Sing one for them.

From the ages of 8 to 18, I spent my free time singing and traveling to perform in chorales and chamber groups. Through music I’ve seen Mozart’s cathedral in Salzburg, a 100 year old woman’s birthday party, and the US secret service’s preparation for foreign heads of state, but I just as vividly remember milling around back stage at Disneyland. The movie “Pocahontas” was rocketing toward the height of its popularity and as such the perimeter of our stage was sprinkled heavily with large, cartoonish leaves – an ironically fitting false front for a false frontier. From the audience’s perspective the scene was idyllic in the swaddling sense only Disney has perfected, but standing on stage looking out all I saw was a thicket of lumber loosely held together in a Jenga-like patchwork of logs in various states of decay. All traces of the majesty on the other side were gone. I didn’t have the luxury of time to ponder this vision because it was time to perform. And if you’re going to sing, might as well sing it for someone else.

I may not be a singer anymore, but the art of performance is a valuable skill that certainly came in handy last week. It started with a few long-awaited Hill briefings. I have to admit that I’m undeniably star struck in the presence of our news-making American politicians (speaking of false fronts and false frontiers). During these briefings I was able to see how the same set of key messages can be tailored to grasp the attention of a staffer, a republican or a democrat senator. For many years I tutored students of varying backgrounds, degrees of education, and levels of English competency. To rephrase a message in order to get it across to someone unfamiliar with the subject matter is not wrong, in fact it is exactly what should be done to avoid misinformation. You can see by my sharing this thought process that I’ve struggled with the concept and practice of Senate ‘briefings’ but ultimately even a level of communication so abbreviated that it can be reduced to a half page of approved talking points is much better than none at all. Going to Capitol Hill is always an adventure, and once again I found myself hopelessly lost in the tunnels under the Senate offices. Thankfully next to the Senate Hair Salon there was a small gift shop where I was able to pick up a few trinkets for my friends and colleagues in Alaska.

A few hours later I was greeted in Anchorage with a nostalgia for my Alaskan life. It immediately pervaded my memory to the degree that the entire interval I’d spent in DC became a blur, as if it had passed by over a weekend or even a vivid dream. I’m sure this was at least in part a coping strategy as I needed to focus on my thesis defense the following day. And after countless long nights and stressful days fussing over it in the final weeks of preparation, I was overcome relief that it was finished and I’d passed. Exhaustion quickly followed suit, but I was delighted to fly to Kodiak over the weekend and celebrate with the dear friends who could make living on a tiny island off another island off mainland Alaska feel like the happiest place on earth, which incidentally is exactly what they did. Speaking of the happiest place on earth…

It struck me that perhaps a whole forest somewhere was cut down to prop up these fake leaves on that Disneyland stage… I wondered what Pocahontas might have said about that. Since then when I’ve come across a particularly lovely place I ask myself, “am I seeing the forest supporting this facade, or just the leaves?”. Is policy the structure behind the government, or is it the product of its supports? Is my pervasive nostalgia triggered by a genuine love of Alaska as a whole, or just the fleeting glamour of the life it at times provides? The answer to these questions won’t come easily, but I’m sure eventually they will come.