Deprived of sleep, I dream of women and Mormons; ham and eggs, toast and coffee

Thirty-one hours and 53 minutes after I got up, I went back to bed and took my iPhone with me. I had gotten everything done that I needed to in that time.

Couldn't go to sleep, though. Damn. It's like my body forgot how to sleep.

Sure do want to sleep. Sooner or later.

I think of all the sleep I have missed these past few months.

How can a person do this again and again and again?

Hell. I've been doing it for 35 years.

I gave up a bit after 3:00 PM, went out and laid down on the couch. Margie had the TV on, alternating between news channels - MSNBC, CNN, Fox.

I laid there for four hours, slipping in and out of strange dreams as pundits pundited and people vying to lead this nation demonstrated why our government has been stalled into nonsense, stupidity and ineptitude, why people are staging more and more occupations, and caused me to fear for the future of this nation that I once thought was better than this.

Then I got up, ate some mac and cheese and I'm still up. Been coming in and out of my office. Keep sitting down at my computer, trying to get some work done, but nothing happens. I go out and sit on the couch with Margie who has been watching various tv shows, all of which involve murder, mystery, crime solving and beautiful, mysterious women who make you want them but of course you cannot have them.

I watch a few minutes, get bored, then come back in here and fail to accomplish anything.

But I can always place a picture or two from the day on this blog, write a few words of nonsense.

So that is what I have just done.

I think I will go to bed now. See if I can get some sleep. 

Don't feel like I will be able to. Maybe if I lie there long enough, I will.

It is 10:47 PM now. I would tell you how long it has been since I first got up yesterday morning, but I can't do the math anymore.

I already put up a post today, so I will wait and post this tomorrow, see what happens overnight.

Overnight. I laid in bed, feeling like I would never sleep. Outside, the wind howled and tore. Jim settled down on my shoulder. He felt warm, comfy, but still I lay awake. Another cat settled at my ankles - I wasn't sure which one. Margie said she would come to bed at midnight but I was never aware of her doing so, so I guess I did go to sleep.

I awoke at just about 3:30 AM. I had imagined that I would get up about six when Mat-Su Family Restaurant opens and go there and order breakfast, but that was two-and-half hours away. So I stayed put, hoping I might go back to sleep. And I did - the in and out kind of sleep, punctuated by vivid dreams - and there were beautiful women in all of them.

Between punctuations, I would wake and check the time... 3:42.... 3:59... 4:12... 4:37...

Then I awoke and it was 5:54. If I could pop right up and head to Family Restaurant, I would be virtually assured of getting my favorite table... the one wedged in the corner between the window and the wall that separates the main dining area from the large, over-flow, one behind. The table where I can sit with my back to the wall so no one can shoot me in the back, the table from where I can sit and observe all the people that go in and out, from where I can watch their reflections play upon the night-blackened window and if the train passes by, that is a good seat from which to watch it.

But I didn't pop up. I dozed back off, fell back into a dream. Once again, there was a beautiful woman.

She wore a white blouse and a black skirt, which stopped at the top of her knees and her legs looked pretty good. Her hair was long, thick and black. She appeared to be about 25. She had come to the train station, which was in Iowa, to pick me up - along with the platoon of other brand, new, Mormon missionaries who had come in on the train with me. 

What the hell was I doing there? I had done this once before, decades ago, and once was enough. But, lacking the necessary conviction, I had none-the-less committed and so had to follow through.

The woman led us to a car and we got in. She was a new convert to the Mormon church and expressed firm and total faith and dedication to her new creed. She looked at me skeptically. Perhaps it was because of my age. All the other new missionaries were, like... 19, 20... perhaps it was because she sensed that I felt lust toward her, even though I knew that lust to be futile, just as it is 99.999999... percent of the time.

This is true all the time for all men, straight or gay - even those who deny it - be they monagamous or promiscuous. It doesn't matter. The Creator built this desire into men and it is always there and then we are told that God will condem us for it, even those who hold it only in their heart and remain faithful to one partner.

The beautiful woman drove us across farmland, freshly plowed. There were no mountains to be seen, there was no wilderness, the whole country was fenced and farmed and I did not want to be there. I thought about Margie, my children, my grandchildren - baby Lynxton. I would not see them for two years.

What the hell had ever gotten into me that I had agreed to do this?

