"We're home anyway."

Johanna's mom is visiting and while discussing the blizzard outside she said, "It's all right. We're home anyway." I smiled. I remembered.

Johanna's Apa (grandpa) used to say that when the weather got bad. He was already an old man when I met him. Unfortunately he took ill the summer we were to be married. Evan McCarr, always putting his family first, waited and passed away the day after our wedding. Apa died in his own home surrounded by family. The doctor had given him pain pills to help with the cancer quickly spreading through his body, but he never took them and didn't complain. It was a lesson in death I will never forget. Strong. Courageous. Graceful. Beautiful. He died as he lived.

Like I said, I didn't know Apa long and never when he was young and strong. Once he explained moose hunting before the Nushagak river was at its current population levels. Taking out across the tundra on his snowshoes, when he found the right tracks he followed them at a trot. Apa ran in his snow shoes until he reached the moose and eventually brought it to bay. How long did that take? Six hours. Then he would go home, hitch up his dogs, and haul the moose home. Once he told me his five dog team could haul two moose on a twelve foot sled.

Apa's stories were incredible, almost unimaginable, but not uncommon. When the entire village would travel by dog team, one man's job was to run ahead on snowshoes, establish rest stops by lighting camp fires, then continuing on to light another fire and so on until the destination was reached. Johanna has a relative on her grandmother's side that was said to run as fast as a caribou. These men were respected and widely known. They were amazing. Travel to any village in Alaska and you can hear the same stories. The languages would change, but the physical prowess and knowledge of the country (or water) would be the same.

Once I asked Apa how he camped when he traveled with his dogs. "Light a fire and wrap up in a canvas." That's it. Sometimes they were out for long periods traveling perfectly raw country. No checkpoints. No veterinarians. No handlers or food drops. Often long trips employed two men, one dog team, and hundreds of miles. Typically each man took his turn in front of the dog team breaking a trail for the dogs to follow. They traveled and camped in every kind of weather. Bitter cold, driving snow, rain, wind, they dealt with everything imaginable. They had to do it and they did.

So the next time the weather drops to 40 below, a blizzard moves in, the temperature shoots to 115, or it just won't stop raining, don't forget... It's all right. You're home anyway.