Gifts of Easter

Being homesick is inevitable at some point when traveling, but moments when my entire family is on a computer screen in front of me make it much easier to deal with, especially on a holiday like Easter when everyone is together. I got to skype with my favorite girls, and it's fun to see Jayme figure out how it works. She still tries to kiss me on the computer screen.

Since we don't have running water, cooking has been pretty challenging. Most of us are eating frozen dinners, and personally, I'm getting tired of Cliff Bars. Carpenter Dave volunteered to cook everyone a big spaghetti dinner on Easter if everyone else would pitch in for the food. We stocked up the day before in Fairbanks and Sunday, we enjoyed a big family dinner followed by the movie, Into the Wild (that part might have been my idea).

Clockwise from the left in the hat: Carpenter Dave, Brian, Nick, Preston, Jessica, Allan, and Matt

After dinner, I went on my nightly walk to my happy place on the deck to journal and take photos of the river melting. It's breaking more and more, and I took the first shot from the deck, and the second from below on the shoreline. In a couple weeks, this will all be moving water.

Later that night, I was in a dead sound sleep when I got a knock on my door at 2am. With my eyes still closed, I stumbled to the door and barely squinted one eye open to see Nick, bright eyed and excited, telling me to go outside and look straight up. The warm, cozy, sleepy part of me wanted to crawl right back into my cocoon of warmth, but I made Nick promise to always wake me up when the lights were out, so I knew I had to go outside.

The first time I saw the lights, I was almost drawn to tears but the -5 temperature forced me to hold back out of fear they would freeze. This night, however, I couldn't help it. My eyes got blurry and I knew tears were coming. My sleepy stumble quickly turned into waves of excitement and disbelief. It literally looked like it was raining down. Happy Easter, He is indeed risen. Photo: Nick Harrison.