Tide, Feather, Snow_ A Life in Alaska - Miranda Weiss [18]
John would pull out the map and locate our next adventure, and our life rode this momentum of exploration. We had an endless list of new things to do together: places to ski, parts of town to explore, aspects of winter to learn about. And during these months, the sun’s cold warmth forged an intimacy between John and me based on new things we shared: a flask passed between us during a ski, a thermos of hot soup sipped while sitting in the snow, our mutual distaste for the smell of exhaust that lingered long after passing snowmachines were out of earshot. We did everything together and were perfect companions—enjoying the same kind of snacks on long skis, moved by the same scenes of beauty, eager for a long day out in the cold and equally content to return to our warm, pillowed house at the end of it. These adventures weren’t athletic or overly rigorous; the point was to really see the world in which we lived. It was this insistence in John that made me love him.
But he was more confident in this new terrain than I. He could talk to the neighbor about his broken snowmachine engine just as easily as to a local scientist about native birds. I was tongue-tied. And so I remained on edge, quiet and uncertain, while I began to recognize John in this life. I saw his capability around boats in a way I’d never known before. He knew how to tie them up, how to push us off, and what to do with ropes. He quickly memorized the names of all the peaks and coves across the bay while I couldn’t keep them straight.
Next to John, and surrounded by dozens of capable acquaintances, I began to feel alone in my incompetence. I was in need of a friend, the kind I could laugh with uncontrollably and feel at ease with despite my inabilities. The women here seemed practical, no fuss. I introduced myself to a woman about my age who had recently moved to town. She was a Republican and a churchgoer, I learned, two qualities that might make us incompatible. But I invited her to join John and me for an afternoon ski, and we drove up to our favorite spot and parked at the edge of the road. From there, you could look to the horizon and see endless valleys and hills: black, spruce-filled creases in an otherwise white expanse. I had learned to ski as a kid; John had learned when he was a bit older. We both loved stepping our skis through deep powder and navigating quietly around animal tracks, fortresses of alder, and the places where the snow broke through over thickets of willow. But my new friend got her skis tangled in the alders and didn’t seem to like our idea of fun. So we packed up and drove back to town, and I didn’t see her again. Soon after, I heard she had moved away. Half of me scoffed: I guess she wasn’t up to this life. The other half wanted to run away, too.
As the snow piled up, we needed to figure out a way to keep our road and driveway plowed. Our neighbors, who lived in the only other house on the road, owned a plow truck, and we agreed to keep the road plowed in exchange for borrowing the truck to clear our driveway. Like us, the neighbors rented their place: a long, double-wide trailer fitted out with deck and shed. They had two young girls with white-blonde hair who dressed decidedly un-Alaskan in dresses and sandals. One of the daughters was named after a pop music star. They were from someplace else, and the girls’ father worked up north for the oil and gas companies: two weeks on, two weeks off. Their mother, a petite woman who wore slim jeans and bleached her hair blonde, stayed home. Often, when John and I came home from work, we found that she had already cleared the snow. She was tough; she could handle a disagreeable truck, a heavy plow blade, and a snow-covered road that dropped off on either side into a ditch. I was determined to master the plow truck until I got it stuck on the side of the driveway, and John suggested it would be okay if I gave up.
Each step toward becoming familiar with the life here shunted me another one back. While