Time and Space

I'm back home from my Alaska adventures. But – the reason I'm late today – I'm experiencing a slow transition back to every day life. It's rather odd because my body and mind seemed to be lagging behind – back in place, but not quite there yet.

It began when I opened the front door to my house late last Thursday afternoon. The quality of the light seemed off. Even when I raised the blinds, the light seemed not quite right. The rooms seemed to have shrank a bit in my absence – except for the bathroom which now seemed larger, but I automatically stepped up as I had been doing for a week in my cruise ship cabin.

I put this distortion of light and space down to the fact that I'd been up at three a.m. that morning to catch a flight from Vancouver, Canada to Albany. And over the course of the past two weeks, I had changed time zones a couple of times. And I'd come from jacket weather, including hat and scarf to Albany, in the midst of a September hot spell.

But here it is a week later, and I am still a little sleepier than usual. Still trying to catch up with the world that went along without me for two weeks – although I did occasionally check my email. Undoubtedly, over the weekend, I will make the transition and by next week I will be back in the rhythm of my life. But I wonder if this isn't a bit of psychological resistance – the need to hold on to what I loved about the wilderness of Alaska. To remember white-water rafting and riding horseback in a rain forest.

I think there is a story here about stepping out of one’s daily life and then coming back – about a character who is gone for a longer period of time, who does resist settling in again. I'll have to give it a bit of thought. Meanwhile, here are photos taken as I was standing on a glacier. I was a bit hesitant about getting into a helicopter for this ride, but the friend I was traveling with convinced me. It was awe-inspiring.

This photo doesn't capture the awesomeness of a glacier. Here's a crevice in the glacier that was quite deep and a little scary. There is a name for it, but I had on my gloves and no pen at hand to write it down.