Broken Heart

It's the day before the Equinox, our first real spring day. Sixty degrees. I've thrown caution to the wind and put into the garage my snow shovel and a 50-pound bag of ice melt. No matter that many here still mutter about not getting too cocky about spring because remember that blizzard we had in late March of 1956. Tomorrow, in Annapolis, boat owners will celebrate The Burning of the Socks which they do every spring equinox in order to bring work and customers into the boatyards. They actually burn their socks, which they tend to wear only in winter. They don't wear socks again until the next equinox.

I get the idea that I'm going to spend a lot of this afternoon in my hammock, slung between two dying maples. I determine to bring a book with me: Fatal Shore. I also bring my IPod. And some ice water with lime juice. Before I go out to sling my hammock I post on my Facebook page: Hammock. Book. IPod. Immediately a friend comments that she likes my status and don't forget to wear sunscreen. I throw caution to the ever-increasing breeze and lay there, in my hammock, face to the sun, no protection whatever. It's the first time the sun has felt warm since October.

When I actually get into my hammock all desire to read leaves me. The pages of Fatal Shore flutter in the wind like a flip book. The weather report for today gives sunny and a little breezy, giving way to clouds. Squinting, no clouds yet, holding my IPod above me against the glare, I make out a woodpecker in the branches directly above me. Listening. I have a feather from a wing like hers in my kitchen, in an old glass inkwell that my ex-lover gave me in 1977 when we were courting, when she presented me with a tiny bouquet of Forget-Me-Nots. That was in Alaska. The state flower. The feather is black with tiny white dots. The woodpecker darts in and out of the branches. Listening. Calling. Listening.

Not inclined to read, I scan my IPod. Playlists...music does not amuse. Podcasts: The Ascent of Money...Secrets of InDesign...Understanding Balance Sheets...Nanotechnology, The Next Big Thing. I choose This American Life, the episode about frenemies, those people close to us about whom we have a great deal of anxiety, friends with whom we hesitate to spend a lot of time because of this anxiety, friends with whom we feel competitive, like those women on New Housewives of Orange County. Part of the Frenemies broadcast is about the genesis of the phrase "I'm not here to make friends..." which, it appears, was first uttered on an early episode of The Apprentice, a reality TV show. It's been uttered on reality TV shows many times since then which is the point of reality TV. Frenemies concludes. Then I listen to a collection of pieces by Scott Carrier; one is about amnesia. Carrier interviews a hypnotherapist, asks her generate thirty minutes or maybe an hour of total amnesia in him, but she doubts that she can. Few people are really that willing, she says. He goes for it but, upon coming out of hypnosis, is disappointed to find that he can still recall what he's been doing that day, the name of the friend he brought with him whose job it would be to help him navigate when he'd forgotten everything. A psychologist, also part of this piece, suggests that we forget that which makes us uncomfortable. The fact that he's not willing to forget becomes part of Carrier's podcast. This material is not really the sort of material that I should presently be listening to. But I persist. I have this feeling.

It's been five days since I learned that my friend died, with her partner, in a boating accident on Chesapeake Bay. My friend of over 35 years whose body washed up on Westerhouse Beach five days after she left in bad weather to presumably take the boat to Colonial Beach, on the other side of the Bay and up the Potomac. Her partner's body has still not been found. This was in December. I am sitting in the sun in Maine on the day before Equinox. I learned of her death in an email sent to me by our mutual friend and my friend's long time lover, now, of course, her ex. The three of us were together constantly in college in Alaska. Robin majored in geography.

It's been five days since I learned that my friend died. In that time I've sent email to everyone I could locate who knew us in Alaska. I've posted of her death on two email lists and people I have not met, but who have a sense of my life, have emailed back to give me the strength I've asked to borrow.

In Google Earth I've found Robin's House on her peninsula at Deep Creek. In the satellite view, her boat is tied up at her dock. Although one couldn't tell from the satellite, it's a Chris Craft, a 31 footer. I've searched for, found, and closely examined nautical charts of the waters between Deep Creek, Westerhouse Beach, and Colonial Beach Marina. Especially in the area identified as The Targets immediately south and west of Tangier Island, around which they would have had to navigate to get to the marina from their origination point. The Targets are a bomb site where naval aviators out of Norfolk practice getting good at hitting things. It's also said to be a good fishing spot. Anglers bring up unexploded ordinance, however, so one must be careful. There's a circle on the charts labeled "Prohibited Area". I've even conducted Google searches on Chris Craft, hoping to find out if her boat might have come with Loran installed. But no luck. I only learned that Chris Craft makes boats a lot bigger than the one that broke up, presumably in the area of The Targets. People who look for such things in circumstances like this have found deck chairs, a table, and small pieces of the boat but nothing else. Robin was identified through an autopsy and investigation. They found a car registered to her at Colonial Marina and the police put two and two together.

