Boat Update!

Before I do a general summer-update, I will post up some pictures of my boat-in-progress. I just moved in the past few days, and was really hoping to get deck beams all secured in place beforehand. Come to find out, hand-cutting compound angles is a wee bit tricky, and I blew through quite a bit of wood before getting the hang of it. It's still taking awhile for each one, and not reading the directions correctly really didn't help at the onset.







A week ago (or so..) I cut out spreaders and end braces, leveled and adjusted everything, and now my boat really looks like a boat! The ends are doweled together, and she's taking shape...slowly but surely!

And maybe you'll notice that I'm no longer working within a carport for my woodshop! I've moved, and Megan's front yard area is now my make-shift boatbuilding workshop. So far I've been super lucky with weather - summer finally came!! But I'm going to have to bust out the tarp action, and work when I can when the sun is shining!

And the rain came down...

Day six. Or seven.  Possibly, come to think of it, eight nine or ten, of rainy days here in SouthCentral Alaska.  I cringe to think of summing up the time I've seen the sun in the past week.  The hours could be counted on one hand, and that time denomination is pretty optimistic. 

I have been wanting to post pictures from recent events, but my camera cord is hopelessly lost in my house somewhere.  I have searched to such an extent that I'm afraid that I had a "moment" and perhaps placed it in the freezer?  Or one of the dogs ate it.  Or it's gone to the same place my single socks go missing to...

So no pictures, but some updated thoughts from life in Homer these days.  There's a good chance that my camera cord *will* be uncovered, as I am presently taking a break from packing. Yes, packing. Yet again I'm moving myself, my dogs, our belongings, to another home.  Yeah! This time, we're moving in with Ms. Megan Murphy, to her fabulous home- such an exciting work-in-progress that I'm very much looking forward to be part of the changes and living amongst & contributing to the improvements I've been so impressed by!  Not to mention having such wonderful roommates (that being said, I will very much miss Jen and Blaine and our little house with big windows in the suburbs of Homer).

My current life plans include staying around Homer for the winter.  I just love rain and scanning fish *that* much.  Just kidding...I'm excited about hanging around a bit longer - it took me so long to warm up to this place (and I mean that extremely figuratively - have I mentioned how damned cold it's been this "summer"?), I'm not quite ready to leave yet. 

Last weekend, the last solid bit of sun I can recall, Kaya and Shaemus and I went down to Bishop's Beach to run at one of the super-low tides.  Once getting beyond the 1/4 mile immediately surrounding the parking area, there were no people.  No one.  This is a beautiful part of a seaside tourist community in Alaska, vs. Maine where I'm from.  The beaches, more or less, remain fantastically deserted throughout the summer...even when the sun is out, there isn't much in the way of sunbathing to be done, and even less swimming.  So as we were running down the beach, the dogs were playing in the rocks, the waves, tearing down the open sand - and I was running along, shirt tied around my waste and sun streaming onto my arms and bared torso (first, and probably only, time of the year).  The cliffs along the beach remind me so much of Peninsula Valdes in Patagonia, and my dogs running with abandon made me feel so blessed and overwhelmed with joy that I couldn't imagine it was time to pack up and move on at this point.  There are just too many runs left to do on that beach, with those cliffs, and these dogs.  Not to mention the quite-good skijoring to be done in the wintertime! 

I should get back to packing, but whenever I find that camera cord....my boat looks much like a boat these days!  I know, you can't wait, can ya?!

inspiration realized - kayak building...

so, as i just described in my last post, mom and i were across the bay and i was inspired. i need a boat.

okay. what i really need is a small skiff, with a small engine.  given, however, that i have little in the way of financial resources, and the skiff my dad said he'd give me is upwards of 3000 miles away (by land, lord knows how far by sea...), the kayak i'm fixin' to build is going to have to suffice for now.

so this evening i got up the courage to do some measuring, some more measuring, and then to make some serious cuts in the gunwales, which are still nailed together for symmetry's sake.

i'm pretty pleased with my use of power tools...

