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Still alive in memories Thought of fondly, though years pass Part of your family’s history Loving hearts still hold you fast.
0
Jul 24, 2019
Jul 24, 2019 at 9:17 AM UTC
ZanyLainey
Ma
Still alive in memories Thought of fondly, though years pass Part of your family’s history Loving hearts still hold you fast.
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4
Here the waves rise high and fall on the icy seas and white caps chew the driftwood logs of hemlock and toss them wildly upon sandy beaches. The steep mountains rise straight from the sea floor as the December sun shines through the dark clouds that hang heavy with snow near the top peaks. Blue icebergs drift slowly down the narrow channel. This volcanic island is one of many that are scattered along the coast of Southeastern Alaska. On the South end of the island is another tiny island and on it stands an old lighthouse, a shambles. It has a curving staircase and an old broken lamp that used to beckon to ships at sea. Wild grasses and goosetongue cover the ground and close by Sitka blacktail feed and gray gulls circle. There is a mountain stream nearby and in the fall the salmon spawn at its mouth. The black bear and grizzly scoop them up with great sweeps of their paws, their sharp claws gaffing the silver bodies. Walking North along the deer trail from the South end of the island are remnants of the Treadwell Mine. It was the largest gold mine in the world. In the early 1900's the tunnel they were digging underneath Gastineau Channel caved in and the sea claimed her gold. The foundry still stands a rusty red. The dining halls are vacant, broken white dishes are strewn inside. The tennis court that was built for the employees is overgrown with hops that have climbed over the high fence and grown up between cracks in the cement floor. The flume still carries water rushing in it half-hidden in the rain-forest which is slowly reclaiming the land. The beach here by the ocean is fine white sand, full of mica, gold and pieces of white dishes. Potsherds for future archeologists, washed clean, smooth and round by the circular waves of this deep, dark green water. Down past the old gold mine is Cahill's house, yellow and once magnificent. They managed the mine. The long staircase is boarded up and so are the large windows. The gardens are wild, irises bud in the spring at the end of the lawn, and in the summer a huge rose path, full of dark crimson blooms frames the edge of the sea; strawberries grow nearby dark pink and succulent. Red raspberries grow further down the path in a tangle of profusion; close by is a pale pink rose path, full of those small wild roses that smell fragrant. An iron- barred swing stands tall on the edge of the beach. I swing there and at high tide I can jump in the ocean from high up in the air. There is an old tetter-totter too. And, it is like finding the emperor's palace abandoned. There is a knoll behind the old house called Grassy Hill. It is covered with a blanket of hard crisp snow. In the spring it is covered with sweet white clover and soft grasses. It is easy to find four leaf clovers there, walking below the hill toward the beach is a dell. It is a small clearing in between the raspberry patch and tall cottonwood trees. It is a good place for a picnic. It is a short walk again to the beach and off to the right is a small pond, Grassy Pond. It is frozen solid and I skate on it. In the summer I swim here because it is warmer than the ocean. In the spring I wade out, stand very still and catch baby flounders and bullheads with my hands; I am fast and quick and have good eyes. Flounders are bottom fish that look like sand. Walking North again over a rise I come to a field filled with snow; in the spring it is a blaze of magenta fireweed. Often I will sit in it surrounded by bright petals and sketch the mountains beyond. Nearby are salmonberry bushes which have cerise blossoms in early spring; by the end of summer, golden-orange berries hang on their green branches. The bears love to eat them and so do I. But the wild strawberries are my first love, then the tangy raspberries. I don't like the high- bush cranberries, huckleberries, currants or the sour gooseberries that grow in my mother's garden and the blueberries are only good for pies, jams and jellies. I like the little ligonberries that grow close to the earth in the meadow, but they are hard to find. Looking across this island I see Mt. Jumbo, the mountain that towers above the thick Tongass forest of pine, hemlock and spruce. It was a volcano and is rugged and snow-covered. I hike up the trail leading to the base of the mountain. The trail starts out behind a patch of blueberry bushes and winds lazily upwards crossing a stream where I can stop and fish for trout and eat lunch; on top is a meadow. Spring is my favorite season here. The yellow water lilies bud on top of large muskeg holes. The dark pink blueberry bushes form a ring around the meadow with their delicate pink blossoms. The purple and yellow violets are in bloom and bright