Travelers' Tales Alaska (24 page)

“Don't you realize you can hurt her?” I'd growl protectively. “Don't you even know what gentle means? Can't you be sweet to your sister?”

Maybe it's just hardwiring,
I told myself, trying to be reasonable.
Maybe little boys can't help it.
But then I'd catch a malignant gleam in my son's eyes. Even when I was doubled over in pain, he begged for me to pick him up, or to run to another room and fetch him something.
No compassion,
I thought. And:
Where did we go wrong?
And even when Tziporah was crying, Aryeh giggled and shrieked louder, delighted by the chaos, though he said over and over and over that he loved her. We'd started a reward chart on the refrigerator: one sticker for every day Aryeh didn't actively menace his sister. But he couldn't make it through a single day. He couldn't earn a single sticker. I agonized: Hadn't we taught him that people can hurt, that
living things can hurt, that he is not at the center of the universe, the only thing that wants or feels?

At home, there was simply no escape from Aryeh's volume and motion—his tireless pinball-like trajectories, which made every room seem too small. Here in this dark log cabin in the Kenai mountains, there was only less room, fewer places to hide. But I hoped the simplicity of this primitive lodging, and this location—no phone or email, no visitors at the door every hour, no work demands—might help us sort things out.

Within an hour of our arrival, the wood stove was popping and hissing, a steamy warmth was saturating the cabin, and the baby had faded into slumber, wrapped in a tight cocoon of blankets. I urged Brian to take Aryeh outside so that I could nap, too.

Sleep rejuvenated me. When Aryeh pushed open the cabin door two hours later, cheeks patchy red from the cold, I couldn't even imagine why I'd felt impatient or angry, today or ever. He stood in the open doorway—gusts of wind whipping his blond curls—chattering about fish and grayling and how he'd caught one and sixteen inches and could I come down to the rowboat to see.

I wrapped myself and Tziporah in more layers and we all headed out again in the rowboat. Brian and Aryeh had caught three grayling, enough for dinner, but now I'd get my chance to catch a fish, an easy fish, my first fish. Brian rowed us north along the shore, toward the leaning mountain and the waterfall.

“Can we stop and cast here?” I asked.

“Wait,” Brian said. “There's more of a cove up there. It will be better.”

The wind plastered my bangs against my eyes, my gloved hands were cold already, and I knew the baby might not tolerate this outing much longer. Minutes passed as Brian slowly
worked the oars, battling small, choppy waves. The rowboat seemed to stand still. The waterfall at the head of the lake was no closer. The wind battered our ears and snatched at our words.

“How about here?” I called out.

“This isn't a good spot,” Aryeh said, mimicking his father. “Around the curve. I know how to do it. I'll show you.”

Finally, we gave up and set the anchor along a straight stretch of scrubby shore, and I took one of the two rods we'd brought. I tried to remember how this worked, how far back to pull my arm, how to avoid nailing innocent bystanders with a sharp hook.

I cast once, enjoying the simple feel of it, and the sound—a sharp whizzing through the air before the satisfying
pa-lunkkk
of lure hitting water. I cast again. No bites yet. Then Aryeh started reaching. “Can I try? I know how. Can I try?”

“Let Mom do it,” Brian said. “You caught your fish already.”

I tried to cast again, but Aryeh kept reaching, waving and pulling at the air. He insisted on using the smaller rod I was holding.

“Just one more time,” I said. “Let me.” But then, worrying as he reached toward me that he might stand up in the boat and fall into the icy water, I relented, handing the rod to him.

Brian, from his seat in the stern, reached precariously over the bundled baby to hand me the other rod. But Aryeh and I were seated too close together to both cast. I needed all my attention to duck and throw my gloved hands up to my face every time Aryeh's hook came arcing wildly through the air.

“Maybe this just isn't a good spot,” Brian said finally, as the wind pushed at us. The baby's face looked pink and chapped from the wind. Red pinpricks were appearing around her almost-invisible hairline as she slept—tiny bites from bugs we'd never seen.

“That's all right,” I said. “I'm cold, too. Forget it.”

Next day, I was determined to spend more time outside, and to get an earlier start fishing. We spent part of the morning taking photos, wandering a small bog behind the cabin, and exploring the lake shore. About a foot back from the waterline there was a uniform band of gnarled, pinkie-sized, weathered wood pieces, like a bathtub ring of driftwood. Just beyond this were patches of knee-high grass, sprinkled with wildflowers so small and delicate that we hadn't noticed them the day before. But on hands and knees, they came into view. I counted a dozen kinds within a few yards: columbines and lupines, geranium and Jacob's ladder, cinquefoil and monkshood. Of all these, my favorites were the palest blue forget-me-nots, bending and blinking in the wind.

I was marveling at this miniature alpine world of fragile beauty when I looked up and caught sight of Aryeh methodically sprinkling sand and gravel on top of his baby sister's head. In two breathless strides I was next to them, seething. Tziporah looked up at me with round, green-eyed innocence,
staring up at her brother, then staring up at me. Her long eyelashes were covered with sand—it was a miracle none of the dust had blown into the eyes themselves—and there were tiny bits of gravel in the corners of her eyes, just above the pink rims. I gasped and stuttered and swept a hand over her face, which started her crying, since now the sand was in her eyes. In one motion I swept Tziporah into my arms and stomped away, fuming.

“I can't believe him!” I ranted to Brian for the next few minutes. “He's hurting her! He doesn't care about anyone or anything!”

