When I woke today, I looked at the clock and then at the window. 
I thought, “Hmmm… it should be brighter than that at this time of
day.  I wonder if it’s ash in the air.”  I turned on the
radio and one of the first things I heard was a volcano report saying
that the ash cloud was extending northward over the Susitna Valley.

It was our turn under the ash plume.  Over the past few days,
light dustings of ash have fallen on the Kenai Peninsula and on Kodiak
Island.  The intensity and frequency of Augustine’s eruptions
escalated three days ago.  For that long, the volcano has been
emitting a continuous ash plume, pyroclastic flows and occasional
explosive eruptions.  It shakes and booms, and I have felt some of
the subsonic vibes even at this distance.

I smelled the volcano when I stuck my head out the door earlier this
morning, and got some grit in my eyes, but that was all.  There is
no significant visible darkening of the surface of the snowpack, and
for the last two hours the sky has been clear.  Apparently, the
wind has now shifted the plume away from us.

Potemkin, the visiting tomcat, came in briefly this morning to eat and
warm up.  Last time he was here it was much colder — minus
twenty-something then, around zero now — and we noticed that the tip
of one of his ears was shriveled from frostbite.  It hasn’t
dropped off yet, but surely will.  Old Granny Mousebreath had lost
the tip of one of her ears before we moved in here with her, makes it
look like the tip of a tanto blade.  Potemkin wanted out again
right away, and I had an irrational maternal protective urge to tie a
tiny bandana over his little nose.

Two days ago, Kristi Wallace took the photo below during an AVO overflight.  The gas and steam rising from the slopes and base of the volcano are from pyroclastic flows.

The next image was captured yesterday by Game McGimsey.  Photo
courtesy of Alaska Volcano Observatory and U.S. Geological Survey.

The photomicrographs of ash particles below were captured by Pavel
Izbekov using the ISI-40 scanning electron microscope at the Advanced
Instrumentation Laboratory, University of Alaska Fairbanks.  The
ash sample was from the January 14 eruption, collected by John
Paskievich of AVO.  Photos courtesy of AVO/USGS/UAF.

The AVO website also has an interesting, even amusing, illustrated report of their crew who recently went to Augustine Island to fix the webcam.

Several factors determine the extent of a person’s control over how she feels.  Feelings themselves don’t originate from a single source.  If people can’t agree on a single definition for just one emotion such as “love”, then it is obvious that we are going to have difficulty agreeing on a definition of “emotion.”  Having read widely in the fields of psychology, metaphysics, semantics and semiotic, I have encountered many definitions for emotion and feeling.

My favorite authors are those who begin by defining their terms.  One such is E. J. Gold, in whose lexicon there is only one true “emotion” (Love, of the spiritual kind), and the other things we generally call emotions are, to him, actually thoughts or feelings.  Possibly because I’m female, I am not going to try setting up arbitrary definitions, but will be using words such as “feeling” and “emotion” interchangeably because that is how it is done in common usage.

First, I will dispense with Love (the spiritual kind), because it is, I feel, a special case and easiest to eliminate from the discussion.  This is the one that doesn’t just happen to us.  We don’t fall into it, although we might grow into it.  It is not an object we can obtain from others through manipulation or exchange for Love or anything else, even though experiencing this unconditional spiritual love from someone else has the power to kindle such feelings in oneself if one is open to that.  It is a choice we can make, an action we can take, a Universal force to which we can attune ourselves.  It is energy, and can be employed to heal anger, hatred, insecurity and all the other fear-based emotions.  It is entirely within our control to decide whether to live in this Love or not.

The other “love” (and I’m not going to deal with “love” of pizza, Maserati, movies, the color purple or San Francisco, which everyone understands refers to fondness or preference), the “romantic” kind that sweeps over us and takes our breath away, making it impossible for us to perceive any human flaws in its object or to be contented when we are out of the object’s immediate presence… well, that’s very different.  It comprises (or can include) passion, intimacy, bonded attachment, and a decision to commit to a partner.

In Why We Love, Dr. Helen Fisher examines and explains the origins of these feelings in the caudate nucleus of the mammalian brain and the way they naturally evolve from passionate lust to affectionate attachment over time through the mediation of neuroelectrochemistry.  At last, from her research and that of her colleagues, the processes of falling in and out of love make sense.  Astute and aware individuals have always recognized that these feelings are inextricably bound up with the biological urge to procreate, but along the way culture has confused the issue with euphemistic circumlocutions and hypocritical myths that have been perpetuated in fictional romances, fairy tales and soap opera.

Since those feelings originate in brain chemistry (electrochemistry, actually, but lets keep it oversimplified, okay?), we could, if we wished, “control” them with drugs.  Many people do alter their emotions chemically, either intentionally or unintentionally.  So, there is part of my answer:  yes, we can “control” our feelings by altering our brain chemistry with drugs.  Some of the problems inherent in that method include toxic effects of the drugs and unwanted “feelings” that result from imprudent and/or uninformed choices of the drugs one uses.

