Thursday, January 22, 2026

"Memories" social visits

Here's something I never thought about until one cold morning in January 2026.  Every day it's part of my wake-up routine to scroll down the list of memories facebook puts up. Today there were several replies posted by two friends who have died in recent years. As the realization dawned on me there were sudden moments of sadness. But soon enough I realized in a way they are still with me and for a few moments I am again connecting with them and sharing brief interludes and fond memories with each one. After this was posted, another friend (living) wrote about similar experiences. She likened them to social visits.

And there was this follow-up: Here's an example: A few days after I posted about the warmth in reading memory conversations with friends who have died, this came across talking about writing with a friend:

"Joe May
What about the blood on the floor, Tim???
Tim Jones
Beads of it dripping like perspiration from your brow.
Joe May
This evokes an image of someone hunched over an old Underwood typewriter pecking away by the light of a Coleman lantern. The raw plywood floor around his chair is spattered with new and old stains of blood, sweat, and tears. The rusty oil drum stove is surrounded by empty ravioli cans and ice cream cartons. How close is this?
Tim Jones
You just described the 10 x 14 cabin on the Susitna River where I wrote The Last Great Race. My typewriter was an office upright that dated back to the 1930s that I bought from the Chicago Tribune when I worked there. The only thing missing from your picture is the ermine who used to venture out onto the open floor, stand up on his hind legs and look at me like I was crazy."
    
 Since that time I have paid more attention to the comments on posts in my memories lists. Even if I find only one it shines a warm light into the approaching day. Joe and I had several conversations like this one, thinking I might post a few more as I come across them.
 
A serious shortage
Here's another one of those "Memories" social visits: 
April 14, 2021 Tim Jones ·
Can somebody tell me why there's a Dinty Moore Beef Stew shortage. Is it a pandemic thing? Hoarding canned stew. I haven't seen any in my stores since maybe early February. Other brands yes, but not Dinty Moore. This is serious. 
Joe May I bought 2 cans around Christmas. Hope I'm not responsible.
Report when you find more.
Tim Jones
Author
I could blame you if I hadn’t bought more than that in December for my winter supply; no more than usual though. I always leave at least one on the shelf.
Johnny Augustus Vespillo Newman
I love Dinty Moore
Tim Jones
Author
Do you know where the name came from?
Johnny Augustus Vespillo Newman
i do not
Tim Jones
He was a character in the Popeye comics
Joe May
He was cook on a tugboat I worked on in 1957. He baked his cakes on both sides. He also drank a lot, both on and off the job.
RECIPE CHAT

April 19, 2015  ·

Shared with Your friends

Enough of this. No more Facebook recipes. Garlic and brown sugar glazed chicken is not nearly as good as it sounds. 🙁

Emma Silver —Lol I'm with you

Carla Helfferich —Too bad--it does sound good.

Kitty Delorey Fleischman — I used to think you couldn't use too much garlic until I put six bulbs in a hummus recipe. When it was finally edible, I had about a gallon of it.

Joe May — I have a recipe for smoked salmon dip that I don't even share with Sandra. Women just don't seem to understand the alchemy of dead fish. I had considered putting it in my will for eldest son but If you're interested, let me know....

Kate KT McKee — I could say something really crass here in response to Joe, but will let him off the hook this time.

Joe May — Old Scandinavian humor, Kate. No offense intended.

Tim Jones — Joe, as long as there's no brown sugar in that dip recipe I'd love to have it.

 


Another throwback Thursday: This is late 40s/early 50s at a farm we owned in Java, N.Y. As I recall i seldom took off that coonskin cap. A bit of the history can be found here http://alaskaatitude.blogspot.com/.../there-goes...

Joe May

Same design: Used mine to haul logs. Other end of the log was strapped to the back of a Honda three wheeler ATV. Wheel barrow driver needed only lift the handles and run like hell to keep up. Very tricky....
No photo description available.

Tim Jones I doubt that mine ever held a log, but I did pack some stuff on it one day and try to run away from home there. After pushing it up a hill, once I reached the other side and was out of sight, I got scared and went back. I don't think anybody even knew I had gone. They didn't make ATVs at this time.
 
Joe May
We hauled 16 ft roofing tin through our swamp with this rig...Sandra on the wheelbarrow handles, me on the three wheeler....I still remember the words she used.
 
 Tim Jones
I can imagine. I didn't know those words yet when I pushed that thing up the hil

Philip Munger
 
Timmy, Timmy Crockett, King of the wild back yard.....
 
Tim Jones
 
It was a hundred acre wood

 
Marian Nattrass
 
Never knew your family had a farm in Java. Interesting!

