July 30-31: Gustavus to Slana, AK (Part 2)
The guy driving the bus that took us back to Skagway was really funny and even Benny liked him. It was interesting that our passports were required, but then again, we were passing into and out of Canada. We were back in Skagway about 11:30 and then walked for several hours in the amazing crowds of people, most of whom came from the two cruise ships that were docked practically in the middle of the small town.
Lev asked me, “Would you ever take a cruise?”
I chuckled. “Lev, my life was going to be one giant cruise for a while.”
“You were going to be in the Navy, I get that. I mean a cruise, cruise. As a vacation.”
“If you are talking about the Caribbean? Nope. Now if you are talking about the Med then yeah. I could take Benny to all the places we watch in documentaries on travel and just … places. Italy, Greece, Malta, Turkey …”
“Turkey?! You’re a woman!”
“Relax. I’m not talking about in-country. But seeing Ephesus and places like that would be cool.”
“Oh. I forget you were raised by people that went to church.”
I paused and then asked, “Is that a problem?”
“Huh? No. Definitely not. It just isn’t all that common these days.”
I suppose in his experience that was true. Meemo had mentioned there were fewer and fewer “young people” in her church that was my old church. Seems crazy. Lawrence insisted that Penny take Benny to church when he wasn’t there to do it. We went to the little community church around the corner from the apartment complex. My shipmates and cadet-mates and I always went to “chapel” as part of our activities at camp and that sort of thing. Makes me feel bad that I haven’t kept that up. Maybe I should. I liked church when I was a kid. Some of the kids didn’t necessarily like me but that was a different issue; I could be rough on people. And some people from the community church helped us get through the initial stages of when Lawrence didn’t come home. I wonder if I ever told them how much I appreciated that. Is it too late to at least send a note? Sigh. I know I count on that part of my “upbringing” for comfort and direction. I might not come right out and say it, but I know who the Creator is and all the rest of it. I want Benny to have that same confidence. What to do, what to do. This raising a kid isn’t nearly as easy as you’d think it would be.
Speaking of Benny Little Bear, Lev managed to find another surprise for him. This one I whole-heartedly agreed with. The Klondike Gold Rush National Historic Park is one of the most different of the national parks that we’ve been to. I mean Benny and I have hit most of them and this one still stood out for being different. It’s basically a building in the middle of Skagway. If not for the “park theme” paint job and the huge NPS sign I’m not sure most people would even notice it. And those that do mostly just walk in, wander about for a few minutes, then walk out. Benny got to do most of the junior ranger activities right on site. And yes, even with it being last year a couple of the rangers on duty remembered “Aunt Gus and Little Bear.” They played the “guess who this is” photo game with Benny and I facing away from the camera while the rangers faced the camera. Even before we left, they were getting hits on their intranet post.
We were about to leave when one of the rangers walked up to Lev and asked a question, got a handshake and a nod.
Back outside I asked, “What’s up?”
“Rick says hello.”
“Rick.” Then it clicked, “You mean Rick Royston? He was moving to Costa Rica to be with his uncle and Rosa.”
“He said he is back in the States and to drop him a line.”
“
You drop him a line.”
Lev looked like he didn’t know how to respond for a moment before asking, “Er … you mad at him or something?”
“No. But I don’t want there to be any question that …” I stopped, embarrassed, and shrugged. To try and put it into words I added, “Chain of command. He wants an email you can do it. Is that the quilt shop your friend’s aunt works in?”
Lev took the change in subject with more grace than I did it with. I’ll be honest, I don’t know if I ever liked Rick or not. I think I did, but we never could get out of the friends lane and I’m glad we didn’t. I may not have made up my mind about Lev but I most definitely have about Rick and don’t want there to be any misunderstandings all the way around. If he is back in the states then … whatever. I’m tired of being confused and refuse to play the game. Maybe it is just a simple “hi” but he has my email and can contact me directly.
Not long afterwards Lev steered us away from the quilt shop – wouldn’t Lev drop his teeth if he knew that I can quilt (at least some easy stuff) courtesy of Grandma Barry and Meemo – and towards a huge shop. A souvenir shop. We spent a ridiculous amount of time in a giant souvenir store on one end of the main drag. Benny found t-shirts, in the same style, for all of us. Matching hats as well.
