Not the end

"I needed to remind myself... This wasn't going away, not any more than it does every late spring."

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In between so many majestic curtains, coronas overhead, in between chasing my tail being unable to put my tripod down to take a photo because it was all just too beautiful, I couldn’t fully realise that this wasn’t the end. I didn’t want it to end. I couldn’t have it be the end.

It was almost anxiety inducing. And then I realised this wasn’t about Yellowknife, this was about the aurora.
I get varying levels of this every spring, when the aurora gives way to endless daylight, but it hasn’t been this crippling maybe ever. It’s usually an emotionally, mentally, peaceful transition to the bright summer nights.
This was a surfacing fear I was giving the aurora up, but this isn’t that. Leaving a place I have for so long associated with such a deep love is not so straight forward. The aurora will be waiting for me again in the fall, and I will be there to meet her, just in a new, even more beautiful, better feeling, place.

"If there's one thing I've learned, it's that I need this as a big part of my life."

This distinction was one of the most important ones to have made. Chasing my tail holding my tripod, unable to put it down because I was too excited about the aurora in every part of the sky and feeling waves of anxiety as I prepared to leave — this was the beginning of Yellowknife for me. It was nearly every one of those 20-something trips here 10 years ago.

10 years ago, it was as much about Yellowknife as it was about the aurora.

Now it is, I feel it in my bones, now it is just about the aurora.

La bise

Passing 10am, I stepped out of the shower and leaned slowly in toward a mirror. The heaviness of my eyelids was unrelenting, and my cheeks and my nose were unusually rosy. I remembered how they hurt even under my balaclava just 8 hours earlier.

Sometimes even after a sound sleep, that end of winter, frigid day and night, full life exhaustion sets in.

"If aurora hangovers exist, I had found them."

The night before, the wind was finally slowing from the consistently 30 gusting 50km/h it had sustained for days prior. The temperature settled at -34°C. Once again cold enough for my right eye to tear single tears consistently through the night, as it always does when it is so cold. It felt so good to be wrapped up in my parka and in an indescribable warmth, not the least of which was such a magnificent twilight sky.

This is my favourite time of the year to be out with the aurora. I love it so much, and the feeling of these April nights, most definitely this one in particular, I wish I can keep forever.

Another weekend of stollen, ice roads, and the magic valley

Two and a half months since our last visit and it felt like a lifetime of change in between.

"I feel like you've turned a corner, in more ways than one."

Some of the very best, the most raw and deep in my heart moments over the last 7 years here were birthed in the just days between cross country flights at ungodly hours inclusive the misery of 6 hours on Q400s. The winter walk with glühwein, the Zehabesha takeaway nights, the hysterical laughter and genuine weirdness that only two of the closest friends share, and endless, endless tea and coffee consumption.

A few aurora chases and new-to-us-both ice road drives with sweets and coffees made it all too perfect.

Besties.

The magic valley

In a race against time, driving… a little bit quickly… over the last stretch of ice road, I just repeated in my mind “Please, please please. Just a few minutes more.”

I was, of course, speaking directly to the aurora. Begging and wishing for just a little more time before she would dance. It was not a question of if, but when. And it felt strongly like it was an any second thing now.

For the last few minutes driving, I watched my odometer more than I watched the road ahead of me, waiting for the perfect addition of numbers to signal where my turn needed to be.
I could have stopped at any moment, but I wanted so badly to disappear into this little 'valley’. It is my favourite place to photograph the aurora here, but it has been years since I’ve been there.

When I pulled over just where I wanted to be, I didn’t hesitate for a moment in stepping outside. The exterior lights were already in the off position, and as soon as I placed the car in park, they all went dark. I didn’t bother with the interior lights. I just took my camera and tripod, and half zipped up parka outside into the -37° and looked up.

I think before I even shut my car door behind me, I spoke a soft “wooww” out loud, to just myself. The Milky Way and entire moonless sky of stars all around the silhouettes of the mountains was literally breathtaking.

Just some short moments passed, just enough time to extend my tripod legs. And then it was the beginning of hours of the aurora dancing all across the sky. I am sure she was far in the south this night, and just maybe I had her ear.

Somber moments and simple joys

I never expected to see these little cedar waxwings playing around my house this morning, technically the afternoon. I still had my coffee in my hand, so it was morning to me.

After so many of them flew around my dining window and caught my eye as I sat at the dining table, I stood at the window looking a few metres down to one of the trees I planted years ago where dozens of these birds stayed for some moments. I just stood watching them, sipping my coffee and smiling like it was the first time I had ever seen anything so beautiful. It was deeply surreal.

"Cedar waxwings are a really special bird for me, one that represents a lot of love, but that's more a story not for this blog, at least not now."

There was just one other time I had seen them here in Yellowknife and it was not anywhere near the middle of winter like we are in now. This felt extra special and like I could not miss them, and like this was not just a coincidence.

The forever northern sunset

Just a few hours later, the sunset snuck beautifully up on me. The low grey overcast sky of the entire day was glowing orange as light flurries still fell. This forever sunset is one of my favourite things about the north. From the sky, the horizon faded into a misty snowfall far in the distance and all around the snow was reflecting pink. Cotton candy clouds circled the entire sky.

Tea, dinner, and tea

Back home, just the simple joys of too-hot-to-drink tea, candlesticks, and some writing carried me well to dinner. I didn’t even make it through a full episode of The Great Pottery Throw Down before I was messy pouring tea into my thermos and changing in a hurry.

Tonight as I began tipping the teapot spout down toward my mug, I stopped myself and ran back toward the living room bringing AuroraMax up on my phone. It was instantly clear there wouldn’t be time to sit down with a cup of tea, so back in the kitchen, I poured straight into my thermos for the road.

Tea waterfall down the side of a mug and all over the counter successfully averted.

As the aurora lowered back into the northern horizon, I retreated back to the car where two slices of stollen were waiting. I really did bring them out with me on a plate with a fork, and despite driving hurriedly out, not a speck of powdered sugar was spilled over the plate’s edge. The car smelled strongly of lavender cream earl grey tea. A shimmering, pink lined arc of the northern lights danced straight out the front windshield.

The aurora quieted quickly down, and before I left for home, I laid out on an area of the ice not far from the car where I cleared the snow away. It’s hard to say how long I stayed this way, staring straight up. The aurora had cleared of the sky overhead, but I would occasionally catch faint streaks of her in my peripheral vision just as I would catch the faintest sound of Look After You, left playing quietly on repeat, when the engine would switch to battery and there was no other sound.