Month: September 2018

Today was one of those days where I felt like I had a job, even though I don’t.
The “storage tent” Arthur ordered – which is for me to put my extra stuff in – arrived. It’s a large object: a box of a kit that needs to be built. So it was at the Alaska Marine Lines freight office in town. That meant we had to take the trailer into town (though in retrospect I think if we’d really wanted, we could have put the box into the back of his SUV).
To take the trailer into town, we had to rearrange the trailers parked in the driveway – there’s a heavy-duty cargo trailer and a boat trailer. Arthur wanted to drive these trailers around, and my thinking was that he has a lot more experience driving trailers around than I do, on the steep driveway and one-lane dirt road, so I let him, just kind of watching and trying to be a spotter for when he should stop backing up.
Clearly Arthur was struggling with the 3D puzzle aspect of backing trailers into the odd angles of his driveway. I know that it’s not an easy thing – I don’t presume that I could have done much better. But for Arthur, who is accustomed to a sense of expertise and smooth competence with this type of thing, I think it was painful for him to confront the fact that he just wasn’t doing well. Over and over, he would back up, hit the bushes or the side of the road, missing his target, and have to pull up and try again. I mean – I’ve been there. Trailers are hard to back up. But he was getting frustrated and angry, as he does.
I couldn’t do anything but just let go and let him struggle. And worst was that, after we finally got the trailers where he wanted, and we were getting ready to drive into town for our weekly Thursday shopping and errand trip, well, Arthur noticed (and I did too) that he’d managed to place a huge dent in his front bumper while doing all his back-and-forth navigating the trailer. It was clearly a new wound to the vehicle, and noticeable.
Arthur was devastated. I think not just that he’d dented his SUV, but that he didn’t remember doing it. I could see him kind of deflate, and I recalled sitting with the SLP (Speech Pathologist) at the VA, a month and a half ago, and her saying, “Well, perhaps he’s just going to have to have his moments of failure, for his new limitations to hit home.” I think this was just such a moment.
I drove into town. At one point, in one of the parking lots, it became my moment to have to back up the trailer – because we were hauling around, to pick up the storage tent. Arthur started to try to tell me how to do it. As I said, I’m certainly no expert trailer-backer-upper, either. But then he just grumbled, “don’t listen to me, you saw what I did.” It was a moment where he showed his shame and embarrassment.
We got the tent. He left the trailer hooked up to the SUV in the driveway, perhaps thinking he’d want to tackle more backing up tomorrow. I’m not sure I’m up for it. But it’ll have to happen, I guess.
It was not that difficult a day from a task standpoint. It was emotionally rough, I guess you could say.
On a brighter note, I had made some 김치볶은밥 (kimchi fried rice) for lunch, and Arthur conceded it was “quite acceptable” – which is high praise, coming from him.

A cloud in the afternoon.

[daily log: walking, 2km]

This morning Arthur and I took Wayne to the Klawock airport, and he flew back to his home on Vancouver Island, BC. 

That leaves just Arthur and me alone together again, at this place Arthur calls "Rockpit, Alaska." That's Arthur's name for his location. Typically it's called "Port Saint Nicholas" but that invokes images of Santa Claus or some Russian colony that never existed, maybe. I like the name Rockpit.

On a walk down the road, I noticed that fall comes early.

And Raven, observing the world and then taking flight.

As the saying goes, it's "just us chickens," now. But that seems to refer to the neighbors' chickens. The immediate neighbors to the east – with whom Arthur does not really get along – also have goats and dogs, who are somewhat annoying because they generally run loose, and no one informed them as to the location of the property line. So yes, I have seen goats on Arthur's front porch, and dogs on his dock. Of course out in the woods, there are bears.

I no longer have any excuse to not work on some of the unpleasant projects hanging over me: e.g., my tax problem. This has me somewhat depressed.

[daily log: walking, 4.5km]

Today was Arthur's birthday. Last week was my birthday.

Wayne was very cool – he ordered us a chocolate cake, with both of our names on it. So we had a birthday party. And the rain came, to help us celebrate.

Here is Mr. Heron, on the dock in the damp drizzle, this morning.

Here is the expressway, on our afternoon walk.

Here is the cake, and two people getting older.

[daily log: walking, 4km]

This morning, Juli and Keith left to return back to Portland. They took the ferry across to Ketchikan, which requires a very early departure from the house – 6 AM. Wayne drove them over there, and then went and did some of his river/estuary fishing, while Arthur and I stayed home. I went up the hill and tromped about a bit. I am trying to place some surveyors' string up along what I think is the south lot line so that I can maybe have more luck finding one of the the southwest corner stakes.

Wayne came back around noon. He had a lot of fish, which he took down to the dock to get cleaned.

In the afternoon, we went into town to run errands – Thursday is shopping day!

[daily log: walking, 2km; tromping, 200m]

We had a busy day with our guests.

In the morning, we went out fishing. The fish, however, chose not to participate. Here are three guests on the boat – Wayne, Keith, and Juli. Wayne is the person who originally taught Arthur most of what he knows about fishing. Wayne and Arthur are pretty good friends. Wayne is also Keith's brother-in-law. He lives on Vancouver Island (he's Canadian).

Later in the day we drove into Craig. There was an art show at the Tribal Council hall. It's pretty surprising the range of talent in such a small town – sorry, no pics. Of course, you know you're in a small town – everyone knows each other. 

Then we walked around town. We saw a lovely pastoral scene – abandoned house-boats.

We saw Richard's landing craft, which he is restoring (it's a bit derelict). He intends to use it to land heavy machinery on small, off-the-grid islands.

Finally, in the afternoon, back at the house, I searched again up the hill for one of the property stakes. I found one – the easy one, on the southeast corner.

[daily log: walking, 3km; tromping, 150m]

I had a rather busy day today.

First, in the morning, I tried tromping up to the southeast corner of the lot. I didn't reach it – I got about two-thirds of the way, which would be about 50m. But that's through thick undergrowth, ancient logging slash and up a very steep hill.

Then, I got back to the bottom of the hill and Arthur said, "Let's go fishing." 

So we went fishing. We didn't catch any fish. We also stopped and got gas for the boat, because we have guests coming.

Then we ran into town and ran a few errands, and then we collected our guests at the Craig downtown airport (float plane landing). 

Juli, Keith and Wayne arrived from parts south, via Ketchikan.

Here's their airplane, coming in to the dock.

[daily log: walking, 1.5km; tromping, 100m]