I started to say, “Benny …”
But for whatever reason Lev thought that was fantastic. We have not one, not two, but three sets of matching t-shirts … and two hats each.
“Lev …” I started to say, for all the good it did.
“C’mon. This’ll be great! Everyone will know we’re together,” he said with a huge grin that I was just not willing to dim.
“Fine. But stop spoiling us like this.”
He just kept grinning. “I’ll do it if I want to,” he said almost mulishly.
All I could do is whisper, “Please
don’t teach that phrase to Benny. If I catch him saying it, your life might be forfeit.”
“Er … sure thing Gus. We’ll use our indoor manners won’t we Benny?”
Benny snickered and said, “That’s indoor voice. Aunt Gus wants us to use church manners.”
“Ooops.”
They both snickered and all I could do was roll my eyes and say, “Guys, not completely seeing the humor here.”
They tried. I’ll give them that. They were both just too pumped up with fun. Under my breath I muttered, “See if you two get any more sweets for the next few weeks. I swear you are so wound up.”
An older lady in there beside me chuckled and said, “Hate to break it to you, but they never grow up.”
Grateful that someone understood I sighed and said, “Now you tell me.”
She and a couple of other women standing there all laughed. It gave me a funny feeling for other people to look at Lev, Benny, and I and see a family group. For some stupid reason my heart started racing and I felt like I was close to having an anxiety attack. I wonder what in the heck that means.
Lev wasn’t finished with his shopping. Socks. More of the craziest, garish socks you can imagine. Apparently themed socks are sexy. I mean, okay the socks with the northern lights design were kinda nice. The fireweed pattern socks were even nice in a girly kinda way. Wolves and grizzlies might even be considered manly. But will someone please explain to me how wearing salmon on your feet is “sexy”? I mean seriously. And all I could do was laugh. Lev can be such a nut case. He has the most bizarre taste in socks and T’s. The first ones he wore when we met in Florida were just ridiculous. But Benny loved it and was always trying to figure out what the joke was. When he did, it made his day. And Lev’s as well, which may be why he was doing it.
He insisted on getting me a long-sleeved sleep shirt that said, “Otterly Exhausted.” Benny thought it was hysterical. I think this was Lev’s way of telling me he realized too late that me sleeping in a spaghetti-strap T maybe wasn’t the wisest thing and that he should have warned me. But knowing how “cheap” I could be I “fixed” it by wearing a hoodie to bed.
I figured if he could do it then I could do it and I replaced the thermal cup that someone in the Team had “borrowed” and then “lost.” I made sure that this one would fit in the cupholders in the van because the other one hadn’t.
“You don’t have to …”
“Don’t even start Lev. Benny and I haven’t even had to touch any of the per diem because you’ve been picking up the tab for groceries and everything else.”
“Er …”
“I’m not cheap … I’m thrifty. And you need this. And if you can buy me a sleep shirt, unless you want me to pick up a pair of shorts for you with chili peppers on them, I suggest you simply accept the cup gracefully.”
Big Ear Benny of course wanted to know why Lev would wear underwear with chili peppers on them and asked the question a notch above indoor voice. Lev had to walk away. I thought he was horribly embarrassed at first, but he was laughing and didn’t want to have to explain why.
I rolled my eyes and told Benny, “Can’t be worse than the socks with pizza slices on them.”
“But those are cool.” He shrugged and gave it up as some type of weird adult thing and started looking at more weird socks.
A heard snickering and a giggled, “Good save.” I glanced over and there was a girl there hanging up t-shirts.
“They always hear what you don’t want them to.”
“My sister says the same thing,” she said still giggling.
I pushed the buggy towards a stack of boxes of drinks. Lev rarely drank, not even beer, but I wondered if he wanted to. The problem is most beers have gluten in them. I know there are some gluten-free beers because Penny of all people found a list of them online. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the list on hand which made me wonder if wine had gluten in it. I know Lev likes the occasional glass, and wine by itself is gluten-free though it can get cross-contaminated during the winemaking process if you aren’t careful. I guess I need to look up what liquors are gluten-free. I’ll ask him if he wants to drink and get him to understand he doesn’t have to abstain just because I do.
