A Touch of Melancholy

I enjoy opportunities to catch an episode or two of Deadliest Catch. My mother-in-law introduced me to it some years ago, but it is not always available to me. I enjoy their surly comraderie, the glimpses of my original state, the moments of living rugged vicariously through them.

We happened upon a couple of recent episodes tonight.

I feel a bit melancholic, thinking of the grief and loss the family and friends of Cpt. Phil Harris have been going through since early February.

And it has nothing to do with him being a "tv star."

Their loss is no different from the loss experienced by anybody else who has had a loved one pass on. Death is about the only guarantee in life, besides taxes.

I believe its effect on me has more to do with the fact that loss was experienced; that the raw emotions were captured (for the glutonous viewing by the rest of us); that their loss speaks to the heart of our own losses. We can empathize, not merely sympathize. My heart aches for them, having an inkling--a glimmer--of what they're likely going through.

And then there's the point of being an ex-pat Alaskan...he died in my old stomping grounds. My mother worked in that hospital. She worked in that hospital when smoking was still allowed in the offices. And they had those awful cubicle dividers with the not-quite-carpet walls and the cubicle office doors that stuck. And the typewriters with the triplicate carbon copies that smelled so bad it gave you a headache walking past a box of them.

I remember the employee family picnics on the grounds.


And I find that I miss home.


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