A simpler way to “control” feelings is to change the way we think about how we feel.  Anyone who has ever gotten over the “heartbreak” of being dumped by a lover, or who has forced oneself not to become involved with an inappropriate but very attractive partner, has used this method.  The dynamics of neuroelectrochemistry appear to be a complex feedback loop in which thoughts control feelings and feelings control thoughts and we have some degree of control over which forces predominate.

As long as we deny responsibility for our feelings, they will be out of our control.  If we believe, for example, that someone can hurt our feelings, our feelings are going to be hurt a lot because people in general will not always say and do the things we want them to.   If our self-esteem is contingent on the esteem and approval we receive from others, then those others will control our feelings.

Once we take responsibility for our own feelings and realize that we have the power to choose not to be hurt by the thoughts, feelings and actions of others, we will no longer be hurt by others.  It really is that simple.  I know that because I have gone from being a high-strung, over-sensitive, clingy, emotionally needy crybaby always seeking approval and external validation, to being a sensitive, secure, loving and emotionally independent person,  through taking responsibility for my own feelings.

Note that I said “through” taking responsibility and not “by” that.  Subtle semantic difference, it means that the process started with that decision, but the choice and commitment were not all there was to the process.  Over time, my habits of thought and feeling changed.  At first, if someone rejected me or abused me or slandered me, I’d react negatively and then I’d remind myself of this: “What others think of me is none of my business.”

If everyone had turned against me at once, I might not have been able so easily to deal with it, but that is very unlikely to happen to anyone.  Dr. Seuss said it best:  “Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.”

I weaned myself from that need for external validation at the same time that I was building independent self-esteem.  In the same way that it helped to  remember that other people’s thoughts and feelings are none of my business, I was aided by this injunction:  “Do nothing to damage your self-esteem.”  If I screwed up and did something of which I disapproved, I did what I could to clean up the mess, reminded myself that everyone is fallible, treated the whole thing as a learning experience and resolved not to make the same mistake again.  By that process, my self-esteem grew and my need for external validation dwindled away.

Over time, there has been less and less sting from things people say and do to me.  When something does trigger a knee-jerk response from me, I am less likely than I used to be to fall into hurt feelings or fly into a rage, so I am able to respond more sensibly and appropriately.  It works not only with those “feelings” that can get “hurt” by rejection and disapproval.  It also works with more obvious and overt fear reactions.  It’s all fear, after all.  Hurt feelings are only the manifestation of the fear of inadequacy, isolation, rejection, etc.

I may never entirely lose that knee-jerk “emotional” response.  I see an analogy between that and the physical startle response to loud noises, unexpected touches or similar sudden shocks.  I recall a time when, if someone startled me, I would say, “You scared me.”  I don’t say that any more, nor do I think it.  If my body jerks and starts at a surprising event, I know I’m startled.  It barely deserves a thought most of the time.  That understanding of the startle response, and my having lost the more-or-less automatic association of startlement with fear, allows me to more effectively respond when I’m startled by something that requires quick response.

Knowing that I am responsible for my own feelings also liberates me from responsiblity for other people’s feelings.  Nobody can lay a guilt trip on me if I say or do something that “hurts her feelings,” as long as her hurt feelings were not my objective but only an incidental result of her taking offense at my frankness.  I know that it is her choice to be hurt, that her decision to take offense is a sign of her own emotional irresponsibility and low self-esteem, and that I have a responsiblity to myself and the universe to express my own thoughts and feelings openly and honestly regardless of any anticipated response they might trigger in someone else.  The handy aphorism that reminds me of reality in this instance is, “It is equally spiritually unevolved to take offense as it is purposely to give it.”

ItzaRoos asked what I think of the book, The
Hibernation Response, Why You Feel Fat, Miserable, and Depressed from
October through March — and How You Can Cheer up through those Dark
Days of Winter by Peter Whybrow, M.D., and Robert Bahr.

So far, I am enjoying it.  I find it massively validating. 
If there will be any reassurance or new helpful information in there
for me, I have yet to find it.  I’ve only had it a couple of days,
and the library allows me four weeks before I need to return it, so I’m
in no hurry to finish it.  I read it in little bursts when I’m
feeling most alert and able to absorb data.  For bedtime reading
now, I have The Da Vinci Code.  I had been curious about all the
hoopla surrounding it, and Greyfox found a copy somewhere recently so
I’m getting a chance to find out what that’s all about.

The latest avo
images are four days old and show only the plume of gas and steam that
has been present since the beginning of the current eruption cycle a
few weeks ago.  There were four separate explosive eruptions
during the night, and there is an ash alert for Kodiak Island
today.  The image from the webcam on Augustine Island is currently
black, and the one aimed at Augustine from across Cook Inlet near Homer
shows only fog.

In local news, Potemkin, the visiting tomcat who has been showing up
every few days to get warm and fill up on food and water, spent the
night here last night.  Our cats appear to be more accepting of
him, except for grumpy old Granny Mousebreath (the catriarch), and
Cecil and Albion, the largest males of the younger generation. 
Maybe they’ve noticed that when Potemkin comes around there is always
plenty of smelly wet canned food for everyone.

