Ellyn Oaksmith's Blog - Posts Tagged "ellyn-oaksmith"
Lost and Found on the Bering Sea
On New Year’s Day around 20 years ago, in Dutch Harbor Alaska, I boarded the M/V Arctic Enterprise, a large fishing processor. I had flown up after signing a 2 month contract with the Arctic Alaska Corporation. My sister, Liz, was beside me. She was waiting to hear about law school. I was a writer looking to pay off my student loans and develop a writing life that didn’t include endless meetings in Los Angeles.
The Chief Engineer of the vessel saw us board the boat from the vantage of the wheelhouse. Snowflakes fell lazily down from a steel grey sky. Beyond us stretched the icy waters of the Bering Sea and some of the most profitable and dangerous fishing grounds in the world.
The other people boarding the vessel for their contract were from vastly different backgrounds. My sister and I were from private colleges and in my case, had a graduate degree. We were clean cut, enthusiastic and in the eyes of the Chief, who said, “Oh boy, those two think this is Outward Bound,” completely unprepared for life on a fishing boat.
The boat was older, well-used but perfectly safe thanks to one of the finest Chief Engineers ever to grace the ocean. We were to work 16 hours on, in the slime line, gutting and packing fish. In our 8 hours off, we would eat 2 meals, take a shower and somehow, on a rolling, turning, groaning boat, sleep.
Given that lots of people turn up in Dutch Harbor thinking they can easily make their fortune, the Chief’s estimation was dead on. Not only were we “Greenhorns,” we were women, a rare commodity in Dutch Harbor and on fishing boats. Some old timers even considered us bad luck.
My sister, whose previous work experience involved counseling those in crisis, worked her way into the part-time position (in addition to working in the factory) of “house mouse,” doing laundry, stamping roe bags for sale to the Japanese.
Everyone loved her. Not only was she a hard worker, she found ways to make the factory workers lives a little easier. She joked around with them constantly, taking special care with their laundry and made it her business to help people. When the cook had what I can only call a well deserved nervous breakdown half way through his contract, she suggested that I at least get a chance to cook one meal, as a tryout. If I worked out, the Skipper would save time and lots of money. We wouldn’t have to tie up at the dock, burning through cash, sitting out the season waiting for a replacement.
My tryout recipe was, stupidly enough, taken from the Silver Palate Cookbook. I used prime cuts of chicken that should have been saved for several meals, bottles of lemon juice I would kick myself later for dumping into a marinade. The shaking, chain-smoking, jabbering cook watched me prepare Lemon Chicken for a crew of men whose tastes ran to plain stew, biscuits and gravy and under-the-sea Jello salad, (a dish I’d never heard of and would try, later, with little success, to prepare.)
Amazingly, the Skipper, who had the same taste as his crew, promoted me to cook. I learned to listen to the crew, posting a sheet and pencil asking for favorite meals, most of which I’d never heard. I borrowed cook books from other boats cooks who took pity on me.
I’d been raised in a family of gourmet cooks, which was a liability with this crowd. I made stews without vegetables, thick white gravy with lumps of sausage, invented Chicken Cordon Bleu on a bun, which everyone loved. I was generally admired not for my ability to master down home cooking but my willingness to kill myself trying.
I was even hit, during a bad storm, with a flying ham. I was locked in freezer. I saw a man jump from his bunk during a nightmare wearing nothing but a pair of leopard print skivvies. I watched from the galley during a storm while a deck hand had his shoulder set by the Chief, who received directions from the doctor on call via radio satellite.
My sister lasted out her entire contract. They weren’t able to find a replacement for me so I ended up working for 4 straight months on the same boat, rarely seeing daylight, piling up checks and redefining, for all time, what being exhausted meant.
Later, once I’d rested in Seattle, I signed on for 2 more contracts. I flew to Alaska for 2 months of cooking at sea and wrote, traveled and lived reasonably well for the six months I had off. Eventually I paid off all my student loans and a portion of my future husband’s. I helped contribute to the purchase of our first home.
Working in Alaska is extreme living and moments of unbelievable beauty. I will never forget the playful Dahl porpoise swimming alongside the vast hull as it sliced the water or the Aleutian Islands sloping into the improbably bluest water.