Except to attend to funerals of loved ones, I hadn't been in a Mormon church in 30 years and now I was committed to a two-year mission?

The beautiful woman drove us to a church in the middle of a field. It was brick, with a tall steeple, no cross on top. She led us inside. Many people were gathered there, all Mormons, Iowa Mormons, but it looked just like Utah. The men all wore white shirts and ties, all had short, neat, hair and all were engaged in serious and earnest discussions.

I awoke again. It was 6:52.

Then a very curious thing happened. Jim, who was now lying beside me, suddenly rose into a sitting position, leaned back onto his haunches, lifted his paws into the air in front of him and sat up very straight, so that in profile he reminded me of a kangaroo. He had an intense glint in his eyes, the earnestness of which was magnified in his stiff, but spring-laden, posture. He stared intently at the south window - the same window that you see in the top frame, but now it was black beyond, because it is the darkening time of year.

Then I noticed the other two cats, Pistol-Yero and Chicago, also sitting up in very alert positions on the bed, intently staring at whatever Jim was staring at. I listened carefully, to see if I might hear a moose, or a vandal, but all I could hear was the wind and it was howling, tearing, destroying the very light snow cover that we had.

Then, in unison, all three cats began to slowly rotate their heads to the left, as though they were watching something move around the bed and into the wall. I listened as intently as I could, but, other than the wind, detected nothing. Soon, they were all looking toward the east window, the east wall.

I was fully awake now. I auto-started the car, waited until the cats settled back down and then got up. I dressed and then went out and got into the car, which was still warming up. The wind had indeed destroyed the snow cover. The ground was pretty much bare. The temperature was a warm 28 (about -2 C) and the lady on the radio said the winds were hitting 65 in some places. She said it would cool off toward evening and we could expect temperatures of about 10 (-12 C).

Still, in years past, it had not been uncommon to send the kids trick-or- treating in sub zero (sub -18 C) weather and Wasilla's lakes remain unfrozen, whereas, until recent years, they would generally freeze up in mid-October.

I drove to Family Restaurant. My corner table was waiting for me. I sat down and ordered, feeling very glad that I was here and not in Iowa, where I have never been. The ham was good, the eggs were good and so were the hash browns - not as good as Abby's, but Abby doesn't open until nine. I had Connie hold my mult-grain toast for desert, then lightly coated it with strawberry jam and washed it down with my third coffee refill.

Now, another big task awaits me and once I post this, I will get to it. I must complete it before I go to bed again. No matter how long it takes, I cannot stop until it is done. It could also take 30 hours, but I don't think so. I think I can complete it in 20.

Twenty hours. Not bad. Not bad at all.

It's going to be a good day.

The image of what I faced; fixed now, blog about to rise again

My laptop computer is fixed now. I took it to the Apple Store by the Lincoln Center and for a very tidy sum but much less than the $1800 or so a new laptop would have cost, they replaced my screen and connecter cable.

This is a picture that I took of the screen before I took the computer.

You can see how hard it was to try to edit photos.

It is much better how. I will start blogging again this weekend...

...after tonight's slide show and party, plus a good night's sleep.

Mormon missionaries ride bicycles

Two Mormon missionaries with their bicycles, spotted as I crossed through the intersection of the Palmer-Wasilla and Glenn Highways in Palmer. Other than what you see in the picture, I know nothing of them, yet I know them very well - better even than they do.

A former Mormon missionary shadow biking down Seldon Street in Wasilla. I know all about him, yet he is an enigma to me. I may never understand him at all.

Now... I must apologize. I have spent the past five or six hours dealing with one of those things that a man who is not a businessman yet is in business for himself must sometimes deal with, just like a real businessmen must - one of those things that he thinks he can do in half-an-hour and if he was a real business man could probably do in three sentences to his secretary, who would then take care of it in 15 minutes. The businessman who is is not a business man then winds up spending half a day and nearly $2000 to get done, an expense which will liklely yield him nothing and the particulars of which he does not understand at all but if he wants to stay in business he has to take the time and he has to spend the money.

So I am left with time to begin my long delayed Arctic series and it will have to start tomorrow.

Actually, the best thing to do would be to hold it for the online magazine I plan to start and not even worry about it all for now, but I promised that I would do it and there are people who have let me know they want to see it, so I will do it.

Hopefully, beginning tomorrow.

Now I must get back to work.