The principal of a nearby high school had some peace demonstrators
arrested recently.  They were standing near a table where two
Marine recruiters were running their sales pitch on the students,
holding a placard saying, “Military recruiters lie.”  A high court
has ruled that schools must allow the orderly expression of dissent
when military recruiters are present, so this case won’t just quietly
disappear.

The temperature here is in double digits below zero and the skies are
gray.  I am feeling restless, which is an improvement over my
recent malaise and ennui.  I had a weird dream last night about my
car.  It had some sort of disease like cancer and was growing
bumps and blobs that interfered with its operation.  I haven’t had
breakfast yet and won’t be able to have any until I decide what to
eat.  I suppose that should be my next priority.

I’ve gotten some well-meaning advice about my seasonal affective
disorder and my family dilemma.  Now I am going to ungraciously
demonstrate why most people stop trying to give me advice after a while.

dingus6
suggested that there’s someone who might be willing to “help” with
chores in exchange for a “place to stay.”  I have fantasized at
times about having some star-crossed soul (a non-smoker who doesn’t use
alcohol or other drugs) wander up to my door and offer to exchange
his/her carpentry and mechanical skills for a pallet on the floor of my
squalid digs.  It hasn’t happened yet, and I can’t see myself
being willing to take in someone whose lifestyle would aggravate my
allergies or otherwise endanger my well-being, or whose practical
skills don’t exceed my own.  I’m not up to running a rescue mission.

When I talk at 12-step meetings in town about my lifestyle, the general consensus is that my ability to not only stay here in these conditions, but actually be happy
here most of the time, is totally incomprehensible.  Nobody I know
would volunteer even to share this crappy little falling-apart trailer
that the owner GAVE to me free of charge just to get out of paying the
taxes on it, much less to chop wood and carry water for the dubious
privilege.

These woods are dotted with a scattering of abandoned cabins and
trailers whose former inhabitants have fled back to the warmth of the
south and/or the lights of the city.  Anyone enamored enough of
these woods to want to live here would be able to squat in one of those
places without having to put up with a crazy old woman who talks to
spirits and won’t tolerate smokers.  Anyone wanting more comfort
than is usually found in those abandoned places can find winter
quarters housesitting for some of the many people who only use their
cabins in the summer, and whose cabins have amenities lacking here.  The exceptions might be people with
large families, dog teams, obvious psychoses, or other impediments that
would tend to make them unwelcome in my house, too.

wixer said,
“Maybe one or two of those light bulbs that give you ‘sun’ might
help?”  Maybe so.  I have a few of those lights, packed
away.  I think it best that I leave them packed away.  They
use horrendous amounts of wattage, and I would be much less inclined to
regularly switch on a light and gaze at it than I am to suit up and go
out into the snowy sunshine.  I would be far more likely to want
to plant marijuana under those lights, not because I want to smoke any
of it, but because of the temptation of the potential income.  I
just don’t want to go there.

While Greyfox was here today, clouds were moving in but the sun was
shining through occasionally, so I got out into it.  The “wattage”
of that light, especially reflected off the snow, far exceeds the
expensive indoor kind.  It has the added advantage of being
accompanied by exhilarating fresh air and (sometimes) breathtakingly
beautiful vistas or wildlife sightings.  Truly, there ain’t
nuthin’ like the real thing.

My
foxy windstorm has blown through and is gone on back down the valley to
his own squalid little digs on the edge of town.  On his way up,
he stopped in Willow and picked up the library book I had
requested.  Now I can see if any of the author’s suggestions for
avoiding winter blues will work for me.  The first event of the
Winter Carnival is a sled dog race that starts this evening. 
Greyfox said that the parking lot at the community center (where the
library is) was full of mushers hitching up their teams.  As he
had guessed, I was sorry to have missed that.

 
After our shared lunch, while I was outdoors soaking up rays,
Greyfox was in here using our computer.  Koji is always so glad to
see the missing pack member that he often makes a nuisance of himself
just by trying to get close.  Here, he had been yelled at and sent
away after trying to lay his head in Greyfox’s lap.  He went
around and crawled onto the back of the sofa (AKA “Couch Potato
Heaven”) where he could be between the two of us, which is his very
favorite place in the whole world.

The temperature has been rising slowly all day.  It is up to five
below zero now — still not truly “warm” but so much less chilling than
when it was thirty degrees colder.  I have been feeding wood into
the stove less often, piling it less deeply in there, attempting to let
some of the accumulated charcoal burn to ash and reduce the depth of
the bed of coals that built up this week while we tried to keep the
house warm enough to keep my tropical plants alive.

If it keeps warming up, it will surely snow.  So far, the snow
pack along the road out to the cul de sac has been windblown and packed
enough that it’s only about knee deep and I managed to slog through it
today.  To me, this is a lot better than when the snow is so deep
I’m confined to the plowed roads and shoveled paths.  I have
already had to abandon my little path through the trees to the muskeg
because that’s where the snow drifted that blew off the road.

What a relief!  When I got up this morning, it was only 23
below.  I think the low during the last two days was somewhere
around 36 below zero.  Of course, that means that clouds have
moved in and I won’t be able to get any sunshine today.  I’d
realized yesterday, even before anyone mentioned “cabin fever” or
“winter blues” that I was depressed and needed to get some
sunshine.  Whenever the sun is out again, I’ll do that.

