Kwethluk

Pronounced Kweeth-luck. It has a sort of ring to it, doesn't it? I understand it is Yupik for "bad river." It will be my new home as of the first of August. I just accepted a position as 7-12th grade English teacher in Kwethluk. It is located in the Lower Kuskokwim School District and is about 15 miles east of Bethel, as the crow flies... but 30 miles via the ice road on the Kwethluk River in the winter months (which also include much of fall and spring as there is currently 5 feet of ice today, April 18).

Other than that, it is cut off from the rest of the world. No roads in or out. It is a fly-in village of just over 700 native Yupik residents. Subsistence is the way of life for these villagers; they spend their summers fishing and putting up Salmon, Moose, Caribou, and Berries of all kinds. Everyone has a 4-wheeler and/or SnoGo (snowmobile). It is a dry community, meaning that alcohol is illegal. That doesn't mean that it isn't there, however. It is a simpler life, a slower pace, not somewhere travelers happen upon by accident.

The school has 200 or so students, K-12. Sarah will have around 15 students in her graduating class. It is a 100% native student population and they speak Yupik as their native tongue. In essence, I will be teaching English as a second language. There is also a possibility for me to teach a Culinary Arts class in the spring and I intend to start a DDF (drama, debate, forensics) program there. Wait!- It gets better... I already have two friends in the district with whom I worked at LCO (Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe School in Hayward, Wisconsin). Ann was the school counselor at LCO and will be my new itinerant counselor at Kwethluk. Rachel taught at LCO when I was there and she now teaches in Quinhagak, so I'll be seeing her at inservices and holidays! How great is that!

From the first moment I met the folks from this School District, I felt at home. Accepting a job was never easier than it was yesterday when the principal, Kevin, called me to offer me the position. It's like a puzzle piece finally fitting together to make the perfect picture. I had someone ask me yesterday, "So, what is your 5-year-plan?" Wow. This is my 5-year-plan. Only now, it has become my August-plan.

My future is on my doorstep. This is the path that will take me to my PhD in Indigeneous Studies and on to be a forerunner in finally designing a native curriculum for bush Alaska that really works. I guess it's time to make a new 5-year-plan, or maybe it's my 15-year-plan. Where do I see myself? I've always seen myself, eventually, in a small cabin buried in the mountains of Alaska, next to a river. Perhaps that path leads directly out of Kwethluk - the 15 miles toward the mountains in the distance. Could it be true? Could dreams really come true? They do. They are. I've never felt more alive - peace and excitement rolled up into a solitary ball of contentment. I am sure of this. This is my destiny. I have found my path. I will skip along it all the way to Kwethluk!

This is what I went to bed looking at last night. Woke up to 5 inches of fresh snow this morning. Yes, it’s April 5th. I love the snow. I really do. If there were no promise of summer, I’d wish for it to keep snowing every day, forever. However, there is a summer and it looms like a great shadow on the horizon. It’s coming closer every day as the days grow longer. We have light until 9:30pm now. As the daylight increases by 6 minutes each day, I can actually feel summer approaching. I can feel it’s breath on the back of my neck during recess duty. I can smell it in the sea spray on the beach. I can even taste it in the freezer burned Halibut that needs to be eaten before this summer’s catch can take its place.

This world. This Alaska. It lives. It breathes. Sometimes I think I can actually feel its chest heave with the heaviness of the rain. The changing of seasons is a living thing here. It’s visible, daily, even hourly, sometimes by the minute. The snow piles up overnight and then drains off the roof in a downpour in the afternoon sun. The moose are growing bolder with each day – closer to calving in May. The bears are leaving their tracks in the spring snow as they emerge from their dens. The mud is growing soft and thick in the parking lots around town. The students are growing restless as they make plans for the impending summer. Whaling in the Arctic is coming to an end as the ice flows begin to break up and villagers make plans to travel to their summer fish camps.

It may still look like Christmas in pictures. But here… here you can feel the change. It’s intoxicating. This place is intoxicating. This place draws one in with its exhilarating seasons. This place is my home. This place is my Alaska. This is what I will go to bed dreaming about tonight.

Spring is trying it's best to get here, but we still get snowflakes almost every day. For every 3 inches that melt, another inch falls. Today, I took Nali out to the beach for a brisk, 38 degree walk. The wind was gusting 30mph with occasional sea spray hitting us and dark clouds on the horizon. But, it was beautiful, as always.

As I consider what to do about next fall, I embrace my life in Homer. As of right now, I don't have a teaching job in the fall. I have toyed with the idea of doing something other than teaching. But, Alas, I AM a teacher. That's just who I am. Teaching opportunities in Homer are sparce and the outlook isn't good.

I don't want to live any closer to civilization, so Kenai or any other city of size is out. I have applied in to the North Slope and Bering Strait school districts. The solitude of the bush tugs at my heartstrings. Barrow has two openings for High School Language Arts teachers. But, isn't that just a compromise?

I have a pre-screening interview with Point Hope (west of Barrow) on Monday. That's more like it. Off the road system. Population 750. Whaling, subsistence community. North of the Arctic Circle. Polar Bears abound.

My mind wanders to these far off places until a gust of wind blows straight through my ears. My headband must have shifted. I adjust my headband as I'm brought spiraling back to my present, look around, and sigh at the beautiful landscape that I yearn to leave behind.