Anchorage Daily News

HAINES -- It finally warmed up last week and almost got sunny, just in time for the Fourth of July and Sen. Ted Stevens' visit the next day. The mayor got him here by hand-delivering to the senator's Washington office a brochure detailing our festivities honoring the 50th anniversary of statehood and the Alaska military tradition at Haines' hundred-year-old former Army base, Fort Seward. It had a photograph of the guest of honor, the senator himself, on the front. When Senator Stevens noted that there were no dates, the mayor told him that we would hold the event any day that he could come.

July 5th it was.

That's why even after racing up Mount Ripinsky, waving at the parade marchers, lunching at the library picnic, rafting down the Chilkoot River in homemade boats, dancing at the Pioneer Bar to a local swing band, and even after staying up late enough to hear the fireworks whistle and boom and see parachutes of sparks shower down over the dusky harbor, we celebrated all over again the next day.

On the 5th of July, the firemen served 680 plates of barbecue and beans, the old cannon blasted at Fort Seward, trumpets bugled, singers sang, totem poles were unveiled, veterans were saluted and Senator Stevens was honored all around the Chilkat Valley from downtown Haines to nearby Klukwan.

While a clever photographer who is young enough to be the senator's great-grandson dubbed the show "Ted Man Walking," no one said that out loud. In a town known for being outspoken and opinionated, the senator was treated with the kind of courtesy we would give, say, the queen of England. At a breakfast hosted by local Republicans, Tim June, the Democratic candidate for the state House, was the only one in a sport coat and teased my T-shirt-and-Carhartt-clad husband that the GOP was backsliding.

It was easier to treat the senator as a celebrity benefactor that we (sort of) know than to quiz him about the politics of oil, war and climate change, so we took turns shaking his hand and thanking him for coming. We spoke to one of the most influential men in our state, our country and the world the way we would the groom's great-uncle in a receiving line at a wedding. We mentioned friends or acquaintances we had in common. We said we hoped he enjoyed his stay. (A reporter did ask a few pointed questions, but the senator was ushered away by local chaperones who said there was no time for that.)

I had expected black Suburbans, flags, suits and Ray-Bans all around. Instead, he seemed to be with a few friends from Juneau and wore khakis, a trim flight jacket with his name on it and black walking shoes. He arrived for a ceremony out in Klukwan early in an unadorned minivan. Waiting for it to start, he chatted easily and patted a dog. He thanked everyone for inviting him.

There were about 75 villagers and townspeople assembled on the edge of the Klukwan Veterans Memorial Park. The elders, many in beaded suede vests or with button blankets over their shoulders, sat on chairs in the front. The rest of us stood or leaned on the hoods of parked rigs down on the village road. There were a few sprinkles as the senator took his place up on the lawn in a semicircle of a dozen or so veterans, mostly in jeans, beaded vests and gold and blue veterans caps, for the unveiling of two new warrior totem poles carved here.

The simple, formal ceremony was the kind we do so well in this valley of artists, musicians, performers and speakers. It was hosted by two village women, sisters and go-getters, dressed in black and red with Tlingit silver jewelry who spoke with grace and authority and kept it moving.

It began and ended with prayers and included "America the Beautiful" on the trumpet and the familiar "whaa-hey-yaas" and drumbeats of the Tlingit National Anthem. The color guard saluted, roll was called, the totem poles were uncovered and carvers praised. There were short, heartfelt speeches thanking veterans, including one from the senator and one from state representative Bill Thomas, a Native Vietnam vet himself.

Most of the veterans present had been in Vietnam, although one had just returned from Iraq. The best count is that 39 hometown guys fought in Southeast Asia. They all survived. So many believe that their good fortune was the result of prayers back home that the totem designers memorialized that power with carved hands and faces on each side of the fierce soldier figures.

In closing, our hostess asked us to bless all the citizen soldiers gathered before us, the weathered fisherman, the old logger, the village guys and town guys, her daughter the National Guard medic, the equipment operator and the senior senator from Alaska, all of them the same, by holding our hands out and praying for their wounds to heal, the ones we can see and the ones we can't. The leader who we feted like royalty in the morning was, at the end of the day, another old soldier among equals. On the anniversary of our nation's birth, that's good to know.

Heather Lende lives and writes in Haines and is the author of "If You Lived Here, I'd Know Your Name." She can be reached at hlende@adnmail.com.

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