embrace

Last night, we flew over southeast Alaska on the way north and the clouds parted below us to lay out the intricate waterways of the inside passage. Glaciers snaked out of snowcapped mountains far below us and plunged into the slate gray sea. Later, we dove below glowering storm clouds into Fairbanks where a cold, spitting rain was competing with smoke from nearby wildfires to fill the evening air. The sunset glow was reddish brown and the smell of it was acrid and heavy underneath the damp. I escaped the plane, and an overly talkative seatmate, giddy with being home and apprehensive, as always, as to what this will mean this time, every time. There is so much riding on that little word. Fairbanks, as always, is less spectacular than the geography to the south, but is beautiful in her own right with her rolling hills and snaking rivers. A friend picked me up, and we made our way through the wet streets, out of town to pick up my truck from Jenny’s house.

There, in the dusk and through a sudden downpour, I met the three-day old puppies that will be the backbone of her sled dog team in two years time. Dan Kaduce, Jodi’s husband, had come to take off their dew claws earlier in the day, and was able to determine their lineage, these little squirming balls of life with tiny squished ears and unopened eyes, from their bodies, colors and facial structure. I still have so much to learn.

I made my way to Toni’s cabin, but didn’t arrive there until very late. The midnight sun is gone this late in the season, and I fumbled in the dark for the key and the lock and the lights. Exhausted from nearly twelve hours of travel after a frantic morning of preparation and last minute packing, I fell asleep seconds after my head hit the pillow in her cozy loft.

This morning I was awake with the early sun and the neighbor’s frantic dog shrieking away into the misty morning. The clouds were low and scattered but sunshine looked to be peaking through. I went on a run through our old neighborhood, struggling with the unaccustomed hills, relishing the gravel and mud and wet grass. I passed Georgina’s Pond and found that the memorial wreaths and candles are all gone now, eight years and many memories later. The black tannin water was occupied by a pair of wood ducks, paddling lazily under the encroaching marsh grasses.

At our old cabin, the little tripod I built to host the house number by the road had been torn down and the number was tacked up on a twisted black spruce tree far back from the road, almost invisible. The cabin had new lattice around the base and a large storage shed at the end of the driveway, but otherwise looked the same as it did during our five year occupancy: a generic little log structure in a typical tumbling spruce and birch forest outside of town. I plodded on down the road. At the sprint kennels, the dogs barked and yelped at my passing. A few minutes later, two elderly women pulled over in their rental car and flagged me down. They were looking for Mary Shields’ kennel for a tour, and had made a wrong turn. Their GPS wasn’t working correctly, could I tell them the way? I was thrilled to do so, thrilled to know where to direct them even though I’ve never met Mary nor been to her kennel. I realized later through my giddiness that what thrilled me was not only to be home, but to be taken for being home by strangers.

Arriving back at Toni’s, I determined that the weather is good enough for a journey out to Angel Rocks for a hike up to the huge granite tors that jut out from the topography there. It will be a nice little shake-out hike to see where I am after my attempts to get in better shape these last two months, and as always a good view from the top, even on an overcast day. I’ll run into town to get bearspray and bagels. I have been here less than twelve hours, and already I can feel my shoulders relaxing and my heart beat slowing down, my breath evening out. I am always afraid that coming back will be terrible, somehow I will find that I do not belong here, after all, in this place I have placed so much credence in, imbued with so much hope for the my future and place. But as always, coming back is as much of a homecoming as I need it to be. Somehow the indifferent forest embraces me, after all.