More Than His Share, and What Happened to Summer?

I'm going to guess that no one reading this blog will recognize the name Dan Peek.  I wouldn't have, before about two years ago, when an email came to the Ronald McDonald House where I was working.    

I was listening to Pandora the other day, and a song by America came on.  I had a minute, so decided to read the bio they had listed for America, having more than a casual interest, as you will see.  I liked some of their hits, but wasn't a huge fan.  Getting to the end of the bio, I was shocked to read that Dan Peek, a founding member of America, had passed away.  How did I not hear about this?  Wasn't he way too young to die?

I switched to Wikipedia, and found he had passed away in late July of last year.  That explained why I missed his passing:  we were on our week-long trip up to our new lives in Southeast Alaska, so not getting much more than major headlines for news.  Wow, I just couldn't believe he had died.  The article said he was only 60, definitely too young.  He had passed away in his sleep, most likely a peaceful and probably painless death.  May you rest in peace, Dan.

I was working at the Ronald McDonald House in San Diego, and my boss got an email from Dan, out of the blue.  He forwarded it to me, asking that I find out if it was legit, and go from there.  It turned out it was very legit:  Dan had several guitars that he no longer played, and had decided it was time to do something with them besides just store them. He wanted to donate them to us, to do with as we saw fit, to benefit the families served by the Ronald McDonald House.  Wow, how cool is that?!  

Between one thing and another, and another, it took about four months to get this wonderful, thoughtful donation finalized.  In the mean time, Dan had posted his offer to donate his guitars on his blog, and a few fans had responded that they would love to purchase one or more of them.  Some of these guitars had appeared on America album covers, so had a little more cache.  

Finally the day came when the guitars arrived at the House.  Dan had even donated the materials and labor by his handyman to carefully crate them up for shipment, who then drove the crates to the nearest Fed Ex facility, which, if I remember right, was about 80 miles from his home.  The only hiccup in the whole process was when his wife saw the list of guitars Dan had chosen to donate, one of which was her favorite.  Dan was so apologetic about having to switch it out for another, while we completely understood of course, and would have been just as happy with four instead of five.  He was a very generous person.

We were just about to put them on ebay when one of the people who had contacted Dan months earlier finally responded to one of our many emails to him.  He wrote that he really wanted the whole collection, and would pay a bit of a premium over what our research had shown the guitars would probably bring at auction.  Accepting his offer would also save some costs, so we accepted it.  Dan's thoughtful gift resulted in the Ronald McDonald House of San Diego getting $50,000!  Wow, we were pretty excited!  What a wonderful donation!  We invited him out to participate in a person-to-person thank you event, and introduce him to some of the families staying at the House.  He politely declined, saying he didn't travel anymore, but thanked us for the invitation.  He was so accommodating throughout the whole process, it was nothing but a pleasure working with him.  

You may be wondering why he chose the Ronald McDonald House for such a generous offer, and why San Diego's, out of the hundred's of wonderful Houses across the U.S.  When Dan was very young, around six maybe, he had to be hospitalized for a while, and the nearest hospital was 200 miles from his family home.  His family couldn't afford to stay in a hotel, so for periods of time, he was in a hospital in a strange town, alone.  When he thought about donating his guitars, he thought of the one organization that is dedicated to overcoming just that situation.  As to why San Diego, we had recently updated the website, and at the same time taken advantage of a service Google offered nonprofit ads   high on the right hand column of a search page, and that was how he found us when he searched on "Ronald McDonald House."  Wow, that really paid off for the House!  

A deer family out for a morning walk

Viking Lumber in Klawock is the last large lumber mill in all Southeast Alaska

Last week it was sunny almost the entire five days!  Before that, we had several sunny warm days lately, a very nice change from most of the summer.  The seawater turns so very blue when the sky is clear, and the sun reflects like magic off the ripples from the jumping salmon, the breezes playing along the surface, and the currents flowing underneath.  

The Tribe put on their Second Annual Sockeye Salmon Festival two weeks ago.  This is an all-day event, with events for kids and adults, a salmon dish contest, a dessert contest for youth, and a free salmon fry.  The weather cooperated, and it was sunny nearly all day.  We had a big crowd and everyone had lots of fun.  Kathy was in Sitka for training, so missed out.  

View across the ballfield to the Klawock Inlet

KCA Tribal Council President Nick and co-worker Tom

Lined up for the three-legged race.

The sound of the purse seine boat engines idling at the dock outside my window always tugged at me, as if a good memory was being tickled.  They rubble with lots of power, even though muffled by the water and the boat surrounding them.  They sound nothing like the higher, sharper, loader rumble of a 302 in a Mustang.  Only after hearing them many times, and taking a few minutes to explore my memory, did I realize why the sound was familiar and positive:  it reminded me of the Jungle Cruise boats at Disneyland!  Ha, that's it!   That has always been one of my favorite rides.  The Boat Guides do a great job of using double entendre's, etc., for the adults, while also making it fun for children.  Those boats sound the same, low and rumbling.  Too funny.  

The dog and coho salmon are jumping in the channel, right outside my window and across the bay, seeming to have contests, and to yell at us, ‘come and get me,’ are fun, and big, but it’s not enough.

Patches of snow remain in the mountains, a true indicator of how cool and cloudy this summer has been.

Hope everyone has a fun Labor Day weekend.