Hello world! I'm back and ready for more adventures.
Last Sunday, May 29 2011 I graduated from Brown University with a Bachelor's degree in Literary Arts. I'm as surprised as anyone that I actually made it through to the end and got handed a diploma. I was pretty sure I'd find a less conventional way to finish, or not finish, but I got swept up in the moment and forgot to thumb my nose at the proceedings. I don't mind. I had a glorious and strange, tumultuous, complicated and beautiful four years, learned and changed a great deal, more outside the classroom than in, but both were involved, and Commencement was as good a way to cap it off as any. Better than most, I imagine.
I had a day or so to finish packing my room up and transition, and by Tuesday night (5/31) I had arrived in Anchorage and found my new home. I'll be living here until the end of September, working as a bartender for Holland America/Princess (HAP for short) Alaska Rail Services.
"What does this mean?" you may well ask. Let me explain. Two cruise lines that have a bunch of ships up here decided to join forces and allow passengers to extend their trips with various wilderness adventure and "land tour" options, including the chance to ride from Anchorage up to Denali National Park or farther up to Fairbanks (or back down south) on luxury glass-domed scenic tourist trains. I had the good fortune to score a gig working on the upper level of one of these trains for the duration of the season.
Two of my old friends from Portland, Hope and Nicole, worked on the train last summer as food servers, and told me about it. They are both back this year. They live with Hope's aunt about 40 minutes outside of Anchorage in a town called Wasilla. However, they set me up to room with a friend of theirs named Blair. Blair found a house for me and two other "train people," (Zack, who's awesome, and Debbie, whom I still haven't met) so all I had to do was show up, shell out tons of money for rent and food and getting situated, go through two quick days of training, and get started.
I went out for my first practice "run" this past weekend. I was assigned along with fellow trainee John to shadow a more experienced bartender named Alex. The way it worked:
Saturday, 4:45 am - Woke up, groggy and cranky. Got into the shower. After 5 minutes, the water stopped coming out of the shower head. I've found out since, from Blair and Zack that there is a way to make it start again, but I didn't know that then. So my shower was done. Got dressed, packed my backpack, grabbed a piece of bread to munch on the road, and set out.
5:30-6:05 - Walked 1.6 miles to the railway depot.
6:05-6:15 - Changed into my uniform. Swiped in and got on the train.
6:15am - 9:15pm - At work. This meant, variably: preparing for customers, hanging out and looking at scenery on an empty car (because for some reason the bosses assigned us to shadow someone who had a "dead car" for the first 2/3 of the trip), switching to a car in the care of Sarah, a non-drinking, 26-year-old Mormon from Louisiana, listening to Steve the rail guide narrate and describe the area around us, schmoozing and chatting with passengers, and helping to mix, serve, bus and ring in drinks. I also ate hot lasagna train lunch around 2pm.
9:15-11pm - Loaded onto a bus and went to the local supermarket/superstore "Fred Meyer" to buy dinner food. Then got back on the bus and was driven to the Fairbanks Best Value Inn, or the BVI as it is not-so-affectionately known. Most train employees hate the place because it's not very nice, but I had my own room, and a TV and a better shower than I have in Anchorage, so I didn't mind. I've stayed worse places. I decompressed for a bit, mostly watching That 70's Show repeats, and went to sleep.
Sunday, 5:20am - Woke up and got ready for the return journey.
I was again on the clock from 6am until 9:15 or 9:30 at night. I walked homewards with four other train people, and arrived at home around 10:30. Miraculously, Zack had just finished making dinner and invited me to partake. I already love living with him. :)
Some first impressions: the days are long. Obviously. The mornings are early, and I was tired and very hungry when there were still hours to go in any direction. This run also was extremely easy and laid-back compared to how I've heard it can be sometimes, and I was just learning and helping, rather than serving a whole train car of people myself, so I can only imagine how tired (and hungry, and foot-sore, and burnt out on people-time) I will be when I have to do this all alone. At the same time, the scenery is incredible and beautiful. There are kabillions of trees. Aside from those, the world here is all mountains and huge wide open sky with bounteous and lovely clouds and perfect streams.
Another major perk: wildlife. In my 17+ years of living in Maine, I never managed to see a moose. On my first day on the train, I saw 4. I missed a couple other people saw too. Yesterday I saw a great horned owl in her nest with her almost-grown baby and a bald eagle with a fish grasped in its talons. Haven't seen any bears yet, but I expect that I will.
There's lots more to say, particularly about my sudden plunge into some form of real life adulthood and how I'm coping with that, and I have words about sunlight in Alaska as well, but I'll save all that for my next post.
(6/6/11)
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