Trailer Wife

It started yesterday morning around 5:30 AM as I was walking to the gym. When I walked home an hour later, there was an inch or so on the ground. It has been snowing ever since, and I think we have about six inches of accumulation. And so, the whole world has undergone a remarkable makeover. What was once muddy and gray now glitters. Everything is still. The soft, bouncy light that accompanies snow fills the windows with cornflower blue. It's hard to be sad when there is fresh powder under your feet.

As a kid growing up in Oregon, serious snow showers were rare, and never happened on Christmas Eve. I remember Calvin (of Calvin and Hobbes) saying once that "Getting an inch of snow is like getting ten cents in the lottery," and I completely agree. When it comes to the weather, I am all about extremes. This is what makes me hopeful about living in Fairbanks. Though I know that this perfect, powdery snow will become crusted, besmirched, and detestable all in good time, the fact that it is finally here, and that winter has demonstrably begun, feels very satisfying. In Alaska, it will always be a white Christmas.

Tonight after dinner, Sam and I took Gus out for some impromptu, improvised sledding. Since we don't actually have a sled yet, Sam plopped the kid down on the rake and made do. Gus loved it. They must have done ten or fifteen runs along Copper Lane, and Gus only fell off twice. It sounds a little sentimental to write down, but watching Sam run madly around with the baby cackling behind him felt like a snapshot moment. You know - when everything from the light in the sky to the smell in the air to the wicked glint in your kid's eyes align to create this palpable, heart-swallowing moment. The kind that you'll be able to instantly recall for the rest of your life. It was a good day.

Because it pains me to relive the past few days in depth, I'll leave it to the following bullet points to describe:

• Saturday: attempted to relax at a bookstore, only to realize I had forgotten my wallet and had to go home. Seems like a small thing, I know.

• Sunday: huge, ridiculous fight with Sam pertaining to the wildly expensive bed we bought and now hate.

• Monday: did a google search about the nagging pain in my knee and realize I have something called "housemaid's knee." Depression ensues.

• Tuesday: minor car accident on the way to Gusser's 12 month checkup, 4 booster shots and blood draw for the kid, Suburban is towed, awful cab ride with pissed off toddler, $1200 mechanic bill.

• Wednesday: made and entirely consumed loaf of banana chocolate chip bread, found myself rendered incoherent during fiction workshop.

• Thursday: found out the bumper on the Suburban must be replaced adding another $400 to our outstanding bill.

On the heels of my Worst Week Ever, I am attempting to look on the proverbial bright side, despite the many flaws in that logic. As a great lover of lists, I've chosen this one as a stand-in gratitude list, which is my normal remedy when I find my head firmly planted in the nether regions. Just in case you think me soulless, I've decided to leave Sam and Gus out of my answers, since they could easily embody each one.

1. What is your idea of perfect happiness? The dinner table, full of good food and familiar faces
2. What is your greatest fear? Bear attack, followed by a tsunami
3. Which living person do you most admire? The Dalai Lama
4. What trait do you most deplore in yourself? Social awkwardness
5. What trait do you most deplore in others? Kindness meant only to disarm or deceive
6. What do you consider the most overrated virtue? Patience
7. What or who is the greatest love of your life? Literature
8. Which talent would you most like to have? Self-discipline
9. What is your current state of mind? Addled
10. What do you consider your greatest achievement? Defying the statistical certainty that I'd end up pregnant, addicted and poverty-stricken before I hit 18
11. What is your most treasured possession? Macbook, red Julie blanket, Visconti fountain pen
12. What is your superpower? Getting by on little to no sleep
13. Who is your favorite hero of fiction? a tie between Dorothea Brooke from Middlemarch and Sylvie from Housekeeping
14. Who are your heroes in real life? Artists of all stripes
15. What is your motto? I think that I shall never see, a poem as lovely as a tree
16. What do you most value in your friends? Honesty, Humor, Intellect
17. Which word or phrase do you most overuse? F*ck. (I'm not proud)
18. What is your greatest extravagance? Marathon TV series watching on my computer in bed
19. What is the quality you most like in a woman? Wit
20. What is the quality you most like in a man? Self depreciation
21. On what occasion do you feel the most authentic? When I'm with my sister, when I'm finishing a story, when I am walking alone.

Sigh. I preface almost everything I do these days with a sigh. It's very sigh-y time of year. The leaves are gone, it was 10 degrees when I got in the car to go to the gym this morning, and sunset will arrive seven minutes earlier today than it did yesterday. Smith Lake froze completely solid over the weekend, where Gus had his first on ice experience. It's a shallow lake, so you can see the pebbly floor and spiky plant life through the foot or so of clear ice. It caught everything in stasis--twigs half in and half out of the water, reeds swaying in stillness, bubbles frozen on their way to the surface. It was quite beautiful. And a little bit eerie.

Because that's how I've felt the last couple of years - in quiet suspension. Or more to the point, in a state of perpetual anticipation. Waiting to go to Scotland, waiting for pregnancy to be over, waiting for Sam to get a job, waiting to come home... and of course the problem with waiting is that the distraction of waiting keeps you from getting anything else done. So here I am, waiting, again, for graduate school to start in the fall, waiting to get my life restarted. For a person somewhat lacking in patience, I'm finding it a bit difficult to get over myself.