Lev came back with a couple of sets of ceramic coasters in his hand. “I usually try and bring back a few easy ‘gifts’ for whomever is at the house when I pass through.”
I shrugged. “I’ll find room for them.”
“Nah. I’ll just need to pack them and ship them to my Drop Spot.”
“You’re what?”
“I travel so much that it is just easier to have everything shipped to one location … mail, boxes, supplies, all the yada yada you accumulate when you travel. I stop there between assignments and go through it and decide what stays, what goes, and where to store it long term.”
“Your uncle doesn’t do it for you?”
“Uh uh. I don’t like people in my business.”
“Oh.”
“Er … that didn’t come out exactly how I meant it. I mean I don’t …” He stopped and sighed. “I just … I mean I know how this sounds. I just don’t like involving my family in parts of my life.”
I blinked. I hadn’t considered that.
“Let me explain it another way. Your brother, Benny’s dad, could trust you to take care of his business while he was away. And some of it was pretty … personal … because his wife just wasn’t able to do that stuff.”
“Yeah. Pretty much. He taught me.”
“Well, I don’t have anyone like that. My sister and I … like I said we get along better from a distance. My sorta cousin … you met him … Kenny who is James Lee’s dad, I’m just not comfortable with him knowing my business. We’ve never been close enough for that.”
“I thought you said next to your Uncle Cyrus that he was your closest family member.”
“He is. But that don’t necessarily mean I want him knowing my business.”
“O…kay.”
“And Uncle Cyrus already … look, I just don’t have anyone like your brother had you. I know you say he raised you and trained you to do it … mostly because of Benny and all … but that’s just not something …” He shrugged.
I felt bad that he’d gotten the wrong impression. “Hey, I’m not knocking you for how you feel. I just didn’t know. I thought your uncle or cousin would have stepped up. You let them use that land and everything.”
“It isn’t necessarily that I let them, it is the way my grandfather’s will was written. Uncle Cyrus and his sister have life estates on the property. Even if I wanted to sell the property I couldn’t until they are both gone. I’d also have to buy out my sister though she only has a one percent interest and she’d have to give approval of the sale and frankly I don’t know if she would. She can be weird about our mutual family stuff. I was still pretty young when my father …” He stopped and looked over to see that Benny was looking at the snacks and trying to see if any were gluten-free. “… died. My sister was a pre-teen and it messed her up. The part of his estate that went to her was used so she could go away to some private school out near my mother’s people where she lived until she got out of college. She pretty much spent it all on education and the rest on her wedding which was a pretty big deal because of who her husband’s people are. Mine – because Mom wasn’t allowed to touch it – sat accruing interest. I didn’t know it growing up, but my grandfather would put money in the account for me every summer that I came and helped him out. I never knew any of that until he passed away. My sister got real … look, she just wasn’t happy and Mom was bent the guardian ad litem had kept that from her as well.”
“You had a guardian ad litem? But what about your grandfather … and uncle?”
“It is how my dad’s brother set it up so Mom wouldn’t get any of his estate during probate.”
“Wait … uh …”
“I told you my family tree was weird. My dad’s brother was named Denson … I called him Uncle Denz … and was way older than my father had been. From my grandfather’s short-lived, underaged first marriage.”
“Er …”
“He died when I was nine. He was okay but he never married and …” Lev shrugged. “Family. It is what it is for some of us.”
“Okay. Sorry if I brought up bad memories.”
“Naw. Not bad just … in the past. This is the present. So, just to let you know if you want to send anything back to the States for storage you can send it to the Drop Point.”
“Good to know and thanks. But … since Benny and I already have a bunch of junk I will have to eventually go through and since we don’t have a place to go after all of this is done, and since all good things must come to an end at some point …”
“Why?”
“Why what?
“Why do good things have to end?”
I shrugged, “Because in my experience they always do.”
Benny walked up with a sour look on his face, giving me an out from a conversation that had turned uncomfortable.
“What’s up?” I asked.
“All the snacks have gluten in them.”
“I take it you assumed I was going to buy some junk just ‘cause it was gluten free.”
He knew he’d been caught but was smart enough to say, “Wellll, mostly I thought Lev might want something. He was looking for chips yesterday.”
