Setting Forth

I’ve spent the past month applying for graduate programs to begin this Summer.  I’m very excited about pursuing a Masters of Fine Arts (MFA) in Creative Writing.  So I applied to University of Alaska Anchorage, University of Alaska Fairbanks, Pacific University in Oregon, and Goddard University.  Fairbanks is the only residential program.  The other three being low residency I could live anywhere, travel anywhere (within reason), and still work on the degree.  I think there are benefits to both kinds of programs, should I get accepted, I will have a hard time deciding which lifestyle I want to assume while working on an MFA.

Here is the first chapter from the 20 page writing sample I had to submit with my application for all four programs.  I think… I want to be a Non-Fiction writer.  At least that’s what I’ve applied for.  I have toyed with Fiction over the years, but I guess I feel more comfortable with Non-Fiction.  Maybe that could change?  The piece below could be called a memoir, as most of the chapters are about my life the last two years in Arctic Village.  I have unofficially titled it Living With Caribou People. This first chapter is called "Setting Forth."

As we boarded the Cessna I had no idea what I was getting myself into.  Nearly all my belongings were boxed up on the plane, ratchet strapped right inside the cockpit just behind me.  Yet we were dressed like this was just another hiking trip- boots, backpacks, rain jackets, and high tech sweat proof shirts.  If my wife was nervous there was no indication in her demeanor or tone of voice.  I on the other hand felt as if my stomach had been turned inside out.  We were headed to another part of the state, to a world I had never seen.  I felt as if I should be a little more scared, but I wasn’t.  I was clueless.  I was naïve.  I had a sense of adventure raging inside of me.  A sense of purpose so strong it was dampening all my other thoughts, cares, and worries.

We spent two weeks putting a 1800 square foot condo into a 10x15 storage space.  I gave a lot away.  Saving only our bedroom suite- hand made Amish furniture from Pennsylvania (a wedding gift from her family), and some fine china  (a wedding gift from my family).  Also stuffed into the aluminum container were several boxes of books and our tropical clothes, we wouldn’t be needing those 120 miles North of the Arctic Circle.  It felt good to purge materialistic pieces of a past life.   A life where the military allowed a young couple to move 20,000 pounds of stuff 6,000 miles across the country.  My belongings for the next year would be several boxes worth of essentials mailed in advance, along with a couple hundred pounds of dry goods (rice, beans, dog food).  Saving only what had the most sentimental (or monetary) value.

 

It was two o’clock in the afternoon.  From Fairbanks I could see summer storm clouds approaching from the North.  I had only been in this part of Alaska a few times before.  Everything about it still felt unfamiliar to me. There were no jagged peaks looming in the distance as in Anchorage.  Fairbanks is surrounded by densely forested hills, or domes, rolling forever into the distance. The new environment had my senses at a heightened state of alertness.

We sat in the waiting area, silently thinking about the future, about how our lives were going to be forever changed.  A grizzled old pilot came out and called our names from a manifest.  We were the only two passengers scheduled for the afternoon flight.  Whether he sensed my anticipation or not, he gave no indication.  The Cessna rose quickly from the East Ramp of Fairbanks Airport, banking sharply and pointing due north.  We climbed above the clouds and seemed to drift for two hours.  I tried to stare out the window and memorize the landscape but my mind wandered from one thought to another.  Impatiently curious about whom would greet us at the dirt runway.  Frazzled by how I would become a teacher on the first day.  Scared of what the natives would think of me.  Curious about how my wife would take to this new environment.  It still all seemed a bit surreal.

Within minutes of leaving Fairbanks the landscape became void of human life.  Rolling hills turned to larger domes, which became the White Mountains.  This time of year they were a stale brown, signs of a dry Summer.  Haze in the distance gave some indication a forest fire was lurking out there.  As quickly as they began the White Mountains ended, sloping downward into the vast Yukon River valley.  It would still be twenty minutes until we crossed this mammoth river.  The flats were full of small ponds, lakes, creeks and tributaries feeding into the Yukon as it snakes thousands of miles across Alaska.

Just after crossing the Yukon River the pilot finally spoke up.  Shouting over the sound of the engine, he asked why I was going to Arctic Village.  I think he assumed we were just visitors.  Coming to hike into the Brooks Range and return back to civilization.  A smirk came across his face when I told him I was a new teacher.  I felt as if he was privy to an inside joke that I was about to become a part of. He knew dozens of teachers come and go from rural Alaska each year.  I’m sure several had sat in the same seat as I was.  He knew what I would quickly learn in the village.  He had seen the trouble come and go from his cockpit.  Probably even witnessing brief events on the runway, chance encounters that shaped his own opinion of Native Alaska.  The pilot spoke briefly of the beauty surrounding Arctic Village, and the frequency from which hikers and hunters visit in the summer.  Then he said nothing else, with holding his thoughts.  Letting me form my own opinions as the plane continued northward.

As the Cessna circled the village once, I was immediately surprised at how small it was.  The first obvious sign of civilization were the large red roof of the school seen from miles away.  Spread across a fairly wide valley, nestled alongside a twisted river, Arctic Village seemed to be growing out of the landscape.  There were no rows of houses; the only real symmetry of human life was the long strait runway.  It looked as if human life had bled in with the contour of the land, maybe even becoming part of the land.

The plane came to a halt at the end of the gravel runway.  Immediately four wheelers fired up and swarmed the aircraft.  The lifeline to the outside world-only coming once a day-had arrived.  People began scurrying around emptying cargo containers, loading up a school truck, going through the daily motions of collecting supplies from the plane.  It all seemed foreign.  My senses were still on overload.  Trying to memorize every face.  Listen to every voice.  While also collecting my belongings as they were ungracefully tossed into the dusty Earth.  This was my new home.