I met people I would have otherwise never encountered: strong, intelligent people and misguided fragile people with vastly different lives and goals. That New Year’s Day, when we stood on that ramp, was the beginning of a test that ultimately, my sister and I both passed.
(My sister got into UW Law School. She also married the Chief Engineer.)
The Chief Engineer of the vessel saw us board the boat from the vantage of the wheelhouse. Snowflakes fell lazily down from a steel grey sky. Beyond us stretched the icy waters of the Bering Sea and some of the most profitable and dangerous fishing grounds in the world.
The other people boarding the vessel for their contract were from vastly different backgrounds. My sister and I were from private colleges and in my case, had a graduate degree. We were clean cut, enthusiastic and in the eyes of the Chief, who said, “Oh boy, those two think this is Outward Bound,” completely unprepared for life on a fishing boat.
The boat was older, well-used but perfectly safe thanks to one of the finest Chief Engineers ever to grace the ocean. We were to work 16 hours on, in the slime line, gutting and packing fish. In our 8 hours off, we would eat 2 meals, take a shower and somehow, on a rolling, turning, groaning boat, sleep.
Given that lots of people turn up in Dutch Harbor thinking they can easily make their fortune, the Chief’s estimation was dead on. Not only were we “Greenhorns,” we were women, a rare commodity in Dutch Harbor and on fishing boats. Some old timers even considered us bad luck.
My sister, whose previous work experience involved counseling those in crisis, worked her way into the part-time position (in addition to working in the factory) of “house mouse,” doing laundry, stamping roe bags for sale to the Japanese.
Everyone loved her. Not only was she a hard worker, she found ways to make the factory workers lives a little easier. She joked around with them constantly, taking special care with their laundry and made it her business to help people. When the cook had what I can only call a well deserved nervous breakdown half way through his contract, she suggested that I at least get a chance to cook one meal, as a tryout. If I worked out, the Skipper would save time and lots of money. We wouldn’t have to tie up at the dock, burning through cash, sitting out the season waiting for a replacement.
My tryout recipe was, stupidly enough, taken from the Silver Palate Cookbook. I used prime cuts of chicken that should have been saved for several meals, bottles of lemon juice I would kick myself later for dumping into a marinade. The shaking, chain-smoking, jabbering cook watched me prepare Lemon Chicken for a crew of men whose tastes ran to plain stew, biscuits and gravy and under-the-sea Jello salad, (a dish I’d never heard of and would try, later, with little success, to prepare.)
Amazingly, the Skipper, who had the same taste as his crew, promoted me to cook. I learned to listen to the crew, posting a sheet and pencil asking for favorite meals, most of which I’d never heard. I borrowed cook books from other boats cooks who took pity on me.
I’d been raised in a family of gourmet cooks, which was a liability with this crowd. I made stews without vegetables, thick white gravy with lumps of sausage, invented Chicken Cordon Bleu on a bun, which everyone loved. I was generally admired not for my ability to master down home cooking but my willingness to kill myself trying.
I was even hit, during a bad storm, with a flying ham. I was locked in freezer. I saw a man jump from his bunk during a nightmare wearing nothing but a pair of leopard print skivvies. I watched from the galley during a storm while a deck hand had his shoulder set by the Chief, who received directions from the doctor on call via radio satellite.
My sister lasted out her entire contract. They weren’t able to find a replacement for me so I ended up working for 4 straight months on the same boat, rarely seeing daylight, piling up checks and redefining, for all time, what being exhausted meant.
Later, once I’d rested in Seattle, I signed on for 2 more contracts. I flew to Alaska for 2 months of cooking at sea and wrote, traveled and lived reasonably well for the six months I had off. Eventually I paid off all my student loans and a portion of my future husband’s. I helped contribute to the purchase of our first home.
Working in Alaska is extreme living and moments of unbelievable beauty. I will never forget the playful Dahl porpoise swimming alongside the vast hull as it sliced the water or the Aleutian Islands sloping into the improbably bluest water.
I met people I would have otherwise never encountered: strong, intelligent people and misguided fragile people with vastly different lives and goals. That New Year’s Day, when we stood on that ramp, was the beginning of a test that ultimately, my sister and I both passed.