Today, Greyfox plans to come up here, bringing groceries and supplies,
to pick up some signs I made for his tables at this weekend’s Willow
Winter Carnival.  The signs say, “Kids, keep hands off the
knives,” and “No knife sales to minors.”  Essential
equipment.  For him, this is one of the more difficult shows
because the event is four days, two weekends, and he has to move all
his merchandise in and out each day.  There’s always a hurry to
take it down and pack up because the room is used for other events in
the evenings after the trade show closes.

Several people left comments meant to reassure me about Doug. 
Most of what was said was probably true in a limited sense, but didn’t
really address the real issues, or was based on incomplete
information.  Doug has been writing creatively and designing
“inventions” and art ever since he went on Ritalin in fourth
grade.  He had been doing photography even before he got his first
camera of his own, which was a serendipitous find lying at the base of
a  roadside joshua tree in Joshua Tree National Monument, in
1993. 

He writes all the time, competitively, in fanfic writing
tournaments.  He spontaneously grabs a camera whenever he sees
something he wants to capture, such as a cute kitten or a beautiful
sunrise.  His aim in wanting to travel is not to take pictures or
write about what he sees.  The writing and photography he sees as
possible ways to support himself as he explores the planet.  The
travel is the aim.  It’s something he can’t do on little day
trips, and when he has the liberty for a day trip now, his choice is
always to go to town.  As soon as he mentioned his ambition to me,
I started advising him on ways to prepare to realize it.

I have never stopped assuring him that he doesn’t have to stay here,
that I’ll manage.  Maybe if I had a plan, he’d believe me.  I
have no plan.  All I have is this understanding that I have always
had all I needed, sometimes just finding it in the nick of time. 
I also have a stubborn tendency to think that I can survive on my
own.  That is probably a lot of whistling past the
graveyard.  The fact of my life is that there have been a series
of people who have gotten some of their needs fulfilled by taking care
of my needs.  Whether their willingness to take care of me is
karma or psychopathology, I dunno.  I do know that his mom’s
“needing” him at home has relieved Doug of the need to get out there
and make a living in the usual way. 

We have a symbiotic relationship here that is, in some ways, more
psychologically healthy than the usual family dynamics that compel
parents to drive kids from the nest when they are out of school. 
But our own family dynamics have their own pathologies in addiction and
various other issues.  The perspective I expressed yesterday was,
as some of you noted, colored by seasonal depression and my prolonged
illness.  As I said, sometimes
I can handle it.  At times, I can even see the situation from all
sides at once and that is quite a feat, given its breadth and
complexity.

Well, enough of this for now.  I have to go prepare for the arrival of Hurricane Greyfox.

I go for weeks at a time obeying, with relative ease, my mother’s
oft-repeated injunctions to look on the bright side.  Then, a
bunch of things pile up on me and I feel so… vulnerable… limited…
useless… frustrated.

• For days and daze Doug and I have watched the thermometer, with
  its readings hovering around twenty below zero.  Yesterday, he
  wondered out loud, “How long is this going to last?”  I reminded
  him that it’s January and we are in Alaska, and that when it does warm
  up it will undoubtedly snow.  That is both realistic and
  optimistic, a combination of views I like to cultivate. 

  I
  got up this morning and looked at the temp:  THIRTY below! 
  At least it’s not snowing, and that’s the best feeble attempt at
  optimism I can manage right now.

• For weeks, there had been no activity on my KaiOaty
  site, no potential for income to offset the increased expenses of
  winter survival at a time when Greyfox’s income is also at its lowest
  of the year, or to help pay the debt that has accumulated since the
  summer, when we were spending every spare dollar we had to pay off the
  loan he took to buy his new used car. 

  Then, finally,
  when someone did request a reading, I’m in this neuro-muscular/immune
  flareup, foggy-minded and wanting nothing more than to just curl up in
  the warmest spot I can find in this cold house.  I made the
  attempt, anyway, and my guides said forget it, wait, I was in no shape
  to do it justice.  I can’t fight that.  Well, I could, but
  that would be stupid and I’m wise enough to know that it’s futile to
  fight these flareups.  Is that the bright side there?

• When our motherboard got fried last month and I broke my glasses,
  I was forced to drive into Wasilla several times, to deal with those
  issues.  Until then, I hadn’t been to town since September, being
  to ill to enjoy the trip and too broke to afford the gasoline.  I
  took advantage of those opportunities to attend a couple of 12-step
  meetings and find the fellowship that is really the biggest thing I
  miss about being so far out of town here.

  After the NA meeting,
  one of the women I love the most and can identify with the best
  mentioned that she hadn’t seen me for a while.  I explained that
  it’s a long drive into town and I hadn’t really had to
  make it since the rehab ranch discontinued the van and eliminated my
  volunteer position.  I said that it was mostly that commitment
  that compelled me to make that drive as often as I did.  She took
  it personal and said, “What, we’re not enough of a reason for you to come to town?”

