I’m back home now and here to stay for a bit. I love this place - the impossibly verdant summer greenery that lasts just a few breaths of awe, the shadow-casting moonlight of winter, the people that are so delightfully weird and make me feel like I’m in good company. But it leaves with me a soul-wrenching question - what do I do with this travel blog now? I do love keeping up with it, frustrating as it it as times. I love choosing the pictures, working the layout, writing a monologue to express what a picture can't capture, all to provide some concept of what the journey was like. I’d pick the experiences that would stick out the most from when I was staying in one place a month.

But I feel a loss of identity in settling down. Moving into a cabin in Alaska feels somehow too conventional for me. I stayed here before, but I knew at the time it wouldn’t last and this time it’s permanent. So I guess I’m back to writing about day trips from the cabin. Looking back on my blog entries from the last time I stayed here, it doesn’t seem like my writing or photographs suffered too much from being in one place. Not to say they were exceptional or even great, but they’re still full of what interests me visually and my familiar angst and reflections that I do enjoy revisiting from time to time. But now that I’m back again, I think I’ll ease down from the once-a-month blog cadence. Even that has been stressful when combined with the ceaseless travel itinerary and pecuniary duties of life. I’ll take my time with excursions and my output will decrease, but I’ll try to be more thoughtful in the shots I do take. I’ll try to put more planning into my shots, instead of winging it and heading out on the bike into whatever is nearby.

So here we go. Today I made a short drive from the cabin to what I believe is a thermokarst pond, where melting permafrost made the ground sag and fill with water. Solstice is approaching and there is a day coming up that won’t have a sunset (it will happen at 12:01am the next day). It’s not a grand journey today, but I loved it as much as any national park. The Athabaskan translations below are from “Junior Dictionary of the Central Koyukon Athabaskan” by Eliza Jones.

Losing Myself at Home

The Masters

A Life Different