from inside the skull of the sun

Last night I corkscrewed the cooked brains out from the inside of two marten skulls. It was truly disgusting -- I don't think I could ever eat brains, following this grotesque activity, so there goes my career as a zombie. Caveman Bill had shown up at my door with two skinned, frozen marten carcasses that he collected for me from a trapper back a couple of days ago, and I finally got around to doing something with them after letting them hang out in the freezer on top of the ice cube trays and perogies awhile. I'm sure the smell of cooking marten drove out the weak-stomached from the house. Perhaps there is a better way to quickly clean bones but I'm a self-taught butcher. I regret that I didn't get to meet the woman who was originally supposed to be my co-resident. She is both an accomplished artist and the daughter of a big game hunter, so would have been an excellent match I'm sure, and someone who I might have learned from with regards to cleaning carcass.

Anyway, I got to experience first-hand what Caveman Bill had told me about bad animal juju. Marten meat is inherently foul, a very dark red flesh that cooks to a deep brown-purple and stinks of dark turkey meat combined with old fish (likely due to the marten diet). It's certainly not the most foul thing I've ever cooked, but it was a fairly pervasive stench. If I'd had time, I would have buried the bodies and let insects do the work of cleaning the bones, but I'm here for only another three days.

Midnight Dome sun and sundog.

In brighter news, I did an epic hike to the Midnight Dome yesterday, during what was probably the most gorgeous day I've seen since arriving in Dawson. The light here is always special and stunning even when slight, but yesterday it was fairly mind-blowingly beautiful. The Dome is the highest point in these parts, where everything is visible all the way around for miles. Sweat was pouring down my spine while I hiked straight up for close to 2 hours in -25˚ weather - no hat or mitts required. My Canadian sherpas for this hike were Blair and Carly, and a sweet Scottish fella named Jim. The low light was so richly golden orange that all shadows in the snow appeared deep blue in contrast. On the way down, we slid on our bums in our snowpants, all the way down the steep power line cut, whipping out of control in a well-worn bobsled-like path. It was possibly the longest and most fun sliding of life.

Here are some more highlights from the climb up:

Work-wise, my project labour for this residency is nearing completion and I'm SO completely thrilled with the results. I love the objects. I will document them well before abandoning them, but part of me would like to keep them all. The stories will always be mine and will always be shared. One of the artifacts will be left at an indoor site, though I won't say where. All of the abandonment sites won't be easy places to get to. Carlos Jabbour has built me four beautiful wooden boxes now to house the objects (I only finished four of the original six planned). They all have clear plexi fronts screwed on, so that the contents are visible. Everything is a bit roughly constructed, but gorgeous and in keeping with Dawson's general ramshackle, makeshift vibe. The storytelling website with the audio clips (osteobiographies) is underway as well. I've learned more about what works well with this bone making process so I'm looking forward to repeating it again somewhere else!