Tim Jones
 
Not a working farm, really just land but it did have a sugar bush.
 
Del Allison
 
Tim, your expression of isolation including your snow machine, & fat tire bikes, resembles my personal thoughts, having never owned either. My mode of remote travel for over thirty years in Alaska, was dog team. Blazing trails and enjoying Mother Nature. Mechanical transportation is a total distraction to peace & tranquility. I still wondered what the result would be if gas pumps went dry and the power grid shut down. The wild berries providing the wine spirits, with an evening toast to the "Aurora" dancing on the horizon. Happy New Year...

Here's another one of those "memories" conversations.

Tim Jones

I had almost forgotten how therapeutic splitting firewood can be.


 

Sharon Wright

I used to love our wood stove, campfires, bonfires. Then I developed an allergy to woodsmoke. Replaced the wood stove with a Toyo stove and all those symptoms went away. These fires have been hard on me. Glad someone is still enjoying wood fires and splitting firewood--although it's sure easier in the winter, Tim.

Tim Jones

I am not burning anything except energy. This wood is spruce that has fallen down in storms over the years and I never got around to splitting. About three huge trees worth.

Sharon Wright

Bonus! We're heading back to Delta this weekend to deal with our blow downs--white spruce and useless poplar. I used to love doing that, too. Still glad Dave does it all now.Top of FormBottom of Form

Carrie Ann Nash

I need to do something therapeutic like that. Even scream therapy or something. The endless outrage is exhausting. And despite all the fighting and writing and calling I feel totally powerless to overcome the evil that is Dunleavy/Babcock/Arduin and their minions. Chop away!

Tim Jones

When I was quitting smoking a few years ago, I always left some unsplit wood in a pile by the door, so when it got to be too much, I could go out there and blast away at it.

Oh, the joys of writing 

Here's another one of those "memories" conversations

Shared with Your friends
Ah the joys of the writer's life. I just received a royalty check for $1.44. One dollar and forty-four cents. Partaaaayyyy!
Gail Somerville
How will you ever decide what to spend it on? Hahaha
Shelley Gill
I have six books with one publisher. Have yet to get a check. Twenty five books and I work as a naturalist and do school visits. Shoulda been anything else.
Tim Jones
We don't do it for the money, that's for sure.
Shelley Gill
I used to write a book a year. Now I'm trying for three a year.
Tim Jones
I have been working on the current one for more than five years. If it ever gets finished and sells the hourly wage might be in the negatives
Michele Vincent
That'll buy a can of beer from the local 7-11
Sharon Wright
Buy stamps for your next submissions!
Tim Jones
It's all done on line these days.
Suzy Peakall
Don't know whether to cry or laugh at this one!
Kitty Delorey Fleischman
Sounds much like the magazine world.
Helen Hegener
I gave up on the traditionals a decade ago, never looked back, never been sorry. I'm not getting rich, but it's keeping me happy.
Tom Walker
Whooooo-hoooooo.
Tim Jones
Ha ha you got one too.
Tom Walker
Tim Jones no, I didnt. Nada
Tim Jones
You should have, it was our book. I'm not sure which is worse, getting a royalty check for $1.44 or not getting a royalty check for $1.44.
(In a more recent time I received $500 from Cruising World for an article they never printed) 
 
Garden 
For lack of anything else on a quiet Saturday morning here's another one of those "Memories" conversations —from my gardening days.
So, it's late at night and a tuna, lettuce and tomato sandwich sounds pretty good. Got tuna, got tomato, got … uh oh. Then it hit me. Went outside and clipped a couple of leaves out of the garden. How cool is that?
Rosemary Bassett
Pretty darn neat, isn't it ?...I have a garden too..
Sue Whittom
I enjoy a garden, particularly a salad garden with lettuce, tomatoes & cukes. I also have always grown chives for baked potatoes.
JD Richards
Uh, VERY!! 🙂
Del Allison
You could have gone fishing & had salmon, tomato & lettuce, less mercury. Lol
Joe May
Del: It's said there were cheek to jowl dip netters at the mouth of the Kenai..boats colliding and swamping each other...seemingly a lot of ill mannered people trying to catch the same fish. It was safer in the garden.
Del Allison
It's that time of the year. I been getting my sockeye at SAMs. Sure has been tasty having grilled fresh copper river salmon. I miss digging those clams at Clam Gulch.
Gail Somerville
Perfect!!! And it certainly does not get any fresher or crisper than that!
(I hadn't realized it when I first posted this but four of these people are no longer with us.)

