NOME -- One hundred eighty-three, to be exact. Those are all the miles I've driven since arriving in Nome -- this town with three roads out and no roads in.
Three beautiful, somewhat-maintained roads. Do you ever just have the urge to blast some music and drive as far as you can, trying to get lost in your thoughts as your wheels get lost in the grooves of the road?
I used to do this a lot, but here it's a little more ... real. For instance, you could really get lost or wind up in the middle of nowhere, or at least as far into nowhere as I've previously ventured. There are so many important precautions. Like letting someone know where you're going, how long you expect to be gone, what you have with you, and at what point one of your roommates should go to the radio station where you work and radio you on the UHF (just in case). Then, of course, there's the more immediate concern of how much gas you have and if you're going to bring the GCI phone (a local provider that's more reliable than most of our AT&T or Verizon phones).
Honestly, this way of thinking in an immediate, grounded way has become sort of natural. The feeling of tires crunching over gravel instead of pavement, the comfort in knowing that your car (truck) is hardy enough to handle even the most treacherous rock paths through the tundra. I love to drive, but I've quickly realized that driving to Teller is not equivalent to driving on the Belt Parkway. On the Belt, the cars swarming around you are beings themselves, and it's a video game just trying to speed through in one piece. Here, when you pass someone on one of the three main roads outside of town, you're likely to be met with a wave. For me, that wave has been a gesture of community -- just checking in, making sure everything is OK, acknowledging the other person when you might go for miles without seeing anything else but rolling tundra.
Earlier this month, we took a long, 71-mile drive to Teller, the nearest community and the only village accessible by road from Nome. We went to see the Teller Cultural Festival, full of beautiful traditional music and dance. It was similar in some ways to the gathering in Wales, but it's a bit closer to home, with more familiar faces around the room. On the way home, though, the fog was unreal. I've never driven in anything like that before. It was so thick that even our low beams were too bright and we couldn't see more than a foot or two in front of the truck for at least an hour of the three-hour drive.
Clearly not as afraid as maybe I should've been, I marveled at the thick cloud that rolled over us like something out of the movie "Twister." "I can't believe the world can create this!" I said, more impressed than anything else. Loosely gripping the steering wheel, I pumped the brakes a little as we coasted down a hill.
We took it slow, and in classic form, Caitlin warded off fear by falling asleep, while Francesca, Courtney and Kristin kept us all alert by telling scary stories and then some funny stories, all while passing around candy corn from my care package (thanks, Mom and Dad!) and some seasoned popcorn.
In the end, we made it home in one piece after a few hours of toiling on the road. Darkness is something new here after the long, bright days of summer, and darkness in the middle of the Teller Road is something else entirely.
I'm reminded again of the first description I heard of Western Alaska -- life is pretty much the same here as everywhere else, just a bit more pressing. The world is a powerful force. And the lengths that people go to connect with each other are truly impressive.
Jenn Ruckel is a reporter for KNOM, where this originally appeared. She grew up in New York.