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Show first glimmer. After recording the number offish Jerry catches, their length and type, he writes that Jerry told him he had fallen while walking back to the camp and was worried he had maybe cracked a rib. In amongst the Arctic Char comes a hint, like frost, of fragility. As though falling were not worrisome enough, on the morning of the second day, they realize that fuel is running low. My dad does not write this, but I know it is because my uncle overhauled the fuel canisters before they left and did a poor job of it. The irony is bitter, for my uncle was a chemical engineer, a specialist, in fact, in fuels. The founder and editor of what became The Sinor Synthetic Fuels Report, he helped design the first space shuttle in the 80s, worked on alternative fuel sources in the 90s, and finds himself, on July 12, 2003, faced with the knowledge that they are two days into a fourteen day trip and have used half their fuel already. Aidan has not yet been conceived on July 12. His being waits in the universe for a body, and in my journal I remain transfixed by the ordinary in my life: a new puppy that won't behave, a deadline for an essay, heat that has clamped the intermountain west and refused to let go. I mow the lawn, riding the tractor up and down the hill beside our house, and consider calling my mom to make sure my dad has gotten off okay. In my journal I spend a page saying I have nothing to write about. My husband, Michael, and I begin the day by painting the sun porch. By noon the heat is more than we can take and we abandon the project for the cooler reaches of our living room. The day before my father left for Alaska, I chose not to call him to wish him a safe journey. Our last interaction, an argument over a card game, had left me angry and 238 |