|
 |
|
|
Friday, Sep 05, 2008
|
|
|||||||
|
|
|||||||
|
Gone North with dogs |
|
.jpg) |
|
| Gone North with dogs | |
| by Rev. Barbara Allen, CMP -
SGN Contributing Writer "Oh Lord, help me be the person my dogs think I am." Mary Shields book: Sled Dog Trails, begins with poetry in prose: (Chapter 1 - I Want to Go Back) "I may have picked it up while drinking from a small mountain stream in the Chugach Mountains. I may have inhaled it while breathing the ancient winds blowing in from the glaciers across from Homer. Perhaps I digested it with some blueberries gathered from the tundra near Bethel, or it may have infected my eyes while squinting out at McKinley from Fairbanks. I don't even know when I first became aware of the symptoms, but as I stood there alone in the center of the parade grounds at old Fort Chilkat, waiting for the ferry to begin my journey back to Wisconsin, I knew I had been permanently enchanted by the North. "Speaking to the stars, I recited some lines from Robert Service: It's the great, big, broad land 'way up yonder, It's the forests where silence has lease; It's the beauty that thrills me with wonder, It's the stillness that fills me with peace. There's a land - oh, it beckons and beckons, And I want to go back-and I will." Mary was 21 years old. Her life was about to change." She returned to Alaska to work for Camp Fire Girls summer programs and afterwards found a place to live in the Fairbanks area, a shed, paying her rent with babysitting. Varied jobs helped provide necessities. Mary had the space and time youth needs to consider life and the world. It was 1966. Her answers seemed to come from the wilderness. She decided to live in a cabin the railroad had abandoned between Anchorage and Fairbanks, her closest neighbors were over two miles away, the nearest community, Gold Creek, was about 13 miles South. It was rustic and primitive, but the beaver pond and view of Mt. McKinley (now Denali) made up for that (after she cleaned away the prior uninvited furry four footed "residents and squatters" and dirt). Friends loaned her an old freight sled and three sled dogs, which arrived by train along with 50 lb. sacks of dog food. She learned about sled dogs by trial and error that winter as she lived with three free-spirited northern dogs. Sledding alone in the Alaskan wilderness was the greatest adventure she'd ever known. Spring brought a litter of six black puppies, all but one of which went to new homes. One chubby roly-poly silly looking male she'd affectionately named "Cabbage" somehow wound up back with her each time she tried adopting him out. Finally, this part Labrador comedian stayed. As time passed, Mary became the first woman to finish the 1,049 mile Iditarod Sled Dog Race. In international racing, she and her team ran in the Yukon Quest and the Hope Race from Alaska to Siberia. After she broke through the "ice ceiling," two other women won the Iditarod! More than competition, Mary enjoys the pure pleasure of long spring trips with her dogs, exploring the wild country of Alaska and meeting people who live in "bush" communities. On these month long sled vacations, she carries a 12 day supply of food, sending additional supplies ahead to villages&which welcome her arrival. Her sensitive, highly recommended book: Sled Dog Trails is worth reading. Learn more about this and other media at www.maryshields.com. Arriving at her home in the woods, one is greeted warmly by Mary and the aroma of freshly baked homemade cookies, a specialty of hers, which she serves to guests along with tea or coffee, as they visit around a hand-crafted round wooden table in her dining room. The handsome, immaculately clean log cabin was hand built of scribe-matched logs 15" in diameter, 28' x 28'. All windows are triple pane thermals. It's an inviting place into which she welcomes small tour groups of up to 10 people per evening, who get a tour of her vegetable and flower garden, meet Mary's team of huskies; pet them; take keepsake photos; laugh at the healthy, hearty dogs romping together in the dog yard as Mary talks about the husky breed (not purebreds) and about some of her training experiences and techniques. Relaxing and enjoying light refreshments in her sunny log cabin home, guests learn about her racing, mushing, and life in Alaska as she shares the small wonders, simple gifts, and joys of her adventures. Visits with her have been lauded as one of Interior Alaska's most rewarding experiences; she's listed in Alaska Best Places published by Sasquatch Books, which said: "Mary Shields may be a wonderful storyteller, but her sled dogs are the stars of the show". Her garden is fully fenced to keep out hungry moose who may pass by. Raspberries are grown atop her cabin's sod roof for the same reason. Veggies in her garden and in those of many Alaskans include: Cabbage hybrids from UAF (University of Alaska Fairbanks), which may grow to 45 lbs. (she puts a salmon head under each one for fertilizer); zucchini's, cauliflower, dwarf curly kale, snap peas, beets, romaine lettuce, Yukon gold potatoes, and flowers for the soul. Many Alaskans, particularly those who love dogs, live on their own forested acreage and have similar protected vegetable gardens. Somewhere during the course of my visit with her, I recall a quote from Thoreau's Walden: "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion." The short epilogue concluding Mary's book reads: "So now you have listened to my heart and you know where my dreams take me. Each spring when the clearest blue sky calls and the sun arcs a little higher each day, my path will lead out to where there is no trail. Lucky stars, my good dogs and& warm companionship have allowed me to know the wonders of that trail. These pages are my attempt to share those wonders with you and to encourage you to listen to your own heart and follow your own trail. You don't even need a dog team." When in the Fairbanks area, make reservations to visit with her. Thank you Mary Shields for sharing your path with us. |
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 post your own information on the Seattle Gay Blog |
copyright Seattle Gay News - DigitalTeamWorks 2007