“Uh huh,” I said just looking at him.
He wrinkled his nose and said, “Anyway, all of it has gluten stuff. I read the ingredients and some of it I don’t know what it is, but I can tell when it says wheat and the other stuff we aren’t supposed to have. Even the gummy worms.”
“That’s some tragedy right there. How about you help me to keep Lev on the straight and narrow and not spoil us. I mean will you look at this basket?!”
Benny was easily distracted, and he did indeed help me to keep Lev from buying too much junk. Until it came to some mini-block building sets.
“Aunt Gus has a bunch of those.”
“She has a bunch of what?” Lev asked.
“The mini-Lego stuff. The Umpire State Building was the last one she worked on in Key West.”
“Empire, not umpire,” I told him. “And don’t …” From the corner of my eye I saw Lev make a move. “Lev!”
“Why didn’t I know you liked Legos?”
“Put those back.”
“No,” he said sounding like an obstinate two-year old. “They’re small and won’t take up much room. Or we can ship them back in my box and you’ll have something to look forward to.”
“Lev … I try not and give into that too much. When I was younger …”
Benny told Lev, “We had to put all her blocks in storage except for a box of little ones and the Umpire Building when we moved to Key West.”
“Empire, not umpire I told you. And adults don’t play with legos.”
Lev was not helping. “Sure they do. I have a cousin that has a house full of big ones, mostly Star Wars, Star Trek, and the robot ones.”
I have no idea how long the “discussion” would have continued except that Lev wouldn’t listen or participate. Every time I tried to bring it up he would just go la-la-la. Seriously he would stick his fingers and his ears and go, “La-la-la.” Benny thought it was funny. Me? Not so much. I now have a box of humpback whale pieces in the van and in a box on its way to Las Vegas … which is where the drop point is … is a grizzly, an eagle, and a moose. Now if I can just keep the hamster from going all OCD. The whale has 471 pieces which isn’t a gazillion but will keep my hands and brain busy for a bit. Argh. This has got to stop. Lev keeps telling me he is “flush” and not to make a big deal out of it, but I am and will. He won’t stay “flush” if he keeps this up.
Back at his friend’s aunt’s place I went over the van stem to stern … changed the oil, checked the brakes, checked all the rest of the fluids and filters and topped off and changed as necessary from the inventory of spares I had on hand. To say thank you I did the same to the aunt’s ancient Ford Bronco made back before all the stupid computers and regulating chips. It was a rolling (and well-used) museum piece. With the sun staying up as long as it does, I didn’t realize how late it was getting until Lev stuck a bowl of venison stew in my grease covered hands.
“What time is it?!” I asked as my stomach surprised me with a growl.
“Ha! I knew it. It’s almost 9 o’clock.”
“Crap! I didn’t mean for you to have to cook.”
“I didn’t. Bishop doubles as a short order cook when he isn’t helping his aunt or working on a fishing boat, and he wanted to try a new recipe out. And don’t make with the face. I donated some ingredients to the cause, bought a case of beer from the Anchorage Brewing Company, and helped cook and clean up. Now your turn. Eat. How close are you to finishing?”
After getting over the fact that someone was looking after me instead of the other way around, I asked, “Where’s Benny?”
“Winding down after taking a shower. Boy is that kid proud of all that Junior Ranger stuff he has.”
“Yes, he is. Thank you. And I just need to check the oil one more time to make sure that I found the gasket that was leaking and got it sealed. She had all the parts, just no one to put the puzzle together.”
“Bishop is good at a lot of stuff but cars isn’t one of them. His brother – who is good at that stuff – is working the oil fields right now. You did a good turn helping her out like this. The Bronco is the only vehicle she has and as you can see there isn’t exactly a lot of car lots around here.”
I shrugged. “She’s nice. And she even dried the tarp and tent which I forgot to do.”
“Yes she is and yes she did. Now eat before it gets cold. I’m going to help auntie pour Bishop into bed and then that’s where we need to be going.”
“Aye aye, Admiral.”
He grinned because he knew I was playing but in a sense, maybe not. Very weird feeling to be so comfortable with someone that I knew I didn’t have to be completely “on” and the only one thinking 24/7/365.
[1] View: https://youtu.be/5Z5-5xLGsk0
