Cowboy Poetry w/Merrill White

So this is your first summer in Ketchikan, but this is not your first summer in Alaska.

You've lived in Alaska for quite some time, right?

I have.

I've lived in Alaska for about 14 years, or not quite 14 years, but coming up on it.

Nice,

nice.

I came up to Alaska as a single dad with two teenagers.

I got them through high school in the Anchorage area, just outside of Anchorage.

Nice.

And then I started working the seasonal jobs.

I've worked up on the slope in the oil fields of Alaska.

Wow.

Uh, for the last seven years, the last three, four years, I worked just January to April, which is when new construction goes on up there.

I kind of transitioned from the production side to the, um, construction, which I enjoy quite a bit.

That's my main bread and butter.

Some summers I worked.

Last summer I worked in Denali National Park.

Nice.

Doing the same thing, driving, doing tours.

This year I needed to work in the summer again.

I got some projects, things I'm trying to do.

But I hadn't had a chance to come down to this part of Alaska.

And despite all my time in Alaska, so I thought, well, if I've got to work and I've got to do some things, let's try Ketchikan.

So I came down here.

I've enjoyed Ketchikan a great deal this summer.