I was drenched. The rain wasn’t heavy, or even steady, but we’d been out for hours. I’d pulled the drawstrings tight; my hood bore down on the visor of my hat, pushing my glasses hard against the bridge of my nose. Mosquitoes swarmed my face, and I buried my chin deep into the high-zipped neck of the rain jacket. I managed to protect my nose and its immediate surroundings, but was otherwise unable to sustain a defense. The mosquitoes hadn’t been so bad when I first realized my headnet was missing.  But as we mucked through the wet, dense willow riverbank, they were out in force. Ella, tormented too, urged me to higher — drier — ground, but I resisted. I’d lost the river for the last time.

A couple of weeks ago I started letting Ella take me on walks. She starts along her favorite downstream trail and I follow. No two walks are alike; she may follow the river or head away from it. She loves chasing birds, finding swimming holes, and running circles around me (literally). We can do this only because Ella is so well-trained: she chases birds on the wing, not on the ground, to play, not to catch. She won’t chase game (grouse and ptarmigan, caribou, moose, or even the snowshoe hare), and she can’t catch squirrels. Ella knows to stay within range. When I can’t see where she’s gone, I stop to look at the wildflowers, mushrooms, and nascent berries at my feet. She always comes racing back.

As we started out into the drizzle, I threw on a wool overshirt, hat, rain pants and rain jacket, and stuffed a headnet into my pocket. Mosquitoes aren’t dissuaded by a little rain.

“Where’re we going?” I asked.

Ella ran well ahead and then back, tail wagging, full body smile.

The first time she urged me down this path was a few days after I arrived here last August. I had my fishing rod in hand, and she seemed to know exactly where to go. I stopped when she did, dropped my line, and a couple of casts later caught a nice grayling.  Good girl!

This time we walked past the fishing hole, fording a small creek. Ella ran ahead and back, leaping over dwarf birch brush after sparrows, robins and swallows, lost in the joy of the chase. I studied the lichen, scouted for mushrooms, admired the flowers – wild roses, native peas, fireweed, purple monkshead, yellow potentilla, blue bells, pink plumes, alpine-white dogwood, lavender asters – in the brief season of their glory.

The rainy week had given rise to mushrooms, patches of common “deceivers” (yes, that’s what they’re called) and similarly ordinary-looking brown-capped gilled species, and clumps of white puffballs, like bunches of miniature low-flying balloons. The stranger mushrooms generally kept to themselves: a round stemless mushroom here, a large slimy orange one there, a shelf mushroom on deadwood, a mushroom with a black-scaled stem. I took samples for awhile, dropping them one by one in the zippered pocket of my jacket, avoiding the largest and slimiest; once or twice I picked a suspicious-looking fungus only to drop it out of some innate fear.

Dampness had started to seep in past my rain gear; it was time to turn back.  I waited for Ella’s inevitable return, and soon she came running.

“Let’s go home. Find the trail!” I commanded.

Ella turned and continued north, by my reckoning, the way we’d been heading all along. The mountains were obscured by clouds, but I was sure she was headed north.

“No, Ella.  Go home! Find the trail!”

Ella pursued the northern path again.

I led for a bit, turning home as best I could without doubling back; Ella and I prefer to hike a loop rather than out-and-back. Ella redirected me at every opportunity.

“Go home. Find Gary. Find the trail!” I ordered again.

She tried, but when I fought her again, she walked behind me and sat. Her message was clear: lead or follow; don’t try to do both.

We wandered — how long I’m not sure — until I realized I could no longer hear the river. I was lost. The river was my guide; home was upstream. Clouds continued to mask the landmark mountains, but eventually I saw enough to know which way to head to reach the water.

We crossed a small drainage and headed upward until we found ourselves on a high bench, well above the river, then dropped down to its edge. Ella wanted to cross the river, but it was wide and fast; she might make it, but I wouldn’t. And there seemed to be no need: home was on our side of the river. When the willows and mosquitoes got too dense, we headed back to higher ground. Ella found the animal trails, scouting ahead, circling back. We were wet, but I felt safe, knowing I only had to continue our upstream course, the water to our right.

Suddenly the bench narrowed, and I blanched: two creeks appeared to our left. As they flowed to the river they turned; to continue upstream meant crossing them. This made no sense. We had forded nothing but a tiny stream near home, and a shallow drainage as we climbed the bench. Logic told me I shouldn’t be crossing streams, but I also knew I had to continue upstream. We started across, and I felt my boots fill with water. So I headed downstream. Maybe by doubling back I could find a spot where the creeks were narrow and more easily crossed. Maybe I could find a river crossing.

It was getting late. I hoped Gary wouldn’t notice the time; there was little he could do to find us, and I didn’t want to stress him. Besides, how embarrassing to be lost! I was wet, but not really cold or tired. I was losing a lot of blood to the mosquitoes, but otherwise felt fine. It would not get dark, not really. Ella had to be reminded that the time for chasing birds was over, so I knew she still had plenty of energy.

We wandered. Defeated, we headed back upstream, where we looked for the best path across. I picked up a walking stick to steady me on the slippery rock riverbed. We stopped at the small mid-stream island, looking for the easiest crossing, then waded in again. Water leaked in at the elastic cuffs of my rain pants, soaking my jeans. The tail of my wool shirt, hanging just below my rain jacket, was soaked. As I trudged along in my water-filled neoprene-lined boots, the water warmed until I barely noticed it.

But we were on the right track. My relief in knowing this was only slightly marred by the sight of bear scat on the path, the first I’ve seen here. It didn’t look fresh, or at least that’s what I told myself. Before long we came to the timber remains of an old bridge, placing us only a couple of miles from home. The cabin we’d hiked to on a sunny day the weekend before stood across the river. I let Ella lead me to an easier path up the bench, knowing now exactly where we were.

