I left Alexandria Wednesday evening at six, and after making brief appearances in Dallas, Seattle and Anchorage, I boarded the twenty-minute flight that delivered me to Kenai.  Needless to say, the plane was small and we were packed in pretty tight.  It wasn’t like the one that Ray Stevens sings about in Southern Air.  They didn’t peel rubber on the runway,  there were no window screens, and I did not notice an ‘eat more possum’ bumper sticker stuck out on the wing.  We did have a lady driver, the engine sounded a bit like my old neighbor’s outboard motor, and the passenger to my right was traveling with a hairless cat.  (Why would you have one of those in Alaska?) We landed right on time…4:50 a.m., which, being interpreted is 7:50 a.m. central time.  I don’t have to tell you that it was a long day’s night.

Trish, the Grouchy Old Woman Jr.,

met me and brought me to the bed and breakfast. I’m enjoying getting to know her.

Later that morning

…because I went straight to bed…Sharon gave me a big hug and said, “Welcome home!”

Sharon’s brother, Lee, is here from Kentucky.  We are sharing the downstairs.  He said, “With me you have to be very blunt, so which towels are you using?” Being unsure, he had dried his hands on the bathroom rug.  What a thoughtful man.

The first words I heard Blanche say were, “I’d like to come in there if I could figure out how”.  It was good to see that nothing has changed.  That is, nothing except the landscape.

The place where we chopped down all that cow parsnip

is covered with snow.  And in town,

people are carving ice sculptures.  And since I’m not used to ice and snow,

I was given a seminar on how to walk on the stuff. They said to step flat, not from heel to toe, and to keep my toes turned in.  After a trip around the yard    I made the remark that walking pigeon-toed and flat-footed was doing a number on my hips.  Trish looked up and said, “Well, you didn’t slip, did you?”