Lost Without the River

by Barbara Hoffbeck Scoblic

  Our love extends even more to trees. Our house was sited in the midst of trees. Arborists were amazed at the numerous varieties of hardwoods and pines on our property. Joe and I fought to keep as many of those trees as possible as the drive was laid out and the house was built. We were heartbroken each time another tree had to be felled by a chain saw.

  During that time, I had to undergo a medical test in which I was slid headfirst into a narrow, completely enclosed, stainless-steel tunnel. The technician warned me if I accidentally touched its edge, the test would be invalid and have to be repeated. I dared not move, he told me, not even a millimeter.

  In the tunnel, in total darkness, I searched my mind for something to concentrate on. I began to list the kinds of trees in our woods. Then I began to arrange them alphabetically.

  “Apple, ash, aspen, cedar, cherry, cottonwood …”

  If I remembered another tree as I went along, I couldn’t just add it but made myself start over from the beginning. My self-imposed rules required that the finished list be in perfect alphabetical order.

  The medical test went on and on. At last, I was rolled out of the tube. I let out a long breath. However, my relief was short-lived.

  “We have to put you back in again,” the technician announced nonchalantly.

  “I’m not sure I can do it.”

  “Oh, it won’t be as long this time.”

  Back into the narrow darkness. I began to feel claustrophobic. How could I possibly hold still?

  I started my list again, but that didn’t seem to work. I realized I needed to make the rules of the game harder. So, as I listed the trees, I added the separate species. In alpha order, of course.

  Apple; ash; aspen (big tooth, quaking); birch; cherry; cottonwood; dogwood (gray, pagoda, red); elm (American, slippery); on through to several species of maple and to the oaks (black, chestnut, pin, red, white); and then all the way on to walnut, willow, witch hazel.

  Years later, even knowing that those trees now belong to someone else, in times of stress when all I can do is sit still and wait for news—good or bad—I begin, “Apple, ash, aspen …”

  In the tomb-like silence, Diana and Skip waited for my response.

  “I like the finish of these much better than those in the other room,” I said.

  “Those had high-gloss finishes. These are satin.”

  “Oh. We never used high gloss when we painted,” I said. “I like this one. The grain is beautiful.”

  “It’s poplar,” Skip said.

  “That’s appropriate,” I replied. “Poplar is in the cottonwood family. We grew up with cottonwoods. And look how beautifully the grain of the door matches the box itself.”

  “Of course. It’s cut from a single piece of wood,” Skip said.

  “This one. This is it. Can you make sure the grain matches?”

  “Of course. I’ll specify that.”

  And so our contracts state:

  To be cut from one piece of wood. Grain must match.

  TRAVELING WITH BOB

  The trip had been a mistake, it seemed. I was going to be forced to sleep overnight in the back of a van or stay in a cabin with no plumbing and risk meeting a bear, black or grizzly, or both, while on a middle-of-the-night trek to essential facilities.

  The phone call had been completely unexpected. Even more so was the opening sentence, “Barb, how’d you like to go to Alaska?”

  Bob’s voice in North Dakota boomed over the phone, sounding as though he were shouting at me from the end of my hallway.

  “Why are you asking?”

  And then Bob told me of his plans. He was going to drive from his home in eastern North Dakota through the Canadian Rockies to Alaska.

  “I need to know by next week,” he said.

  “What? Why so soon?”

  “Well, if you’re coming, I’ll plan my trip around your arrival, swing over to Anchorage to pick you up.”

  It was a time when I was feeling particularly fragile. In my sixties, I’d recently nursed my family through a string of medical crises. Bob, I suspected, was feeling freshly invigorated after hearing good news following a cancer episode. And I’d always wanted to visit Alaska.

  “It’ll be the end of the season. Are you sure we’ll be able to get reservations?”

  “Reservations? Hell. I’m driving my ’84 Dodge Caravan. If we get stuck, we’ll just sleep in the truck. I’ll throw in a sleeping bag for you.”

