Looking for Lisa on the Rachel Maddow show; iPhoning it with Carmen, Scott and Shoshana at the Metro Cafe

The day before yesterday, I answered my iPhone to hear the very excited voice of my daughter, Lisa, whom I have not seen since before I left for Kaktovik at the beginning of the month. "Dad!" she exclaimed. "Did you know that Rachel Maddow is going to be doing her show in Anchorage tomorrow?"

It was the first that I had heard - although right after the call ended, I saw it plastered all over the Alaska blogosphere.

Only 200 tickets would be given out, first come, first serve, and Lisa had put in her name. If she was successful, she would get two tickets only.

So it was agreed that if she got the two tickets, her mom would drive into town and go with her.

Sadly, Lisa was not successful.

Happily, Charlie's mom was and she invited Lisa to go with her.

Trouble was, Lisa's car is out of commission. She had no transportation. So her mom volunteered to go into town, pick her up and take her to the Taproot Cafe in Anchorage, where Maddow would be doing the show live.

This meant that I would have no car in the afternoon, which was fine by me, because I would have my bike and I needed to do some bike-riding.

Still, I wanted to venture out in the car at least once that day, so Margie and I drove to Arby's for a sandwich.

Here we are, in the car, along the way, at the corner of Lucille and Seldon, where I have stopped at the sign until this vehicle passes by.

At about the same time that I would normally have gotten into the car to drive to Metro, I plugged the headset into my iPhone, tuned the radio to KSKA, put on my helmet, climbed onto my bike and pedaled to Metro.

In some ways, it was a horrifying pedal. I had not ridden my bike since before I left for Kaktovik and I have not even been taking any good walks. I have had no exercise to speak of all month long and I felt it - in my lungs, in my muscles.

Still, I pedaled resolutely on and soon I was in Metro, where I found Shoshana and Carmen in Halloween dress.

I cannot find my pocket camera, which I think might be under the bed somewhere, I did not want to carry my 5d II, so, again, the only camera that I had was my iPhone and the lens was extra smudged.

That's okay, because when you shoot pictures with a cell phone, you do not look for technical perfection. You look to see if you can capture some kind of feeling, even through the smudge and motion blur and if you do, that is good enough.

So here is Shoshana, photographed through my smudged iPhone. I get a good feeling when I look at the picture - just as I always do when I pull up to the Metro drive-through window and see Shoshana smiling, ready to take my order.

She is just the kind of person who gives one a good feeling.

Carmen, with Scott in the background, as seen in the mirror. In this blurry image, I get the feeling of energy, vivaciousness, friendly warmth and slightly devilish mischievousness that Carmen always brings to Metro Cafe. Although he occupies but a small part of the frame, I feel the absolute, determined, doggedness of Scott as he battles to defeat his horrid cancer.

I believe this is one of Scott's brothers, washing the Metro windows. Scott sat down with me and we talked for a long time - not much about cancer, but about other things, about America, Alaska, where we are, how we got here, what the future looks like.

It would all be worth expounding upon one day.

Afterwards, I pedaled home upon pavement coated with a thin layer of splotchy, frost ice. I wondered what would happen if the bike slid out from beneath me and I came down upon my artificial shoulder.

I did not really believe there was much chance of that happening, but soon, if I keep riding my bike, the chance will be fairly high. In the past, when this would happen, it was never a big deal, because you slid on ice, went down on ice and slid across ice - but now...

I had no cover on my ears. They got a little cold.

The Rachel Maddow show was nearing its end when I arrived home. I scanned the crowd, looking for Lisa.

I could not find her. As it turns out, when Margie picked her up at work she forgot her driver's license, left it behind and so was barred from entering the Taproot Cafe. Lisa did not get to be part of the crowd. To help make up for it, she plans to go do some volunteer work for Scott McAdams.

Later in the evening, I watched the repeat of the Maddow show. What I saw was Alaska, bursting with energy across the political spectrum, some of it rational, some of it irrational and a great mystery to me, given what has been made so obvious - all of it passionate and heartfelt. It looked like yesterday would have been a fun day to have been in Anchorage. 

