They say if you’re going through hell, keep going. That life begins at the end of your comfort zone, and the only ones for me are the mad ones. That it’s not about waiting for storm to pass, but learning to dance in the rain. And, of course – how can we forget Mr. Wilde? – life is too important to be taken seriously.

So the weight cut-off for most apartments that even allow dogs in San Francisco is 25 pounds. So Cal’s on a venison-blood diet, and we’re taking long hikes in the alpine to drop lbs. It’s kind of like a tri, as we do a swim once we get up there to even things out. He’s dropped ten pounds so far. I’m hoping a good shave of his undercoat will put him over the top and get him to where he needs to be…

Dance like no one is watching, love like you’ve never been hurt. Sing like no one is listening, take no prisoners, and all that jabber. Nevertheless there you are, a good twenty feet above the harbor, on the roof of the Adak. The camera’s rolling. Do you jump?

If there has been an angel fighting alongside us for the life and goodness of the Adak, his name is Mike, and he owns a direct-reversible steel tugboat called the Thunderbird. A boat which actually works and operates as a tugboat. When he’s not towing or not assisting cruiseships, or floating off dead sea lions and advising the Alaskan government on native subsistence, Mike has been selfless with his time and deep knowledge, which he brings to bear upon the woeful Adak. When she wasn’t getting fuel, he figured it out: clogged filter. When the engine block was cracked, JB Weld. And when she flooded, spray it all down with freshwater. Even the electrical box.

They say the ten plagues of Egypt were a divine demonstration of power and displeasure. To show how weak mortals are in the face of god.

Well, we here on the Adak have weathered plagues one and nine – flood and darkness as a result of fire – in the space of a week.

Midway upon the journey of our life,

I found myself within a forest dark,

For the straightforward pathway had been lost. – Dante, Inferno

Sitting here in the Portland Airport, by the window, watching SkyChefs load up an Alaska Airlines plane. Waiting for the red-eye to Atlanta, eating bacon and eggs for some odd reason – then a plane to New Orleans for my buddy Justin’s bachelor party. Then to Philly to do Greensaw work, and then up to NYC to meet with Kent. The Adak is loaded up with renters – god keep them safe and dry. Last guy I had in the fo’c’sle I had to give free nights to, whenever it dripped on his head while he slept. Seemed fair.

She went!

In fact, she went beautifully. With aplomb. Blowing perfect smoke rings along the way, as if to proclaim to the world, and all the folks gathered on the harbor docks — “Really? Truly? You ever doubted me?”

“Life only avails, not the having lived. Power ceases in the instant of repose; it resides in the moment of transition from a past to a new state, in the shooting of the gulf, in the darting to an aim.”

So says Ralph Waldo Emerson. Well, we were sure availing the other day. The harbormaster made it clear that Adak’s welcome on the end-tie of float two was over; the “Mixer,” a fancy-schmancy yacht, was on its way back, and we were being kicked back out to the transient dock – or, what I like to call “the country home.”

It’s that time of the year again! Just as daffodils and groundhogs, cherry trees and robins announce the arrival of spring elsewhere, so the sac roe herring fishery spells the end of winter here in Sitka, Alaska. Boats with names like Storm Chaser, Perseverance, Leading Lady, Defiant and Invincible begin to appear from points north and south, often rafting to the tug. The boat in the picture above is the Invincible, fresh out of the boatyard. Just their seine skiff, covered in snow here, probably costs five times what the Adak cost.

…I was at the Larkspur on a Friday evening having a beer with a couple of friends, half-listening to the stories of this guy getting arraigned for sexual misconduct, this girl who cold-cocked the dude who runs refrigeration out at the processor, feeling sorry for myself with my shoulder all slung up, trying to figure out how to justify all this time writing and away from carpentry, when my phone rings. A Palo Alto number.

So the book is off, thank the lord. Have been fairly holed up for the past month, waking at 5, writing til 8 – breaking only for board games of Settlers, this great new game called Agricola, attending a rally at Crescent Harbor against GMO-modified salmon, and having Ms. Pam Houston make a visit to the Adak – which was a great honor.

Writing now, from this L-shaped couch on Finn Alley, Sitka, I feel like I’m stepping out of the marathon at the tenth mile or so, and stopping. It doesn’t seem right – but I also want to keep this account updated.

From where this desire to burn down our lives and begin again? It is an urge to be resisted.

Small kindnesses tip the balance in favor of toeing the line. The TSA woman in Sitka who makes an exception and drains your water instead of making you go through security again. The flight attendant who – seeing the situation – passes over a free meal. And the woman on a rainy night in Capitol Hill, in Seattle, on a layover, who asks do you, too, smell fried bread in the air?

Well, that whole love thing didn’t work out so hot. Onward.

Finally, here in October, we get our summer. A high pressure system sitting just off the coast; winds come out of the northwest. Cotton candy clouds in the morning which the lowering sun makes short work of. We lose a chunk of the sun each day; it sets further and further to the west. Last night the northern lights pinged, pulses of white-green and occasional pinks. The sea lions move slower in the harbor. Even these summer days tinged with darkness.

August 22nd. Finally, summer has come to Sitka. Dry warm days spent on the deck, scraping, sanding, silvercoating. Painting. Pressure-washing. Sunsets at eleven at night. sun back up at three.

Chris Stock a buddy from Philadelphia came up to take care of his new charge, the Sitka Spruce, an old Air Force rescue boat he bought off Thom and I. We all held our breath as he put her up on the grid.

Something strange afoot chez Adak.

Suddenly the urge to can fish and pickle string beans and rip off the stern port corner to excise rot. To do something about previously-tolerable leaks. Make things warm and waterproof. What flew before flies no more. It might have something to do with a woman leaving her life in Colorado to move here to Alaska.

And the days pass, and the days pass. A job tiling, installing a floor. Cal does his best to help out on site. The boat gets whacked with 45 knots from the southwest – a battle against the leaks. Back goes the plastic onto the wheelhouse.

Work has been good and constant clearing off and rebuilding the woodshed on the island. Boating out there early each morning. Waves slamming the hull of the Crestliner, tying up, sharpening up the chainsaw blades and going at it.

Sometimes things of a heavy nature crash down on us and need to be removed. Waiting for the other shoe to drop. Now that’s a funny one – woken up by one heavy shoe crashing down, and just lying there, waiting for the other shoe to drop. In any case when they happen to drop on us they need first to be de-limbed and then surgically chopped into rounds. Split with a maul. Put in wheelbarrows and stacked. To dry and then eventually heat our fragile bodies over a long winter.