Alaska Saga

... and Interior Alaska in particular. How many places are there in the world where you can enjoy good friends, pudgie pie pizzas, beer and vodka tonics, and the warmth of a bonfire underneath the watchful aurora?

It was a chilly night, with temperatures dropping to -10F in the hills. Our beers froze solid, and our vodka tonics turned to vodka tonic slushies. Despite cold noses and the need to act like rotisserie hot dogs to keep our backsides from freezing solid, there was no denying that this was a spring night in Fairbanks!

The aurora danced across the expanse of starry sky, bending and spiraling in vivid green. Red tinged the bottom edge. This was the best display I've seen in a couple of years.

Thanks, Tom and Melissa, for hosting a wonderful night! Kelly, Jonathan, and Kristen, it was wonderful to catch up! And Ken, thanks for driving me home so I could enjoy my slushy!

We had an amazing amount of snow on Thursday. Twelve inches, the most snow in a single day since 1970. Driving was treacherous, between the unplowed roads; flat light that would not allow road features to be distinguished from one another readily (think: is that the road, or the snow bank on the side, or the ditch?); falling snow; swirling snow; and sticky suck-your-tires into the ditch soft, wet snow at the road's edge. I drove up the hill to my house in first and second, every muscle in my body paying attention to my tires moving on the road. Made if safely.


This twelve inches fell after a very recent six inches, which at the time it fell was the most snow in a single day in Fairbanks in over a decade. I hear snow totals had been slightly below normal, but we caught up all at once! Twelve and six inches might not sound like a lot of snow for someone living in the humid midwest or upstate New York areas, but... It's a heck of a lot of snow in the dry climate of Fairbanks. And it WILL get a car stuck. The neighbors were all out with plows and snow blowers. I took to the driveway with my shovel, and with my dog for entertainment.


Kaia is so much my Alaskan snow baby. She snuffled in the snow, covering her face, with frost building up around her lips and on her eye lashes. She belly slid, dove, bounded, rolled. She jumped into the piles building up on either side of my shoveled drive and tunneled through. Tossed snow over her back. Snuffled again, snorted snow into her nose, coughed, and started all over again. She made shoveling a great deal of fun (I normally don't mind it anyway).


Anyone getting tired of winter should get themselves a dog that adores it. Life is better this way!

Lest one forgets that Alaska is no ordinary place to call home, she reminds us by sounding her barbaric yawp to the world. Temperatures hovering near the 50 below zero mark for over two weeks in January, twenty to thirty degrees below normal and -40F in the hills; a volcano threatening eruption continuously for over a month; the aurora visible in a crisp, starry sky from my bed, as I snuggle into my wool comforter... It has been an interesting year already. It's time to share the Alaskan yawp again... and mine.

Winter solstice occurred tonight, 21 December 2007, at 9:08 pm Alaska Time (22 December 2007, 06:08 UST). We celebrated at a bonfire hosted by our friends Bob and Patricia, with all guests invited to sacrifice something to the fire at the exact moment that solstice took place (as noted by our official timekeeper).

It was an eventful night, one that made me thankful for the soon-to-be lengthening days and reminded me to enjoy even the little light we have right now. I'll elaborate tomorrow.

I hope you all relish tomorrow's sunshine and the promise of a few extra minutes, wherever you may be (at least in the northern hemisphere).

The ice fog lifted from downtown Fairbanks at about 11:30 this morning. So nice to be able to see more than twenty feet in front of me.

When I walked out to start my car this morning, the air was so crisp it hurt to breathe. For the first time this winter, I had to cover my nose and face with a gloved hand to make sure I didn't burn my lungs. Despite the frigid, bitter conditions, I took a minute to look up and enjoy the sky. The stars were out in full force, looming a little larger than they usually do in such thin, clear air. I knew I had to take in as much of the sky as I could before I left the hills of Ester.

We quickly descend a hill on our drive into Fairbanks. The ice fog settles in a pocket around the highway, and Fairbanks itself sits in a bowl. The mornings when ice fog visits, the inversion also sets up very low in the sky. It's a bit eerie driving around in the dark, with wisps of fog and smoke drifting through the air at eye level. All of the street lights, building lights, car lights are pulled and distorted by the heavy air. It feels a bit like a post-apocalypse universe. It is an interesting experience, and it makes me thankful that I live above the inversion.

The ravens have been playing in the parking lot around my downtown office. Such intelligent birds, I can see why they're a totem animal for so many people. I love that they're bad- always into things. I think perhaps they have a sense of humor, which one would have to have to be such a big bird in such a frozen place. Ravens are such a big part of our world in Fairbanks. Sometimes I don't notice them in the warmer months; but in the winter, they're omnipresent. Perhaps it's how starkly they stand out against the snow. Perhaps it is that they are one of the few living things moving around on days like today.

Living in Fairbanks is hard sometimes, sometimes it reminds me what it is just to survive. I like that I understand the essence of survival. I like that I am reminded at this time of year what determination is, what grit is, that the simple act of being is not always an easy thing. I like that I am reminded how fleeting life can be, without having to learn that through death. Everything is very delicate in the winter, everything has a fragility. Yet underneath the fragility is this amazing strength. Winter in Fairbanks reminds me of this, and I think that is a really amazing thing to have the opportunity to know. That is one of the reasons I am still in Fairbanks.