I think I've reached that point in my life when, suddenly, not everything is possible anymore. There are many things that, no matter how badly I want them or how hard I'm willing to work, aren't available to me. I've had a twisty path toward adulthood anyway, so these little delays and detours drive me absolutely ape shit with frustration. A good example: on Saturday, Sam stayed home with Gus so that I could take a few hours and go to a bookstore. I decided to go to Barnes and Noble to get a new moleskin (instant happiness). I sat in the car for 10 minutes to let it warm up, drove for 15 minutes, and strolled around for 20 before taking my purchase to the checkstand... where I realized I had forgotten my wallet at home. That feeling of utter aggravation, as if the entire universe is conspiring against me, swept over me in a wave of four letter words. I feel sorry for the clerk. I went back to my car, let it warm up, drove home.

And as I walked in the door, earlier than expected, Gus was sitting among a thousand shredded copies of my New Yorkers, happily eating expensive watch ads, and he looked up at me with this devilish little grin and says, Momm-meee! Thank goodness for toddlers who remind you to live in the moment.

Some of you will remember my sweet friend, Andy Dobson, from my wedding. He has been living in LA for the last several years, and has landed a commercial for Kaiser Permanente. I'm not sure what excites me more... seeing Andy on film, or seeing his face accompanied by the dulcet tones of Allison Janney's narration. My two favorite things in the world have finally come together... my fabulous baby boy best friend and Press Secretary C.J. Cregg. I'm having a moment.

It is a GORGEOUS day in Fairbanks. 50 degrees, crystal blue sky, no wind. The air is crisp and smells like pinot gris to me... Fall.

Gus and I took a trip to Creamer's Field today, which is a swath of land that once held the largest dairy in interior Alaska, and now serves as a migratory waterfowl sanctuary. It's a place for serious bird watching and there are several stair-mounted platforms for people to perch at bird-level. It reminded me a lot of Finley Wildlife Sanctuary in Corvallis, a place Sam and I only discovered in the last few weeks of our Oregonhood.

It has been a tough week for me. Alaska (and more importantly, Alaskans) is not always the most welcoming place. I see community here, but I get the impression it takes a long time to burrow down through the various layers of social insulation. Creamer's Field, with its cheerful and insistent signage, friendly dog walkers, and beautifully thrown shadows, made me feel a little more at home than I felt yesterday. So, progress.

A writing deadline, for me, equates to permission for bad behavior. I stop doing the dishes. Bags of Hershey's kisses appear and are consumed by the handful. Gusser's clothes don't match, fruit goes bad, liters of empty diet coke bottles pile up under the sink... it's not pretty. Needless to say, blogging is sacrificed to hours bent painfully over 4th and 5th drafts.

But this morning, when I woke up to take my completed short story to Kinkos (sidenote: since when are photocopies 9 cents a piece!!!), I felt the deadline mania slip away, and actually stopped to appreciate this sunrise. The photo hardly does it justice - isn't that always the case? I stood on the porch for a long time, feeling minutes ticking by for the first time in a week. It was lovely.

Not much is happening, aside from the fiction marathon. The graduate workshop I'm in is providing some much needed intellectual stimulation. For one thing, there is grown up conversation. How did I live without it for so long?? (Apologies to Sam) All of the mommy-angst that had been building up over the last year has suddenly found an outlet, and I feel worthy of being a member of the universe again.

Gus is growing up a little more every day. Have I mentioned what a great kid he is? I swear to God, he has this bemused, humoring look that he gives me when I am particularly frantic and inept, which makes me think of him as more of a good-natured (albeit very needy) roommate than offspring. He is very thoughtful these days, and studies objects and people for a long time before smiling and giving them unintelligible names. Sam is certain he saw a dog on TV the other day and said, Pubby!, and I'm hoping that doesn't portend some animal fixation to manifest in the coming years.

While I was ogling the sunrise, Gus crept out into the foyer and stood smiling at me when I turned around, cocking his head to the side as if to say, "See? What did I tell you." If he turns out to be a Buddhist monk or a classical flautist, I won't be at all surprised.

PS - it was 50 degrees today, and will approach 60 tomorrow! I'm beginning to think that this "extreme weather," is just a nasty rumor.

All week there has been something niggling at the back of my mind... like a bill I've forgotten to pay or a lunch date I blew off. And then tonight, in the throes of post-story-completion clarity, it came to me in a flood of heart-stopping, head-bashing agony.

So, Happy Birthday Amanda. Hope you can forgive your feeble-minded friend for not calling on the special day (Wednesday). My only excuse is something I'm calling Fairbanks fugue.

My ten favorite things about Amanda:
1. When sitting for a pedicure, she will choose the most ridiculous color available and totally pull it off.
2. She loves Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves almost as much as I do.
3. Whenever I see a jar of Marmite, I gag, and then smile, thinking of her smearing it on her morning toast.
4. Three words: The Witching Hour.
5. She has the most beautifully manicured eyebrows I've ever seen.
6. Because of her, I will now forever pronounce the word "gorgeous" with an English accent.
7. When I say, "Bosco Chicken Salad," she totally knows what I mean.
8. She is kind, passionate and full of grace... but more importantly, she is goofy, irreverent and a hopeless klutz.
9. That day in November 2007, when we sat all day in the writing studio of Alt Mor--the wood fire burning cheerfully, Stanley pacing peacefully, sheep bleating out the window--and talked for six hours straight.
10. She is a gift that Scotland gave me. (I miss you)

Ever wonder what bored Alaskan sports freaks do all day during 6 months of impenetrable winter? Here's what some cheap animation software and 18 hours spent indoors will get you...





Hey, Coke-a-Cola advertising execs: turns out polar bears aren't that playful or cuddly. Watch out or they will jump out of the sky and wreak some serious havoc. Go Nanooks.