Grace and greetings.

We arrived back from Fairbanks Tuesday evening; I was tired, angry, frustrated and depressed. Kim made the quick remark that I was already missing those "sticky up things." That is what we jokingly call trees when ever we go somewhere off the North Slope. As I thought about it, the statement made sense. The only "trees" that we have here, are our "palm trees." The trees are made of driftwood with strips of baleen nailed to the top of them.

I have not thought about it before, but I guess I do miss trees. The nearest trees are over four hundred miles to the south of us. Most of the portion of Alaska that is within the Arctic Circle are above the tree line. For me, I guess it was something that I did not think about until after the fact. Most of the people in the polar parts of the world comment that they did not notice they missed the sun until after it had returned. I guess my missing the trees are the same, I did not realize that I missed them until I left them behind again.

We are hoping to make it back down to Anchorage this summer, then I will get to see some of those "sticky things" again, and I will appreciate them a little more.

Peace and blessings.