--Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness
I had every intention of using this month's blog to complain about the weather in Ketchikan. October has notoriety around town for extreme wind and rain. It seems, this year, we have been spared...for now. This gives me a blank sheet of paper to write and that intimidates me.
September 28th, 2006: 8:00pm
The cruise ship, Zuiderdam, sits humming on the waterfront. The dark night accentuates the dominance of the 13-story ship over Ketchikan's humble skyline. A small crowd of parka-clad locals gathers on the dock to wish the last ship of the year farewell.
"This was my favorite stop!" yells a passenger high overhead.
"See you next year!", calls back out a woman on my left.
She follows up with a few words utter low, under her breath. The crowd around her cackles with laughter.
The ship's crew responds to the captain's invisible signal and fore and aft lines are release. Pointed south, the ship accelerates toward more profitable waters for the winter. And the town sit quietly, brightly watching her sail away.
Fireworks! Business owners celebrating the end of a successful season? Or locals celebrating another thwarting of the visiting masses?
As if the ship was giving the season its queue the wind began to blow and the rain began to fall as I walked back to my hotel room.
Strolling past one of the many jewelry stores in town, I hear an accented voice announce, "$350,000".
Among its other nicknames, Ketchikan is known as the "St. Croix of the North" because of its abundance of jewelry stores. Even before the ship is out of sight each of the store managers is either pouring over his or her books of inventory or packing merchandise in boxes so that all may be ready to open that identical store on a tropical island just in time to welcome the arrival of the Zuiderdam from the winter season.
For a fleeting moment I think to myself, "I'm in the wrong business."
The town now gets to keep itself to itself for the next 7 months without any major human disturbance from the outside world beyond the occasional Alaska Airliner. But even the airport is on a separate island. With the exception of the downtown waterfront, Ketchikan now belongs to the local folk. Of course the exception mentioned above is why I'm here.
In the past two months, we've demolished an old boat harbor, built half of a 1200-ft waterfront pedestrian promenade, and begun pile driving for a cruise ship dock extension. Before I head south, we'll also build a floating cruise ship dock and a new small boat harbor. The project extends over 1/3 of a mile of waterfront inspiring my dreams of driving around in a golf cart to check in on the work. Of course, by doing that I might as well paint a big red bullseye on my hardhat for the construction crew to chuck rocks at. Instead, of the golf cart my company has sent in reinforcements from the south. Tim Fisher arrived two weeks ago in order to watch construction on the second of the two cranes; relieving a great deal of my work load.
On the homefront, Michele has just finished her last classroom test for nursing school. Just a couple more weeks of clinical work and a little bitty exam that tests everything she's learned in school over the last two years and she'll be an RN. Tomorrow she's comes north to Ketchikan for the fourth time to visit me. Typical of my lovely wife, she has met more people in town during her brief visits than I have in two months. We are now over half way to December and the her move north.
In the meantime, I'm doing well and miss all of you: my friends and family.
--Rian
