airport air

At last, my blood runs warmly again. Until I found this seat in the sunshine, I either shivered or hung on the edge of shivering from the infamous and inescapable chilling airport air. Lyn texted me. She, Katherine and Beth are making pancakes with the blueberries we picked along the Winner Creek Trail last night. I dont feel as if I’ve left. I’m merely taking a little weekend trip. Katherine will be at the Anchorage airport in a few days to take me back to Lyn and Stuart’s, right? Though my heart struggles to believe it, the cold paper bag of halibut sitting in the shaded seat beside to my right reminds me that those goodbyes were real. In a week, I will start over again…but in French.

The office, minus Philly

My friend Katherine

Katherine and I spent almost every minute of everyday this summer together. Moreover, we were roommates with 2 other girls for the past two years at school. We’ve spent an entire year together without interruption of anything longer than Christmas break. Towards the end of this summer, we often communicated wordlessly because our minds had fused together after constant exposure to one another’s thoughts and habits. It will be strange, maybe lonely, going about my day without someone who understands the references and the laughter that my utterance of “Philly!” is supposed to produce. Though millions of people have viewed the SNL Surprise Party video, laughing at an allusion to it will not be the same without Katherine and Aunt Lyn. And when I ask someone, “did you watch Pants this season?” they will have no idea that I mean So You Think You Can Dance. In one week, I will be on my way to Paris, France where I will know no one, where every kind of reference and joke that I am accustomed to sharing will be lost, even if I could tell it in French. Before I leave for France, I will post a few more times about my imperfect but fantastic summer in Alaska.