Except the sun is shining. It is wonderfully warm and I do not want to be inside at all.

View images as slides

Encounters at the Post Office: an aging dog, the man who loves the dog even more than he loves cameras and the anonymous woman coffee buyer; health benefits of coffee

I spotted them the other day at the post office as I was walking back to my car, the man still in his car with the dog. I thought, "I should photograph these two before the man gets out of the car," but I was feeling very lazy, tired to the extreme, worn down by all my recent travels and sleepless nights.

If I took the picture, then it would only be right to show it to the man and dog and tell them what I was doing, but I did not feel like explaining anything to anyone and I already had a tremendous amount of pictures to deal with, so I let the moment pass.

Just before I got into my car, the man stepped out of his car and commented on my camera. He wondered if it it was film or digital and if one could even still buy film at all.

He still had an old film camera, he said, but the camera didn't work anymore. He loved photography, he loved film. He had misgivings toward digital.

So I told him I would like to photograph his dog with my digital camera and he said sure. He wondered if he should roll down the window so that I could see the dog better but I told him "no" because if he left it up I could get both the dog and him in the picture - he by reflection.

The dog is Sleater, and she is 13 years old. She has cataracts and diabetes. Jerry would like to buy a new camera, but he spends a lot of money on Sleater's medical bills. There is not enough left to spare for a new camera.

Through the Metro Window, study # 4997: Discussing the health benefits of coffee

At the post office, I also came upon someone else. I am not quite certain who. A woman. Was it the woman driving a pickup truck who parked in the spot next to mine? Was it the woman who came through the door right behind me, so instead of letting it shut in her face I held it open and she walked through and smiled and said "Thank you?"

Or was it the one who held the door for me and I said "Thank you," to?

Or just one I passed in the hall?

There was one more who I remember seeing as she walked on the sidewalk to the post office door and then went inside well before I reached the door? She returned to her car even as I was still getting my mail.

These incidents happened on a couple of different days and I cannot quite sort which ones happened on the very day that I pulled up to the window at Metro Cafe and Carmen said my coffee was free, that a woman had seen me at the Post Office and so had bought this coffee for me, plus a pastry and she had even left one dollar for the tip.

This left a quarter in change, so Carmen gave me the quarter.

Whichever one of these ladies you might have been - thank you!

I also heard a story on NPR about coffee and health and in particular, prostate health. A study had been done and it found that men who drank a goodly amount of coffee were 60 percent less likely to get prostate cancer than men who did not. 

Those who drank a modest amount of coffee, 30 percent less likely.

And it noted that due to the anti-oxcidents in coffee, there are many other health benefits to be had from drinking coffee.

In my upbringing, to drink a cup of coffee was to sin - and to sin big.

I developed prostate problems very early in life. These problems caused me a great deal of pain and discomfort. I had to get up two or three times a night - sometimes even more.

I did not start drinking coffee until I started to hang out with Iñupiat whale hunters. 

It took a lot of years, but those prostate pains and problems all seem to have gone away.

Most nights, I do not have to get up even once now.

I did take some medication for awhile and it helped a lot, but I had to stop because I could not afford it and the insurance company that charged me cadillac premiums for clunker service and eventually drove me off their rolls before health care could pass would not help with the medications.

Yet the problems went away after I quit the medication.

Coffee?

I don't know. Maybe. Could have been.

In this picture, by the way, Carmen, Shoshana and I are having a serious discussion about the health benefits of drinking coffee, vs. religious taboos against drinking coffee.

In some ways, I still feel like I am committing a grave sin everytime I drink a cup of coffee, but I enjoy the coffee and maybe, just maybe, it is helping to keep me alive.

The story said that for maximum benefit, one should drink six cups of coffee every day. 

I would, but I fear that if I drank that much coffee every day, it would kill me.

When I am with whalers, I sometimes drink that much coffee but when one is on the ice the body metabolizes everything very fast.

View images as slides

They'rrrrrrre baaaaack.... in the blog: Jobe, Lavina, Kalib, Jacob and Margie - in that order

How long has it been since this face has appeared in my blog? Six weeks? Something like that. And look, in this, the very first frame that I shot of him upon our reunion, he is just standing around. STANDING around. Not wobbling shakily. Standing.

As though it is no big deal at all. As though it is just something that a little kid would be expected to do.

Jobe. 

Standing around.

