 |
| Thanksgiving Day 2004. One month dating. |
 |
Thursday, November 25, 2004
Tuesday, December 10, 2002
An Instance of Clairvoyance: The chess set that owned me
In December 2002 I was living in Olympia Washington, enrolled in and living on campus at Evergreen State College. My girlfriend and I liked to go to Seattle for shopping and restaurants.
On one trip I had this specific vision and goal. I wanted to get a chess set. I had precise design in mind -a wood box with glass chessboard on top and the pieces kept in the box. I hadn't seen that design online or in a store, its just the design that popped in my head.
I also had in mind the place to get it at. I had this feeling the store that specific chess set would be at would be right beside the Uwajimaya Grocery store in the International District. I had never noticed a store that would sell anything like a chess set in the International District, but just like the chess set vision, this store just popped in my head. I also had the idea the chess set would be in the left front part of the store.
My girlfriend and I rode the city bus from Olympia to Seattle and got off in the International District, the first stop for that bus in Seattle. From the bus stop at Dearborn Street I just started leading us. Right where I thought the store would be...there it was. A little shop across the street from Uwajimaya's.
We walked in, and I asked if they had a chess set. The clerk said yes and led me to the chess set setting at the left front part of the store. And the chess set looked just like the one I had thought of. Of course, I bought it.
I've never been a good chess player, and rarely played the game. But some sort of spell came over my girlfriend and I. We played chess for the next three days, every hour we were awake. My girlfriend was going to college in San Diego, so eventually she had to go back before school started. We played right up to the hour she had to go.
I've never been able to get anyone to play chess with me in that obsessive compulsive way since then, that was such a magical three days. Now just a memory -the chess set that selected me and owned me for a few days.
On one trip I had this specific vision and goal. I wanted to get a chess set. I had precise design in mind -a wood box with glass chessboard on top and the pieces kept in the box. I hadn't seen that design online or in a store, its just the design that popped in my head.
I also had in mind the place to get it at. I had this feeling the store that specific chess set would be at would be right beside the Uwajimaya Grocery store in the International District. I had never noticed a store that would sell anything like a chess set in the International District, but just like the chess set vision, this store just popped in my head. I also had the idea the chess set would be in the left front part of the store.
My girlfriend and I rode the city bus from Olympia to Seattle and got off in the International District, the first stop for that bus in Seattle. From the bus stop at Dearborn Street I just started leading us. Right where I thought the store would be...there it was. A little shop across the street from Uwajimaya's.
 |
| The storefront. Now a different business |
We walked in, and I asked if they had a chess set. The clerk said yes and led me to the chess set setting at the left front part of the store. And the chess set looked just like the one I had thought of. Of course, I bought it.
 |
| The chess set. |
 |
| The chess set. |
I've never been a good chess player, and rarely played the game. But some sort of spell came over my girlfriend and I. We played chess for the next three days, every hour we were awake. My girlfriend was going to college in San Diego, so eventually she had to go back before school started. We played right up to the hour she had to go.
I've never been able to get anyone to play chess with me in that obsessive compulsive way since then, that was such a magical three days. Now just a memory -the chess set that selected me and owned me for a few days.
Saturday, June 1, 2002
The Summer of 2002
Timeline: May 2002 till September 2002. My age: 40. Location: Seattle, Naknek Alaska, Ketchikan Alaska, Klamath Falls Oregon and the Siskyou Mountains.
My Summer of 2002 wasn't about one thing, it was a string of things entirely unrelated, but tied together simply by the accident of timeline. One thing would end and I would look around and just come up with the next thing. I had the whole summer to find something to do before getting back to The Evergreen State College in September.
My summer starts in May. I was living at a friend's house in Bremerton Washington, and planned to work most of the summer in Alaska. This was maybe my ninth work contract in Alaska for Trident Seafoods, but it was the oddest. Most work seasons match a fishing season, and they usually last two to six months. But the May salmon fishing season in Bristol Bay is different -it lasts only about six or seven days.
My final plane ride to Bristol Bay landed in King Salmon Alaska, and from there we took a company shuttle to the Trident plant in Naknek Alaska.
The land in this area is rolling hills and a sparse distribution of short trees. Not the extreme beauty I was used to in other parts of Alaska. The shoreline along Bristol Bay was the exception -a nice rugged beach. The village was mostly Natives, and I loved the little village library there.
We hung out for a few of days waiting for the fishing run to begin, then the season began...like no other fishing season I had seen. My first day of work lasted 27 hours. I had 3 hours off for sleep, then back up for 24 hours of work, then a 4 hour break, then back up for another 20+ hour work shift. This went on for six days.
Amazingly I was totally alert and going strong through the first 48 hours of the season. It was only on the third work shift that I began to get really tired. Eventually I got so tired I was falling asleep standing up. The foreman came over woke me up by saying something. He didn't give me any hell for falling asleep, he knew we were all working past the point of human endurance.
I got back to Seattle with near $2000 from the few days work, and promptly went to the North Face store at 1023 1st Avenue in downtown Seattle and bought a few black long sleeve polypropylene shirts and a huge yellow luggage bag (like my roommate in Naknek had). Over ten years later and the bag is still my main travel bag. The bag would be essential for all the flux that would happen the rest of the summer.
Romance. I had struck up an online long distance relationship with a Japanese woman by the name of Yukie Watanabe attending college in San Diego. We had met on a Japanese alternative music forum, she started the first chat between us. I didn't even know if she was a she till about a week later. That all started in February 2002, and by May we had decided to meet in June in Seattle.
So after my short gig at Bristol Bay I return to Bremerton for a few weeks, and waited for finally meeting Yukie at The Belltown Inn on 3rd Avenue in downtown Seattle.
The big day finally came, we met, hit it off, and spent a week with me playing tour guide and boyfriend.
Historical note: we saw Mike Watt and the Secondmen perform at the Crocodile Cafe on June 8, 2002. I had seen Mike Watt back in early 2000, got to talk to him, and he was a big strong man. Between 2000 and 2002 he had a major medical emergency surgery that averted a life-threatening situation. So when I saw him for this 2002 show he was a very different man. He was markedly thinner. He was even playing a lightweight Gibson SG bodied bass (not his usual big thunderspeil). As always, he and the crew put on a great, and sometimes deeply moving, show.
Our week together ended with both of us riding a Metro bus to Seatac airport -her flying back to San Diego and me flying to Ketchikan Alaska for a summer long gig with Trident Seafoods.
All my previous gigs in Alaska were very remote. Most of the time I was on a big fish processing ship. The one exception was Akutan, which is an extremely remote village with only one tiny store and one bar. Ketchikan was very different. The Trident plant was on the south end of the town, on the main road. Walking to any part of the town was easy. The town even had a city bus, its turn around point was right at the Trident plant.
Ketchikan quickly became one of my all time favorite towns, and still is. For those who've never been to southeast Alaska, let me explain an odd thing about the region. Southeast Alaskan towns don't sprawl out into suburbs like most of America. In a way, they are all downtown. All the businesses are "in town" and the residential homes start downtown and cluster in town. The spacing between houses is a very few feet. Said in one phrase, southeast Alaskan towns are "urban density".
