So, after 2 months in wild Alaska, how am I adapting to mainstream life in the lower 48? Here are the highlights!
Greatest convenience (besides a flush toilet): plugging in my computer and phone every night and finding them fully charged in the morning!
Best Kitchen Moments: Washing dishes with soap, water, and a sponge, instead of a paper towel
Grocery store mania: Fresh fruits and veggies! Yesterday I bought peaches, nectarines, and cantaloupe for a fruit salad.. Dinner every night is a huge salad with chopped veggies, including those fat, juicy tomatoes on the vine and avocado. If you could find a cantaloupe in Alaska it would probably cost $5 or more. We are quite blessed in the lower 48 to have great access to fresh, relatively inexpensive food.
Friends for Tango and Me: I am enjoying time with Gennie and being helpful to her as she downsizes. Tango is friendly with her chihuahua, Rigby. Life is always better with people and pets that you care about!
Challenges
Waking at scheduled times: I have my writing class, and Gennie and I have things to do and places to go. I set my phone alarm once again so I can get a good start on the day. The first night I barely slept but I am doing better now. I like having goals ahead for the day and a time to get up and moving.
Writing challenges: I wanted to learn where I can improve my writing and the lessons are coming from all directions. Although not always easy to confront one’s “areas for improvement”, I am ready to move forward. I see that my writing is sometimes dense and unfocused. Also, if I want an audience other than myself, I spend too much time on my observations of the natural world and less on people, my relationships with them, and human emotions. While I seek out authors who write about nature and the process of travel (i.e., John Muir), I learned that most people really want 99% of the human side of the story. The natural setting is a backdrop for most readers. But, that is what I want to write about! So, I am considering what to do about this impasse. The most immediate solution is to continue writing just for myself and my own joy. I can also switch to writing in a different genre. This morning I read an article by a New York Times journalist who did a great job writing about wolf research, a colorful researcher, and problems with ranchers, while also focusing on the setting. You can find that here.
Overall, life is great fun! Gennie is a positive, happy person and is close to her dream of downsizing right into a Class C RV and hitting the road fulltime. It is awesome to help someone else wade through the stuff of a lifetime and find the dream! She made so much progress yesterday, sorting and giving away a bunch of things. I weeded her garden beds and later acted as Chief Cheerleader!
Did I mention: no rain!!! Day after day of sunshine, but next week temps increase to low 90s. I don’t care! am still close enough to my Alaska trip to rant: any day without long underwear is a good day!