  What could I say that wouldn’t make it worse?  I said nothing, just let her turn away and walk out.

• It has been a vague but continual source of concern for me that
  my son, at twenty-four, didn’t know what he wants to do with his life.
   Yesterday, he said he finally realizes that what he really wants
  to do is to travel.  He sees himself writing, doing photography
  and odd jobs to support himself and I see nothing wrong with that plan
  except that as things stand now I stand in the way of his realizing it.

  I
  have often told him that I could get by without him, that I would
  survive if he chooses to go on out and have a life of his own.  I
  say that because I feel it is true, that I would somehow manage.
   But he wants to know how I would do it, how I would get the
  firewood split, the snow shoveled, walk to the mailbox when it is so
  cold the air takes my breath away, and I have no answers.  I don’t
  know how I would get by without him, but I would rather try it on my
  own than to be the only thing between him and the realization of his
  dreams.

  Until now, the question was always resolved by the fact
  that he had no plan, no compelling desire to do anything in particular.
   Now I no longer have even that much consolation.  In a
  perfect world, I could assist and support him in realizing his desire
  and could share some of his travels with him.  He is the best
  traveling companion I ever had, enjoying as much as I do taking the
  back roads, following our noses and making no itineraries.  The
  best I could do for him now under these circumstances is to give him
  some empty words of reassurance that I’ll be okay, my old backpack and
  a few bits of advice born of my experience on the road.

  I don’t
  see a bright side here, not for him nor for me.  What good is it
  finally to know what you want to do when love and a sense of obligation
  keep you from doing it?  How can a mother feel good about having a
  loving child to give her care she needs and accomplish tasks she can’t,
  when he is doing it at the price of his own ambitions and dreams?
   How long can he go on this way without its becoming simply a wait
  for me to die?  

  Years ago, Greyfox made it clear that
  he’s waiting for me to die and cease being a drain on his resources.
   Recently he has made some statements indicating that he sees some
  value in my existence and my input.  That came as a relief and a
  pleasant surprise to me.  Even so, I don’t want to be a drain or a
  drag on anyone.  I don’t mind dying but something in me knows that
  my suicide would cause more grief than it would alleviate, so I’m not
  going to do that.  The only course I see open to me is the one I
  am on, stumbling on, muddling through, falling down and picking myself
  up again.

  I’m tired.

Here,
the weather is still cold (minus twenty or so F) and I am still
muddling through the current M.E./C.F. flareup.  Nothing
interesting or notable about that.

Off to the west and southwest from here, in a tradition over
four-and-a-half millennia old, millions of people are headed
for the warmth of their family homes or are preparing for the trip in
celebration of the Lunar New Year, the second new moon after the Winter
Solstice.  This time of year many of the
largest Asian cities become virtually deserted as people return to the
villages of their ancestral roots.  The Year of the Rooster is
ending and the Year of the Dog is about to begin.  It is a time of
homecoming, even more so
than is our tradition at Thanksgiving.  The annual return of
Chinese people to their homeland from new homes all over the world is
the planet’s largest human migration.

Gōng xǐ fā cái!  The traditional Chinese greeting of “Kung
hei fat choi,” is commonly translated as a wish for a happy and
prosperous new year.  In fact, it is literally congratulations on
one’s prosperity and a subtle hint that since one is so prosperous one
might hand over a traditional red “lai see” packet of money.  For
kids, it is very much like Halloween trick-or-treat. 

In Vietnam, the red envelopes of “lucky money” are called li xi.  In Japan, parents give their children otoshidama for oshogatsu (new year’s), a special “allowance”
or gift of money in a pochibukuro, a special packet.  In the weeks leading up to the new year
celebration, Japanese toy stores step up their advertising in order to
attract as much of that otoshidama as they can.  The appropriate New Year
greeting in Japan is, “Akemashite omedeto gozaimasu.”

The
New Year’s greeting in Korea, where the holiday is called “Seol” or
“Seol-nal,” is “say hay boke-mahn he pah du say oh”, a wish for many
blessings in the coming year.  On sut dal sum mum, New Year’s Eve
in Korea, lights are left on in every room all night and nobody is
supposed to sleep, in order to greet the new year alertly with eyes
bright and wide open.  An old belief said that if one slept that
night, his eyebrows would turn white.  The day before the new year
begins is traditionally spent in a thorough housecleaning.

The
ritual cleansing and the wearing of new clothes is a widespread new year
tradition in Asian cultures.  In Japan the cleaning and shopping
may take up to two or three weeks before the holiday, and there are bonenkai,
forget-the-year parties, to wipe out bad memories of the past
year.  At bonenkai, the usually strict observances of social
position are relaxed and it becomes acceptable to use more informal and
“impolite” language.  At midnight, Buddhist temples ring their
bells 108 times to call in the new year.  At this season, flanking the entrances of most buildings in Japan are kadomatsu (right),
which always consist of pine
boughs symbolizing endurance, a vigorous old age and success in
adversity.  They also frequently include bamboo for uprightness (virtue,
fidelity, constancy) and growth, and plum branches to symbolize spirit.

