January 30
I had two strange memories flood over me this week while I thought to notice myself rooting down here. The first was the recollection of seeing the Dick Proenneke PBS special for the first time years ago, its images interspersed with a lulling quiet. I recalled specifically two things: the fact that he fashioned his own tools & tool handles on site (recalled mostly because that takes a committed bad-ass), & the sound of his oars in the glass-smooth water of the lake. Resourcefulness lending itself to recreation, that sort of thing. & then the second memory involves meeting some random friend of a contemptible peer at DU who was visiting & discussing plans to make a film featuring Alaska. At the time, I was reading a history of the state & so came to the conversation academically. Which, really, is entirely implausible. The guy, it turned out, was every bit as much an insufferable ass as his friend, but what strikes me now is the absence of the senses from that brief