Why the urban density? The towns are surrounded by Pacific waters and intense mountain ranges. The mountain ranges are so intense there is no highway system linking the towns. All the towns have no roads going more than 30 miles outside of town, with exception of Skagway (which has a highway that connects to the Yukon, and thus all of North America).
People get from town to town or to the rest of the world via boat or plane, period. There are homes out far from town, but they are not part of the cul-de-sac suburban paradigm. They simply built on land with no road to the house. A boat is moored alongside the patch of land, and thats how they get to town.
The culture of southeastern Alaskan towns is like a rugged frontier version of Seattle. Espresso stands and cafes are prevalent. The clothes, the architecture, the people, the coffee, the food -all had a Seattle vibe to them. Which makes sense, the region is the just the extreme northern end of the Pacific Northwest.
I had arrived and began work weeks before the salmon fishing season was to begin, and only worked an eight hour day. So I had plenty of time to see Ketchikan. Most mornings I walked into town, got a latte at the little stand at the main pier, and walked back to start my work day.
Several nights I went to the totally awesome bar scene downtown with a few coworkers -two lesbians and a guy that was once very deeply involved in the Aryan Nations, but since had become an outspoken critic of the movement, he had appeared on talk shows.
One extra crazy thing to add about the former Aryan Nations guy. While we were there in Ketchikan, he accidentally crossed paths with a woman that had saved his life. After his defection from the Aryans they had lured him into a trap, they had asked for a meeting just to talk, and when he had arrived they tied him up and took him to the basement to torture and possibly kill him. A Japanese woman who happened to be a national champion in karate heard his screams and raided the basement, fought the entire group of Aryans, and rescued my friend.
He had since married, but his wife was not in Ketchikan. He said it was a difficult temptation having his Japanese super-athlete ninja live saving girl...friend there. I don't know how that turned out, he got a higher paying job at another plant in Ketchikan and I never heard from him again.
The night of the 4th of July was one of the funnest nights I've had. Hanging out with the already mentioned crew. We saw the fireworks, hung out at a bar right beside all the cruise ships moored along the pier, on a roof top part of the bar. Even saw people dive from their cruise ship balconies into the water.
Coming back from the bar we watched the oddest thing. A group of about 15 teens were climbing up a roof and getting into an upstairs business space. They didn't seem to be breaking anything or stealing anything. They seemed to be just having fun climbing. The police arrived, but were on the other side of the building, and were checking out the doors and peering in windows on that side. We had a view of both the teens and the police. It was so weird seeing these two sets of people so close at the same building but not meeting up.
The south end of town where the plant is has an interesting history. In the early 1900's it was the Asian Quarter, populated by Asian immigrants who worked at the fish processing plants. The main grocery store on that end of town was evidence of the asian influence -Tatsuda's IGA.
I loved my dorm room and building at the Trident plant. It was old, wooden -a classic industrial operation from 100 years ago.
Unfortunately...very unfortunately...my first and last bad experience with Trident would unfold. My job was assistant to the crew chief. I believe her name was Susan Sorenson. I may have that wrong, but I'm close at the very least.
She had picked me up at the airport, and we had gotten along very well, both as coworkers with her as my boss and also just chatting about politics and life. She was from New Zealand, her husband and 10 year old son were at the plant also. He was an engineer. Her son had a nanny. Strange coincidence: the nanny was the mother of my boss Leslie Learned in Antarctica.
All was great for a few weeks. Then one morning I sensed a shift, and she became nothing but hostile and psychologically abusive from that point on. Years later I would run into the girl who worked in the position after I did, and learn that the woman was notoriously a psycho, that she could become someone's worst nightmare for no reason apparent to anyone.
This was torture for me. I began taking walks and trying to figure it all out. I couldn't. Then one morning I was walking and got invigorated while listening to the Butthole Surfer's Weird Revolution. I came back to the plant, and quite. The plant superintendent John Webby apologized to me for whatever I had gone through that had pushed me to quit. He said my personal file showed me as the very best kind of employee, fulfilling every contract, working my way up to both bookkeeper in one plant, and head of quality control in another. He terminated me with notes that I could work at any Trident plant except the Ketchikan operation.
Years later, much too late, I figured out what I should have done. I had the personal file with Trident as my record, with several explicitly positive reviews from superiors. I should have gone to John Webby and said my boss was being abusive to the point that I cannot take it, that I have never broken under any pressures of work (fatigue, inability to do job, etc) and the strength of my past record should support my contention that this particular boss is being abusive.
But, no, I did not think of or do that when I could have.
As for the female dog that was my boss at Ketchikan. I hope the worst for you. I had some of greatest times of my life with Trident, had the very best bosses I've ever had, and was loving that summer in Ketchikan. You needlessly polluted that otherwise perfect run. For anyone out there who is employing a woman from New Zealand, that worked for Trident Seafoods in Ketchikan...consider firing her.
Hours after I quit, as I was taking my last walk in Ketchikan, I found a $100 bill on the sidewalk.
Arriving in Seattle, I didn't have my dorm room at Evergreen until school started, so I checked back in to the Belltown Inn for week. I had some money from the Trident gig, and decided to just enjoy Seattle for a few days and try and think of a next move.
When in hotels I tend to watch CNN Headline News...constantly. One of the main news stories of that summer were the major forest fires going on in the Siskiyou Mountains of southern Oregon. Forest fire fighting had long been on my bucketlist. I decided to go to Oregon to fight fires.
After making the decision a news story reported the deaths of a few fire fighters in the Siskiyou Mountains. They had been driving in a fire company van along a logging road and plunged over a mountain drop off, plunging several hundred feet.
Danger usually attracted me in the years before I had my son North. So, I went to Oregon. Specifically, I went to Klamath Falls, a small town in southern Oregon.
To be a wildlands firefighter one must be certified, which requires a week long course. Klamath Community College offered the course, they had openings for the next week's course, I paid and registered for the course over the phone and got on the very next Greyhound bound for Klamath Falls.
The road trip to Klamath Falls was awesome. We crossed the Columbia River via US Highway 97 and stopped at Biggs Oregon. It was my first time to see the Columbia Gorge.
In my first hours after arriving in Klamath Falls I checked into the Maverick Motel in downtown. I had booked a room for a week before arriving. I wanted to stretch my legs after the road trip, so I began walking to Klamath Community College. I assumed it being a small town the college would be a short ways away.
It was five miles. I walked in the bright sunshine of the desert, getting a sunburn that would leave a visible tan line for years.
The week of living in the Maverick and going to the little community college was interesting. Klamath Falls is in a desert, with forests nearby. I befriended two guys in my class and had a week of hanging out with them. They were hired on my fire crew after course completion. One of them was Tom Ames, one of the best people I've ever met. I stayed at his house from the time of the course completion till we left for the fires. He had a way of maintaining control of his kids without being mean at all, yet they were exceptionally well behaved. He was deeply religious, and even in that he had a way of being...well...cool about it. Odd coincidence #2 for the summer: Tom Ames had worked at the plant in Akutan Alaska that I had been a bookkeeper at. Tom worked there a few years before I did, and he was friends with Dave Abbasian, my boss at Akutan.
