This is gonna be about pee...

Today I find myself alone at the house. James has gone of to “Magic Monday”, which means he’s playing magic cards at the bar with other enthusiasts. I enjoy my own company, but the quietness is getting to me. In Denmark I’ve always lived in places where I could hear if not see my neighbors. I’ve always been surrounded by people, shared apartments with people or lived in communes with plenty of people. Here it’s just me surrounded by quiet and still-very-cold snow. I don’t want to hide from it. I want to face the quietness and become comfortable with it. And so when I finish this blog I will go pee in the snow and stand in the dark for a moment to enjoy it all…

Yes, you read it; I will go pee in the snow. Our plumbing is frozen and so nature will be my bathroom at the house until spring comes. Dishes will be done elsewhere and showers are now a sought-after exotic bird preciously enjoyed on rare occasions. This is all part of the Alaskan living and so it is not news to me, but you dear reader, might find it fascinating, appalling or maybe appealing to learn about these living arrangements up north. I have it easy too. There are no avalanches waiting to happen here as there are in the small town of Cordova this week. We are not cut of from the road system and in need of food flown in from afar as the villages out west. And no bears have woken up from their hibernation to rummage around our trash, as has been the case in Anchorage. Instead the biggest disaster in my life this week was when Bianca (I know it was her) the cat peed on my new electric-heated blanket and I had to shed a tear. “Life’s rough in the north” James said, and patted me on my shoulder.