  His mission was to see a grizzly. Preferably up close.

  “Can we go to Homer?”

  “Homer? I’ve never heard of it. What’s so special about Homer?”

  “If I go, I’ll explain.”

  I put Bob’s offer on hold for a few days. Two of my friends who had brothers, brothers who would never make such an offer, thought I must go. They saw it as an unparalleled opportunity. But our siblings weren’t so sure.

  Bill thought it was ridiculous. “You don’t know what the weather will be. You might get trapped up there in a blizzard.”

  John said only, “Well, I don’t know …,” and then his voice trailed off.

  “How long will the trip be?” our sister Helen asked me.

  “Two weeks.”

  There was a long pause as I held the receiver. Finally she said, “Two weeks is a long time.”

  Roughing it gave me pause. I’m a planner. And searching for bears definitely was not my style. But more than that: Would Bob and I get along? Only two years apart in age, we’d been inseparable as kids growing up. But it had been forty years since we’d spent more than a few hours together at a time, and in those ensuing decades we’d lived more than a thousand miles apart and grown even further apart in our views. The environment, gun control, political parties—name an issue, we sit at opposite poles. Talk about red and blue. And the 2004 presidential election was only weeks away.

  At the last minute, I told Bob I’d meet him in Anchorage and shipped my parka and long underwear on ahead.

  Not able to accept the possibility of no bed on the very first night, I made reservations at a bed-and-breakfast in Anchorage. And because my only must-do in Alaska was to stay in Homer, on the water, I made reservations there also.

  “Why Homer?” Bob asked. “I’ve never heard of bear sightings in those parts.”

  I told him about Annie. She and I had worked in different departments at a small college in Manhattan. One particular day, every person we’d dealt with had been difficult or impossible. I’d seen a PBS special the night before about Homer; it had shown moose wandering the streets and snowcapped mountains reflected in the clear waters of the bay. From my sofa in Manhattan, I saw Homer as a pristine paradise at the end of the United States.

  “We’ll just have to go to Homer,” I told Annie. And so “Homer” became our mantra. On overworked and discouraging days, we’d say, “Homer,” and smile.

  Then Annie received a diagnosis of breast cancer. She took control, timing her chemotherapy and radiation treatments so that she was able to keep on working. She fought for her life, and won. For a time. Two years later, the cancer came back with a vengeance. I didn’t even get a chance to say goodbye. Now, I had to visit Homer. For Annie.

  Bob was waiting at the Anchorage airport.

  “I did a test-drive last night,” he told me. “I didn’t want you to have to wait.”

  I thanked him. Although he’d been sitting quite a while, he seemed out of breath.

  “On my drive through the Canadian Rockies and British Columbia, I saw so much beauty! I’d see a spectacular mountain, think there couldn’t be anything more beautiful, and then the next day there’d be another. Unbelievable! Each day the views were better than the day before!”

  He was almost hyperventilating.

  That evening, before we retired to our separate rooms, I brought up something that had been on my mind since I’d agreed to go on this trip.

  “Bob, can we agree that politics and anything remotely related to it will be off-limits?”
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  “What fun is there in that?” he countered.

  “Please,” I drew the word out.

  “Oh, okay, if that’ll make you happy.”

  “There’s one more thing,” I said.

  “And what’s that?”

  “No dirty stories.”

  “Now, why would you ask for that?” Bob responded.

  “You’re good at telling them, I admit. And I do laugh at a few. But sometimes you go too far and the stories make me uncomfortable.”

  “Hmm …”

  I didn’t push him. And he didn’t say any more.

  Homer was to be our first destination. But while Bob and I were spreading generous layers of native-berry jam onto homemade scones, enjoying our first Alaskan breakfast, the owner told us that if we wanted to see wildlife in Denali National Park, a four-hour drive, we had to head there right away. Winter was coming in fast, and the authorities were about to shut down the buses, the only way tourists are allowed to venture into the interior. Seeing wildlife (read: bears) was paramount to Bob.