I went to work for Ore-Cal Fire Suppression, based on a ranch in the farming crossroad town of Malin Oregon, about 30 miles from Klamath Falls (map). They were nice folks -a family owned and operated business.
Before going to fight fires we were issued a huge array of gear -uniforms, backpack, etc. We had to supply our own professional grade fire fighting boots. I bought a pair of Danner boots for about $230, much like the boots in the photo to the right. I loved those boots, wore them year round and everywhere, even in the summer with shorts.
Onward to the fires! We loaded up in big V-10 Ford vans, with massive luggage racks spanning the whole length, our bags cinched down on top, drove to the fire fighters base camp for the Rogue River/Siskiyou National Forest fire, called the Biscuit Fire (wikipedia).
The base camp was far from the fires, maybe 30 or more miles. Every day was a major commute in the vans from camp to the mountains, and back again. About 15 miles was on a good state highway, then the rest was on gravel logging roads. Every day was to a different location of course, the situation in the woods was always dynamic.
A firefighting base camp is big. Keep in mind this was the biggest fire of that summer in the US, so maybe not all base camps are as big as my experience. They had food preparation trailers where we lined up for our breakfast and dinners, and were issued our sack lunch for out in the field. Tents with lots of long military style mess hall tables were our only rooms to hang out in other than our tents.
I soon saw how easy it was for the van of fighters to have died by leaving the logging road and plunging several hundred feet. The Siskiyou Mountains are famously steep. Not really good for hikers. The logging roads have plenty of mileage along those drop offs.
Plus our driver drove really fast down those gravel roads. Speed on those roads is crazy enough, but of course my life is never just plain old crazy, there always has to be something even crazier. Our driver wasn't just reckless....he may have been high. He talked with a slur, and was networked with the pro drug dealers of of Klamath Falls (more on that a little later). He was a really nice guy to me, I feel bad reporting this, but the story would be missing some of its most terrifying dimensions if I left it out.
Our crew was one of the...um...more troubled crews at the base camp. Others were more full time and had a military professionalism about them. Ours had some good guys, but there was one guy who was a poster child example of inbred, and another who took a bet to eat dog food. There was an exceptionally lazy passive aggressive one, and quit a few that were poverty versions of frat boys, all from Redding California.
Kid Rock. A lot of them were cut from the same cultural/mental/genetic cloth as Kid Rock. Thank you pop culture for providing archetypes that make convenient handles for communication.
I had fun getting the Kid Rocks to hate me. I didn't want them to like me, and dumbasses are much more entertaining when they are mad anyway. We had plenty of time in the vans, which is where i practiced my craft of pissing them off.
They were Fox News type fans, so I went on and on with all kinds of wild liberal ideas, taken to a lunatic fringe in a way only Lance Miller's can manufacture. I used anomalous ammunition also. A friend had told me he had this game he played with his 2 year old daughter that involved saying Hairwashin!
It was one very precious moment when the van load of guys looked both mad and confused when I suddenly shouted in a high pitched voice Hairwashin!
Fighting the fires. We mostly hiked or manned a checkpoint when at work. The most constant hardship was wearing the long sleeved uniform while baking in the summer heat. Some of the treks up and down the mountains were hard.
Once on a mountainside we had to clear away trees and dig a trench. Some of the guys were chainsawing the trees while most of us we digging the trench. One madrona, a very heavy kind wood, fell right my way. Luckily I saw it coming and moved out of the way. That was my closest brush with death for the summer.
Twice we got really close to the fire. The first time was a little dangerous. We were near the base of the mountain, near a creek. It had been one of the nicest areas we had patrolled. It was there I got to see a tree that was possibly 200 feet high fall down the mountainside on fire, really dramatic moment I just happened to be looking in the right direction at the right time to see. We got a radio call that the fire had gotten unpredictable. We rushed to get all our gear and got in a van and split.
The second time we were near a fire, it was a controlled burn. It wasn't as big as the true wildfire, but still impressive.
Eventually someone in our literal motley crew screwed up in some big way back at the base camp, and we were all sent home.
We all went back to Ore-Cal headquarters and turned in our gear, and waited for another assignment. During this time I was invited to stay at the van driver's home I had mentioned before. He was married and had an 8 year old son. He was really a good guy, even with the whole drug thing going on.
He lived in the national forest near Klamath Falls. This is how cool the Pacific Northwest is: down the road from his house was an espresso stand. He took me out four-wheeling up to a mountain peak, and in general the best kind of host.
Once he took me to his best friend's house party -at a house right on Klamath Lake, their house had a massive deck that went out over the lake. His friend owned the house, didn't work, and I think they may have been the main meth dealers of the area. All I did was drink beer and talk with these people, and honestly...they were solid nice in all that I saw of them. Anyway, the house and the lake were awesome.
I waited around for another assignment. I went out to the Ore-Cal ranch in Malin and helped them with their website. I think it all went on for a week or maybe more.
Then one of the crew bosses got in a major accident. He had been in a company van, out on Transformer Road near the ranch. There was an intersection with stop sign, and the crew boss had just plain run right through the intersection, colliding with another truck. Pure idiocy.
I got to thinking about how dangerous the drives on those logging roads were, and then this accident happened due purely to the idiocy of the crew boss. The probability of death working with this crew was just too high, I decided to end the whole fire fighting thing.
There were still a few weeks left in the summer before my dorm room would become available. I emailed my mom and worked out a plan to visit my mom and dad for the rest of the summer.
I remember the last night in Klamath Falls. I had checked back into the Maverick Hotel for a couple of days. The Greyhound bus boarding time was 1:15AM. I got there and on a bus bound for Los Angeles.
Three hours later, two nuns who were staying at the Maverick Motel were taking a morning stroll on a nearby jogging/biking trail I had walked on many times. A man from out of town stalked them on the trail and strangled them to death with their rosary beads. It was a horrific murder in the national news.
My ride down the agricultural valley of California took me through an area I hadn't seen before. Its not known for its beauty, its not a tourist draw like much of the rest of Cali. The bus picked a woman in Lancaster, that would later overdose in her chair, and once in L.A. a very jaded and emotionally flat Greyhound staff boarded the bus with rubber gloves on and removed the woman.
I eventually boarded the bus that would take me to Tulsa Oklahoma. Got to see the beautiful desert southwest once again.
My visit at my mom and dad's place was the best of my whole life. Something had switched in my dad's demeanor, and we had the first good time hanging out since I was a kid going to drag races with him (drag race story).
It would also be the last. He came down with all kinds of health calamities, and was largely incoherent. I visited once more in 2011, which was important for both us, then he passed away in 2012.
My summer came to an end as my classes started at Evergreen State College, my last year at the school, and with a National Science Foundation scholarship. At that point in my life a phase ended. I have not been on any kind of true adventure since -by that I mean randomness and danger in the context of travel.
The Summer of 2002 was my last time being crazy.
The author of this blog also has two books available on Amazon. Athena Techne uses some of the autobiographical content of this blog and adds a philosophical perspective utilizing the ancient Greek god Athena.
Athena Techne :: Amazon.com Page
Autistic Crow Computer is a fiction set in Seattle, about an autistic boy and two crows. The book was written for young autistic readers, although reviews by non-autistics have been positive.
