Five years

(Photo of my backyard in Homer, Alaska, on November 2, 2005)

Wednesday, November 2, 2005. The hum of mountain bike tires on wet pavement lulled me into gray daydreams — flickers of my cold concrete office, the puzzle pieces of newspaper design, an interview with an artist — set against a backdrop of a steep hillside dotted with log cabins and Tyvek-coated shacks. My commute. Behind me, Kachemak Bay was shrouded in clouds, but still sparkling beneath a far-reaching finger of pink sunshine. I turned off West Hill and continued churning up the gravel of Diamond Ridge. It was only 4:30 p.m. and already daylight was fading. I rose above snow line and watched my front tire carve treaded tracks through a dusting of powder, which became deeper as I climbed. I had never ridden a bicycle through snow before. I was struck by the sudden silence; the snow muffled my tires and resisted my pedal strokes, until the entire world seemed to dissolve in a slow-motion dream. I exhaled. My frozen breath swirled in front of my face like silk curtains. I turned onto my side street and sliced through the powder, past the moose tracks, past the horse whose long hair was speckled in snowflakes, toward my own large single-room cabin in the woods, high on the bluff above Homer, Alaska.

I had lived there just over seven weeks, and was still completely awed by my surroundings: the sparkling bay, the snow-capped Kenai Mountains, the ash-belching volcanoes, the quirky downtown buildings and cobbled-together cabins. I pulled my bike up the porch and looked out over my backyard. The view was absolutely jaw-dropping — rolling hillsides of spruce trees and alder blanketed in snow, all framed by the white mountains. I went inside and fished through several drawers until I found my camera, a cheap 2.1-megapixel Fuji digital that I acquired when I decided to move to Alaska. After all, you really shouldn't move to Alaska without a camera. I had only taken a handful of pictures so far — mostly of the amusingly vintage furniture we purchased at local garage sales to fill the spacious single room and loft, of my cat stalking voles in the tall fireweed, and the crumbling outhouse in the front yard. But the wintry scene demanded photography, even low-tech amateur photography. I snapped one or two shots and went inside to warm my numb fingers and toes.

Later that night, I sat down to send a few e-mails to my family and friends. I muddled for words to describe everything that was happening — new job, new partnership, new life in a place that in nearly every way was worlds away from the life I knew before. “Today I rode my bike in the snow,” I typed in the subject line, and fired off my picture to the people I loved and missed.

“I really need to start a blog,” I said to my then-partner. “It’s hard to keep up with e-mails.”

“You mean Bike to Shine?” he asked, referring to the blog I kept to document our Alaska road trip and cross-country bicycle tour in 2003.

“No,” I said. “I already shut that site down. I need an Alaska blog. One where I can keep in touch with everyone and post pictures at the same time.”

I returned to the computer and set up a new account with Blogger.com. I scrolled through the templates and picked the cool blue hues that reflected my snowy location. I chose the url “Arctic Glass” because the phrase evoked sheets of ice on the ocean and the glistening silence of frozen tundra. It was also how I once misinterpreted a line from the Modest Mouse song “Grey Ice Water.” From the lyrics of that song, I also chose the name of my blog: “You got a job … Up in Alaska … It’s easy to save what the cannery pays cause there ain’t no way to spend it.”

