Termination Dust

It's definitely fall in St. Michael, Alaska.  Yesterday, from the windows of the church, we noticed what we would have called "termination dust"--the earliest snowfall--on the low mountains just south of us.  Yesterday evening, it snowed in an almost blizzard-like fashion for about half an hour, though it melted very quickly, and this morning, there was snow on the ground!  It was a very sunny day today, so that, too, is all gone, except for near buildings where the sun never reached.

The tundra does have fall colors, and I got a couple of pictures yesterday of the tail-end of them:

Of course, the pictures aren't the best, but you can see the red in with the yellow and brown, I think--the colors were more vivid a week ago, but I was sick and not thinking about pictures for my blog.  I didn't get pictures of the snow, as it wasn't light enough when I left for school for them to turn out.  We are so far west of our time zone that although the evenings are still long (light until close to 9), the mornings have already closed in, with sunrise not until after 8 and full light not until closer to 9.

Fortunately, I wasn't seriously ill at all--just a cold--but laryngitis with it, so Wednesday and Thursday I couldn't really talk at all.  There really aren't subs readily available here, but I was able to take Wednesday off to go to the clinic and rest my throat.  Thursday (and Friday, even though my voice was returning by then) I connected my computer to the projector and typed anything I needed to tell the kids.  They were very cooperative with the circumstances, I think.  I had recovered enough by Sunday to lead the Liturgy of the Word, and today, my voice is fully functional, even if raspy.

I promised some information on the curriculum here at St. Michael: I'll wait one more post for that, as I hope to grade some papers (which, you can imagine, I'm significantly behind on) before I need to leave to get to the store before it closes.  Some of you reading this will remember a time--as I just barely do-- when the store closing at 7 wasn't unusual; but coming from a culture of 24/7 big box stores, it does take some getting used to.

Hope all is well in your imagined corner of the Earth!

AMDG

Tim

Anthony A. Andrews School

I haven't yet gotten around to showing off my new school!  It's a beautiful facility, built just a couple of years ago.  The front of the school you've already seen.  Here's the inside:

Looking back at the school's entrance

The mural in the main hallway.  Haven't seen any of these in real life yet.

The school cafeteria

The gym.  It gets a LOT of use.

Some of the students' work, made in Cultural Awareness classes

The seventh-grade lockers, with the welcome sign only a little the worse for wear

The door of my classroom

My classroom, as seen from the entrance

My classroom, as seen from the back (notice the laptop provided for teacher use :) !)

In my next post, I'll give some details about what happens in a typical school day here and how it compares to other places I've been.

I'm off to lead the Rosary at church--the other Catholic teacher and I proposed beginning that as a Friday evening devotion.  Attendance has been limited so far, but we'll see how things progress.

But before I leave, a couple of shots of a very important building--the village post office:

The view as you approach the post office from the road.  The sign says "Alaska Army National Guard."  The flag is up when the post office is open--6 days a week.

Another view.  The gray skies have been typical of my time here, as have the puddles on the roads.