The geese are daring to stay on the beach for a little longer. They seem to stop here on this island for one more party before they fly away home. Don’t cringe, the winter will wait just a little longer. The bay is a shore of sand bordering the wildland. There are three giant, gull occupied rocks that stand out of the water, a smaller island with “an old Indian cave,” and tall evergreens, then ocean and beautiful mountains in the distance. Everything in Alaska is bordered by the ocean or mountains it seems. I speed by this beautiful bay sometimes, most times really. So much in a rush to offload the barge or some other thing that I convince myself I don’t have time to take it in. This time, however…
The “side-by-side” atv sprays wet sand up behind, in front of and onto me. The sky is grey, veiled by rain and fog. I feel like I’m looking at the world through a filter. This time I slow the atv to a crawl, then park it. The rain pelts my face. I may have mentioned this but on the Island, the rain always falls sideways. A day earlier a coworker and I were standing on a grassy bluff overlooking the beach. The wind caused the rain to blow against the bluff and then up into our faces. “It even rains upside down on this goddamn island!” He exclaimed. I replied with a chuckle as water soaked through both of our heavy weather gear.
I drop the window down on the front of the side-by-side and sit for a little. A cancer stick hangs from my lips. I watch the geese as they walk here and there on the bay’s shore. They are not in any hurry to fly when they can walk a few steps. They have thousands of miles to stretch their wings. The breeze blows my longer hair side to side and I realize that on the Island what normally is called wind is just a breeze here. Farther out from the bay the waves are dangerous and beautiful. All things worth it in life are dangerous I think. When we think otherwise we have finally become old.
The grass on the sand dune behind me is whistling to me. It is tall and green. I smell the ocean. I smell the trees. I can smell the life of the Island. Farther back on the Island, the old trees jut up as high as they can, fighting each other to taste the rare ray of sun. The old trees are endangered here now. Climate Change has caused the water to rise against the Island and wash away the shore. In a few years the point will be gone. It loses thirty feet of ground a year. Hundreds of years fall into the water as the roots give way. And the years are washed into nothing more than beach wood. The others that still dare to fight the tide stand as a lost cause, vain sentinels in a decided war.
If one traverses away from the beach and into the wild they will find moss covering the bases of even elder trees. The moss slinks its way up the trunks and past the lower branches, which are dead and unneeded. Higher up, the canopy of needles and branches saves one from most of the rain in the forest. The pine cones and dead leaves on the floor ensure that silent walking is impossible. But the wildlife are not warry of noise as much as they would be somewhere else. Especially the deer. They do not fear men here. For they rarely encounter them.
Even in the greatest of storms on the island once every few hours the clouds wear themselves out and the sun punches its way through. It tells me it is still there. Rainbows appear everywhere on the island and the greedy sand dries out and becomes thirsty again. When the rain stops the wildland explodes into color and I love the rain forest, but mostly so when it isn’t earning its namesake. The crows, stellar jays, seagulls, eagles, and falcons take to the sky for some time and play. But not the geese. They fly out of necessity and they only wish to walk a little more, so they watch the other birds with me.
I sit for a little longer than I should in the atv. The geese waddle around me and make silly noises. A group of them decide unanimously that the beach party is over. They raise as a single entity and begin to circle the beach. Others agree and rise as well. They catch the wind. It is now and never they say and call to each other. So long, my summer birds. They are small in the air, then tiny, then only the horizon.
I start the atv and the other geese who stay for a little longer yell at me. I back up to take the winding trail back to the tents. I drive through the forest and watch the deer do crazy jump-runs alongside me, though at a distance. As the forest breaks into a clearing the sun also does through the clouds. I feel the warmth against me. The forest’s birds take their chance. They fly this way and that in the wind. They call to one another and scuffle above the tree tops. I watch and forlornly hope that maybe things will stay like this forever. But I know the tide cannot be fought for long, the birds will abandon the point, the deer will retreat deeper into island to a more permanent wildland and in time the waves will wash even the bravest sentinel away.
Storied By Josh 