  We looked at each other and nodded. I called the inn in Homer and changed our arrival date; Bob checked the park bus schedules. We tossed our luggage into the van and headed out.

  When we reached the Anchorage city limits, I pulled out the map, preparing to navigate.

  “What are you doing?” Bob asked.

  “Keeping us on the right road,” I said.

  “Put that map down! Look out! Just enjoy all that beauty!”

  It began to snow before we reached the park, and when we arrived, we found that bus service had been suspended for the day. The snow continued to fall lightly. Heavier snow was forecast. We drove, both of us on the lookout for bears, until we reached a Do Not Enter barricade. Bob turned around, and we drove the loop again. No luck. Then Bob said he thought we should leave, abandoning the opportunity to go farther into the park the next day and forgoing lodging near the park. He was worried about getting trapped in a blizzard. I trusted his judgment—he lives in North Dakota, after all—and so we headed out.

  We drove and drove, making one stop for gas and “dinner”: two granola bars, and a Snickers for dessert. It’s not as though there were no rooms—there were no motels. At last, we found an open motel with one available room. A bed for me. A cot for Bob.

  As we waited for the night clerk to complete our reservation, Bob said, “Barb, look to your left.”

  I did and was startled by a huge taxidermied grizzly towering above me.

  “That’s a beauty!” Bob said to the clerk. “How tall is he?”

  “Oh, just a little over nine feet,” the clerk replied.

  Before I fell asleep, I tallied up. We’d changed our plans three times. And that was only day one.

  The next day, backtracking, we headed to Homer. On the side of the road, we read a sign that proclaimed, Hope.

  “Do you want to go to Hope?” Bob asked.

  We had one no-reservation night before we’d reach Homer.

  “I don’t know.”

  Bob looked at me over his dark glasses.

  “Barb, if you don’t go to Hope now, you never will,” he said, already signaling and slowing down to take the turn.

  The road began as tarmac, then turned to gravel. It was almost twilight, time to find a room in this town of 270 residents. There was only one restaurant, which would be closing in a short time. We decided we’d have a quick dinner and then look for lodging. Bob talks to everyone, and soon patrons and waitresses were telling of their recent encounters with grizzlies and other bears. As the stories multiplied, I grew anxious. I wanted to sleep in a bed, within walls. I paid the bill and headed for the door. Bob was encouraging the storytellers, and their stories were getting better, or worse, depending on your viewpoint.

  “Bob. Bob. Bob!”

  He stood and, with his head turned so as not to miss a word, sidestepped his way to the door.

  Climbing into the van, we set off to search for lodging. We turned at a sign that read, Rooms. Under the tall pines, the light of day had begun to dim. We stood near a small cabin twenty yards from a rushing stream. An idyllic location.

  A middle-aged woman with a did-it-herself haircut stepped out.

  “Do you have a room available tonight?” Bob asked.

  “Yes, I have a cabin with two beds.”

  “Showers?”

  “Yes, the toilets and showers are over there,” the owner said, pointing toward a small building a city block away.

  “This is great! Have you seen any bears this week?” Bob asked.

  The tone in his voice let me know he’d actually like to meet a bear on the way to the john at night. This was what I’d been afraid of. Now we’d disagree and begin to argue, one of us would have to give in, and resentment would color the rest of our trip.

  “Bob,” I said, “I don’t think I can do it.”

  “No?” He tried for neutral but couldn’t hide his disappointment.

  “No.”

  Shrugging, he asked the woman about other lodging possibilities. She knew every place around but didn’t think there were any vacancies.

  “Perhaps we could ask the people back at the restaurant?” I said to Bob.

  We headed back to our new friends. The regulars deliberated, and the owner called around. She found a place with one bed and a cot. The lodging, above a convenience store, was run by a hunting guide who supplied not only a key to the room but also directions to a bear-viewing mountain road. We didn’t unload our luggage but headed out immediately. We drove until dark. No luck.