And he walks around at will, too.

I was worried that after all this time, he might have forgotten his grampa. Remember how he loved me? How he adored me?

Has he now forgotten me?

After a brief period of study and contemplation, he walked right over and sat down on my lap. He had not forgotten.

And then he went out to play with Martigny. Martigny did not not want to play with him. Maybe it was the "woof" on his shirt that scared her away.

I'm afraid Jobe has been sick the past couple of days. Respiratory infection. 

Jobe needed rest.

Still, he gets up and moves happily around. He is getting better.

Then Jacob called, to say that he and Kalib were coming home from their walk and would soon reach the nearby park. I went out to see and this is the first frame I shot, right after they came into view.

Last time I saw them, there was a still a good amount of snow here. Now the leaves have come out.

Kalib went straight for the slide. As he started down, he looked up at his dad to see what his dad would do.

His dad came sliding after...

Kalib threw some pebbles into a slide chute and then watched as they tumbled and slid back down.

Then he ran off and his dad chased after.

Soon, they were in the house, eating popsicles. When offered a variety of colors, Kalib chose the green one. Then he saw his mom pick a red one for herself and decided that the red one would be better instead.

I also had a red one.

The red ones are best.

Although the green is pretty good.

It was about 10:30 PM now. Margie's flight was scheduled to arrive at 1:38 AM. I had come in early just so I could finally see the boys, but Jobe was now asleep and the rest would soon join them.

That meant I had three hours to wait.

The prospect horrified me.

What I could I do with all that time?

I could go sit in a bar and sip root beer, wink my eyes at honkey tonk women and say stupid things as they danced and sauntered across the floor.

Instead, I laid back on the couch. I sank right into it.

I closed my eyes. The lids were so heavy, I did not feel like I could ever open them again.

I fell asleep right there. At 1:09 AM, I forced myself to get up and go. I drove to the airport and picked Margie up. Her plane had come in half-an-hour early and she was standing there waiting when I pulled up, so I stopped, she put the one bag that she had left with in the back plus the other that she had bought and filled in Arizona and jumped in. 

I took off without even taking a picture.

As regular readers know, it is our tradition to go out for breakfast the morning after either one of us returns from a trip.

So this morning we went to Family Restaurant - no, not Mat-Su Valley Family Restaurant but Denali Family Restaurant, just a few miles further up the Parks Highway.

I would not have even known about this brand new restaurant had I not gone to Fairbanks to cover Katie John's graduation, but I saw it as I drove home.

If they had named it, "Mckinley Family Restaurant," I would never have tried it. I would not have walked through the door. I try never to patronize a business that bears the name, "Mckinley." I stick to "Denali."

Inside, it was very much like Mat-Su Family Restaurant. The decor was similar, the menu similar, the food similar and the plates exactly the same. Even all the staff that I could see, including the waitresses, were staff I recognized from Mat-Su Valley Family Restaurant.

So I thought maybe it was an extension, built by the same owner to compete with him/herself.

No. It wasn't. It was built by a competitor and the staff that I could see had all been hired away.

Breakfast was very good - the hash browns cooked just right and, I hate to say it, better than at Mat-Su. 

I will still continue to patronize Mat-Su. It is a bit closer. And Mat-Su Valley Family Restaurant has helped me bear some extremely hard mornings. Very hard mornings. Mornings that followed nights of turmoil and grief, nights without sleep.

So I will keep going to Mat-Su Valley Family Restaurant.

But I will patronize Denali, too. Good hash browns are a big draw to me.

Margie enjoyed it, too.

It was the first time she had drank coffee in weeks, she said. 

She stayed with her sister, who remains a pretty active, decent and abiding Mormon. She allows visitors to brew coffee for themselves, but Margie did not feel like brewing coffee for just one so she abstained.

Tomorrow, I will discuss a recent NPR story about the health benefits of coffee - particularly for the prostate - and will thank a generous, almost not-anonymous lady who bought me a coffee at Metro the other day.

Margie is glad to be home, but she says it feels cold here.

"I have come back to winter," she said.

This, even though the leaves are sprouting out here and it snowed three inches at her sisters house 6000 feet up in Arizona her final morning there.

Still, it was warmer there than here.

Which it ought to have been.

View images as slideshow

(warning - slideshow contains additional photos of Jobe and Kalib not seen in the actual post)