Dreams of the Last Frontier

A few days ago, I was asked if it felt weird to read my Dad’s letters. It took me aback, but it was a good question. My answer was (and is) no. I don’t feel like a voyeur or that I’m peeping into personal thoughts and feelings that I shouldn’t see or share.

Dad was a quiet man, a good man who never hesitated to show his love for his family. To us it was as apparent as the beard on his face and the twinkle in his eye (and, yes, as he got older and whiter, many, many children asked him if he was Santa Clause). He loved us unconditionally. He also loved Alaska unconditionally. And he was proud to say it out loud.

His letters say it out loud. From them, you can feel the struggle he went through to find a decent job, while desperately missing his family. His struggle to get us up there with him, to provide a home and a secure financial future. He did manage most of those things, except for the financial part. He eventually got a good job in the Civil Service, but we always lived one paycheck away from financial disaster. And, although—spoiler alert—he never got his log cabin, he absolutely loved living at the base of Pioneer Peak (the beautiful mountain across the road from our house). I remember him going out in the mornings, cloudy, sunny, rain or snow, and looking up at the mountain, taking in deep lungsful of the sweet, clean air.

His dreams about Alaska and what she would provide were as big as the land itself, but she never really came through in that way. The way she did provide was in letting him be content in a place he loved with his family in a warm, sometimes leaky, but safe home. Luckily for him (and us) Mom came to love Alaska as much as he did, and so we grew up in a happy, loving home. One with its own set of unique trials and tribulations, but in the wild land he loved so much. In that way Alaska gave him everything. Dad followed his dreams to the last frontier and gave us everything.