2018: Prologue, January-April

I started 2018 with four clipboards in my hand desperately trying to get drunk people to sign an initiative to protect salmon and stick it to the government. In Anchorage, Alaska that shouldn't be a hard sell. but as the fireworks and the sound system by the stage echo over the frozen streets, it's hard to ask someone if they're registered to vote.

I returned to my apartment, tired and delirious from the cold, and read that not far from where I had been gathering signatures, the first murder of the new year had taken place. This, I felt, was an auspicious start to the new year. 2017 had not been kind to me. I had such high aspirations for what I was going to do. My crush from high school would be moving back to town, I would be graduating high school, I had an exciting job lined up for the spring, and I was preparing to graduate college. Within a matter of weeks, I realized that nothing was going to go according to plan. The job conflicted with my busy class schedule and I wasn't able to give either one the attention that they required. The very real possibility of failing to graduate hung over me and stung deeply.

By the time summer rolled around I had resigned from my job, crossed the graduation threshold by such a narrow margin that I hadn't invited anyone to my graduation out of fear of not being permitted to walk, and my relationship with the person who I genuinely thought I would spend the rest of my life with was irreversibly strained. 

I got a new job as a lobbyists assistant making more money than I felt I was worth, I rented an apartment knowing that if the job fell through it would be impossible to cover the rent in. I was never good at the job and started relying more on nicotine, alcohol, and weed to get by. by the time I lost my job, I was grateful. I had no confidence in anything that I was doing and mistakes were pilling up. I am still embarrassed at the magnitude of some of my screw ups. I regret few things more than my time working for that firm. 

I took a job gathering signatures for four different ballot initiatives, two for healthcare reform, one for salmon, and one that denied members of the state legislature their daily cost of living stipend should they fail to pass a budget before the deadline. I loved the work, even at $1 per signature I started out by making comparable money to what I had been making before. As someone who has always enjoyed talking to strangers and working sales, I dove into the work. Even though I was cold, and even though I was routinely getting the cops called on my by shop owners who didn't want me there (tough luck, I got rights) I thoroughly enjoyed the work.

Don't I look thrilled to be there?

On the morning of December 1st, I got the call that my grandmother had passed away. I tried to go to work that day, but it took the wind out of my sales. I sat in my car and sobbed uncontrollably before driving home for the day. When I returned from the funeral, I learned that half of our initiatives were being canceled, which reduced the potential earnings by half. 

I have distinct memories of standing outside the Safeway in Eagle River, freezing, watching the sun peak up from over the mountains near the start of my shift and then disappearing hours before I could go back home, all while singing the soundtrack to Jesus Christ Superstar in my head while dancing around to keep warm. It would snow, or sleet or the wind would blow. I took a few trips out to Wasilla, Big Lake, and south Anchorage looking for fresh turf, but the fact was I wasn't making money anymore.

When I laid down in the early morning hours of January 1st, I was physical, mentally, and emotionally exhausted from months of despair and dreed. I had enough money in my bank account to get me by, barely, until April, at which point I would have no money, no job, and no hope. By the middle of February, I was starting to crack. I do not have a lot of memories from January and February of this year, not a lot happened. My daily routine was to wake up, apply for some jobs, and keep refreshing my email and checking my phone hoping to hear from someone. 

By the middle of February, I had had it. I made my plans to leave the state. I was offered a job in Denver, Colorado working for Grassroots campaigns, an organization who's Glassdoor page reads like a horror film and whose Wikipedia page includes a dedicated section about their wage-theft settlements. But I was desperate to leave Alaska and after doing the signature gathering in the cold and going two months with no prospects I wasn't picky.

I found someone who could take over the lease on my apartment and moved into my aunt's house in March. I sat down with pen and paper and drafted a calendar, budget, lists upon lists, and accounted for every dollar I would need to spend, every gallon of fuel burned, every mile put on a vehicle which I swore was on its last leg. I replaced the tires on my car, changed the oil, added fluids, and crossed my fingers hoping that my rebuilt, 2007 ford focus to survive the four-day trek down the Alcan Highway. 

I was nervous about leaving Alaska, not only was it the only home I had ever known, but I also knew the dangers of what I was doing. The Alcan is a haul and takes a number on even the best vehicles. My Focus is not the best of vehicles. I had to pack six quarts of motor oil because of a leaky oil pan. My spare tire was just the best one of the four tires that I had to remove from my car because they were so thin. I packed everything I owned into a two-door sedan and prepared for my trip. The plan was simple. Drive down the Alcan, stop in Seattle for a few days and touch base with my parents, then drive on to Denver in time to start my new job.

On April 5th, I watched the sunrise over Matanuska Peak for the last time and set off on my journey.

And our story begins