yellow skunk cabbage abounds, the devil's club are turning green again and fields of beige Alaskan cotton fan the air, slender stalks that grow in the wet marshy places. Here and there a wild columbine blooms. It is here in these meadows that I find the lime-green bull pine, whose limbs grow up instead of down. Walking along the trail beside the meadow I soon come to an old wooden cabin. It is owned by the mine and consists of two rooms, a medium-sized kitchen with an eating area and wood table and a large bedroom with four World War II army cots and a cream colored dresser. Nobody lives here anymore, but hikers, deer hunters, and an occasional bear use the place. Next door to the cabin is the well house which feeds the flume. The flume flows from here down the mountain side to the old mine and power plant. An old man still takes care of the power plant. He lives in a big dark green house with his family and the power plant is all blue-gray metal. I can stand outside and listen to the whirl of the generators. I like to walk in the forest on top of the old flume and listen to the sound of the water rushing past under my bare feet. In the winter the meadow is different: all silent, still and snow-covered. The trees are heavy with weighty branches and icicles dangle off their limbs, long, elegant, shining. All the birds are gone but the little brown snowbirds and the white ptarmigan. The meadow is a field of white and I can ski softly down towards the sea. The trout stream is frozen and the waterfall quiet, an ice palace behind crystal caves. The hard smooth- ness of the ice feels good to my touch, this frozen water, this winter. Down below at the edge of the sea is yet another type of ice. Salt water is treacherous; it doesn'tfreeze solid, it is unreliable and will break under my weight. Here are the beached icebergs that the high tide has left. Blue white treasures, gigantic crystals tossed adrift by glaciers. Glisten- ing, wet, gleaming in the winter sun, some still half-buried in the sea, drifting slowly out again. And it is noisy here, the gray gulls call to each other, circling overhead. The ravens and crows are walking, squawking along the beach. The Taku wind is blowing down the channel, swirling, chill, singing in my ear. Far out across the channel humpback whales slap their tails against the water. On the beach kelp whips are caught in wet clumps of seaweed as the winter tide rises higher and higher. The smell of salty spray permeates everything and the dark clouds roll in from behind the steep mountains. Suddenly it snows. Soft, furry, thick flakes, in front of me, behind, to the sides, holding me in a blizzard of whiteness, light: snow.
0
Aug 24, 2015
Aug 24, 2015 at 12:46 AM UTC
hrtsonfyr
A Sense of Place by Gloria Hulk
Here the waves rise high and fall on the icy seas and white caps chew the driftwood logs of hemlock and toss them wildly upon sandy beaches. The steep mountains rise straight from the sea floor as the December sun shines through the dark clouds that hang heavy with snow near the top peaks. Blue icebergs drift slowly down the narrow channel. This volcanic island is one of many that are scattered along the coast of Southeastern Alaska. On the South end of the island is another tiny island and on it stands an old lighthouse, a shambles. It has a curving staircase and an old broken lamp that used to beckon to ships at sea. Wild grasses and goosetongue cover the ground and close by Sitka blacktail feed and gray gulls circle. There is a mountain stream nearby and in the fall the salmon spawn at its mouth. The black bear and grizzly scoop them up with great sweeps of their paws, their sharp claws gaffing the silver bodies. Walking North along the deer trail from the South end of the island are remnants of the Treadwell Mine. It was the largest gold mine in the world. In the early 1900's the tunnel they were digging underneath Gastineau Channel caved in and the sea claimed her gold. The foundry still stands a rusty red. The dining halls are vacant, broken white dishes are strewn inside. The tennis court that was built for the employees is overgrown with hops that have climbed over the high fence and grown up between cracks in the cement floor. The flume still carries water rushing in it half-hidden in the rain-forest which is slowly reclaiming the land. The beach here by the ocean is fine white sand, full of mica, gold and pieces of white dishes. Potsherds for future archeologists, washed clean, smooth and round by the circular waves of this deep, dark green water. Down past the old gold mine is Cahill's house, yellow and once magnificent. They managed the mine. The long staircase is boarded up and so are the large windows. The gardens are wild, irises bud in the spring at the end of the lawn, and in the summer a huge rose path, full of dark crimson blooms frames the edge of the sea; strawberries grow nearby dark pink and succulent. Red raspberries grow further down the path in a tangle of profusion; close by is a pale pink rose path, full of those small wild roses that smell fragrant. An iron- barred