i already drilled the holes in the bottom where the ribs will go (pictures later - i don't have them handy), and so the job tonight was to shape the gunwales.  i.e. - cut off large pieces of wood.  ack!

i practiced a bit with the hand-jigsaw that i bought for $20 at a yard sale a few weeks ago.  palms kind of sweating with nerves, i cut into my boat frame and started the process....

mom came out and was a huge help - not only did she have good thoughts on clamping and tool-use, but she also did a bit of documenting:

there's a video, as well, of me jig-sawin', but i'm going to have to figure out how to get it up and posted... more later, but the kayak building is on!

inspiration across the bay

  yesterday morning, mom and i took a water taxi across kachemak bay, to kachemak bay state park.  we stayed in a beautiful yurt, built by nomad shelters here in homer.

i really loved this shelter - i think i could easily live in a yurt, and kaya and shaemus didn't seem to mind, either...

the beach was gorgeous - we had a campfire and read by the water in the evening.  earlier in the day we hiked over to the grenwick glacier lake - soooo beautiful!  icebergs were brilliant blue, and the glacier was incredible.  on the way back we had a good bear-scare, with the dogs alerting us to a bear just off the trail in the woods.  i was on the ready with bear spray, and mom was securely fastened to my back.  we yelled our way down the trail, making sure that we were noticed and weren't surprising anyone...all was good, albeit a little shaky, and we made it back to the yurt safe and sound!

 

dogs were happily roaming free, swimming in the ocean and amongst the icebergs, mom and i got to relax and breath in the deep smells of the forest (ahhh! big trees - i love it!), and all in all i felt inspired and incredibly pleased with the world. 

family time!

summer solstice has come and gone, and i refuse to speak anymore on this topic.  too depressing, as the weather here has not indicated to me, or anyone else, that summer arrived at any time.

my little brother flew down to anchorage last week, and hitched a ride down to homer to spend a few days with us - me, kaya, and the new dog shaemus!

 

 

on monday we drove up to anchorage to pick up our mom, who flew in from boston to spend two whole weeks up here!  we surprised her, both with chris and two dogs! i think the dogs are growing on her, and regardless she's been a great sport. 

we then drove up to fairbanks and brought chris back to work with the alaska smokejumpers.  he gave us a tour of the base, where the alaska fire service rents space for the smokejumpers. it was *so* cool.  i was super impressed, and really excited for chris.

katie let us stay in her cabin, and it was great to be back on army road - aside from the freaking swarms of mosquitoes!  holy camoly they seemed bad. maybe i'm just getting weak now that i have a damn-near-constant sea breeze keeping them at bay. 

we went goldpanning at gold dredge #8, up in fox.  it was so funny - i've never considered going goldpanning, but it was fun - i could see the potential for grabbing a pan, some food, and heading up north to try my hand....really it was just fun to try taking some pictures inside the old dredge (they'll mostly be up on my flickr site).  the tour was pretty weak, but i did learn that issac newton invented .... gravity.  it's a little known fact, but there ya have it. 

  

i seem to be an old pro at this!

for the drive back to homer we were blessed with incredibly beautiful weather!  not a cloud in the sky, and denali was in all of her glory on the horizon. it was awesome!  we stopped at wal-mike's on the way home along the parks highway and found some unique treasures...

we were going to stay in anchorage, but the pickin's were slim...we ended up passing on the 'arctic bed and breakfast':

and moved on to indian, alaska, where we rented a little cabin on the side of turnagain arm - it was absolutely lovely! not to mention the store that was right next door:

who says i am not able to show my mom a classy time in alaska? 

spring = whirlwind of activity!

april and may proved to be amazingly busy months this year!  it's hard to believe that the craziness of "spring" is already over, but that being said it's  nice to be able to sit for a minute, drink some tea, listen to npr and look back on the past two months.

major happenings (some of which have been previously mentioned):

two new roommates!  jen moved in the first week of april, coming from hawaii to work through the fall on island conservation in the aleutians.  kaya and i have someone to talk to aside from ourselves and we are very happy about this development in the household.

