Where Am I? Sitka Story Lab Student Anthology
The Island Institute's Sitka Story Lab program released this new book of Southeast Alaskan student writing in May 2016. Called Where Am I?: Stories of Strange Landscapes, Wrong Turns, and New Worlds, the anthology features fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and zany creative experiments that convey the disorientation and the discovery that young people experience, from being in the wilderness to simply growing up. The young writers come from Sitka, Hoonah, Haines, Wrangell, and Skagway, and are as young as nine years old and as old as eighteen. "The writing ranges from fantastic and playful to emotionally moving and dark," said Story Lab Coordinator Sarah Swong. "I'm impressed at how creative and varied these writings are, and at how open students were to feedback and improving their work." The project offered students the chance to write a piece for publication and to hone their writing with an editor.
The Island Institute's Sitka Story Lab program released this new book of Southeast Alaskan student writing in May 2016.
Called Where Am I?: Stories of Strange Landscapes, Wrong Turns, and New Worlds, the anthology features fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and zany creative experiments that convey the disorientation and the discovery that young people experience, from being in the wilderness to simply growing up. The young writers come from Sitka, Hoonah, Haines, Wrangell, and Skagway, and are as young as nine years old and as old as eighteen.
"The writing ranges from fantastic and playful to emotionally moving and dark," said Story Lab Coordinator Sarah Swong. "I'm impressed at how creative and varied these writings are, and at how open students were to feedback and improving their work."
The project offered students the chance to write a piece for publication and to hone their writing with an editor.
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AT THE BAR<br />
An agonizing twenty minutes later, Dorothy and Jeff were out of<br />
the water, in dry clothes and huddled in sleeping bags, clinging<br />
toany sign of warmth they could find. She hugged me, honoring<br />
my decision against a fire. We tended to the parents, checking their<br />
vitals, making sure they didn’t enter hypothermia’s greedy open<br />
arms. I stretched my tense muscles, peering out of the clearing to<br />
the racing water that could have been their death.<br />
A blue, oblong object drifted past, quietly as if trying to slip by<br />
enemy borders. I whispered, not finding my voice. Jeff perked up,<br />
seeking what I saw and took off down a game trail conveniently<br />
placed along the bank. Avoiding eye¬-jabbing sticks, we found<br />
the boat hung up on a tree, on our side of the river, a blessing as<br />
the river was moving fast and curved around opposite to us. Tying<br />
the bow¬line to a branch, we sluggishly made out way back to the<br />
warmth of camp.<br />
After resting, and feasting on tiny fajitas with avocado cooked over<br />
a soggy Coleman stove, Danny and Annie lowered themselves<br />
into the freezing water again, hoisting bags up the bank where<br />
Dorothy, Jeff, and I brought them to camp. Everything in dry bags,<br />
including an expensive camera, was soaked. We tossed half of our<br />
food (cereal, a box of rice, three loaves of bread, all of the crackers,<br />
cookies, the GORP makings) into the river as it were too saturated<br />
to salvage. You’re welcome, Mama Merganser and ducklings. Our<br />
living area was crowded, with our clothing, blankets, and books<br />
hung on trees to dry, tarps set up over the stove, and our tent laying<br />
awkwardly on a steep decline toward the water, a log resting at the<br />
door.<br />
Although the day was rough, and everyone was utterly exhausted,<br />
as we lay in the single tent, all four of us (Annie slept outside incase<br />
help came), giggling at the young pup who growled and<br />
98 <strong>Where</strong> <strong>Am</strong> I?
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