Never Cry Wolf

Reflections and Farley Mowat.

I have been intrigued with Alaska for most of my life.  I can say that now because of the year and age that I've reached.  My earliest thoughts on Alaska came from a movie that came out while I was in high school:  Never Cry Wolf.  It was a film based loosely on a book written by Farley Mowat, but adapted to be about a biologist portrayed by Canadian actor Charles Martin Smith.  Although the location is up in Canada, the world is the arctic for which I've always related to Alaska.

In the film, biologist "Tyler" goes up to study the wolves and becomes very attached and even defensive toward the world of the arctic and the wolves that inhabit it.  The snow on the mountains.  The dwarfed firs.  The clear glacial lakes.  The carved mountain ranges.  The tundra.  All inspirational to me.

My desk with the film DVD.

For a long time I contemplated that world while living in the tame confines of the Wasatch Mountains (tame by comparison only).  But I romanticized the arctic for many years after I'd first saw Never Cry Wolf in the mid-80s.  It remains to this day my favorite film.

I then had the opportunity  to move to Fairbanks Alaska for work, but decided to keep my current position and head to Europe.  Family was there and I missed them.  But while in Holland, I spoke to an American who was stationed in Alaska and spoke of many adventures.  Because of my previous job offer, I felt in some way that I had missed a great opportunity back then.  Holland was special in its own ways, but every fiber of my being longs for Alaska.  The arctic.  It's in my blood somehow.

About 9 years later, while living in California, I began a mantra to myself and some of my coworkers.    Has the job offer in Alaska come in for me yet?  One day, it did.  It was almost like providence.  It came to me as a gifted present--one I'd longed for for many years.  And so about a year later, I moved to Anchorage.  My life has never been the same since.

But life takes you on many journeys.  Even though I loved Alaska, family and circumstance pulled me away from the place I called home and I found myself in many different places:  Illinois, Missouri, Colorado, Utah, Washington and Oregon.  Has it been that many?  It's baffling to contemplate.  But I am a wanderer.  Some of those were job related via transfer, some were chosen while others were to become a ranger.  I lived and died away from Alaska and longed to return.

In 2015, I was called back to south central where the basis of my book Reflections mostly resides.

I rewatched Never Cry Wolf again tonight, mostly out of inspiration to complete Reflections.  I realize more than ever what a completely well done and written film that was.  One of the most underrated films of our time.  What cinematography!  What scripting!  What acting!  So incredibly well down with metaphors and references, philosophies and imagery--simply by words.

I hope someday to see northern Canada east of the Yukon Territory for which I'm somewhat familiar. I'd love to go see where the wolves are, up north in a world seldom seen by people.

Maybe....

Someday....