When I got home, it was 7:30; we’d been gone almost four hours.

“Were you lost?” Gary asked.

“Yes.”

“Were you scared?” he wanted to know.

“Only a little.” It was the truth. I think.

Gary hadn’t worried much, knowing he couldn’t do much, and knowing that Ella would do her best to keep me safe and get me home. As I took off all the wet layers of clothes and hung them over the cold wood stove, I knew I owed her an apology. She had tried to lead me home. She knew where she was, and she knew where I wanted to go. I knew she knew. I just didn’t trust her enough. Or maybe I just didn’t trust myself.

Sunrise: 4:47 a.m.
Sunset: 11:18 p.m.  We’re losing six minutes of daylight every day now.
Weather:High, 64; low, 39, cloudy.

We’re back! After two weeks of traveling and hanging around Anchorage waiting to travel, we got back a week ago Thursday. Salad greens sprouted nicely in our absence, thanks to the long days, plastic vole-proof barrier, and good soil preparation. By throwing our coffee grounds onto the raised bed daily through the winter, we kept the snow down. Once the sun came, the dark grounds soaked up heat, making for a quick thaw and warm(ish) soil.

The tundra is flowering with berry blossoms and wildflowers, but is not yet providing much food for the birds, who have for the most part finished their musical nesting phase and moved on. We have seen trumpeter swans and geese flying by, a bald eagle coming in for a landing off the dirt highway, and a small flock of ptarmigan, no longer wearing winter white. Some believe Alaska’s state bird to be the mosquito, and if size, song and swarm count for anything, it could be.

Most mornings start with a run, hike or bike, where we try to keep moving fast enough to avoid getting bitten. By the time we get back our porridge (oatmeal mixed with most every whole grain known to mankind) is ready to eat before we start our day. Gary has been designing trellises to fulfill some custom orders he got at the Alaska Botanical Garden fair, where he nearly sold out of those he brought. He spends some of each day gathering wood and building them, and splitting wood to make bundles of firewood to sell at the campground. He sometimes lights a damp, smoky fire to keep bugs at bay, and almost always works with a head net on.

I’m a mess of welts, the mosquitoes having traced both the Big Dipper and the Belt of Orion on my right calf alone. Still, I go out to get water at the campground well every day or two, and to fish and tend to the garden. When I look up, I see Ella tormented too, pawing at her face, rolling or scooting in self-defense. Ella and I have spent more time indoors due to mosquitoes than we ever did due to the cold.

Moving On

After traveling to the Block Medical Center outside Chicago and University of Washington’s Seattle Cancer Care Alliance, we don’t have much to report. Unless a review of the slides of Gary’s tumor shows a different diagnosis, it’s not clear that there is anything to do other than get routine scans and continue on with his diet and program of supplements. The folks in Seattle were somewhat more patient-centered and articulate, but their advice did not differ greatly from what we heard in Portland.

Gary’s diet is heavy on whole grains, fresh organic fruits and vegetables (mainly vegetables),  with fish a few days a week, no dairy, no sugar, no refined grains, and no alcohol. I’m finishing off the last of the wine and sweets. When we’re with wine-drinking steak- and dessert-eaters, I switch teams, but in general I’m eating the same foods Gary is eating. It takes work to plan meals, but what we do eat is very good.

This diet is only possible because it’s summer here. To maintain it, and to facilitate the inevitable travel to Seattle or wherever Gary gets his medical care, we plan to leave this idyllic spot before the snows fall in September.  Aunt Vee and my cousins Joan and Glenn have been wonderful to offer to let us stay at Vee’s place near Ashland, Oregon. It’s beautiful, too, 160 acres of oak savannah and gushing springs far from the city lights, a place where we can grow and buy fresh organic produce year-round.

It will be a beautiful place to get our footing for whatever comes next, and we’re so fortunate and grateful to be able to land there. We are grateful for so much. Gary’s sister Karen and her husband Scott have made us at home at their place longer and more often than is entirely reasonable, and we have been well fed and entertained and cared for (Ella too) by friends and family here. We’re grateful to each of you, too, who though distant has kept us in thought and prayer, given us encouragement, recommended some reading, or just made us feel less alone by sending us a photo or note about your goings on.

Even strangers have helped us: while in Anchorage we met with a sarcoma survivor. Warren was diagnosed some 14 years ago, had a hard fight of it for over five years, but at 65 (two years ago) ranked as the top racquetball player of all ages in Alaska and is top-ranked today in his age group nationally. He had some great insight and encouragement for us.

My San Francisco home is on the market now, with its first open house today. It was a lovely city home, quiet, in a great spot with great neighbors. (http://www.610duncanstreet.com)  I bought it in 1991; I could never afford it now, but luckily I’m not looking to live in San Francisco. I’m also putting my snowmachine and sled on craigslist and alaskaslist, and starting to get organized for the move.

I’ve loved every minute here, except maybe one or two moments when I was under siege by mosquitoes. We still have time enough to enjoy: we’ve been hiking with Glenn and Terri, savoring fresh halibut from Ed, chatting with campground hosts Jim and Bona, catching grayling for dinner, watching Ella swim, running a little farther each time we go, seeing a new wildflower almost every day. It’s hard to imagine leaving. But wherever we go, we’ll make it home.

Sunrise: 4:04 a.m. (as compared to 3:41 a.m. on June 20^th – 23^rd)
Sunset: 11:58 p.m. (as compared to 12:14 a.m. on June 20^th – 23^rd)
Weather:  High 54°, low 36°, rainy.

What we’re reading: Edible Forest Gardens: Ecological Design and Practice for Temperate Climate Permaculture (two volumes), by Dave Jacke.