Charlie's raven show; Margie returns to Alaska; Thomas and the boys; biker in the rain; sky warrior remembered

I had to go to town to pick Margie up from the airport. I had not yet had a chance to see Charlie's raven show, so, an hour before Margie's flight was scheduled to arrive, I picked Charlie and Melanie up and we headed over to the Midnight Sun Brewery to take a look and have dinner.

I remain amazed at what Charlie has done with his raven photos. Everybody who reads this blog regularly knows that I photograph ravens when I happen upon them, but Charlie has gone beyond that. Some time ago, he gave himself a mission: to photograph a raven and a stranger every day.

He has done good.

Charlie had a little placard up and in it he gave me the credit for inspiring him to take up a camera and do what he has done. That was nice. He and Melanie should now be driving south, towards Homer, where they are going to join Rex and Cortney on a boat ride to Halibut Cove and then camp out in a cabin for the rest of the week. I hope they catch lots of fish and share with us.

Rex made a kayak and they are taking it, too.

I have written a few times before about how desperate Margie gets for Arizona during the winter, how badly she wants to go back. As always, when I picked her up at the airport, she was happy - no, thrilled - to be back in Alaska.

Of course, winter is over. The sun shines. She would soon greet her grandsons.

Big Thomas was on the go.

The sun does shine - today. But not yesterday, not when I drove to town to see Charlie's ravens and pick Margie up.

Yesterday, it rained.

Dad, top row, third from left, who died on Memorial Day five years ago. May you, your fellow B-24 crew and all the others who fought alongside you for this nation, in this war and others, so many to die in the fight, never be forgotten.

End of writer's block: Meda holds baby Colten, motocyclist passes on the wrong side, boys on bikes, in window, holding Thomas; conversations upon a white horse

An amazing thing happened last night - I got a really good sleep. Actually it took until well into morning - about 10:45 AM - to get it, but I did. After I awoke, I felt better and more alert than I had felt in - hell, I can't remember how long. I had to go to Abby's for breakfast. Margie was still in Anchorage and I kept feeling very troubled about the horse shadows on the wall that I blogged in my last post.

I just didn't know how the sun could possibly have struck the horse statuettes at the just the right angle to cast the shadows the way it did.

So I went back and figured out the mystery. Today, there was a shadow of only one horse head, but that was enough to trace the light back to its source of origin. I discovered that it was not coming directly from the sun, but from sunlight reflecting at an angle off the windshield of Abby's truck, which was parked in about the same place as yesterday.

Meanwhile, Meda Lord spotted another source of light. Meda was waitressing in Allie's place. The source of light was Colten, Shelly's new baby.

Once again, I had worked out in my head some problems in the project involving the B-24 that I mentioned two posts and one day ago in my head, the one that had vexed me with writer's block for a week-and-half. I felt like I could now write, and write good. I wanted to get right to it, but a totally unanticipated survival problem arose and I had to spend some time to deal with that instead. I believe the problem got solved, but I will not know for certain for a day or two. It is the kind of solution that cost me over $1000 loss in anticipated income, but such is the life of a freelancer.

Once that was out of the way, I started to write. Everything flowed. It felt good. But I couldn't stick with it for very long because I had to put it aside and drive to Anchorage to pick Margie up and bring her home for her three day weekend.

I did not want to go. I wanted to stay put, right here and write. I wanted no interruptions. But I could not leave Margie in town so I got up and went. On the highway approaching Anchorage, I looked in my mirror and saw this guy coming fast from behind. I thought it would make a good picture as he made his pass. I was in the center lane and so rolled down my left hand window in anticipation that he would follow the law and pass to my left.

Instead, he passed to the right. It was a very tough shot because in this kind of situation, a photographer must keep his eye on the road, he cannot raise his camera to his eye, he must rely entirely on his shoot from the hip aim and he must get all of his shots off in half a second. He must rely on his autofocus to grab the subject he wants to photograph, but the right hand window was up, dirty and the camera was most likely to focus upon that dirt.

But, as I have noted before, there are sharpshooter photographers and there are quick draw artist photographers. I am quick draw artist, a regular Clint Eastwood with a camera instead of a gun. The cyclist passed on the right, but my draw was quick, my aim was good and the autofocus found the mark.