  At the restaurant the next morning, we were again fed well, both with food and with stories. As we were leaving, I asked the cashier if there was a place where I could buy local crafts. She told me of one, and Bob agreed to delay our trip by fifteen minutes. We easily found the log cabin she’d described; the town consisted of only twenty buildings.

  Stepping inside, I was amazed to see a great assortment of items—bowls, boxes, walking sticks—all hand-carved out of wood harvested from local fallen trees. As I looked at each one, Danny, the shopkeeper, named the tree species of the item. Ash, poplar, cedar. I was the only customer, and he was happy to answer my questions.

  “Are all of these carved by Native Americans?” I asked.

  “Yes. I carved many myself. But we don’t use that term here,” he said.

  “What do you prefer?” I asked.

  “‘Native Alaskan,’” he answered, “It refers to all the indigenous peoples of Alaska.”

  While I’d been shopping, Bob had been waiting in the van. He’d picked up a local flyer as we’d left the restaurant and was perusing ads for property in the area. When I returned to the van, there was excitement in his voice. More than usual.

  “Barb, look at these prices! They’re just crazy. Land is cheap up here! I’m coming back next year and buying a few acres. Build a cabin. Nothing fancy. There’ll be no running water, but the streams are so clean, that won’t be a problem.”

  He continued talking as he started the engine and headed out to the main road.

  It was hard to leave Hope, but Homer beckoned. We drove there and did stay on the water. As we dined, sea otters cavorting only a few yards from our table entertained us. As dusk approached, we hurried through our meal and then drove to another beach, where we stayed until the sun went down, looking for special stones, including green jade.

  The next day, the main thoroughfare was busy with townspeople and tourists. We joined a group waiting in line for a boat trip to neighboring islands. On the ride, we were excited when we saw a whale breech and a bald eagle swoop down to catch a fish, but when we returned to the dock, we found Homer’s commercial attractions distracting, compared with the boat trip and its focus on natural history.

  I now realize Hope was my Homer. Hope was a small, peaceful town populated with caring people. A place that renewed my spirit.

  The rhythm of the trip was set during those first days. We didn’t have a schedule of
any sort. We only had to make it to Vancouver in time for my return flight.

  And so we drove through the Kenai Peninsula, and the Yukon, into British Columbia and on through the Cassiar Mountains. We called out, “Look at that glacier! Look at the snowcapped mountains! Look at those red leaves! Look at the moose! Look at that incredible view of the river! Look at that waterfall!”

  And, also, “Bob! Look at the road!”

  We had planned at the end of the trip to catch a ferry between Haines, Alaska, and Bellingham, Washington, a short drive from the Vancouver airport, which would have saved us about 1,500 miles of driving. But we learned that one ferry was out of service and the others were fully booked. So, with a lot of miles to cover, we made the most of our long days. We stopped to take photos of scenery and of signs (my favorite: MOOSE RUTTING, NEXT 5 MILES) and, of course, for gas and coffee, but enthusiasm was our main fuel. We never turned on the radio, and I never looked at a map while we were moving again. There was so much to see that I didn’t plan to miss any of it. We needed nothing more than the views outside the van’s windows.

  The trip was a revelation—not only thanks to Alaska’s unparalleled, breathtaking beauty, but also because of what I learned about my brother.

  For a man who revels in his second career, working as a predator controller, which means stalking wildcats in the mountains of Texas, he was, to my surprise, exceedingly thoughtful.

  For me, the day begins only after I’ve had a cup of coffee. Because the places we stayed had minimal amenities in the off-season, that cup was often hard to come by. Every morning, as soon as he got up, Bob would toss on his leather jacket and head out the door. Soon he’d be back, handing me a large Styrofoam cup of steaming coffee.

  At the farthest northern reaches of our trip, the edges of glaciers, permafrost beneath our feet, we found that almost all businesses were closed. We traveled with bags of nuts. Without saying a word, Bob would hold out his palm. I’d tip the bag into his waiting hand. We had to keep moving.