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By Root 246 0

is that here, we have opportunities that have been lost in most of the rest of the country and much of the world. We have rivers and streams that wind through their natural courses; we have salmon that run up those rivers in their mysterious ways. We have wolves and belugas, walrus and cranes. We have energetic tides, kinetic winds, and the heat of the earth bubbling up within sight. We have water, ice, snow.

Nearly ten years have passed since I moved up to Alaska in the fall just after the cranes left. Since then, I left the state for a time, returned, fell in love, and got married. This year, I missed the cranes’ departure—a loss that feels like having to return a library book before you’ve read the last chapter. But in the next couple of weeks, I hope to catch the swans as they fly by—this year’s cygnets as large as their parents but the color of grayed laundry. I watch for them through our living room windows.

A band of clouds is moving down the bay now, and by this afternoon, the tide will switch. I can already see a breeze beginning to rifle through the alders. Constant change is our stasis, the open sea our backyard.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I am indebted countless times over for help and support along my way. I want to first thank my parents, Michael and Susan Weiss. It’s because there’s always been such a wonderful place to come back to that I’ve been able to explore.

Thanks to my agent, Kris Dahl, for getting behind this book and to Gillian Blake for her excitement and smart editing.

Thanks to my workshop compatriots at the creative writing program at Columbia University who gutted and filleted my work. Thanks to Richard Locke for his wise editing in the early phases of this project and for helping me see how all of the pieces fit together. I have learned much from other teachers along the way, including Darcy Frey, Lis Harris, Stephen O’Connor, Eva Saulitis, Michael Scammell, Leslie Sharpe, Mark Slouka, and Alan Ziegler.

Two friends I don’t ever want to do without—Jessica Stiles and Rose Newnham—provided well-balanced meals of love, feedback, hot mud, and bacchanalia that continue to nourish me.

I can’t adequately thank my professor and friend Patty O’Toole—a true Justice of the Peace, Our Lady of Nonfiction, for her cheerleading, friendship, and timely words of wisdom that are always beyond what I feel like I deserve. Sara Marcus has been my most important ally from the time this book began to take shape. A committed reader, she delivered pep talks just when I needed them, and without her big brain, this book would have suffered.

Thanks to Tracy Arensberg, who taught me to see birds, and to Starr Saphir, who hears all the warblers in Central Park. She helped me find the wilderness I needed.

Thanks to my colleagues at the Pratt Museum, a small museum with big ideas about the deep connections between people and place.

And I owe thanks to many people who shared their knowledge and experiences, including: Ed Berg, Joel Cooper, Holly Cusack-McVeigh, Tom Doolittle, Lois Epstein, Dave Erikson, Carmen Field, Steve Fishback, Jeff Fox, Steve Gibson, Brian Hirsch, Janet Klein, Ray Kranich, Sue Mauger, Ken Maynard, Thomas McDonough, Dennis McMillan, Ken Moore, Chris Oldham, Rob Rosenfeld, Mara Schwartz, Doug Schwiesow, Rick Sinnott, Larry Smith, Tom Smith, Michele Stenger, Charlie Trowbridge, Betsy Webb, and Steve Zimmerman. Errors are my own.

Deep thanks to the waters and landscapes that have inspired my writing and to the people who work hard to create and maintain beauty in the world around us, as well as birds, fish, predators, clean water, and wilderness. Some of the entities they work through are Cook Inletkeeper, Alaska Marine Conservation Council, Kachemak Heritage Land Trust, Kachemak Bay Conservation Society, and Center for Alaskan Coastal Studies.

Finally, thanks to my husband, Bob Shavelson, for his love, generosity, and potent backrubs. We’re at the beginning; I’m excited for more.

About the Author

Raised in Maryland, MIRANDA WEISS now lives in Homer, Alaska. She received her MFA from Columbia