SURPRISE 
Here's another one of those "Memories" conversations:
Me: OK facebook, wtf did I ever do to make you recommend the "Team Estrogen" page for me?
Rosemary Bassett
That made me chuckle , Tim....LOL
Mary Anne Walker
it's like FB doesnt even know who you are anymore....
Sue Whittom
Tim, I couldn't help but laugh. I remember showing up at the cabin and some strange woman from Chicago (?) there. Do you remember that?
Tim Jones
I have never been involved with a strange woman! Much.
Tim Jones
And if you are talking about the one who was there when I was staying in your cabin, she was from New York. And, yes, kind of strange, Beyond that I was totally embarrassed when you all barged in
Sue Whittom
That's the occasion. It wasn't that early was it? I bet I was more embarrassed. Anyway, it is just a Tim memory that makes me smile....one of several.
EXPLANATION: Sue and her husband and another couple owned a cabin across the trail from mine. They generously let me stay in their cabin while I was building my own. They usually came out on weekends but this happened midweek which (for me)is why it was such a surprise
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3 comments:

  1. AnonymousJanuary 27, 2026 at 3:02 AM

    So glad you continue with your blog. Brings up good memories

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousJune 14, 2026 at 4:28 PM

    Your blog makes for interesting reads. Continue please

    ReplyDelete

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Memorable quotations

The best way to know you are having an adventure is when you wish you were home talking about it." — a mechanic on the Alaska State Ferry System. Or as in my own case planning how I will be writing it on this blog.

"You can't promote principled anti-corruption without pissing off corrupt people." — George Kent

"If only the British had held on to the airports, the whole thing might have gone differently for us." — Mick Jagger

"You can do anything as long as you don't scare the horses." — a mother's favorite saying recalled by a friend

A poem is an egg with a horse inside” — anonymous fourth grader

“My children will likely turn my picture to the wall but what the hell, you only get old once." — Joe May

“Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut.” — Ernest Hemingway

When I write, I feel like an armless, legless man with a crayon in his mouth.― Kurt Vonnegut

“If you wrote something for which someone sent you a cheque, if you cashed the cheque and it didn't bounce, and if you then paid the light bill with the money, I consider you talented.”―Stephen King

The thing about ignorance is, you don't have to remain ignorant. — me again"

"It was like the aftermath of an orgasm with the wrong partner." – David Lagercrants “The Girl in the Spider’s Web.”

Why worry about dying, you aren't going to live to regret it.

Never debate with someone who gets ink by the barrel" — George Hayes, former Alaska Attorney General who died recently

My dear Mr. Frost: two roads never diverge in a yellow wood. Three roads meet there. — @Shakespeare on Twitter

Normal is how somebody else thinks you should act.

"The mark of a great shiphandler is never getting into situations that require great shiphandling," Adm. Ernest King, USN

Me: Does the restaurant have cute waitresses?

My friend Gail: All waitresses are cute when you're hungry.

I'm not a writer, but sometimes I push around words to see what happens. – Scott Berry

I realized today how many of my stories start out "years ago." What's next? Once upon a time?"

“The rivers of Alaska are strewn with the bones of men who made but one mistake” - Fred McGarry, a Nushagak Trapper

Many people hear voices when no one is there. Some of them are called mad and are shut up in rooms where they stared at walls all day. Others are called writers and they do pretty much the same thing. – Meg Chittenden

A non-writing writer is a monster courting insanity. – Franz Kafka

We are all immortal until the one day we are not. – me again

If the muse is late, start without her – Peter S. Beagle

Substitute ‘damn’ every time you’re inclined to write ‘very;’ your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be. ~Mark Twain Actually you could do the same thing with the word "really" as in "really cold."

If you are looking for an experience that will temper your vanity, this is it. There's no one to impress when you're alone on the trap line. – Michael Carey quoting his father's journal

Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing. – Benjamin Franklin

It’s nervous work. The state you need to write in is the state that others are paying large sums of money to get rid of. – Shirley Hazzard

So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence -- Bertrand Russell

You know that I always just wanted to have a small ship to take stuff from a place that had a lot of that stuff to a place that did not have a lot of that stuff and so prosper.—Jackie Faber, “The Wake of the Lorelei Lee”

If you attack the arguer instead of the argument, you lose both

If an insurance company won’t pay for damages caused by an “act of God,” shouldn’t it then have to prove the existence of God? – I said that

I used to think getting old was about vanity—but actually it’s about losing people you love. Getting wrinkles is trivial. – Eugene O’Neill

German General to Swiss General: “You have only 500,000 men in your army; what would you do if I invaded with 1 million men?”

Swiss General: “Well, I suppose every one of my soldiers would need to fire twice.”

