a one year memorial in the Apache way for Vincent on May 14 and she asked me to come.
So Margie changed her schedule so that she would get down there in time for her mother's birthday and then stay through the memorial. She will return with me on May 19.
A week ago last Sunday, at this very corner in Wasilla, I photographed an impending nightmare that I feared was about to come true. Indeed, yesterday, it did come true. Yesterday, we had to send in our income tax and we owed.
I fear we might wind up living on the street yet.
That fellow dancing at the side of the road while I wait for the red light to turn green is the Liberty Tax mascot. It would be his last day at this job. Unless he already had something else lined up, as of today he is out of work.
Before I reached home, I stopped at the Post Office. I did not find any mail in our box, but I did find this dog in this car, patiently waiting for its human.
That's what dogs tend to spend huge portions of their lives doing - they patiently wait for their humans.
Some dogs do get pretty impatient, though.
Especially little dogs.
After I got home, I parked the car, got my bike and went off on a ten-mile pedal, which included the usual stop at Metro Cafe. As I pedaled up the bike trail on Nelson Avenue, this guy commented about my camera so I stopped and we chatted a bit.
He said he is a commercial fisherman and fishes out of southeast. He speculated that I must have plenty of good things to photograph while pedaling around Wasilla - moose and wildlife, mountains, etc., and said if I had been here just days earlier, a young man had died just beyond from crack cocaine. That would have made some photographs, he said.
I told him the jet flying overhead with him standing just beneath would make a good photograph and he agreed. So here it is.
As to the death, I checked the police reports up to today's April 19 date as reported in the online Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman and found no mention of it. However, the most recent date referenced in the April 19 report was April 10, so maybe the reporting is delayed. I will check future reports, but at the moment I cannot confirm it.
I suppose that I could call the Wasilla police department and see if I could confirm it, but that would be too much like I was trying to be a real news reporter here, instead of just a guy pedaling around on his bike with a camera, taking superficial note of this and that, interested more in impression than hard facts.
Anyway, I am too lazy and I have too many other things to do.
I will leave it to the Frontiersman and see if they come up with anything.
I had my iPhone with me, my headphones plugged in and I was listening to All Things Considered on NPR. There was a story on about the 400th Anniversary of the King James Bible.
In recent decades, other language-dumb-downed versions of the Bible have become more popular, but none carry the beauty of language that can be found in King James. The reporter made that very point and showed how the language of the King James Bible has permeated the culture in everything from popular music to the speeches of Presidents in times of national crisis, from Lincoln to Obama.
Several quotes were aired and all were beautiful. At the very moment I pedaled by this street sweeper, the 2003 quote of President George W. Bush speaking to the nation after the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster came into my ears:
'In the words of the prophet Isaiah, 'Lift your eyes and look to the heavens. Who created all these? He who brings out the starry hosts one by one and calls them each by name. Because of His great power, and mighty strength, not one of them is missing.'
I do not like much about George W. Bush. I do not generally like the sound and intonations of his voice.
But I have to tell you, in this instance, speaking these words from the King James Bible, I heard nothing but beauty.
Pure beauty.
After I got home, I gave in to temptation and opened up Facebook - an amazing tool but also the greatest time-waster and destroyer of productivity ever invented.
On the page of my friend, Allison Akootchook Warden, I saw a picture of her in the midst of other poets, including Leah Frankson, Iñupiat poet of Point Hope who now cuts my hair in Anchorage.
Under the picture was this title:
Epic gathering of Alaskan Poets in Palmer...
Whatever the gathering was about, it was happening at that very moment.
I was hot and sweaty from pedaling my bike and hardly presentable, but, without knowing what the gathering was about, I hopped into the car and dashed off to Palmer.
I missed most of it, but got there before it ended.
Check back tomorrow if you want to know what it was all about.
Reader Comments (5)
Take care of our Margie!
That diabetic shock was frightening. Even to read.
Gotta say...for a man who doesn't consider himself a reporter, well, you're certainly all over the place reporting. Sort of like a reporter.
I think one could write an entire blog about dogs in parked cars. I generally stop and speak to them (in a friendly manner, of course). Some of them I would like to take home, but I don't suppose they would agree to that.
I am not diabetic but now and then I get a sugar low. As soon as I recognize the shakiness I drink orange juice. Gets sugar quickly to the blood. Glad Margie recovered quickly.
I also drink OJ (no ice = more juice) when flying. Great hydrator without causing numerous trips to the tiny room in the back of the plane.
Aw Margie. Please take care of yourselves you two.
You really were everywhere today! Who'da thunk Wasilla was so interesting? You make me look at my day differently as I move about. Think of how many of those tax statue of liberty guys are out of work today across America.