blaine just arrived last week, driving down from fairbanks after successfully defending his MS and graduating - he marched and everything! 

here's a picture of blaine, in case you weren't familiar with him. we lived together in fairbanks a few winters ago, and he is a dear friend if not a little bit gross and out-of-hand much of the time.  robin (my co-worker with the IPHC), myself, and jen (the new roommate) ran the shorebird migration 5k fun run...jen came in 2nd for women, and i was behind her coming in 3rd. yeah!

my little (not-so-little, but certainly younger) brother flew up to homer from bend, oregon in april for a visit before heading up to fairbanks for rookie training with the alaska smokejumpers.  i'm incredibly happy and proud to report that my brother is an ak smokejumper now, having survived training.  i had an absolutely amazing time with him, and miss him heaps.  he and kaya had some solid napping time together while he was here.

emily visited shortly after chris left, and then a few days after she headed back to fairbanks, i drove up to anchorage to pick up my aunt patty!  it is always so wonderful to see this place, my current home, through the eyes of someone new.  similar with my brother, my aunt just couldn't stop exclaiming how beautiful it all was.  "WOW!" was pretty much the narrative of the trip.  that and, "oh! can we stop and take a picture?!".  it was heaps of fun, and wonderful to be able to spend so much time with my aunt, who i see and talk to so rarely! she put up most all pictures from this trip (including many many mountains in duplicate and triplicate) on

her flickr site.  i also have photos from this trip on my flickr site (link on the right!)

after patty left, blaine showed up, i dumped my dog with him, and i headed off to new england for my five year college reunion at mount holyoke. 

it was incredible.

  gets and i & mhc                                          the delles - my home for three years

things of note from this trip:

* new england in the summertime. i am always there in december, when it's crappy and cold and gray. yeah, well so's alaska but we have mountains.  but being there in the summer....oooh....i had forgotten.  this trip opened up the remote possibility of moving back to my home-region in the country.  that being said, how does one leave alaska?  this is a very serious question i have, and one that i would love to hear feedback on. do people read this blog?  what would be your thoughts on this?  where does one live, where do you look for work, what kind of sacrifices do you make and what is ultimately most important?  also, how hard is it to go back?

* i loved college.  a lot.  so i'm a big fat nerd. understood. but i loved it and i got to go back. and sleep in a dorm bed, and walk around my beautiful campus and breath in how grossly privileged and lucky i was/am and how happy i am do be able to always, always go back. at least for a long weekend....that being said, i was overwhelmed with the full understanding that my experience at mhc will never ever be touched by another similar one in my life.  living on campus, feeling so safe, and as if the entire world was at your fingers.  very good timing, as my student loans just went back into repayment and i best be remembering why i owe the government my soul.

* what fabulous people!!!  good friends, old acquaintances, all-around interesting people-dynamics.  i love it.  i talked for a long time with my roommate-for-the-weekend about her current MBA program at brandeis in boston, specifically in NGO management.  i am very serious in saying that i am strongly considering such a move...more on this later, perhaps, but deep interests have been sparked in the past year and it ain't about science-y sorts of stuff...

i got to hang out with my mom and my grandparents while i was in western mass as well, which was wonderful! my mom is coming out to alaska at the end of june, and i'm really looking forward to the visit!

here's my grandma, toasting marshmallows for s'mores on the grill. and a picture of my mom, from a hike we went on 4 years ago!  stay tuned for updated pictures after her trip north!!

emily and the band (the bac'untry bruthers) had arrived in homer while i was gone, and our household was joined by emily and emma, still lookin' for a livable place to kick it for the summer.  she's now off at her job training (job = naturalist at the wynn nature center. training = tidepooling across the bay. i'm going to puke. have i mentioned that i scan fish?)  and i'm watching ella-dog while she's gone.  it's kind of like a dog-daycare here, toys strewn about and a third dog that we picked up earlier on the beach (hannah's dog shaemus who we watched for the evening). 

i'm diggin my solitude for the next few days, however!  i have all of the lumbar to start work on my kayak...there has been expressed doubt, but all's i have to say is "whatever". yep, that's my comeback.

i'm using robert morris' book:

from someone's personal website, here's a picture of what i'm aiming for, as far as the frame goes:

so far, i've built two sawhorses.

i think i'm ready .....

