After many months away – save for a snippet of a poem I wrote in February – I return to bloggerland, smiling. My on-line silence has been somewhat intentional; instead of committing myself to “A bit of random banter from Alaska”, I've elected to write letters, and make headway on a manuscript detailing a cross country bicycle trip I took, seemingly, once upon a time. Time can be a great illusion – it's not a pure matter of accounting, but is contextually delineated. Depending upon what immediately surrounds us, events and experiences can seem quite close, or, so far away. And yet, time is also relative to the thoughts enkindled inside of us, so where I may not be in direct contact with someone or somewhere, if I call this person or place to mind, my heart responds, bringing me to them or there.
This realization has become my great comfort when distance stretches me apart from endeared people or places, and has especially kept me feeling connected during the past year and some while I've more or less rooted myself to this remote village – Aleknagik – in southwest Alaska. In native Alaskan Yupik, “Aleknagik” literally means, “wrong way home”. Simply put, these three words tell a more complex story. The village's first settlers had no intention of staying here; they'd been wandering, lost, and it was merely by circumstances of happenstance that this expanse would become their home. In a sense, my story compares. I arrived in Aleknagik a transitory wanderer, and have since found myself making a home. Of course, unlike the hapless hunters, I've had the option to leave, but, a greater gravitational force has held me here.
“Home” can be identified as a specific location – someplace we feel especially attached to, or that evokes a certain nostalgia – but it can also be something intangible we choose to cultivate and nurture. I tend to lean towards the latter within my own understanding, associating “home” with the relationships we give our greatest time, energy, attention and commitment to. This brings me to Jeff, who entered my life as a pal, became my beau, and is now the most significant person in my life. Who would have guessed that two complete strangers – a guy in a pick-up truck, and a girl running alongside the road he was driving on – would end up together, making a home?
Fast forward through a cycle and a half of circling seasons, Jeff and I've joined our journeys together, and here we are, expecting a little one – affectionately called “Peach” while gender is still a surprise – in just over two months' time! We're full of anticipation and wonder for what is to come, and still, (attempting to) remain present to each measure comprising life's composition. A process presides everything, and as this beautiful being grows inside of me, I marvel at how fluttering movements became faint nudges, then transitioned to stronger pokes, jabs, and kicks, to bring on the full dance party of boogieing knees and swinging elbows that's jiggling my belly right now! We've definitely got a mover and a shaker coming into our lives. It'll keep us on our toes.
And, we're en pointe already, actually, preparing to move to the Kenai peninsula this summer. We'll be living in Ninilchik next year – midway between Soldotna and Homer, Alaska's “cosmic hamlet by the sea”. I don't know a lot about Ninilchik – mainly that the Lonely Planet boasts a beautiful Russian Orthodox Church, and that there's great clam-digging nearby at Clam Gulch – but we've been welcomed ever-so-warmly by many “Ninilchikens” and look forward our visit next week! We won't officially move until July, though babe and I'll most likely be in Minnesota until mid- to end of August. So there you have it, the latest and greatest...this is Elise, signing out for the last time from Aleknagik.