(My sister got into UW Law School. She also married the Chief Engineer.)
Published on March 14, 2013 09:42
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Tags:
adventure, alaska, authors, books, ellyn-oaksmith, fishing, ocean, screenwriting, sea, writing
Review of Adventures with Max and Louise Hits the Spot!
Published on March 14, 2013 10:00
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Tags:
adventures-with-max-and-louise, comedy, ellyn-oaksmith, romance, romantic-comedies, writers, writing
Cover Reveal-- Book Available 12/1 on Amazon.com
Published on November 29, 2013 11:13
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Tags:
adventures-with-max-and-louise, authors, books, ellyn-oaksmith, romance, women-s-fiction, writing
The Best Hawaiian Christmas Gift
The plan was, minimal gifts, minimal food, maximum sun and all our dough spent in plane tickets. I was a teenager. My family was going with our best friends, collectively, The Brysons. Between the two of us, we had six kids. Our mothers had gone to University together and their husbands had to get along or spend many weekends unhappily. As luck had it, they became fast friends.
There was no problem settling in. We stayed at a condo near the beach. It was familiar and we shucked our gear, changed into bathing suits and hit the beach. I am sure there were some arguments about my sister and I looking out for our younger brother. I am sure my mother won.
We spent the days at the beach, eating Siamin noodles from McDonald’s and roasting in those pre-sunscreen days until we resembled toast. My nose probably peeled the entire time. My mother likely tried chasing me around with one of my dad’s long sleeve shirts, telling me I was going to turn into a wrinkly prune. I knew that wrinkles would NEVER bother me. Besides, my dad’s shirt was like, totally ugly.
Christmas dinner, which was supposed to be a light affair, turned into something else at the hands of my father who feels that holidays are all about butter, cream and a chunk of meat. He roasted some huge beefy thing in the oven until we were all sweltering and disgusted by the smell. What smelled delicious in foggy Seattle, made our stomachs turn in the tropics.
He presented us with his feast, along with my mom’s best friend’s offerings, which were traditional and heavy. Did I mention that she’s a saint? Part of her saintliness was realizing that no one was going to go along with my father’s delusion that we would eat much. So she bought into his whole Christmas feast ethos and feigned jolliness when we all sat down in various stages of undress and made faces.
"Well isn’t this nice?" she said as we all sat down at the table which took up enough room in the condo living room so that we sat against the walls. Some of us were out on the balcony. Six sullen children stared at the food without comment. Nice? We wanted to be at beach. Or the pool. Or chasing peacocks. That was my brother.
We managed a few bites and tried to run off. My mother caught us by the straps, forced us into the kitchen. We washed dishes from a meal we neither wanted nor enjoyed before dashing off. If we heard one more rotation of the Don Ho Christmas tape one of us was going to jump. We were on the 22nd floor.
New Years was much more fun. The whole city of Honolulu comes alive with fireworks. The fathers bought a bunch of M80’s. Being men in the 70’s they were not looking for sparkly but something that can take an eye out. They took their weapons, along with their children, to light off a few across the street from the condo. Across the street is a school. The police that arrived, lights blazing, told us that it was against the law to light off fireworks, especially illegal ones, on a school ground. Who knew?
Later, after a few, possibly a few too many cocktails, the dads decided that the leftover fireworks were going to waste. We weren’t allowed to come but we did watch on from the 22nd floor balcony as our fathers blew up tremendously loud M80’s. They reverberated across the parking lot and up the building with a pleasing force.
Soon after we had the memory of a lifetime provided as the same police arrived and our fathers ran off the property, away from the police, scaling a fence. We then had the epic joy of seeing said fathers getting a scolding from their wives about setting a bad example and the you-could-have-gotten-killed lectures we’d heard countless times. The dads didn’t seem to mind. They had a great time. Time for another drink.
Yes, there was sun and surf and palm trees but the best part of that trip was watching our fathers get chased by the police.
Merry Christmas!
There was no problem settling in. We stayed at a condo near the beach. It was familiar and we shucked our gear, changed into bathing suits and hit the beach. I am sure there were some arguments about my sister and I looking out for our younger brother. I am sure my mother won.