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iPhoning it with Rex and Ama by the Little Su, where a spineless moose lost his head - and his antlers, too

Rex and his girlfriend Ama showed up yesterday about 1:00 PM. They had wanted to take Margie and me out to lunch, but Margie had gone to town to babysit Kalib and Jobe, so they just took me. Afterwards, Rex drove Ama through his boyhood haunts toward the Little Su.

To Rex, as it is for me, the tour was one of lament, for what he saw was all the places that had been so wild and free now ruined and cut off by the development that has put an end to the hiking, skiing, and mountain biking that we used to do through all this country, but can't do anymore.

To Ama, who grew up in New York and now hails from the San Francisco Bay area, it appeared as though we were driving through a rural, nearly pristine area, with just a few houses here and there, and a gas station.

Ama and Rex met last summer when she came to Alaska to do some adventuring and they hit it off. She had a great time in Alaska and did some things that I still haven't done - such as kayak in Prince William Sound, but she was pretty certain that she would not want to be a winter-time Alaskan.

Rex went and spent some time with her in the Bay area in September and, judging from Facebook, they had a great time.

Now she is back in Alaska. She might have even found a job here. She is ready to try winter-time Alaska, ready to become an Alaskan.

You will note how bundled up she is - hat, gloves, multi-layers and what she probably believes to be a winter coat.

You will note how Rex is not bundled up at all.

I was even less bundled.

It's often like that, when people come to visit from other places. 

Next year, I suspect, she will be dressed just like us.

To me, the air only seemed disgustingly warm for this time of year. The ground should be covered in snow. All the lakes should be frozen over. Some are, and some are freezing, but some have little ice at all.

The bank of the Little Su should be completely rimmed in ice.

It's disgusting, really. I can hardly stand it.

The other day we were talking with Jacob and Lavina about Halloween, and how the kids would go out, sometimes in sub-zero weather, and come back with icy pant legs and their costumes crisp and frozen.

It could still happen that way this year, but I wouldn't count on it.

Rex skips a rock.

What is that he has spotted? A log, drifted almost to the bank?

Why, it's a moose head! As you can see, someone has cut the antlers away from the skull. Soon, perhaps, they will hang on someone's wall, or be placed over a doorway or put on display in a yard. Maybe they already have been.

I wonder where the moose was shot and butchered? This is a place by the road and bridge where many people gather to picnic, skip rocks, cast a line, drink beer, smoke dope or do whatever. It would be very rude to butcher a moose in such a place and just leave the leftovers behind, so I speculate that perhaps it was done upstream and the skull just washed to this place.

A short distance away, we found the spine. There was a significant amount of moose hair on the rocks on the bank.

So I am not sure. It might have drifted down, but someone might have butchered it right here.

Coming into the main channel is a little estuary that has frozen over. 

Whoever left this to freeze into the estuary definitely is rude. I hate to say it, but an awful lot of this kind of thing happens around here.

There are many people who live in this area who do not know where they live.

Oh, yes - they will tell you, perhaps proudly, "I live in Alaska!"

But they don't even know it.

Frozen moose print. I had forgotten my camera, by the way. I had to take all these pictures with my iPhone. I like the iPhone camera, but the lens has become very smudged and hazy.

Ama studies the scientific properties of a frozen puddle.

I find a nice little shell along the bank - a 9 mm. I still have it. It's in my pocket.

Ama observes a scorched tree trunk. Trees here do not have long tap roots that extend deep into the ground. Here, the roots spread out beneath the tree and form a platform for it.

Rex gets an idea for some iron art involving salmon that he wants to create. So he takes a few pictures of this dead one for later study.

The dead salmon.

Later, we go to Little Miller's for coffee as we listen to the afternoon news on the radio. We could not go to Metro, because Metro is closed on Sundays.

The lady at the window accepts Rex's cash.

Such was Sunday.

Now it is Monday.

I don't want to do anything.

I suppose that I had better.

I am tired, though. Really, really, tired.

I don't want to do anything.

But how can I do nothing at all?

That would be boring.