Brian smiled. “He'll learn. He'll figure it out.”

“I don't think so,” I said, rocking the baby back and forth. I soothed the baby and Brian soothed me, and finally we called to Aryeh and all got into the rowboat.

“Let me have the stern this time,” I grunted.

With my back to my family, I took the oars. I rowed as hard as I could, enjoying the work of it, the strain against my shoulders and biceps. Never mind my wasted body from the stomach down; my shoulders and back were still strong. Stronger, even. I pulled hard, exhaling roughly, pushing my lips together, toiling against the wind. We moved slowly along the shore, past rounded humps of glacier-scoured bedrock, and more stunted spruce trees, bent into gnarled bonsai shapes.

For every three rows I had to correct our course with a one-oared row on the right side. I liked the rhythm, the sheer effort of it, with no one to see my contorted face as I strained and pulled. Row, row, row; correction.
This is the best part of the trip,
I told myself.
Who cares about fish anyway?
Row, row, row; correction. We had another day until the floatplane came. Maybe I'd just spend it rowing.

Finally, we rounded a small peninsula and we were in a
protected cove, where the water was clearer and smoother, with views of deeply scored glaciers overhead, spilling from the encircling mountains. We could hear rushing water. We rowed a few yards more and anchored just in front of the stream, where we could see the water quicken and funnel around a bend, draining the lake. Our anchored rowboat swung lazily around its tether, pulled by the stream, and we could imagine fish swimming under and around us, dancing in the same cold currents.

Brian cast. Immediately, he pulled a grayling into the boat, slipped the hook out of its mouth and then released it. He cast again. Another catch. Another effortless release. Aryeh was squirming in his seat. So was I.

“Hand me a rod!” I called out. “Let me try!”

On my first cast, I felt a gentle tug at the end of the line. On my second, I felt a tug again, but this time it kept pulling. I reeled the fish in, and it came easily, it's sail-like fin slicing and sparkling through the water. With a few more reels, I lifted the fish into the air. I pawed at its thrashing body, suspended from my line, and pulled the fish down into my lap. It was small, maybe eleven or twelve inches.

“Too small to keep,” I announced, trying to sound nonchalant. Brian handed me his needle-nosed pliers while Aryeh twisted and jumped in his seat.

I still couldn't believe my luck. I alternately smiled and winced, breathing fast, trying inexpertly to work the hook out from where it was firmly embedded. Two of the hook's three barbs had pierced the grayling's delicate mouth, a tiny, smooth, muscle ring, opening into a pink cavern. I tried to be matter-of-fact, digging the pliers into the mouth, trying to do it one fearless motion. But time passed, and decisiveness turned into hesitant surgery.

“Darn it,” I muttered.

“What? What?” Aryeh demanded, trying to sit higher in his seat and peer over my shoulder.

“Nothing, it's just…not working.”

I went after one barb, then the other. The mouth tore. The fish fought the clutch of my hand. I winced and tried again.

“Are you getting it out?” Aryeh asked.

“Almost,” I said. But I wasn't.

My heart raced along with the grayling's. I was shocked to notice that I could feel its pulse, through my glove, against the palm of my hand. Looking down, toward the steady thrum, I noticed that in my excitement, I had been squeezing too hard. On the black cotton palm of my glove, there was a rainbow of sequins—fish scales, rubbed off the side of this long-suffering fish. I stared at this for a long moment. And then I stared at the grayling, this torpedo-shaped, speckled tube of flesh and blood, its once-beautiful fin now collapsed against its body, its iridescence fading.

“It's not working,” I said. “I think I'll have to kill it.”

Aryeh shrieked: “Don't kill it!”

But this reaction didn't make sense. Why should he have cared? He and Brian had caught three fish yesterday. They'd killed those fish, too, but evidently more swiftly.

I turned the pliers around, intending to use the red, rubberized handle to deliver a solid knock on the grayling's skull. But my grasp slipped, and the pliers delivered only a timid thump. The grayling started thrashing even more. The violence of all this startled me. The casting and reeling had been so satisfying, and now this part was clumsy and confusing and awful. And what about the part that I'd imagined for weeks: where I would just hold the fish, and feel happy, and able, and whole?

“I've got to do it,” I told Aryeh. “It's bleeding.”

“It's bleeding!” he shouted back, panicking now. “Don't kill it, Mom! Don't kill it!”

“Oh, for heaven's sake.”

All this had happened in two minutes, maybe three, but it felt like forever. Now I rested for a moment, staring at the still-thrumming fish in my palm, and at the red, rubberized pliers handle.

Brian was silent. Aryeh hadn't spoken since his last shriek. I didn't want to raise the pliers again. Everyone was waiting. I felt suddenly heavier, bolted to the seat of the rowboat, and weak.

Then Aryeh spoke up, his voice an octave lower, steady and reassuring. “If it's hurt, kill it,” he said. “We'll just have to keep it.”

His switch from panic to smooth calm was so sudden that it startled me.

“That's O.K., Mom,” he said again. “It's bleeding. Kill it. Go ahead.”

And at that moment, I stopped worrying. At that moment, for a moment, I knew that Aryeh understood more than I'd ever given him credit for: about gentleness, and violence, and the subtleties of both. I'd misjudged him. I'd let my own body's wounds—the cramps, my exhaustion—color a whole weekend needlessly red and raw.
Tziporah will be safe with her brother,
I told myself. We'll all keep learning from each other.