Autistic Crow Computer :: Amazon.com Page
My Summer of 2002 wasn't about one thing, it was a string of things entirely unrelated, but tied together simply by the accident of timeline. One thing would end and I would look around and just come up with the next thing. I had the whole summer to find something to do before getting back to The Evergreen State College in September.
My summer starts in May. I was living at a friend's house in Bremerton Washington, and planned to work most of the summer in Alaska. This was maybe my ninth work contract in Alaska for Trident Seafoods, but it was the oddest. Most work seasons match a fishing season, and they usually last two to six months. But the May salmon fishing season in Bristol Bay is different -it lasts only about six or seven days.
My final plane ride to Bristol Bay landed in King Salmon Alaska, and from there we took a company shuttle to the Trident plant in Naknek Alaska.
The land in this area is rolling hills and a sparse distribution of short trees. Not the extreme beauty I was used to in other parts of Alaska. The shoreline along Bristol Bay was the exception -a nice rugged beach. The village was mostly Natives, and I loved the little village library there.
We hung out for a few of days waiting for the fishing run to begin, then the season began...like no other fishing season I had seen. My first day of work lasted 27 hours. I had 3 hours off for sleep, then back up for 24 hours of work, then a 4 hour break, then back up for another 20+ hour work shift. This went on for six days.
Amazingly I was totally alert and going strong through the first 48 hours of the season. It was only on the third work shift that I began to get really tired. Eventually I got so tired I was falling asleep standing up. The foreman came over woke me up by saying something. He didn't give me any hell for falling asleep, he knew we were all working past the point of human endurance.
I got back to Seattle with near $2000 from the few days work, and promptly went to the North Face store at 1023 1st Avenue in downtown Seattle and bought a few black long sleeve polypropylene shirts and a huge yellow luggage bag (like my roommate in Naknek had). Over ten years later and the bag is still my main travel bag. The bag would be essential for all the flux that would happen the rest of the summer.
Romance. I had struck up an online long distance relationship with a Japanese woman by the name of Yukie Watanabe attending college in San Diego. We had met on a Japanese alternative music forum, she started the first chat between us. I didn't even know if she was a she till about a week later. That all started in February 2002, and by May we had decided to meet in June in Seattle.
So after my short gig at Bristol Bay I return to Bremerton for a few weeks, and waited for finally meeting Yukie at The Belltown Inn on 3rd Avenue in downtown Seattle.
The big day finally came, we met, hit it off, and spent a week with me playing tour guide and boyfriend.
Historical note: we saw Mike Watt and the Secondmen perform at the Crocodile Cafe on June 8, 2002. I had seen Mike Watt back in early 2000, got to talk to him, and he was a big strong man. Between 2000 and 2002 he had a major medical emergency surgery that averted a life-threatening situation. So when I saw him for this 2002 show he was a very different man. He was markedly thinner. He was even playing a lightweight Gibson SG bodied bass (not his usual big thunderspeil). As always, he and the crew put on a great, and sometimes deeply moving, show.
Our week together ended with both of us riding a Metro bus to Seatac airport -her flying back to San Diego and me flying to Ketchikan Alaska for a summer long gig with Trident Seafoods.
All my previous gigs in Alaska were very remote. Most of the time I was on a big fish processing ship. The one exception was Akutan, which is an extremely remote village with only one tiny store and one bar. Ketchikan was very different. The Trident plant was on the south end of the town, on the main road. Walking to any part of the town was easy. The town even had a city bus, its turn around point was right at the Trident plant.
 |
| Creek Street (a boardwalk, not for cars), Ketchikan Alaska |
Why the urban density? The towns are surrounded by Pacific waters and intense mountain ranges. The mountain ranges are so intense there is no highway system linking the towns. All the towns have no roads going more than 30 miles outside of town, with exception of Skagway (which has a highway that connects to the Yukon, and thus all of North America).
People get from town to town or to the rest of the world via boat or plane, period. There are homes out far from town, but they are not part of the cul-de-sac suburban paradigm. They simply built on land with no road to the house. A boat is moored alongside the patch of land, and thats how they get to town.
 |
| Main pier as seen from boat, Ketchikan Alaska |
I had arrived and began work weeks before the salmon fishing season was to begin, and only worked an eight hour day. So I had plenty of time to see Ketchikan. Most mornings I walked into town, got a latte at the little stand at the main pier, and walked back to start my work day.
 |
| Main pier, Ketchikan Alaska |
One extra crazy thing to add about the former Aryan Nations guy. While we were there in Ketchikan, he accidentally crossed paths with a woman that had saved his life. After his defection from the Aryans they had lured him into a trap, they had asked for a meeting just to talk, and when he had arrived they tied him up and took him to the basement to torture and possibly kill him. A Japanese woman who happened to be a national champion in karate heard his screams and raided the basement, fought the entire group of Aryans, and rescued my friend.
He had since married, but his wife was not in Ketchikan. He said it was a difficult temptation having his Japanese super-athlete ninja live saving girl...friend there. I don't know how that turned out, he got a higher paying job at another plant in Ketchikan and I never heard from him again.
The night of the 4th of July was one of the funnest nights I've had. Hanging out with the already mentioned crew. We saw the fireworks, hung out at a bar right beside all the cruise ships moored along the pier, on a roof top part of the bar. Even saw people dive from their cruise ship balconies into the water.
Coming back from the bar we watched the oddest thing. A group of about 15 teens were climbing up a roof and getting into an upstairs business space. They didn't seem to be breaking anything or stealing anything. They seemed to be just having fun climbing. The police arrived, but were on the other side of the building, and were checking out the doors and peering in windows on that side. We had a view of both the teens and the police. It was so weird seeing these two sets of people so close at the same building but not meeting up.
I loved my dorm room and building at the Trident plant. It was old, wooden -a classic industrial operation from 100 years ago.
Unfortunately...very unfortunately...my first and last bad experience with Trident would unfold. My job was assistant to the crew chief. I believe her name was Susan Sorenson. I may have that wrong, but I'm close at the very least.
She had picked me up at the airport, and we had gotten along very well, both as coworkers with her as my boss and also just chatting about politics and life. She was from New Zealand, her husband and 10 year old son were at the plant also. He was an engineer. Her son had a nanny. Strange coincidence: the nanny was the mother of my boss Leslie Learned in Antarctica.
All was great for a few weeks. Then one morning I sensed a shift, and she became nothing but hostile and psychologically abusive from that point on. Years later I would run into the girl who worked in the position after I did, and learn that the woman was notoriously a psycho, that she could become someone's worst nightmare for no reason apparent to anyone.
This was torture for me. I began taking walks and trying to figure it all out. I couldn't. Then one morning I was walking and got invigorated while listening to the Butthole Surfer's Weird Revolution. I came back to the plant, and quite. The plant superintendent John Webby apologized to me for whatever I had gone through that had pushed me to quit. He said my personal file showed me as the very best kind of employee, fulfilling every contract, working my way up to both bookkeeper in one plant, and head of quality control in another. He terminated me with notes that I could work at any Trident plant except the Ketchikan operation.