The next day, I typed up my introductory post and announced my new blog’s existence to all of my family and friends. “I’m going to update it in lieu of the mass e-mails I’ve been sending,” I wrote. “Expect lots more pretty pictures of Alaska, which I hope will convince you all to come visit me in Homer.” I didn’t know if anyone would read it. I didn’t know that a scattering of early comments from strangers would ease me into Alaska’s widely dispersed winter cycling community. I didn’t know I would discover a race called the Sustina 100 and decide to use my blog as a training log. I didn’t know that readers’ financial support and encouragement would boost me through the completion of my first race ever — ultra or otherwise. I didn’t know that readership would continue to grow as I documented my ongoing discoveries in Alaska. I didn’t know that support would stay when I made the difficult decision to move to Juneau. I didn’t know my interest in photography would expand from nearly nonexistent to a daily habit. I didn’t know that I would continue to turn to the blog as a cathartic and creative outlet. I couldn’t anticipate the way my relationships with friends and family would enrich and grow in the way they did, because I had never before found such an effective way to communicate what was going on with me. I had no concept of the way tracking my training in a public forum would propel me to get out even when training was the last thing I wanted to do. I couldn’t foresee the way this self-fulfilling cycle would propel me to success in undertakings such as the 350-mile Iditarod race and the 2,700-mile Tour Divide — endeavors that on November 2, 2005, would have seemed wholly ridiculous and impossible to me. I didn’t know this public forum would introduce me to an array of new people, several of whom became some of my closest friends. I didn’t know I would generate 1,276 posts over five years, an extensive record of a half decade of my life. I didn’t know the blog would see the dissolution of everything that sparked it — living in a quirky cabin in Homer, my training logs, my partnership, and even my life in Alaska — and still continue to develop and grow. I didn’t know that ~2,000 people would click into it daily, drawing a small but substantial pool of like-minded people from all around the world.

(Photo of my current "backyard" - Missoula as seen from the top of Mount Sentinel at 7:33 p.m. November 1, 2010)

I didn’t know that this blog would change my life. But I’m grateful for every facet of it. Happy fifth anniversary, Arctic Glass, and thanks to everyone who’s joined me for any part of the journey.

Halloween

Recently, there haven't been nearly enough hours in the day to catch up on sleep, let alone the blog. There are entire essays I'd love to write about the swirl of activity and plans in the past few weeks, but for now a scattered photo post will have to suffice.

This weekend Beat came out to visit me in Montana. On Friday night we headed out for a "quick" mountain bike ride to try out brand-new super-high-beam headlights (possible review to come, if I have time, but not in this post.) Compared to my former usage of various combinations of low-end headlamps, these lights made night-riding seem as natural and easy as riding during the day, although they do remove some of the mystery and excitement of riding with limited visibility. It was one of those situations where we frittered away an entire evening and didn't even go out until after 10:30 at night. I said "OK, we'll ride 10 miles," which turned into the whole Kim Williams trail, which was passively extended to the Deer Creek Sneak, which the lead to necessary singletrack explorations on the Sam Braxton Trail, and before we knew it we had a two-and-a-half hour, ~25-mile ride ending at 1 a.m. This seems to be an early sign that Beat and I make a uniquely dangerous combination — alone, I usually talk myself out of my own unreasonable ideas. But when someone else comes along and adds a voice convincing enough to make these ideas appear reasonable, there's really nothing to stop the cycle of sleep deprivation, outlandish endeavors, and taking already overreaching steps just one step farther.

Anyway, that's why we overslept on Saturday and headed up to Kalispell later than hoped. My friend Dave recently moved to these northern climes, and we met up in the late morning with the express purpose of searching for snow. None of us thought we'd find much. I even left my snowboard at home, because I decided that I didn't want to ride it through bushes and rocks. We headed up to Big Mountain ski resort in Whitefish, and discovered a few fresh inches right at the base.

A couple thousand feet higher, there were dozens of inches of fresh heavy powder, and stunning views to go with it. Was I disappointed that I left my snowboard at home? A little, but the truth is I don't really care. I relish the climbing more anyway, and I actually really enjoy trying to run down 30-degree slopes of bottomless powder, possibly more than I enjoy carving clunky turns on my board. Last winter I was all about learning how to ski (with only limited success.) This winter I have more ambitious athletic goals, but I do plan to work toward becoming more avy-savvy, and also to continue to boost my beginner mountaineer skills by hiking/running snowy mountains.