During the weeklong celebrations of Tet, Vietnamese families erect a pole called Cay Neu
(left) in front of their homes. Bamboo is often used as a Cay Neu. All
the leaves are removed from the tree so that it can be wrapped or
decorated by good luck red paper. Legends have it that the red color
scares off evil spirits.  The sounds of gongs, bells, and
firecrackers, and symbols such as bows and arrows also serve to drive
out evil spirits.

The correct new year greeting in Vietnam is Chúc Mừng Nǎm
Mới,  Cung Chúc Tân Niên, or Cung Chúc Tân Xuân.  
Choose one, and try to say it correctly, at your own risk.  Debts
are paid off before the beginning of Tet, and an
auspicous new start is represented by decorating with the hoa mai
flower (right), a symbol of spring.  Families visit temples and
pray for peace and prosperity.   Painstaking care is given to
starting the year out right, since it is believed that the first day
and the
first week of the new year will determine the fortunes or misfortunes
for the rest of the year.  People avoid showing anger or being
rude, and
refrain from visiting those who are ill or in mourning.  On the
last day of Tet, the Cay Neu is taken down.

The
themes of out-with-the-old, in-with-the-new and out-with-the-bad,
in-with-the-good pervade new year’s celebrations across cultures. 
In Japan, the shimenawa, ropes made of rice straw, ward off evil spirits while the gohei, zigzag shapes made of cut and folded paper and hung from the shimenawa or from the sacred sakaki
tree, invoke the presence of the gods.  I am reminded of the
Native American tradition of smudging with a combination of pungent
sage to repel evil and fragrant sweet grass to attract friendly spirits.

In Korea, the tradition is to decorate the home with bok jo ri,
a strainer or scoop used to separate rice grains from the chaff. 
Its symbolic use is to scoop up happiness and good things and leave out
the rest.

Like most Americans, I grew up thinking of this as “Chinese” New
Year.  I have a vivid childhood memory of  celebrations in
the street, firecrackers, a wild cacophany of noise and bewildering
melange of light and color.  There were many one- and two-man
“lions” and a long, colorful glittering silk-and-sequin dragon
dancing in the street.  It wove from side to side
across the street for about a block.  There would have had to have
been a hundred men or more dancing that dragon!   I might have
been in San Francisco’s Chinatown at the time, or the parade could have been in San Jose; I do not recall which it was.  QuickTime movie of a parade dragon

Vietnamese Tet celebrations often include dancing unicorns based
upon the traditional lion or dragon dances of China.  Fireworks
are a traditional part of the Chinese celebrations, and in Vietnam at
the ceremony called Le Tru Tich at Giao Thua
(the mid-night hour), to welcome Tet, the first hour of the first day of
the new year.  Fireworks are not part of the usual celebration in
Japan or Korea, where it is traditional to climb a mountain
and watch the sunrise on New Years.

Everyone becomes a year older
on new year’s day, regardless of the date of their birthday.  
Chinese astrology differs markedly from the Chaldean Zodiac with which
most Westerners are familiar.  Combining the principles of both
systems can yield a fuller understanding of a personal birth chart.
  The twelve
animal signs
rotate in a twelve-year cycle and combine with the five elements in a
sixty-year great cycle.  Since everyone’s “birthday” is the same -
New Year’s Day – everyone born in a particular year has the same
sign.  Those born in 2006 will be Dogs of the Fire element.

People born in the year of the
dog (1910, 1922, 1934, 1946, 1958, 1970, 1982, 1994 or 2006), are said to be honest, sincere, and faithful, and possess a
sense of duty and obligation.  They respect tradition and
value honor, and enjoy helping people. The Dog is very righteous, and always is
the first to speak out against injustice. These people are fastidious, diligent, and make a
peaceful, harmonious atmosphere. They can also be eccentric,
selfish, and stubborn and find it hard to make friends or fit into
normal family life.

People born in the year of the dog include:
Mother Theresa, Viggo Mortensen, Steven Spielberg, Elvis Presley,
Herbert Hoover, Winston Churchill, Uma Thurman, Donald Trump, Madonna,
Andre Agassi, David Bowie, President George W. Bush (and his wife
Laura), Michael Jackson and Bill Clinton.

If you think this entry was too long, just thank me for not including
all the info I found about traditional New Years foods from the various
Asian cultures.

DOG RACING UPDATE:

After having been delayed for three days by cold weather, the Kuskokwim
300 Sled Dog Race finally got underway.  It is over now. 
Jeff King, the park ranger from Denali National Park, just barely beat
Mitch Seavey for first place, by a mere 95 seconds.

My diurnal cycle has intersected with Doug’s cycle, which has a longer
period.  Yesterday, he was up shortly before I was and he went to
bed last night about the same time I would have gone to bed if… (I’ll
get to that.)  This morning, he hasn’t gotten up yet [got up while
I was writing this entry].  Neither of us likes it much when his
body clock cycles around to roughly coincide with “normal” daylight
wakefulness.  For him, it means less liberty to use either the
computer or the PS2 without interference from me.  For me at this
time of year it means I must sleep lightly to keep the fire in the
woodstove from burning out.