As I waited out a red light at the corner of Boniface and Northern Lights, these two boys crossed the road in front of me.

When I arrived at Jacob and Lavina's to pick up Margie, I saw Kalib, peering out the window at me.

Lavina and Jobe returned home shortly after I got there. Jobe grabbed one of many Thomases.

Then I headed for home, with Margie in the passenger seat. As we motored down Lucille Street in Wasilla, I saw this lady, engaged in conversation from the back of a white horse.

We got home about 8:00 PM. I left Margie alone in the living room and charged straight out here, into my office. I still felt good. Words were still flowing through my mind. I returned to the writing I had struggled with for so long and had been interrupted once it finally got going. For three hours, the words just flowed. I feel good about them. Then, suddenly, it was like my brain slammed into a wall. Exhaustion swept over me. I could not write another word in the project. I had to stop. I am not worried, though. I still feel the flow. It will be there tomorrow and hopefully I will have no interruptions and can just sit and here and get it done.

Then it suddenly occurred to me that if I wanted to get a blog post up, and I did, I had better get to it.

So I downloaded the few pictures I took today, selected these six, processed them, uploaded them and then put my fingers on the keyboard, curious, having given no thought to what I might write for the blog. I then sat here for a spell, waiting to see what kind of words would come.

These are the words that came. And of them all, here is the last: one.

We bury our little Pistol-Yero, then celebrate Mother's Day

Readers who were with me then will recall that my ornery, sweet, loving, little buddy, Pistol-Yero, died unexpectedly while I was in Jaipur, Rajasthan, India. I had wanted to bury him after I returned, but the snow was so deep, the ground so frozen and Melanie was working up north, would not be home for a month and it seemed that everybody should be here.

The snow is melted now. Melanie is back and everyone was coming out to the house Sunday. There is still a lot of frost in the upper layers of ground, but Rex is strong and so, using picaxe and shovel, he punched through it.

Muzzy and Akiak engaged in a long running contest to see who could keep the stick the longest.

In respect for the Navajo beliefs of their mother, Jobe, Kalib and Lynxton could not come near the body of Pistol-Yero and would have to stay inside for the funeral and burial.

It may be a small hole, but given the conditions of the earth here, it took a long time to dig - probably close to an hour. Charlie arrived and spelled Rex for bit. Akiak seemed to dominate the stick game.

I unwrapped Pistol-Yero, put him on a blanket that he had enjoyed in life and brushed his fur. Lisa came out as I finished and wanted to see him.

I then carried him to the back. Except for Lavina and the boys, everybody gathered around for the viewing and final pets.

Margie came out a little late, as she had been helping Lavina with the boys.

Then we headed toward the far reaches of the backyard, where, in the course of 30 years, we have buried a good many of our fur-clad family members - because that's what they are - family members.

Everyone told a favorite story about Pistol-Yero. Margie is talking here. She is saying how she always wanted to keep him off the bed and especially the pillows, but he always got on the bed and pillows anyway and she came to know that he really liked to have a nice, neat, clean bed and pillow to lie on. She also noted how Pistol had usually stayed away from her, because he always liked to hang with me and she would do things like chase him off of beds and pillows, but there were a few times when she had been sitting on the couch and he came to her and sat on her lap and let her pet him as he purred and that was special.

Melanie took her turn filling in the hole - first we did it by hand, then by shovel.

And finally, covered it with stones. Rex and Charlie had dug up this boulder during one of my forays into the house. Caleb placed it on the grave and we piled the smaller stones around it.

Lisa disappeared and then reappeared, carrying three blossoms from a Mother's Day bouquet Melanie had bought for her mom.

Rest in peace, sweet little Pistol-Yero... life is not the same around here without you. You would probably be sitting between me and my computer screen, right now, as I made a regular post about Mother's Day.

We then headed back up to the house. The boys came out and set a tire to rolling.

Kalib set the tire to rolling again as Lavina cooked. He scored a direct hit and knocked Rex down.