Years later, much too late, I figured out what I should have done. I had the personal file with Trident as my record, with several explicitly positive reviews from superiors. I should have gone to John Webby and said my boss was being abusive to the point that I cannot take it, that I have never broken under any pressures of work (fatigue, inability to do job, etc) and the strength of my past record should support my contention that this particular boss is being abusive.
But, no, I did not think of or do that when I could have.
As for the female dog that was my boss at Ketchikan. I hope the worst for you. I had some of greatest times of my life with Trident, had the very best bosses I've ever had, and was loving that summer in Ketchikan. You needlessly polluted that otherwise perfect run. For anyone out there who is employing a woman from New Zealand, that worked for Trident Seafoods in Ketchikan...consider firing her.
Hours after I quit, as I was taking my last walk in Ketchikan, I found a $100 bill on the sidewalk.
Arriving in Seattle, I didn't have my dorm room at Evergreen until school started, so I checked back in to the Belltown Inn for week. I had some money from the Trident gig, and decided to just enjoy Seattle for a few days and try and think of a next move.
When in hotels I tend to watch CNN Headline News...constantly. One of the main news stories of that summer were the major forest fires going on in the Siskiyou Mountains of southern Oregon. Forest fire fighting had long been on my bucketlist. I decided to go to Oregon to fight fires.
After making the decision a news story reported the deaths of a few fire fighters in the Siskiyou Mountains. They had been driving in a fire company van along a logging road and plunged over a mountain drop off, plunging several hundred feet.
Danger usually attracted me in the years before I had my son North. So, I went to Oregon. Specifically, I went to Klamath Falls, a small town in southern Oregon.
To be a wildlands firefighter one must be certified, which requires a week long course. Klamath Community College offered the course, they had openings for the next week's course, I paid and registered for the course over the phone and got on the very next Greyhound bound for Klamath Falls.
 |
| Highway 97 bridge over the Columbia River. Biggs Oregon. |
In my first hours after arriving in Klamath Falls I checked into the Maverick Motel in downtown. I had booked a room for a week before arriving. I wanted to stretch my legs after the road trip, so I began walking to Klamath Community College. I assumed it being a small town the college would be a short ways away.
It was five miles. I walked in the bright sunshine of the desert, getting a sunburn that would leave a visible tan line for years.
The week of living in the Maverick and going to the little community college was interesting. Klamath Falls is in a desert, with forests nearby. I befriended two guys in my class and had a week of hanging out with them. They were hired on my fire crew after course completion. One of them was Tom Ames, one of the best people I've ever met. I stayed at his house from the time of the course completion till we left for the fires. He had a way of maintaining control of his kids without being mean at all, yet they were exceptionally well behaved. He was deeply religious, and even in that he had a way of being...well...cool about it. Odd coincidence #2 for the summer: Tom Ames had worked at the plant in Akutan Alaska that I had been a bookkeeper at. Tom worked there a few years before I did, and he was friends with Dave Abbasian, my boss at Akutan.
I went to work for Ore-Cal Fire Suppression, based on a ranch in the farming crossroad town of Malin Oregon, about 30 miles from Klamath Falls (map). They were nice folks -a family owned and operated business.
Onward to the fires! We loaded up in big V-10 Ford vans, with massive luggage racks spanning the whole length, our bags cinched down on top, drove to the fire fighters base camp for the Rogue River/Siskiyou National Forest fire, called the Biscuit Fire (wikipedia).
The base camp was far from the fires, maybe 30 or more miles. Every day was a major commute in the vans from camp to the mountains, and back again. About 15 miles was on a good state highway, then the rest was on gravel logging roads. Every day was to a different location of course, the situation in the woods was always dynamic.
 |
| NASA image of Biscuit Fire |
I soon saw how easy it was for the van of fighters to have died by leaving the logging road and plunging several hundred feet. The Siskiyou Mountains are famously steep. Not really good for hikers. The logging roads have plenty of mileage along those drop offs.
Plus our driver drove really fast down those gravel roads. Speed on those roads is crazy enough, but of course my life is never just plain old crazy, there always has to be something even crazier. Our driver wasn't just reckless....he may have been high. He talked with a slur, and was networked with the pro drug dealers of of Klamath Falls (more on that a little later). He was a really nice guy to me, I feel bad reporting this, but the story would be missing some of its most terrifying dimensions if I left it out.
Our crew was one of the...um...more troubled crews at the base camp. Others were more full time and had a military professionalism about them. Ours had some good guys, but there was one guy who was a poster child example of inbred, and another who took a bet to eat dog food. There was an exceptionally lazy passive aggressive one, and quit a few that were poverty versions of frat boys, all from Redding California.
Kid Rock. A lot of them were cut from the same cultural/mental/genetic cloth as Kid Rock. Thank you pop culture for providing archetypes that make convenient handles for communication.
I had fun getting the Kid Rocks to hate me. I didn't want them to like me, and dumbasses are much more entertaining when they are mad anyway. We had plenty of time in the vans, which is where i practiced my craft of pissing them off.
They were Fox News type fans, so I went on and on with all kinds of wild liberal ideas, taken to a lunatic fringe in a way only Lance Miller's can manufacture. I used anomalous ammunition also. A friend had told me he had this game he played with his 2 year old daughter that involved saying Hairwashin!
It was one very precious moment when the van load of guys looked both mad and confused when I suddenly shouted in a high pitched voice Hairwashin!
 |
| Actual fire from the Biscuit Fire Complex |
Once on a mountainside we had to clear away trees and dig a trench. Some of the guys were chainsawing the trees while most of us we digging the trench. One madrona, a very heavy kind wood, fell right my way. Luckily I saw it coming and moved out of the way. That was my closest brush with death for the summer.
Twice we got really close to the fire. The first time was a little dangerous. We were near the base of the mountain, near a creek. It had been one of the nicest areas we had patrolled. It was there I got to see a tree that was possibly 200 feet high fall down the mountainside on fire, really dramatic moment I just happened to be looking in the right direction at the right time to see. We got a radio call that the fire had gotten unpredictable. We rushed to get all our gear and got in a van and split.
The second time we were near a fire, it was a controlled burn. It wasn't as big as the true wildfire, but still impressive.
Eventually someone in our literal motley crew screwed up in some big way back at the base camp, and we were all sent home.
We all went back to Ore-Cal headquarters and turned in our gear, and waited for another assignment. During this time I was invited to stay at the van driver's home I had mentioned before. He was married and had an 8 year old son. He was really a good guy, even with the whole drug thing going on.
He lived in the national forest near Klamath Falls. This is how cool the Pacific Northwest is: down the road from his house was an espresso stand. He took me out four-wheeling up to a mountain peak, and in general the best kind of host.
Once he took me to his best friend's house party -at a house right on Klamath Lake, their house had a massive deck that went out over the lake. His friend owned the house, didn't work, and I think they may have been the main meth dealers of the area. All I did was drink beer and talk with these people, and honestly...they were solid nice in all that I saw of them. Anyway, the house and the lake were awesome.
I waited around for another assignment. I went out to the Ore-Cal ranch in Malin and helped them with their website. I think it all went on for a week or maybe more.
Then one of the crew bosses got in a major accident. He had been in a company van, out on Transformer Road near the ranch. There was an intersection with stop sign, and the crew boss had just plain run right through the intersection, colliding with another truck. Pure idiocy.