swing stands tall on the edge of the beach. I swing there and at high tide I can jump in the ocean from high up in the air. There is an old tetter-totter too. And, it is like finding the emperor's palace abandoned. There is a knoll behind the old house called Grassy Hill. It is covered with a blanket of hard crisp snow. In the spring it is covered with sweet white clover and soft grasses. It is easy to find four leaf clovers there, walking below the hill toward the beach is a dell. It is a small clearing in between the raspberry patch and tall cottonwood trees. It is a good place for a picnic. It is a short walk again to the beach and off to the right is a small pond, Grassy Pond. It is frozen solid and I skate on it. In the summer I swim here because it is warmer than the ocean. In the spring I wade out, stand very still and catch baby flounders and bullheads with my hands; I am fast and quick and have good eyes. Flounders are bottom fish that look like sand. Walking North again over a rise I come to a field filled with snow; in the spring it is a blaze of magenta fireweed. Often I will sit in it surrounded by bright petals and sketch the mountains beyond. Nearby are salmonberry bushes which have cerise blossoms in early spring; by the end of summer, golden-orange berries hang on their green branches. The bears love to eat them and so do I. But the wild strawberries are my first love, then the tangy raspberries. I don't like the high- bush cranberries, huckleberries, currants or the sour gooseberries that grow in my mother's garden and the blueberries are only good for pies, jams and jellies. I like the little ligonberries that grow close to the earth in the meadow, but they are hard to find. Looking across this island I see Mt. Jumbo, the mountain that towers above the thick Tongass forest of pine, hemlock and spruce. It was a volcano and is rugged and snow-covered. I hike up the trail leading to the base of the mountain. The trail starts out behind a patch of blueberry bushes and winds lazily upwards crossing a stream where I can stop and fish for trout and eat lunch; on top is a meadow. Spring is my favorite season here. The yellow water lilies bud on top of large muskeg holes. The dark pink blueberry bushes form a ring around the meadow with their delicate pink blossoms. The purple and yellow violets are in bloom and bright yellow skunk cabbage abounds, the devil's club are turning green again and fields of beige Alaskan cotton fan the air, slender stalks that grow in the wet marshy places. Here and there a wild columbine blooms. It is here in these meadows that I find the lime-green bull pine, whose limbs grow up instead of down. Walking along the trail beside the meadow I soon come to an old wooden cabin. It is owned by the mine and consists of two rooms, a medium-sized kitchen with an eating area and wood table and a large bedroom with four World War II army cots and a cream colored dresser. Nobody lives here anymore, but hikers, deer hunters, and an occasional bear use the place. Next door to the cabin is the well house which feeds the flume. The flume flows from here down the mountain side to the old mine and power plant. An old man still takes care of the power plant. He lives in a big dark green house with his family and the power plant is all blue-gray metal. I can stand outside and listen to the whirl of the generators. I like to walk in the forest on top of the old flume and listen to the sound of the water rushing past under my bare feet. In the winter the meadow is different: all silent, still and snow-covered. The trees are heavy with weighty branches and icicles dangle off their limbs, long, elegant, shining. All the birds are gone but the little brown snowbirds and the white ptarmigan. The meadow is a field of white and I can ski softly down towards the sea. The trout stream is frozen and the waterfall quiet, an ice palace behind crystal caves. The hard smooth- ness of the ice feels good to my touch, this frozen water, this winter. Down below at the edge of the sea is yet another type of ice. Salt water is treacherous; it doesn'tfreeze solid, it is unreliable and will break under my weight. Here are the beached icebergs that the high tide has left. Blue white treasures, gigantic crystals tossed adrift by glaciers. Glisten- ing, wet, gleaming in the winter sun, some still half-buried in the sea, drifting slowly out again. And it is noisy here, the gray gulls call to each other, circling overhead. The ravens and crows are walking, squawking along the beach. The Taku wind is blowing down the channel, swirling, chill, singing in my ear. Far out across the channel humpback whales slap their tails against the water. On the beach kelp whips are caught in wet clumps of seaweed as the winter tide rises higher and higher. The smell of salty spray permeates everything and the dark clouds roll in from behind the steep mountains. Suddenly it snows. Soft, furry, thick flakes, in front of me, behind, to the sides, holding me in a blizzard of whiteness, light: snow.
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154