Life philosophies via poetry

I aim to live my life in the vein of this snippet from the poem, Ithaca by C.P. Cavafy (happy birthday to him today, b. 1863). Wise words best not forgotten (and very useful when setting out on a large and daunting project....stay tuned for more info on my foray into amateur woodworking!):

When you set out on your journey to Ithaca,
pray that the road is long,
full of adventure, full of knowledge …
visit many Egyptian cities,
to learn and learn from scholars.
Always keep Ithaca in your mind.
To arrive there is your ultimate goal.
But do not hurry the voyage at all.
It is better to let it last for many years;
and to anchor at the island when you are old,
rich with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting that Ithaca will offer you riches.
Ithaca has given you the beautiful voyage.

springtime is here, i don't care how much it might snow....

it's april in homer - we woke up this morning to snow snow snow, but it cleared up by mid-day. of course the forecast for tonight says 2" of snow likely, and 100% chance of precipitation tomorrow (a mix of snow and rain). excellent.

but this time the unseasonal snowfalls feel like they may be okay. i might just make it through without losing a bit of my mind...

this has been a busy busy month so far! starting things off, kaya and i got a new roommate - jen. she works with island restoration - i.e. eradicating mammalian invasive species on islands, in this case rats out in the aleutians. she's a great roommate - i really don't think i could have asked for any better.
my lil' brother made an appearance shortly thereafter and stayed with us for just over a week before he headed up to fairbanks to start rookie training with the smokejumpers up there.
i can't even begin to describe how incredibly great it was to spend time with chris...i didn't get many pictures, but here are two that give a decent idea of how a lot of time was spent.
a few days after chris left, emily & ella drove a bazillion hours from valdez to hang out with kaya and i for the week. we had a great time - playing on the beach, eating good food, runnin' with dogs along the spit, and clammin'!

my one day off we actually left homer (i was pretty excited about this..) and headed north up to clam gulch and ninilchik to try our hands at diggin' for the ever-elusive razor clams. we had some issues with the tides, and some issues with needing food (issue resolved by eating gargantuan breakfast-for-lunch in kasilof), and some issues with digging/racing after clams. in the end it was determined that emily is a clam-diggin' fool (who would-a guessed?!) , and we were victorious with two clams - one for the each of us. i am really really quite excited for more clamming when the tides get low again. unlike clammer emily, i actually love to eat the things. perfect!

ella and kaya enjoyed themselves, though ella wasn't so sure about the bouys in the water nor the digging operation.




and on the way home, emily cracked herself up (and admittedly me as well) with clam puns.
these are our clams:
clamentine and clamella

we just hope they don't have clam-mydia

happy for the present moment.

this poem came today from garrison and the writer's almanac.

given the gray skies outside, and the solid chance of snow showers, i think it is well-timed as a reminder to look up and smile.

always. look up and smile.

both in the summer, and in the winter, and in all of the beautiful days in between.

"Snow, Aldo" by Kate DiCamillo. © Kate DiCamillo. Used with permission of Pippin Properties, Inc.

Snow, Aldo

Once, I was in New York,
in Central Park, and I saw
an old man in a black overcoat walking
a black dog. This was springtime
and the trees were still
bare and the sky was
gray and low and it began, suddenly,
to snow:
big fat flakes
that twirled and landed on the
black of the man's overcoat and
the black dog's fur. The dog
lifted his face and stared
up at the sky. The man looked
up, too. "Snow, Aldo," he said to the dog,
"snow." And he laughed.
The dog looked
at him and wagged his tail.

If I was in charge of making
snow globes, this is what I would put inside:
the old man in the black overcoat,
the black dog,
two friends with their faces turned up to the sky
as if they were receiving a blessing,
as if they were being blessed together
by something
as simple as snow
in March.