I got to thinking about how dangerous the drives on those logging roads were, and then this accident happened due purely to the idiocy of the crew boss. The probability of death working with this crew was just too high, I decided to end the whole fire fighting thing.
There were still a few weeks left in the summer before my dorm room would become available. I emailed my mom and worked out a plan to visit my mom and dad for the rest of the summer.
I remember the last night in Klamath Falls. I had checked back into the Maverick Hotel for a couple of days. The Greyhound bus boarding time was 1:15AM. I got there and on a bus bound for Los Angeles.
Three hours later, two nuns who were staying at the Maverick Motel were taking a morning stroll on a nearby jogging/biking trail I had walked on many times. A man from out of town stalked them on the trail and strangled them to death with their rosary beads. It was a horrific murder in the national news.
My ride down the agricultural valley of California took me through an area I hadn't seen before. Its not known for its beauty, its not a tourist draw like much of the rest of Cali. The bus picked a woman in Lancaster, that would later overdose in her chair, and once in L.A. a very jaded and emotionally flat Greyhound staff boarded the bus with rubber gloves on and removed the woman.
I eventually boarded the bus that would take me to Tulsa Oklahoma. Got to see the beautiful desert southwest once again.
My visit at my mom and dad's place was the best of my whole life. Something had switched in my dad's demeanor, and we had the first good time hanging out since I was a kid going to drag races with him (drag race story).
It would also be the last. He came down with all kinds of health calamities, and was largely incoherent. I visited once more in 2011, which was important for both us, then he passed away in 2012.
My summer came to an end as my classes started at Evergreen State College, my last year at the school, and with a National Science Foundation scholarship. At that point in my life a phase ended. I have not been on any kind of true adventure since -by that I mean randomness and danger in the context of travel.
The Summer of 2002 was my last time being crazy.
Athena Techne :: Amazon.com Page
Autistic Crow Computer :: Amazon.com Page
Monday, February 1, 1999
The Seven Foot Tall Terrorist : The strongest man I have ever met.
December 31 1998 I boarded the F/V Bountiful to begin a contract to work as a seafood processor through the winter crab fishing season. We began our journey on the ship canal in Seattle, and made our way to the Bering Sea, and began catching crab sometime after January 20th.
This is the Deadliest Catch kind of work. Our boat was unique in that it caught and processed the crab. It was the first boat in the world that had done that. The work and environment was by far the hardest thing I've done. We worked from 7AM to 1AM seven days a week. Physically, the work created a lot of pain in my forearms. The waves and the ice could have killed some of us. The waves stayed between 40 to 60 foot swells the whole season. Another crab boat near us went down with the whole crew.
Everyone on board was tough, well except for one dude that stayed sea sick, eventually began stealing cash from his roommates bags -he was beaten, fired and with a high disregard for his safety lifted over to a freight boat while our boat was going full speed in rough seas. Anyway, back to the tough guys.
There was none tougher than Muhammed Ali. He was seven feet tall, not fat and not skinny. Sunni Muslim. He observed his time of prayer everyday -out on the deck- stoically facing skyscaper size waves and hurricane force wind and ice/rain.
I just now put two and two together, just after writing that last paragraph. He did what I thought was a bizarre thing, but now it makes sense. He was doing his prayers on the Muslim schedule. We worked 18 hours a day. He had to miss some work everyday. Here's what I've finally figured out:
In the mornings, before 7AM, the whole crew just about dead from the season's work and lack of sleep, Muhammed Ali would go to the crab shack at about 6:40 and kill a massive amount of crab, splitting their body in half and creating a huge mound of legs (this is a normal part of crab processing). What was bizarre was his coming in early and working that hard.
It was to repay for the time off doing his prayers.
Everyone on board got tired, cranky....prone to argue or fight...except Muhammed Ali. Once in some cuss-word and complaining filled banter between the guys he just stood with no expression, and in a lull he said "life is beautiful".
Muhammed was in the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) as a somewhat independent special force type operative. He was self-funded, working in Alaska. When he returned home he would by a fresh supply of armaments and go into enemy territory 30 to 60 miles, and kill people.
I met some interesting people on the F/V Bountiful.
Two weeks after the Sept 11th attacks, I was riding a bus from Olympia to Seattle, my bus went by the Immigration Detention Center -where the authorities do interviews and often arrest if the interview goes the wrong way. I saw Muhammed Ali coming from the building and crossing the street, he was within 30 feet of me.
He apparently had gotten through whatever dragnet for terrorists was being done then. Though I imagine the authorities differentiated between KLA activities that killed Slavs and operatives wanting to kill Americans.
Who knows, maybe as a Sunni and an elite fighter, he may have gone on to international operations Sunni Jihadists do. Maybe he died in a fire fight with an Air Force fighter jet launching 12,000 bullets.
Life's Rich Pageant.
This is the Deadliest Catch kind of work. Our boat was unique in that it caught and processed the crab. It was the first boat in the world that had done that. The work and environment was by far the hardest thing I've done. We worked from 7AM to 1AM seven days a week. Physically, the work created a lot of pain in my forearms. The waves and the ice could have killed some of us. The waves stayed between 40 to 60 foot swells the whole season. Another crab boat near us went down with the whole crew.
Everyone on board was tough, well except for one dude that stayed sea sick, eventually began stealing cash from his roommates bags -he was beaten, fired and with a high disregard for his safety lifted over to a freight boat while our boat was going full speed in rough seas. Anyway, back to the tough guys.
There was none tougher than Muhammed Ali. He was seven feet tall, not fat and not skinny. Sunni Muslim. He observed his time of prayer everyday -out on the deck- stoically facing skyscaper size waves and hurricane force wind and ice/rain.
I just now put two and two together, just after writing that last paragraph. He did what I thought was a bizarre thing, but now it makes sense. He was doing his prayers on the Muslim schedule. We worked 18 hours a day. He had to miss some work everyday. Here's what I've finally figured out:
In the mornings, before 7AM, the whole crew just about dead from the season's work and lack of sleep, Muhammed Ali would go to the crab shack at about 6:40 and kill a massive amount of crab, splitting their body in half and creating a huge mound of legs (this is a normal part of crab processing). What was bizarre was his coming in early and working that hard.
It was to repay for the time off doing his prayers.
Everyone on board got tired, cranky....prone to argue or fight...except Muhammed Ali. Once in some cuss-word and complaining filled banter between the guys he just stood with no expression, and in a lull he said "life is beautiful".
Muhammed was in the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) as a somewhat independent special force type operative. He was self-funded, working in Alaska. When he returned home he would by a fresh supply of armaments and go into enemy territory 30 to 60 miles, and kill people.
I met some interesting people on the F/V Bountiful.
Two weeks after the Sept 11th attacks, I was riding a bus from Olympia to Seattle, my bus went by the Immigration Detention Center -where the authorities do interviews and often arrest if the interview goes the wrong way. I saw Muhammed Ali coming from the building and crossing the street, he was within 30 feet of me.
He apparently had gotten through whatever dragnet for terrorists was being done then. Though I imagine the authorities differentiated between KLA activities that killed Slavs and operatives wanting to kill Americans.