I was already in bed reading while Doug was doing those chores that
must be done before his day can be considered complete:  taking
out the trash, splitting firewood and bringing it in, scooping out the
litter box in his room (I’d already done the other one.), hauling the
scoopings out to the compost pit in the backyard, etc.  As has
happened each of the last few nights, since the latest heavy snowfall,
he came in covered with snow fallen from the ambushing bushes along the
path. 

I mean COVERED, his entire back from head to knees was caked with snow.  I watched it
melt on his clothing as he stood with one hand in the pot of warm water
on top of the woodstove, thawing cold fingers.  I understand why
he doesn’t wear gloves on some of those brief excursions, but I don’t
like it, especially when it is so cold and getting colder. 

Shortly before then, as I had been making tea in the kitchen, I’d
glanced at the thermometer:  minus eleven point something. 
Waiting for the microwave to complete its cycle, I glanced back at the
temp:  twelve point something below zero.  A couple of more
glances and a couple of more degrees colder, and I shuddered and left
the room with my hands wrapped around a hot mug of tea, deciding I
didn’t want to watch that process.

After
Doug  had warmed his hands, taken off his anorak and shaken the
snow off of it, I asked him to check the temp for me.  It was
still about fourteen below, as it had been last time I looked. 
“Hmmm…,” I said, “I guess it was only doing that for my
entertainment.”  However, during the night, the temp dropped about
ten degrees more.  It still wasn’t enough to dissuade me from
traipsing out there a few minutes ago to capture the pink sunrise light
on a big tree overhanging the little cabin in our yard.

Meanwhile, back to my story:

Doug went to bed, and Potemkin, the stray cat who has been showing up
every few days to warm up and fill up on food and water, cried at the
door to get out.  I got up to let him out, then went to the
bathroom.  There, I discovered the door once again hanging from
its upper hinge.

When we moved in here in 1998, that door was half off its hinges and
the frame was splitered where the screws had been pulled out. 
From the deep dent in the plywood sheathing on the outside of the door
and the fact that the doorknob wouldn’t turn and its latch mechanism
won’t disengage without using something to slip into the gap and jimmy
it open, I deduced that a previous occupant had kicked the door off its
hinges to get around that latch hangup.

A few years ago, I had dug up some longer screws and driven them deeper
into the door frame and got the door back into shape to trap us in the
bathroom again.  I left a screwdriver inside the bath and a sturdy
thin-bladed knife on a shelf outside it to be used as “keys” to open
the door if it latched.  I was assuming, until I talked to Doug
today, that he had torn out the hinge screws either inadvertently or in
frustration, but now it seems that the cats are the prime suspects.

How it came off the hinge is beside the point.  Last night around
midnight I fumbled through the hardware collection, found some screws
that are longer than the last set of longer screws, got down on the
cold floor and fixed the bathroom door.  Even before then, I had
exceeded my daily activity limit and hit the fatigue wall while
preparing for a trip to the laundromat that I still don’t know when
I’ll make, since those preparations aren’t yet complete.  My leg
muscles were stiff and hot, with a tendency to go into spasm when I
used them.  Wrists and fingers reached that state while I was
driving the screws.

I finished the job, put the hardware bucket in order and back on its
shelf, and came out to the front room to tend the woodstove.  I
was kneeling in front of the open stove when I heard a clattering
commotion in the back of the house, followed by a sustained sort of
rustling swooshing sound I couldn’t identify.  Assuming it was
generated by Doug or the cats, and concerned because I couldn’t
identify the sound, I left the stove and went to investigate.  I
still don’t know what was making that noise.  Doug was asleep and
the cats were just being cats.  Some items had been knocked to the
floor from shelves in the hallway, so I picked them up and went back to
the woodstove.

That’s when I realized how lucky I was.  I had gone off, leaving
the woodstove open, no burning wood had fallen out onto the carpet and
I hadn’t ignited a creosote fire in the stovepipe.  Lucky, indeed,
which is especially appreciated when I’m so careless and
absent-minded.  My thoughts were running along those lines when I
fell down.  I don’t know how or why I fell.  Things like that
happen when I’m fatigued.  I’m used to it.  I picked myself
up, examined the wound on the heel of my right hand and decided that
first aid for it could wait until I got the stove loaded and shut down.

It was only a scrape, which is lucky because I never did get around to
caring for it.  Something else came up, most likely one of the
cats wanting in or out or Koji demanding a chewy.  If that dog
doesn’t get his rawhide when he needs it, he starts gnawing on the
firewood and furniture.  I don’t recall the order in which the
various additional distractions, hassles and bothers occurred.  I
remember only that the next time I looked at the clock it was about
half past three and I wasn’t in bed yet.  This was fortunate,
because it gave me a chance to stoke the stove one more time before I
went to sleep instead of having to awaken, crawl out of bed, and do
it.  Whew!  Another night survived.

Someone wanted to see my new glasses.  I think it was Ren.  Or, maybe it was Ren. 
Anyway, whoever it was that asked, now you can all see my new bifocals
and as a free bonus you have a closeup of my freckles and the hot pink
nose that indicates a cold day.