It was a beautiful October day at Big Mountain, with intermittent fog and glaring sun, and lots of skiers, jump-building snowboarders and not a small number of snowshoers. It really warms my heart to see so many people out enjoying the early-season snow on snowshoes. When I was younger, cultural obsessions with gear and technical skills essentially drove me away from winter sports and all of the beauty and rewards outdoor winter travel has to offer. I fall into a rare group that really just wants to be outside, without the pressure of shredding mad pow with truck-fulls of shiny expensive gear. Snowshoes open up a much wider world to people with limited skills and resources. Of course, you can argue that winter cycling is just as, if not more, gear-intensive as skiing. That may be true, but I think we all find our niche, and I'm no longer ashamed to face the all-encompassing ski culture that surrounds me and declare my love of snowshoeing, even as nearly all of my friends complain that it's boring and slow.

Beat had also never tried snowshoeing before ... or really any winter sport to much extent. (Beat: "I grew up in Switzerland and never skied." Me: "I grew up in Utah and never skied!" Aw, so much in common.) He found snowshoeing to be marginally fun when marching up steep inclines through knee-deep powder off trail, but not tolerable on the boot-packed trail. He eventually took them off and ran full-speed downhill, carrying the snowshoes like lunch trays in both hands.

Dave, on the other had, looked like he was having a fantastic time on skis. Here he is, apparently posing for a Patagonia ad circa 1992.

Here's my imaginary ad pose. Deuter backpacks: Go-to gear for the extreme snowshoer. (Oh yeah, I forgot that snowshoeing is supposed to be super lame. Oh well. The dangling fleece jacket would preclude use of this photo as a product placement anyway.)

There Dave goes again, ripping it up on skis, making the rest of us look bad.

The real reason for heading up north was Danni's annual Halloween extravaganza. At the bottom of my enormously overstuffed list of duties was finding a Halloween costume, and I hadn't completed it yet as of Friday night. While Dave and his wife, Meredith, came up with brilliant adaptations of characters from the Rollergirl movie "Whip It," I could only dig up a pair of mega-short shorts, cut up a T-shirt, pull on a couple of wrist sweatbands and call myself an "'80s jogger." I talked Beat into wearing his Google kit (Ha ha, I'm a runner and he's a cyclist, get it? No? Oh well.) Beat couldn't quite settle for that lame excuse for a couple's costume, so he donned a blaze orange cap and explained to everyone that he was a "Trail scout for Google Maps, trying to blend in with the Montana hunting community." Then, people would look inquisitively at me, waiting for my extensive story. "Um, I'm a jogger," I'd say, and then bend my elbows and knees in a jogging pose. They'd politely nod and look away, waiting for the conversation to return to Danni's "Sexy Ewok" costume.

Snow, costumes and candy. Could you really ask for a better holiday?

Riding to snow

"22 degrees!" Bill called out, as though a temperature rise of 1 degree was the best news of the night. His headlight beam cast a streaming glow on the whitewashed forest, starkly framed against the black sky. Trees wore new snow like children in oversized dresses, bewildered by the heavy formality of winter. I clenched my numb fingers inside my mittens and pressed my palms against the handlebars. A fountain of fine powder streamed from Bill's rear wheel. I shifted my shoulders in an attempt to follow his line. Once powder is six inches deep or more, you don't so much ride a bike as surf with it, feathering the handlebars and gently shifting your weight as the wheels slice through the swift current. The rear wheel was swept sideways and my mountain bike fishtailed wildly through the snow. I pressed the brakes and righted it, then veered away from Bill, who was fishtailing himself. I blinked against the weight of ice frozen to my eyelashes. City lights sparkled in a distance far below.

"What are you doing tonight?" Bill wrote to me eight hours earlier.

"I brought my mountain bike to work, so probably a bike ride," I wrote back.

"Where to?" he asked.

"I don't know. I kind of want to ride to the snow."

Snow had fallen in the mountains just outside Missoula over the weekend. It was the first significant snow cover of the year, and snow line looked like it was up around 5,500 feet. I was trying to think of how I could access it the fastest when Bill sent me a list of possibilities. And for some strange reason, I read through them and picked the destination that was both the longest and highest of all.