Who knows, maybe as a Sunni and an elite fighter, he may have gone on to international operations Sunni Jihadists do. Maybe he died in a fire fight with an Air Force fighter jet launching 12,000 bullets.
Life's Rich Pageant.
Thursday, December 31, 1998
Working on the P/V Bountiful, winter crab season in Bering Sea
Timeline: Dec 31st 1998 to March 1999. My age: 37. Location: began voyage in Seattle, spent most of time in Bering Sea.
On New Year's Eve 1998 I got on the P/V Bountiful while it was docked in Seattle's ship canal. The Bountiful is a rare type of boat, it catches crab and processes/packages the catch. The boat is owned by Trident Seafoods, which is majority owned by Chuck Bundrant. Chuck invented the crab catcher/processor type boat. I had already worked for Trident in Alaska since 1997 (my 1997 Akutan Alaska story here), and the Bountiful crew had a reputation as an elite tough guy club. I took a demotion from bookkeeping and quality control for the experience.
It almost killed me -working 18 hours a day from 7:00 AM till 1:00 AM, an unheated bedroom, the hardest work I've ever seen, and waves so big they didn't look real. The captain said the waves were 60 to 40 foot for most of the winter.
Everyone on the boat was tough. Except for one guy from Florida who stayed sea sick most of his time on the boat. Then he made a mistake beyond not being tough. He stole money out of his roommate's bag. The captain gathered us all in the wheelhouse, and said he wanted the guy found and he'd be fine with whatever frontier justice happened. The guy was beat up, and fired. Years later I was talking to a deckhand working the boat that received this fired worker. Our boat swung in fast, lifted the guy up with a crane and swung him onto the receiving boat almost at full speed and in rough seas. Petty theft meant this guy's life was in peril till he reached dry land.
There was a seven foot tall Bosnian Muslim, Mohammed Ali, who never complained, and showed up 15 minutes before start time. Think about that one for a moment -we worked from 7AM till 1AM, 7 days a week- and this guy would go to the crab shack at 6:45 and start rendering crab. Another interesting thing. Muhammed was a militant fighting the Croatians. He would take his savings from working in Alaska and go back to Bosnia, buy armaments, and go fight Croatians. He regularly went miles into a enemy territory. I have no reason to doubt the man, his manner of speech and demeanor on the boat was so void of any weakness, including the need to impress anyone or make friends.
Then there was my good friend Hacksaw, a big muscled up street druggie who worked alone in the freezer, no supervision, stacking 5000 boxes of crab, 45 pounds each. He did his job with perfection. I never saw him before or after that stint on the boat, but he was such a good guy I can't write about him without calling him a friend, and truly hope he is doing well.
Everybody liked me except this one deckhand from Hawaii, he was indigenous Hawaiian but not nearly as big as other indigenous Hawaiians I've seen. He pushed me once while we were in the galley for lunch. Others told me was looking for a fight, and would claim I started the fight, hoping to get me fired and lose my end-of-contract bonus. I made a plan to defeat the guy, by being crazy. On my raingear I used magic markers to draw and write little flowers that had smiley faces and swastika eyes, and lots of words about killing. Across my rubber work gloves I wrote "I hate indigenous hawaiians". The propaganda campaign worked, most of the crew laughed about it, and the Hawaiian walked a wide circle around me for the rest of my time on the boat.
In March we had a warm spike in temps, and things were easier for a few days. Then one night around 4 AM we were woke up and asked to come up to the main deck for ice chipping. The seas were rough, and a wave of cold and snow had moved in, laying ice on the boats. It was the most lethal of scenarios for the boats. The F/V Lin-J had just capsized just a few miles from us, and the crew were dead [link], and our boat was coated with ice and prone to the same fate. I got a sledgehammer and started whacking at the ice on the bow of the boat. Every body else was there chipping ice too. The seas were rough, so the boat was rocking like crazy, and there was no secure footing anywhere because of the ice, and one hand occupied with holding a sledgehammer. The experience was interesting.
 |
| The Grand Aleutian in Dutch Harbor Alaska |
A little historical note: those days I was kept by weather in Dutch, the film crew from the very first filming of Deadliest Catch was waiting to fly out also.
I got back to Seattle, moved into an apartment on 50th Street in the University District, and bought a new Ampeg all-tube bass amp and a small all-tube guitar amp, and began playing my Chapman stick at open mics and improv jams in town. I also played in front of my apartment house.
After seeing thousands, maybe millions, of crab killed I became a vegetarian for the next year. My job had often been a crab leg cleaner, and I stood in front of the crab killers, each crab struggling until the guy pushed it into a rendering thing that tore its whole body away from its legs. I thought a lot about death those 18 hour days in front of the killing.
A month after being in Seattle, one day I was playing my Chapman Stick in front of my apartment, and I looked to west and saw my ex-girlfriend Joanna Miles walking down the street. She was with a guy. We had been a steady couple in Akutan Alaska, she was a biologist working for the National Marine Fisheries Service while I was bookkeeper at the Trident Plant.
We had left Akutan in May 1998. We were originally slated to leave on the same plane to Dutch Harbor, but a change my work duties kept me in Akutan another week. I got back to Seattle -then she disappeared, spending all summer working on fishing boats off the California coast with no phone contact and leaving no postal address. She had left no explanation for me, nor to her brother who I called asking about her. I was distraught, so much so I joined a Christian religion, just to make sure Joanna and I couldn't get back together. Part of our bond was in our belief in evolution, and she with her education in biology the belief in evolution was even more grounded. I was so broken up by her leaving with no words as to why, I responded pathologically.
Months later, after she had spent the summer in hiding, I'm sure reflecting on her own independence, our relationship, and life in general, she emailed me. I replied with my bomb: I was now religious, and I knew she could never live with that. Bye. Ironically, it was my experience on the F/V Bountiful that would reaffirm my atheism and belief in evolution.
Seeing her by happenstance on 50th Street tied off a loose end. We chatted amicably, she admired my new instrument and my playing, she cast a smile at me, as I did to her, and then she was gone.
Athena Techne :: Amazon.com Page
Autistic Crow Computer :: Amazon.com Page
Thursday, August 24, 1995
My time in Antarctica and Alaska
In August 1995, maybe on the 24th if I recall correctly, I flew into Christchurch New Zealand. I was on my way to Antarctica. While in "Cheech" I, along with the others working for Antarctic Support Associates, had to wait for weather conditions to permit our 2400 mile flight to Mcmurdo Station. Every morning we would listen for word from the Navy, prepared to either gear up and board an airplane or spend another day as tourists. For five days I got $100 per diem, and had lots of fun hanging out at Caffiends 24 hour cafe and O' Reilly's Irish Pub. Once I made it to Kaikoura for some seaside hiking. Seals were along the shore, and is home to some of the world's most abrupt climbs in elevation from seashore to mountain peak.
When I did arrive in Antarctica, the temperature was around minus 30°(f). Chuck Gallagher told me it was considered a pleasant day. Within a week I saw a Condition 1. Winds over 100 mph, low visibility, sometimes have to use ropes to find one's way from building to building. After a Condition 1, a day with minus 30 ° is great. One night after work we noticed the wind was almost still. This had the effect of bringing the wind chill up to around 0°(f). It felt warm. A small group of us decided to walk along the road over to Hut Point. The walk to the hut was pleasant. When turned around to walk back into town, there was a wind. My eyes froze shut, walking along a drop off into the ocean. I got my eyes open in a minute or so, and found out it is a common occurrence.
