Patty Stoll, the Fit Lady: Her face brightened my walks, my bike rides, my ski journies, but I will never again see her energetic smile

This morning, I received an email from Otto, who I had sometimes met when he was walking or biking with Patty Stoll and I was out doing the same.

"Patty has lost her battle with cancer," he informed me. "...I know you will miss her dearly, as I do, she was such a positive in my life and I don't think anyone will be able to fill the void."

Despite the cancer that nearly a year-and-half ago her doctor had told her would kill her within two or three months, that there was no point treating it for it was hopeless and that she best prepare to die, the news came as a shock.

Patty did not heed that doctor, but fought, and gained much more life - high quality life - than he was willing to believe she could. "It just wouldn't be right," she explained me. "If I could not be here to enjoy this beautiful place."

When last I saw her, at the corner of Seldon and Wards, during one of my brief periods at home early in the summer, she looked good. She felt good and was looking forward to future years. I did not take a picture that visit or mention it in my blog. 

It felt to me like one of those occasions when it was best to just visit and talk and not worry about documenting every thing and to not even bother with the subject of cancer.

I can't remember precisely when I first met Patty, but it was not long after we first moved to Wasilla some 28 years ago.  I was out walking in the woods behind our house when she came walking in the opposite direction - young, blond, fit, energetic and friendly. We stopped and visited.

And so it was from then on - I would frequently meet Patty coming in the opposite direction as we walked, mountain biked and cross country skied. "We've got to stop meeting like this," she would say. Most often, we would stop and chat - although sometimes her bike was moving fast and mine was too and we would just shout, "hey...!"

That was really the only way I knew her. We did not get together at each other's homes, hang out, go to dinner - we just met, out on the trail. Yet that was enough to recognize and respect each other as friends, to see that we were people with many common interests. 

And when they built the Serendipity subdivision and robbed us of the woods that we had so freely walked, skied and mountain biked through, we both mourned the loss of something so wonderful, just outside our doors.

We kept walking and biking, though, and kept meeting like this.

Once, she left for a summer to sail a boat up the east coast from the Caribbean to Canada.

I will keep walking and biking through this neighborhood. I will continue to enjoy it. But, just as I have felt the ache of loss of the woods to Serendipity each time that I have set out on a walk or bike ride in the past half-dozen years or so, I will now walk with a new ache, knowing that I will never again encounter the smiling and energetic face of Patty Stoll, the woman who I affectionately and admiringly called, The Fit Lady. She kept such good care of herself. Always ate right - got plenty of good exercise.

It was - 24 degrees (-31 c) when I took this picture in late December, 2008, but Patty didn't object. She loved it, she thrived in it.

Otto tells me her ashes will be scattered at Gold Chord Basin in Hatcher Pass.

After I learned the news, took a walk. I planned to take a photo of Patty's empty house, but when I reached it, people - family members - children and siblings - had just come out the door and were climbing into their cars.

I had never met any of them before. At left is her son, Willie, who she once so proudly told me was running in the New York Marathon even as we were talking, her daughter, Erin, the artsy one - the graphic designer and her son Erick, who describes himself as "the motor head" of the family. He loves to work with any kind of moving machine, be it a car, snowmachine, fourwheeler, boat motor...

From them, I learned that Patty had done well all summer, that her death Tuesday took everybody by surprise, for she had appeared fit and healthy just one week before. 

"Cancer does not play fair," a sister said.

I then continued on my walk. Tequilla, the sweetheart dog who always feels that she must act tough, barked at me.

I saw a grader coming down Tamar. It is October 1 - see how the leaves here are mostly gone now? It was that big wind that was blowing when I left for Barrow one week ago that took them.

This is Bill, the driver of the grader. Hired through contract by the Borough, Bill was working to fix up the road and to prepare it for freeze-up, which should come soon. On clear days, the morning frost has been heavy for some time now.

Too busy to blog today, so here is Pistol-Yero, at the moment of forgiveness

Truly, good readers, I am too pressed for time to blog today. It could be this way for a couple of days. Still, to affirm my presence in cyberspace, I feel a need to post something, so here is Pistol-Yero.

We had suffered a little dispute and Pistol had gone into the garage to growl and hiss, because he is the kind of cat that does that when he can't always get his way. I sat down to work, but left the door between my office and the garage open enough to allow him to come in when he felt ready.

After about two hours, he suddenly appeared on my lap. He rotated his head toward me until it came into contact with my chest, just below my chin. He spent about 15 minutes there, leaning into me, purring.

Tavra.

This is all I have to say today.

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.

FAT CAT IS BACK!!!!!!

This morning I received an email from Snook, titled, "fat cat called."

This was the message:

"fat cat called and I went and got her yesterday. she's home now...."

For the moment, this is all the information that I have, but it is mighty good information.

For readers who missed the story of how Fat Cat jumped ship in Circle after traveling by boat with Snook, Alma and I up the Yukon River from Fort Yukon to Circle, you can find it here.

This must mean that Fat Cat finally found her way to a home in Circle and so the promised call was made. It must mean that Snook would have made a five-hour round trip boat ride from Fort Yukon to Circle to pick her up.

It means that for over two months she evaded the lynx spotted near the village, and grizzly bears, too.

She must have had a grand adventure and she ended it just before winter, which here can sink into the lower -70's, set in.

If I had the resources available to me, I would hop in my airplane right now, zip up to Fort Yukon and Circle and put the story together as best I could.

But I haven't the resource and my airplane is hopelessly broken.

Yet, I am happy, just to know Fat Cat is back.

I wonder if she is still fat?

Maybe she is Slim Cat now.

Even if so, I have a feeling she will soon be Fat Cat again.

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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