Writing is the only thing that when I do it, I don’t feel I should be doing something else.—Gloria Steinem

Exceed your bandwidth—sign on the wall of the maintenance shop at the West Coast/Alaska Tsunami Warning Center

One thing I do know, if you keep at it, you usually wind up getting something done.—Patricia Monaghan

Do you want to know what kind of person makes the best reporter? I’ll tell you. A borderline sociopath. Someone smart, inquisitive, stubborn, disorganized, chaotic, and in a perpetual state of simmering rage at the failings of the world.—Brett Arends

It is a very simple mind that only knows how to spell a word one way.—Andrew Jackson

3:30 is too late or too early to do anything—Rene Descartes

Everything is okay when it’s 50-below as long as everything is okay. – an Alaskan in Tom Walker’s “The Seventymile Kid”

You can have your own opinion but you can’t have your own science.—commenter arguing on a story about polar bears and global warming

He looks at three ex wives as a good start—TV police drama

Talkeetna: A friendly little drinking town with a climbing problem.—a handmade bumper sticker

“You’re either into the wall or into the show”—Marco Andretti on giving it all to qualify last at the 2011 Indy 500

Makeup is not for the faint of heart—the makeup guerrilla

“I’m going to relax in a very adult manner.”—Danica Patrick after sweating it out and qualifying half an hour before Andretti

“Asking Congress to come back is like asking a mugger to come back because he forgot your wallet.”—a roundtable participant on Fox of all places

As Republicans go further back in the conception process to define when life actually begins, I am beginning to think the eventual definition will be life begins in the beer I was drinking when I met her.—me again

Hunting is a “critical element for the long-term conservation of wood bison.”—a state department of Fish and Game official explaining why the state would not go along with a federal plan to reintroduce wood bison in Alaska because the agreement did not specifically allow hunting

Each day do something that won’t compute – anon

I can’t belive I still have to protest this shit – a sign carriend by an elderly woman at an Occupy demonstration

Life should be a little nuts or else it’s just a bunch of Thursdays strung together—Kevin Costner as Beau Burroughs in “Rumor has it”

You’re just a wanker whipping up fear —Irish President Michael D. Higgins to a tea party radio announcer

Being president doesn’t change who you are; it reveals who you are—Michelle Obama

Sports malaprops

Commenting on an athlete with hearing impairment he said the player didn’t show any “uncomfortability.” “He's not doing things he can't do."

"… there's a fearlessment about him …"

"He's got to have the lead if he's going to win this race." "

"Kansas has always had the ability to score with the basketball."

"NFL to put computer chips in balls." Oh, that's gotta hurt.

"Now that you're in the finals you have to run the race that's going to get you on the podium."

"It's very important for both sides that they stay on their feet."

This is why you get to hate sportscasters. Kansas beats Texas for the first time since 1938. So the pundits open their segment with the question "let's talk about what went wrong." Wrong? Kansas WON a football game! That's what went RIGHT!

"I brought out the thermostat to show you how cold it is here." Points to a thermometer reading zero in Minneapolis.

"It's tough to win on the road when you turn the ball over." Oh, really? Like you can do all right if you turn the ball over playing at home?

Cliches so embedded in sportscasters' minds they can't help themselves: "Minnesota fell from the ranks of the undefeated today." What ranks? They were the only undefeated team left.

A good one: A 5'10" player went up and caught a pass off a defensive back over six feet tall. The quote? "He's got some hops."

Best homonym of the day so far: "It's all tied. Alabama 34, Kentucky 3." Oh, Tide.

"Steve Hooker commentates on his Olympic pole vault gold medal." When "comments" just won't do.

"He's certainly capable of the top ten, maybe even higher than that."

"Atlanta is capable of doing what they're doing."

"Biyombo, one of seven kids from the Republic of Congo." In the NBA? In America? In his whole country?

"You can't come out and be aggressive but you can't come out and be unaggressive."

"They're gonna be in every game they play!"

"First you have to get two strikes on the hitter before you get the strikeout."

"The game ended in the final seconds." You have to wonder when the others ended or are they still going on?

How is a team down by one touchdown before the half "totally demoralized?"

"If they score runs they will win."

"I think the matchup is what it is"

After a play a Houston defender was on his knees, his head on the ground and his hand underneath him appeared to clutch a very sensitive part of the male anatomy. He rolled onto his back and quickly removed his hand. (Remember the old Cosby routine "you cannot touch certain parts of your body?") Finally they helped the guy to the sideline and then the replay was shown. In it the guy clearly took a hard knee between his thighs. As this was being shown, one of the announcers says, "It looks like he hurt his shoulder." The other agrees and then they both talk about how serious a shoulder injury can be. Were we watching the same game?

"Somebody is going to be the quarterback or we're going to see a new quarterback."

"That was a playmaker making a play.”