Hoy mismo I landed in Ketchikan and sent a text to Claire. I had to connect to the internet to do so, no T-Mobile in Alaska. I realized this in 2016 when I got a text that my roaming privileges had reached their limit after hours on the island.

I hope my roaming privileges never reach their limit. 

I rolled onto the ferry on the Revillagigedo side. That only means something to people who know Ketchikan and I used to know it, a person ago.

The feelings quickly returned: the ferry. For most people, the ferry is simply a way of crossing. For me it’s a vehicle of memory. I paid the same ferry attendant I recognized from the summer I worked here, 2016. And I rolled down the ramp until I met the line of people eager to cross over. Alaska invites anxious visitors because they are either visiting someone, going fishing or going on an adventure (or a combination of the three). Only time will tell the purpose of my visit.

There is a difference between going and returning; memory vs. mystery. This visit is both.

In 2016 I arrived to Guatemala 6 days after flying from Alaska to Atlanta, just enough time to pack my bags and kiss my family goodbye. When I stepped foot in Guatemala I dodged inconsequential leaves on the semi-paved sidewalks in case they were slugs. I’d made that mistake twice while jogging in Ketchikan and gone back each time to survey their clearish, sticky guts. I felt bad. I squished them to their death without so much as a murderous intention. Now I see bags of trash on the road and think they are street dogs. Chucho! What will be next? Green fire hydrants mistaken for cacti? Thorny whimsies of nature mistaken for scorpions?

I took a cab and a bus to get to SEATAC airport. SEATAC is a town, did you know?, literally meaning half-Seattle, half-Tacoma and conveniently located next to neither. I figured with a standby ticket to Ketchikan, there was only a chance not a promise I would get a seat on this flight. So I got to the gate 25 minutes before take-off.

“Did I get on?”

“Of course!” She said. 

Of course? I thought. Since standby when? 

“But I think you might be in a middle seat.” 

Middle Seat. I’ll never forget the email titled “Middle Seat” from my (former) boss. 

The content of the email: “What happened?” 

That was it. “What happened?” 

I, however, would be thrilled for a middle seat. In life I occupy a middle seat between Peace Corps and graduate school, heartbreak and moving on, pursuing my dreams or settling down. Or both. Or neither. Before I had the chance to wax poetic about my existence in the proverbial middle seat to an innocent airline gate agent, she said: 

“Ah, I do have an aisle seat. 25C.” 

I took the thin slip of paper and boarded. Pan caliente. Piece of cake. 

I lower into 25C and try to close my eyes. I can’t sleep but I pretend I’m getting rest. I’m annoyed by the two fishermen carrying on in the row behind me, trading stories of the sea. I could care less about their self-important conquests over nature. Mansplaining was invented in Alaska by white men with beers in hand. I return to Alaska a feminist, a new branch of myself. It often makes poor investments in eye-rolling at strangers’ conversations. I know. Why? But I am what I am.

The girl to my left is watching Stranger Things on her phone. NO SPOILERS. I look away. At some point she switches to Sex Education. Is a second season out??

Eventually I crack open my balsamic vinaigrette-tinged teen fiction en Español: Bajo La Misma Estrella (The Fault in Our Stars). I have read this book before, years ago, in English. Going and Returning: to the story by way of new words. I jot down notes of words I don’t recognize: navajazo: stab, costado: side, (ah! A linguistic lightbulb. Acostado means laying down. Costado means side. Makes sense). El gota a gota drip by drip- the IV. A tientas: blindly. Embustero: lying, liar. Rebosante: brimming. Agudeza: sharpness. Divagar: digress.

Is this return a digression? I wonder.

Asomar: to stick out. Frotar: to rub/scrub. 

After a cup of coffee with two packets of International Delight and a quick bathroom trip, we are descending to the island of Revillagigedo across from Ketchikan. I am nervous. I am returning to the setting of the best summer of my life. I have memorized this place in nostalgic hues. Will it be what I remember? Or will I be going instead of returning, starting from scratch?

As I roll my bag onto the ferry I stand over the edge and look at the quiet, easy-to-miss jellyfish. I listen to a father talk to his little boy resting on his shoulders: “Do you see the water move? That’s called a current.” I consider that there is a different name for the water when it is in motion. If water were a person would the current be their gait? The dad says: “Do you see the salmon?” “Yeah what is it?” the little boy dispenses from his endless bank of curiosity. “I don’t know probably a ing [salmon].” I wonder to myself: does this 4 year-old already know the five types of salmon? I didn’t learn them tell I was 29.

The little boy said: “Why is it all wobbly??” “Why is what wobbly?” his dad responded. The second time the son asked this question the Dad said: “It’s the engine.” I think that’s a good answer. All of our engines make life wobbly amiright?

This ferry isn’t a bridge to me. It’s a distinct memory of sitting in the company van, Bertha or the rental, waiting to pick up the wealthy Alaskan Dream Cruise passengers. This is an elite cruise of the Inside Passage of Alaska for distinct clientele. The cruise has space for 60ish passengers and Victoria and I were responsible to pick each of them up from the airport. And sit, again, as we crossed the ferry. I was never good at forced conversation and I could hardly represent the island of Ketchikan.. It was my first summer in the place. Still I tried to dispense trivia during our drive. Most folks wanted to get into town and get to their hotels, ready to start their cruises the next day.

I quickly remembered what my roommate at the old boarding house, Claire, told me about the salmon: they jump out of the water because they are preparing to spawn. When they smash into the current, it loosens their eggs. I push away the metaphor of myself and my own reproductive future. Soon it will be time to shit or get off the pot. I’m 33. I’m about as close to having a child as the four year-old on his dad’s shoulders, asking why the boat is wobbly.

Why is life so wobbly? Oh yeah, the engine. I wonder why I’ve only known the toenail of Alaska, this sweet little Ketchikan Island. I could go to so many places via ferry, see Juneau, Anchorage, or some tiny fisher(person) town. But I return here. Why? Oh yeah, my heart (engine). The thing that pushes me to places once and then again to open up the crinkled pages of memory stained by balsamic vinaigrette.

When we arrive to the “Ketchikan side,” I see Claire and we hug warm and tight. We get into the green Subaru and drive through town. I am quickly reminded of my memory of each berth, the behemoth cruise ship looming large over this island town. Claire says that the ships are getting bigger and bigger and passenger numbers increase with each season. I ask her why she thinks that is. She says: “I don’t know.. People want to come to Alaska, a place they’ve always dreamed of, on the ease of a cruise ship.” Then I point to a lady the size of an ant wearing neon orange and walking the top of the ship with a power-walk pace. I say: “Then there’s this lady who just wants to be on a ship next to an adventure. I think cruises are for people who want to be next to adventures. They think they are on adventures but they’re really just next to them.” Claire says: “That’s a very interesting way to put that.” Pensive friends together again.

I repeat: “The Norwegian Bliss” the name painted on the side of the ginormous cruise ship. Claire explains that there are new ships called the Joy and the Bliss and I comment to her about how strange that is. Like, what if you get really terrible news while you’re on that cruise? “I was on the Norwegian Bliss when I got a call that my house burnt to a crisp.”

So. After three years of being away, I am back. Hello, Alaska: I am wobbly on account of my engine. You are wobbly on account of being an island on the edge (or the beginning) of the ocean. Let’s visit for a weekend.