It's been five days and now I know a little bit about the waters around Tangier Island. I know that some guy who fueled them up said the weather was nasty, that he warned them not to go out. I know there were conflicting reports about how many people were on the boat. I want to know the cause of death, if the examiner found water in her lungs. I want to speak with the investigator and the reporter who posted five stories that I could find. And that guy who fueled them up, him, too. I want to get in touch with her two friends - the ones she told me about the last time we talked on the phone who have bought property twenty miles from where I live and who report that they love it there, that they eat out every night they're here. It was this couple who assured my friend who emailed me that, no, I had not left Maine. That I was still to be found here. My friend, the one with the news, tells me that once she found me she tried to call. But she would reach my answering machine, hear my voice, and go to pieces. No message. And so, three days before Robin's birthday I get the email.

I, too, am in pieces. Broken up like the boat. Who knows. I don't. I'm sleep walking into and out of the hole in history that now exists in my heart.

Dressing Palin's Caribou

It's been interesting to observe the story elements the Red folks trot out to prop up the credibility of Their Sarah as The Genuine Article.

Like: They want everyone to know that she hunts and fishes and that she shot a caribou. This is to encourage the inference that, because she did these and other outdoorsy things (while simultaneously believing in Jesus a lot), she's "just like you and me, by golly. Praise God and pass the ammunition."

I lived in Alaska for 18 years. EVERYONE who has lived in Alaska for any length of time has several common stories.

We each have our "bear story": The one about how we had a terrifying run-in with a black bear / brown bear / Kodiak grizzly / sow bear with cubs. These have several common endings: You survived; you almost died; someone you know died; the bear survived; you shot the bear, bled the bear, gutted and dressed the bear, and now it's in your freezer.

We each have our "moose story": The one about how we had a terrifying run-in with a bull moose / yearling moose / momma moose with yearlings. These have several common endings: You survived; the moose (same word for singular or plural) survived; you hid in a safe place while you watched the moose demolish your car / garage / pick-up truck / 18-wheeler and afterward you watched the moose shake it off and lope away; you spent several days in the hospital; you shot the moose, bled the moose, gutted and dressed the moose, and now it's in your freezer.

We each have our "almost lost a (fill-in-the-blank) from frostbite when I got stranded for three hours because of (fill-in-the-blank) between (fill-in-the-name-of-the-town) and (fill-in-the-name-of-the-town) story". These have several common endings: You survived; you have a permanent numb spot on your (fill-in-the-blank); you don't have a (fill-in-the-blank) anymore; you'll never go outside again when it's 60 below wearing only a mad bomber hat, a flannel shirt, a wool sweater, a down jacket, mittens, long johns, pants, insulated socks, and mukluks.

We all know people who died in small plane accidents, who fell off mountains / glaciers / fishing boats / snowmobiles and were never seen alive again. Most of us know people who simply disappeared. We all know people who live so far out in the Bush that they can come into town only by walking miles through the woods to the nearest track and flagging down the train. Some of us know people living really far out in the Bush who never come into town.

We give a wry and knowing nod to secessionists who want Alaska to pile up all its oil money in its own sandbox and quit the rest of the United States and who have formed political action committees to make it happen.

Every one of us know wingnuts who have risen to places of responsibility beyond their aptitude simply because of the church they go to, the people they know, and the ear marks they channel. Alaska is just like anywhere else in that regard. Except that the population is so much smaller there that you tend to know these wingnuts personally.

The truth is that in Alaska, Palin's life experience and homespun yarns are entirely conventional. But people in the Lower 48 don't know that. And you can bet the Reds know that they don't know that. So they're playing it. And she's playing along. Sounds like she's "just like you and me" - only, due to the caribou she makes sure we know that she shot, bled, and gutted, they ask us to award her extra credit for displaying Classic American Rugged Individual Toughness about which most of us have only nostalgic reference.

Try this recipe at home: Start with with the Republican Party. Pound for eight years with George W. Bush til tender. (You'll know when it has reached the right consistency because it will appear wide but it won't be very deep.) Chop until dicey. Add one Sarah Palin. Add 6 oz of Miss Alaska and fluff carefully. To this mixture add a few jiggers of melting glacier water and several chunks of receding ice cap. Shake and pour. Sprinkle with nostalgia to taste. Serve immediately with an accompaniment of chilled barracuda ceviche, et viola! Whaddaya got? Fox news! And anecdotes instead of issues.

I could go on. That's probably apparent.

Suffice to say: I suspect the Reds want us all to bite down HARD on how much in common Palin appears to have with the hockey mom next door - and masticate long enough to really savor the flavors in the class and gender appetizers they've laid before us. And then they want us to start eating our young while we earnestly discuss amongst ourselves the exquisitely politically correct ways we must acknowledge Sarah Palin.

Don't be distracted by those tender nuggets!

Instead, ask yourself: "Who benefits?"

Then get back to work on the boring stuff: Economic parity, energy sufficiency, poverty, health care, education, infrastructure, the environment. Put out your yard sign. Volunteer at the phone bank. Knock on some doors. Donate it if you got it. Let's win this thing.