Kalib was very pleased, so he rolled the tire back up to the porch to see if he could down Uncle Rex again. He would succeed.

Jobe raked the house.

Corn, mushrooms and peppers were added to the grill. Soon, we would feast in celebration of Margie and Lavina; in celebration of mothers.

I can't believe I'm seeing green; blue and orange train wreck at the window; poet tells me of the generation that grew up not reading comic books

I really can't believe it...

...yet there you have it...

Green!

I zipped into town tonight, grabbed Margie and zipped right back home. Just before we left Anchorage, Jobe caused a train wreck in the window.

Today, I had my at least-once weekly breakfast at Abby's, the breakfast Arlene picks up for me in exchange for shooting the December wedding of her daughter, Aurora. 

You will notice that Allie, the poet and advanced student who, at the age of 16, graduated from high school with high honors, is no longer a blonde, but a red head - a bright red head. If there is a ever a slow moment when I am at Abby's and Allie is there, she will tell me a story or two or three or four about being a teenager in today's world.

Today, she told me about going to Blockbuster all winter long to check out and watch movies, but now that the darkness is gone and we are definitely into the season of light, she doesn't check out so many movies anymore, because who wants to sit or lie around in the living room watching movies when it's light outside?

So I asked if she had seen The Avengers, because to watch a movie in the darkness of a theatre rather than a sun-lit living room is quite a different thing. Yes, she said, in 3D and she had loved it. Fun movie. She asked if I had seen it. I told her how Margie and I tried on Sunday, but got shut out because it was sold out. I told her we will try again. She said we would enjoy it.

I told her I was sure we would, but I also said I doubted that any comic book movie could ever surpass or even equal the experiences I had reading comic books as a kid growing up. It was absolute Magic. "My generation didn't read comic books," she told me. Instead, she explained, they grew up watching movies and reading Harry Potter - but not comic books.

Allie very recently turned 17. She was very pleased. She got to go to an "R" rated movie. She told me which one, but I can't remember. It wasn't that bad, she said, but still... a bit surprising...

Note: As I put together my Return to India series, I continued to make my regular stops at Metro Cafe and Abby's and I shot quite a few pictures. Sometime within the next week, I will catch up with a major post, maybe even two, on both Metro and Abby's.

Brief appearance by the boys; Thomas the Train friends and the real train; yellow moose drives down Lucille; marsh moose gets spooked

I back up two nights ago, to when I dropped Margie off to babysit the grandsons through Thursday. We had tried to go to the 6:00 PM showing of The Avengers at Tikatnu Theatres, but it was sold out, so we went over to the new Olive Garden about two blocks away, but there was a huge waiting line and the lady told us we would have to wait 45 minutes to be seated. We said to hell with that and ate at PHO Saigon instead.

PHO Saigon is good, so I was not disappointed.

Then we went back to Jake and Lavina's at about 7:30 PM. Lavina and two boys greeted us as we got out of the car. 

We will see The Avengers another time.

Inside, I discovered that the love affair between Kalib, Thomas and His Friends and all things train still rages.

Pretty soon, I was on the highway, headed home. About 8:30 PM, I came upon a train. When I saw where it was, I was hopeful that I might catch the engines crossing the train trestle - a very rare and blessed sight to catch when driving randomly back and forth between Anchorage and Wasilla.

Oh, hallejuah! Praises be!

I caught the train on the trestle, crossing Knik River! But, damnit, I had my shutter speed set at 1/125, doing 70. I could have caught this rare and blessed moment in a bit crisper detail had I have bumped it up to 1/800 or something, but, oh well.

I don't really care. I'm not shooting for a tourist brochure. I'm shooting to the catch the moment, and this was it and it was glorious. To me, anyway.

Had Kalib been with me, he would have been thrilled, too.

He would have seen details in the train that I did not see.

Then I was in Wasilla, on the final stretch to the house. A yellow moose came driving in the opposite direction. I was so amazed I almost forgot to take the picture.

Come morning I took a walk. As I came home through the marsh, I spooked a moose. I apologized to the moose. I really didn't mean to spook it at all. I tried to be quiet. I tried to be stealthy. I think it heard the click of my camera. I think that is what spooked it.