I have something to say today, and some pictures to show you from a
walk I took yesterday.  I think you’ll be able to distinguish my
snowy shots of the neighborhood from the pics I stole off the web to
illustrate my text.

The text was elicited by this comment:

The answer is YES!  Emphatically and delightedly I say, yes, Doug
Swingley is back.  The four-time champion had to scratch from the
race in 2004 after freezing his corneas during the crossing of the
Dalzell Gorge, widely reputed to be the trickiest stretch of the
trail.  It was a sad moment when Doug had to fly back to Anchorage
with the Iditarod Air Force that year, sad for him and his fans and for
his fellow-mushers.

Swingley
has the distinction of having finished in the top ten, ninth place, the
first time he ran The Last Great Race.  Some chauvinistic fans
(and Alaskans are probably more chauvinistic than the average American)
were unhappy when this Outsider from Montana started winning the
Iditarod.  I  haven’t heard any of that crap lately,
especially since a foreigner  (two-time champ Robert Sorlie from Norway) started winning.

Doug
Swingley is a charismatic, humorous, and plain-spoken competitor whose
love of dogs may be the most evident thing about him to those of us who
see him only in the media in connection with his racing career. 
In his official Iditarod bio he, “lists his hobbies as dogs, flying and
Melanie,” his wife, musher Melanie Schirilla, who finished third in
this year’s Atta Boy 300 World Cup sled dog race. 

After three wins in a row, Doug Swingley announced his retirement and,
in 2002, took a “victory lap,” a leisurely run of the Iditarod in which
he revisited all the friends he had made on the trail and finished in
fortieth place.  He took a year off, had laser eye surgery, and
came back in 2004 for that disastrous run in which he frostbit his
eyes.  He attributed the frozen corneas to tear duct damage from
the surgery.   In  2005, he raced again even though his
eyesight was very bad.  That year, he finished in fourteenth
place.  Now he has had surgery on his tear ducts.  News
reports say that his corneas are beginning to heal.

Okay, that was the disingenuous (though true) answer.  I know that
spinksy wasn’t asking about Doug Swingley, even though last year when
someone asked him about Rachael Scdoris, the “blind girl” who was
competing for the spotlight but not for the musher trophy, he said
tersely, “She can see better than I can.”

Blind once meant unable to see.  Now, there is a state known as
“legally blind” that refers to vision impaired in certain ways and
within defined parameters.  By that legal definition, my Old Fart
is blind, even though within about an inch and a half of his beautiful
watery eyeball he can see more detail than I can see using a jeweler’s
loupe.  Greyfox’s uncorrected vision is more severely impaired
than Scdoris’s.  The official Iditarod bio again:

Rachael
Scdoris has registered for this year’s Iditarod.  She is listed
again as a rookie because she failed to finish the race last
year.  From her Iditarod bio:  “It has been my plan to race
the Iditarod since I was eight years old,
as it is the biggest and most prestigious sled dog race in the
world.”  That might be true.  Who knows?  I have seen no
indication yet that she intended to “race”, to compete in the race.  By all appearances, last year she was on a book-promotion tour.

She (or her father, there’s some uncertainty about who instigated all
this hoopla) tried to register for the race a year or two before she
actually got in.  They started out demanding that she be allowed
to travel in the company of a “support staff” riding snowmobiles. 
When the Iditarod Trail Committee shot that idea down, and Mr.
Scdoris’s sponsor, a snowmobile dealership, withdrew, so too did the
Scdorises withdraw from the field.

They turned up later with a new plan and invoked the Americans with
Disabilities Act to force the committee to allow Rachael to be
accompanied by another musher to guide her on the trail.  Previous
to that, one musher being helped by another in the race had meant
disqualification.

Rachael’s
keeper in 2005 was Paul Ellering, who had taken 13 days to finish the
race in 2000, entering Nome in 54th place in his rookie year.  He
hadn’t tried it again until the run last year with Ms. Scoris.  It
is unclear whether these two will be joined at the hip again this
year.  In his official bio, Ellering says ambiguously, “Sometimes
you have to see what you got. This year we race!,” confirming what
everyone who saw last year’s race knows, that they were not racing that
time.

In the time leading into the race last year and in the early days of
it, there was speculation about how these two would arrange their
finish, the final run into Nome.  Would the guide-musher drop back
and let Rachael finish ahead of him?  Then the two of them fell
far behind the race leaders very early and speculation turned to how
long it might take them to get to Nome.  Eventually, after it
became apparent that they would not be able to get to Nome within a
week or two after the rest of the pack, we started wondering when they
would give up and go home. 

Feeding
the speculation that Ellering was holding Rachael back, and confirming
the doubts many of us had that she really needed her guide-musher,
several times in the last few days before they dropped out race
standings showed Rachael entering a checkpoint ahead of Ellering. 
Maybe they will be racing separately and really racing this year. 
News on them is scarce.  To the media, they aren’t news. 
Whether Rachael Scdoris can live down her image as a shameless
publicity hound milking a handicap for all it is worth, and become
accepted as a serious dog musher, will depend on how she conducts
herself henceforth.

Our woodpile is looking more like a wood mine now.