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My final day in Utah - Julie and her family, minus the chipmunk; surprise birthday dinner with a silent Bacon scream; back in Wasilla - Carmen's new do; Mahoney horses

This is Matthew Oliphant, youngest son of the very first niece that ever came to me, Julie, and her husband Kerry. We have not spent a great deal of time together but, my favorite memory of him comes from the time period after Mom died. He was very small then and I took a picture of him eating a chocolate chip cookie. It was part of a batch that his mom and brothers and sister had made and brought over for Dad and those of us who were hanging out to mourn with him.

As the rest of us visited, Matthew kept eating those cookies and by the time they left, the cookies were all gone. It's possible his brothers and sister might have helped a bit, but Matthew was the real Cookie Monster.

I didn't see him with a cookie on this trip, but I have a feeling that he is still a cookie monster.

Julie is the daughter of my brother, Mac, Rex's tall twin. Mac got his tall genes from Dad, whereas his twin and the rest of us all got Mom's short genes. Mac grew to be 6'4", Rex 5'7".

The tall genes were passed down to Julie, who also married a very tall man. All of their children are very tall and whatever age they are, they are taller even then their grandpa Mac was at the same. Six foot is nothing to them at all. Even in junior high years, six-footers have always stood short beside them.

Matthew is only seven, but he already stands eight foot, nine-and-three-quarter inches tall.

Well... maybe I exaggerate a little bit... but give him a couple of years.

It takes a lot of cookies to fuel such growth, but Matthew is up to the task.

That's Kerry off to the side and the nine-year old hefting the two-by-fours is Charlie. 

And this is Chase - Chaseninja. Now, the thing is, I may be the short one, but I am still the toughest member of the entire family and everybody knows it.

Well... maybe I boast a little too quickly. At nine, Charlie weighs in at 156 pounds and plays tackle on his Pee Wee football team. If you doubt that he hits hard, notice the abrasions on his forehead. He wears a helmet, alright, but when he hits someone he practically shoves his head right through that helmet and right through his opponent.

That's what those abrasions are from - the impact of his forehead against the inside of his helmet.

And yet, tough as he is, when his mom mentioned that a neighbor had some kittens, he lifted his hands to the praying position and began to plead that she let him adopt one. I was a little slow and caught the moment just a second too late, after he noticed the camera lens was upon him.

The family, minus daughter Riley, in the backyard. Riley had been to the dentist and, as I noted earlier, felt like a chipmunk and refused to be photographed.

Next time.

Julie and Chase.

In the evening, just before I drove to the airport, turned in the rental car and boarded the jet back to Anchorage, I had dinner with Ada Lakshmi, Rex, Tom and all the children of Mary Ann except for the one who had gotten married the day before, plus their husbands and boyfriend. We ate at Thai Gardens, just blocks from the house where Mary Ann and Greg live. The wedding and all its preparations had exhausted Mary Ann, and so she and Greg had stayed home with the two dogs.

As to the son who had gotten married and his bride, nobody had seen either, all day long, even though they were not scheduled to leave for their honeymoon in Vermont until the next day.

I did not get to say goodbye to them.

Tom's children who had not just married planned the dinner as a surprise birthday party for their father. He was completely surprised, especially since his birthday is in September. His children had not been able to be with him then, so they celebrated it now.

As you can see, Tom is now four years old. Either that, or each candle represents 15 years.

Eric, Amber's adventurous, mountain-climbing boyfriend.

And then I found myself in Wasilla, once again, and totally exhausted once again.

In the afternoon, I went to Metro Cafe at the usual time and found Carmen at the drive-through window. She had done some fancy things to her hair and wondered if I would notice.

Of course I noticed.

Carmen's beautiful new hairdo, from the back.

Scott was there, working, too. His cancer battle has been rough, with radiation and chemo subjecting him to ordeals the description of which make me cringe and I will not pass them on here. But he is a fighter, determined to win this battle.

We talked a bit about our separate wanderings into the same places on the Arctic Slope. We thought it might be good to one day write up some of our stories, side by side.

Shoshana came to the window to say "hi, stranger," so of course I photographed her, too. She is not there on Mondays and Wednesdays, as she has class those days.