I spent 13 months in Antarctica. During that time I saw a lot of ice, mountains, and during the six months of night I saw a lot of the new HTML World Wide Web that was in its infancy. I learned to play bass and use Unix. It was on the WWW that I selected my next place to live, Seattle. In October 1996 I left the ice, spent some time in New Zealand and the US East Coast, and took a train from Pennsylvania to Seattle. I arrived in Seattle on November 1, 1996.
My first six months in Seattle were interesting. I met a set of friends, and was at a huge Thanksgiving dinner in Puyallup. I worked as a temp at the very young Amazon.com, and played my bass at their 1996 Christmas party. In 2004 I was still hearing people's accolades for that performance. But I was still burnt out from the Antarctica winter-over. I needed another adventure to undo the mental damage from the last one.
I stepped onto the processing boat P/B Neptune on March 15, 1997. I went from Seattle's ship canal to the Bering Sea, and lived on the vessel until August 15, 1997. During that voyage I first saw Alaska, including a week docked at Akutan Island. I loved Akutan from the first time I walked through the village.
After my six month stay on a processing boat, I had a three day break in Seattle, then it was on to Akutan for me. I got there on August 20, 1997.
I flew in on the only air service to Akutan, aboard the Pen Air "Goose" seaplane. By October I had started providing Internet-use consulting services to the village library and mayor's office. When the mayor's office called the superintendent of plant operations to request a day off for me to instruct the mayor, it got the attention of my bosses. They wanted me to go to work in the office, doing bookkeeping and payroll. I accepted after
a third request. It is sort of funny that I was the one of the few people on the island with constant access to email, using the Juno email service
which required no ISP.
There were many strange, horrible and wonderful events over the nine months I stayed on the island. There were two deaths within the first few weeks, including a gruesome murder in my dorm. In December I held the town bartender Ben Darling in my arms as we rushed him to the village medical nurse, he had been beaten and almost died as we talked. He survived. My efforts to save him, and then my participation in the village's Russian Christmas traditions, all contributed in my being accepted in the village. My only paying gig for playing bass was a performance at The Roadhouse village bar.
From August 1995 till May 1998 I spent twenty-two months in the cold, exotic Antarctica and Alaska. Coincidentally, in both Akutan and Mcmurdo Station I was at the base of the northernmost and southernmost active volcanoes on that side of the Earth. I became who I am at the base of these volcanoes.
The author of this blog also has two books available on Amazon. Athena Techne uses some of the autobiographical content of this blog and adds a philosophical perspective utilizing the ancient Greek god Athena.
Athena Techne :: Amazon.com Page
Autistic Crow Computer is a fiction set in Seattle, about an autistic boy and two crows. The book was written for young autistic readers, although reviews by non-autistics have been positive.
Autistic Crow Computer :: Amazon.com Page
 |
| Me in Crary Lab, McMurdo Station Antarctica Nov 1995 |
 |
| McMurdo Station Antarctica |
I spent 13 months in Antarctica. During that time I saw a lot of ice, mountains, and during the six months of night I saw a lot of the new HTML World Wide Web that was in its infancy. I learned to play bass and use Unix. It was on the WWW that I selected my next place to live, Seattle. In October 1996 I left the ice, spent some time in New Zealand and the US East Coast, and took a train from Pennsylvania to Seattle. I arrived in Seattle on November 1, 1996.
My first six months in Seattle were interesting. I met a set of friends, and was at a huge Thanksgiving dinner in Puyallup. I worked as a temp at the very young Amazon.com, and played my bass at their 1996 Christmas party. In 2004 I was still hearing people's accolades for that performance. But I was still burnt out from the Antarctica winter-over. I needed another adventure to undo the mental damage from the last one.
I stepped onto the processing boat P/B Neptune on March 15, 1997. I went from Seattle's ship canal to the Bering Sea, and lived on the vessel until August 15, 1997. During that voyage I first saw Alaska, including a week docked at Akutan Island. I loved Akutan from the first time I walked through the village.
 |
| Penn Air "Blue Goose" airplane that services Akutan AK. |
There were many strange, horrible and wonderful events over the nine months I stayed on the island. There were two deaths within the first few weeks, including a gruesome murder in my dorm. In December I held the town bartender Ben Darling in my arms as we rushed him to the village medical nurse, he had been beaten and almost died as we talked. He survived. My efforts to save him, and then my participation in the village's Russian Christmas traditions, all contributed in my being accepted in the village. My only paying gig for playing bass was a performance at The Roadhouse village bar.
From August 1995 till May 1998 I spent twenty-two months in the cold, exotic Antarctica and Alaska. Coincidentally, in both Akutan and Mcmurdo Station I was at the base of the northernmost and southernmost active volcanoes on that side of the Earth. I became who I am at the base of these volcanoes.
 |
| Add caption |
Athena Techne :: Amazon.com Page
Autistic Crow Computer :: Amazon.com Page
Friday, July 8, 1994
My On the Road: 2500 miles of hitchhiking in the desert, 10,000 miles of driving -desert camping, Haight-Ashbury, New Orleans, Bryn Mawr College, Toronto and much more
Being written. These are very rough draft notes working towards the eventual blog entry.
Timeline: July 8, 1994 till late Sept 1, 1994. My age: 31. Location: Most of the lower 48 United States, especially the deserts and high plains of the west, one jaunt to the East Coast. Main characters: My travel partner was Beth Feagan, then 20 years old and enrolled on full scholarship to Bryn Mawr College in Philadelphia. She was a nationally noted writer since the age of 16, and thoroughly immersed in Jack Kerouac. We logged an amazing amount of miles, living in abandoned cowboy line shack trailers, million dollar homes in San Fran, sleeping bags in the desert, riding with Dr Dre's bodyguard (and he bought us ice cream)...seen through the lens of two people prepped by years of intense scholasticism. To this day I have not heard or seen another story like the one we experienced. Yes, I know there are people who have went through something much more intense while moving across the great continent of Eurasia. Beth and I can claim to have experienced a lesser understood thing: extreme luxury and beauty almost for free. One day on the trip we happened upon an abandoned antique house trailer in a beautiful forest above the Grand Canyon. We swept and cleaned it out, set up our stuff in it. Walked to the door, and a small herd of horses were gathered at the fence. That is the kind of magic that fell in our laps for free. And that is just one day, and many things just as magical happened to us on other days, all over the US.
I love writing, but in this case I feel defeated that I won't convey the depth of this experience, the Universe gave me something too large and full for words. But if I use paragraphs with some acumen, maybe I can pull this off.
The first trip began July 8, 1994. Left Little Rock Arkansas for Rock Point Arizona (map) (Wikipedia). Beth Feagan had gotten herself to Rock Point by volunteering a week of work at a church mission there. She spent the week helping lay concrete for a sidewalk.
 |
| Cottonwood Canyon Road (between Hwy 89 and Cannonville Utah) |
 |
| Cannonville Utah |
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)