Stand By Me

This morning, just before we're to leave for Seward and the boat, I open my e-mail and find two photos from my brother, from last summer.  Sometimes it feels unreal, that time.  But it was real, and these photos prove it.  And they prove something else about survival and love.  There's a poem somewhere out there with these words, and of course they say too much and not enough.  But I'll put them here anyway, because in this moment, they feel true:  "I am alive because you love me."