After I left Metro, I did the old drive, down past the Mahoney Ranch and the Mahoney horses. I don't know why it hasn't snowed here, yet. I hope it does, soon. I saw some footage from the Alaska Federation of Natives Convention in Fairbanks and there is snow there and of course there has been snow on the Arctic Slope for awhile now.

Some may wonder why I am not at AFN and why I was not at the Alaska Tribal Leaders Summit and the Youth and Elders conference that immediately preceded the convention. I have been going nonstop for months, traveling here, traveling there. I am exhausted. And I can't afford either the time or the expense to have spent this week in Fairbanks.

So I am here in Wasilla. I plan to stay put for a couple of weeks, if I can get away with it.

I have not seen Kalib, Jobe or any of my children except for Caleb yet, but I am going into Anchorage this afternoon, so maybe I will. If I do, then readers will, too.

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In the absence of steel-cut oatmeal, a hand reaches over the seat in front of me

This morning, I looked for the steel-cut oatmeal, but could not find it. Yet, I was determined to eat steel-cut oatmeal - because it is good for you, it is cheap and, especially when you add berries and walnuts into the mix, it is delicious.

Not quite as delicious as breakfast at Mat-Su Valley Family Restaurant, but still delicious.

And I can't afford Mat-Su Valley Family Restaurant right now. I expect to receive a check by the end of the week and then I should be able to afford a few breakfasts at Family, but right now I can't. Just yesterday, two purchases went into overdraft protection.

So I was determined to eat my steel-cut oatmeal.

But the steel-cut oatmeal jar was empty. I already knew this, because I had emptied it yesterday, when I cooked my healthy and economical breakfast. When Margie filled that jar a couple of weeks back, there had been oatmeal left over, which she had put it in another jar. According to my understanding, she had then put the second jar in the hall-way pantry.

But I looked in the hallway pantry and could not find it.

This did not worry me that much, because Margie is forever putting something somewhere, after which she tells me where but when I go to look, I cannot find it. So I consult her and then it is quickly found - sometimes, right where she said it was, sometimes in a completely different place.

Anyway, I wanted my steel-cut oatmeal. She is in Anchorage, babysitting Jobe, so I called her up and asked her where the second jar of steel-cut oatmeal was.

Indeed, she answered, it had been in the pantry, but she had emptied it into the steel-cut oatmeal jar on the counter while I was traveling. 

This meant there was no more steel-cut oatmeal.

This left me with no choice but to go to Family Restaurant.

I did. I ordered ham, eggs over easy, hashbrowns lightly cooked and 12 grain toast, to be dropped and delivered only after I had finished the rest of my breakfast, so that I could lather it with strawberry jam and eat it slowly, while it was still hot, sip coffee and see if I could prepare my mind to face the day.

As I thus enjoyed this breakfast that I could not afford but that circumstance had forced me to buy, this little hand slipped over the top of the empty seat facing me.

I have too much to do today to fool anymore with this damn blog, so I will let this one image, and this exceptionally exciting and important story, which ought to win me a Pulitzer if not a Nobel, do it.

On a day that I am too lazy and sleepy to even blog, someone gives me a gift to keep me awake

I always feel exhausted when I return from a trip. I thought today it might be different, as I had been gone for such a short time, only from Friday afternoon until this morning about 12:30 AM.

But no, all day I have felt lazy and listless. Sleepy. So much so that I decided that even the most simple blog entry would require an effort that I was not up to.

I did, however, make the effort to drive Metro Cafe at the usual time.

There, I found Shoshana at the window, informing me that I had a free Americano and pastry waiting for me.

It had been paid for by a woman who drove up Friday, told them that she liked this blog and then bought this gift for me. She did not identify herself.

So now I am alert just enough to make this simple entry.

Thank you, anonymous reader!

Carmen was there with her red-headed friend, Amanda, who she used to work with at Northern Air Cargo.

So they posed for Through the Window Metro Study, #6201.22222229: Carmen and Her Red-Headed Friend.

Not long after I drove away enjoying the gift, I came upon this fall cat. I could tell that it is an excellent cat, so I took this picture and now I am going to put it up as the wallpaper for this monitor.

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