Bill met me at my office at 5:20. Our pace was too fast right off the bat. Whenever I feel cruddy while riding with others, I'm never sure if they're pushing it more than we usually do together, or if I'm just having a bad day. Either way, my heart rate was severely elevated and I was breathing hard enough I had to deliberately enunciate each word in response to Bill's questions. We veered up Grant Creek canyon and my responses nearly trickled out altogether.

The larch trees were in the peak of fall splendor - golden towers tinted with scarlet light at sunset. My throat started to burn from breathing excessive quantities of cool air. Bill let up on his pace a bit when I stopped chasing him. More than an hour and 15 miles had passed and we still hadn't reached the base of Snowbowl. My mind still hadn't registered that this was likely going to turn into a long ride.

But it was one of those evenings where time didn't really matter. The crisp air, the color, the sunlight - it was all so idyllic that nothing else really mattered. The pressures of our day-to-day lives and our routines and our obligations didn't matter. Even the fact that my body was feeling cruddy and I was perhaps riding too hard didn't matter.

Bill and I rode toward the alpenglow and the one thing that did matter in that moment - the mountains with their inaugural snowfall, and the white silent world we were seeking.

We climbed and climbed. The dirt road turned to mud, and then frozen mud, and then ice. The first dusting of snow came into the beam of our headlamps. Then the snow grew deeper, the forest more saturated, until we found ourselves in a frozen world entirely different from the city's bright autumn hues. Bill watched his thermometer and announced the status of the rapidly plummeting temperature. "28 degrees ... 27 ... 26." Because I had come straight from work, and didn't anticipate riding in temperatures lower than the mid- to high-30s when I left in the morning, I didn't have all the gear I normally would for temperatures in the 20s. I was a bit underdressed, especially on my feet, so I occasionally jumped off the bike to run beside it. I ran until my throat burned, then jumped back on until my toes tingled. When I became too exhausted to run, I just walked, but by then the snow was so thick that I could easily keep up with Bill, even as he pedaled and I pushed.

The snow started to become too deep to ride at all. Our wildly ambitious destination, Point 6, still loomed 1,000 feet above us. It was late. We were both cold, shedding heat and dreading the descent as it was. We pulled off at the top of Snowbowl - the ski resort we had been riding the perimeter of - and pushed toward an A-frame on the tenuous hope that the door would be unlocked. It was. We ducked inside and put on our remaining layers. It was time to stop seeking the snow, and start facing it.

Before we left, Bill pulled out his special surprise - curry lentil soup in a thermos. It was halfway cold - a result of a ride that ended up being much colder and longer than planned. Bill's thermometer read 21 degrees. There was more frost than snow on the windblown building. I sucked at my Camelbak hose, but it had long since frozen solid. "Let's do this thing," I said.

We surfed the steep downhill powder and picked up speed in a single truck track pressed into the road. The wind hit my face like sharp ice so I pulled up my face mask, which quickly started to fill with ice. 21 degrees with a 20 mph windchill equals a stinging slap of reality this early in the season. Eventually bodies acclimate and winter gear is figured out all over again and the biting edge of winter finally dulls. But right at the beginning, the cold is as sharp and forceful as a razor blade, and Bill and I cried out with equal amounts of exhilaration and pain, right at that center point where bodies feel the entire scope of what it is to be alive.

More strategic running got us back to town with hands, torsos and feet that had reached a workable equilibrium. I felt more tired than I had after a post-work ride in a long time, so I asked Bill what the numbers were. 45 miles. 4,524 feet of climbing. Max elevation 6,933 feet. Time 5:35. Moving time 4:51. But GPS knew nothing of the high-friction snow, of the battles with the cold, of the silence and beauty and peace. That's because GPS isn't alive, and we are, which is why we seek these high places, steeped in the wonder of life.