Momma Said There'd Be Days Like This...

Living here is very unique.  Alaska is beautiful.  It's breathtaking.  It's stunning.  It is also rugged.  It's raw. It's challenging.  It's frustrating.  I have lived in Alaska for roughly 5 years if you combine our two tours to this point. What I know is that I love the idea of living here.  Its simple and peaceful, yet almost epic.  The actually act of living here is not so easy to put into words.  This town we live in is small, its isolated and most of the time the weather sucks and it pisses me off.  The schools here are not good.  The size of this town is getting smaller as the months go by.  I feel like I am constantly battling uncomfortableness because of interactions with people in town from the Coast Guard and from work circumstances.   It is impossible to go anywhere without seeing 20 people you know, good or bad.  I definitely have island fever most of the time, miss being able to drive out of town and when the weather is not good, there is just no where to go, at all.  Restaurants are almost non-existent.  There is no bowling alley, no mall, no stores!   I am constantly asking myself, "How do people live here forever?"

And then we have days like this....

Today was absolutely the perfect Alaskan day.  It was warm.  It was sunny.  It was simple.  We took our boat out which always helps me feel like I'm actually getting out of town and going somewhere.  Today was one of those days that reminds me why we are here.  Aside from the oligation Trav has to be here for work, we know this tour is a gift because of days like this.  I stood in silence multiple times today, breathing in the sea air, looking at the vast snow capped mountains, listening to the movement of the tide hoping to etch the moment into my mind.  Days like today make this town seem bigger, the awkward interactions seem more trivial and the terrible weather an afterthought.  I felt so small and so humbled to be a part of a place that most will never lay eyes or feel weak in the knees over.  

Alaska is definitely not for everyone.  I think only the heartiest of people can live here.  Its an easy place to hate and for some an easy place to love.  Days like this are what I know Trav and I will remember most, years from now.  We won't remember the outrageous cost of living, the dark winters, the 14 miles of paved road (okay I will probably remember all of those) but I won't hold on to them like I do now.  It is very easy to focus on what I don't have, what my kids don't have and how miserable the weather can be.  It takes a lot of work to weed through all that and find the simple, pristine, untouched sense that living here offers.  Today it was easy....