We spent the days at the beach, eating Siamin noodles from McDonald’s and roasting in those pre-sunscreen days until we resembled toast. My nose probably peeled the entire time. My mother likely tried chasing me around with one of my dad’s long sleeve shirts, telling me I was going to turn into a wrinkly prune. I knew that wrinkles would NEVER bother me. Besides, my dad’s shirt was like, totally ugly.
Christmas dinner, which was supposed to be a light affair, turned into something else at the hands of my father who feels that holidays are all about butter, cream and a chunk of meat. He roasted some huge beefy thing in the oven until we were all sweltering and disgusted by the smell. What smelled delicious in foggy Seattle, made our stomachs turn in the tropics.
He presented us with his feast, along with my mom’s best friend’s offerings, which were traditional and heavy. Did I mention that she’s a saint? Part of her saintliness was realizing that no one was going to go along with my father’s delusion that we would eat much. So she bought into his whole Christmas feast ethos and feigned jolliness when we all sat down in various stages of undress and made faces.
"Well isn’t this nice?" she said as we all sat down at the table which took up enough room in the condo living room so that we sat against the walls. Some of us were out on the balcony. Six sullen children stared at the food without comment. Nice? We wanted to be at beach. Or the pool. Or chasing peacocks. That was my brother.
We managed a few bites and tried to run off. My mother caught us by the straps, forced us into the kitchen. We washed dishes from a meal we neither wanted nor enjoyed before dashing off. If we heard one more rotation of the Don Ho Christmas tape one of us was going to jump. We were on the 22nd floor.
New Years was much more fun. The whole city of Honolulu comes alive with fireworks. The fathers bought a bunch of M80’s. Being men in the 70’s they were not looking for sparkly but something that can take an eye out. They took their weapons, along with their children, to light off a few across the street from the condo. Across the street is a school. The police that arrived, lights blazing, told us that it was against the law to light off fireworks, especially illegal ones, on a school ground. Who knew?
Later, after a few, possibly a few too many cocktails, the dads decided that the leftover fireworks were going to waste. We weren’t allowed to come but we did watch on from the 22nd floor balcony as our fathers blew up tremendously loud M80’s. They reverberated across the parking lot and up the building with a pleasing force.
Soon after we had the memory of a lifetime provided as the same police arrived and our fathers ran off the property, away from the police, scaling a fence. We then had the epic joy of seeing said fathers getting a scolding from their wives about setting a bad example and the you-could-have-gotten-killed lectures we’d heard countless times. The dads didn’t seem to mind. They had a great time. Time for another drink.
Yes, there was sun and surf and palm trees but the best part of that trip was watching our fathers get chased by the police.
Merry Christmas!
Published on December 01, 2013 11:07
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Tags:
adventures-with-max-and-louise, authors, chicklit, christmas, ellyn-oaksmith, humor, reading, romance
My New Book is Launched!!! A Holiday Treat for under $1.00
Christmas is coming whether she likes it or not…
Meryl thought things couldn’t get any worse. She’s caught her husband in bed with the neighbor. She just found out she’s broke. Then her estranged mother, Faye, shows up.
Faye wants to be a grandmother and has money to loan so it’s hard to turn her away. But what Meryl doesn’t know is that Faye, a former stripper and born again Christian, plans on opening an exotic women’s dance studio in Meryl’s affluent suburban community.
When Meryl’s book club volunteers to promote the studio by performing at a charity tea, they discover that their laced up ‘burb isn’t as proper as they think. As her husband fights to win her back, Meryl grows increasingly attracted to a handsome sheriff, recovering from his own loss. But first she has to get through Christmas.
Funny, sad and sweet, Divine Moves reveals the forces that derail our lives and the sometimes divine intervention that keeps us on track.
http://www.amazon.com/kindle/dp/B00H1...
Meryl thought things couldn’t get any worse. She’s caught her husband in bed with the neighbor. She just found out she’s broke. Then her estranged mother, Faye, shows up.
Faye wants to be a grandmother and has money to loan so it’s hard to turn her away. But what Meryl doesn’t know is that Faye, a former stripper and born again Christian, plans on opening an exotic women’s dance studio in Meryl’s affluent suburban community.
When Meryl’s book club volunteers to promote the studio by performing at a charity tea, they discover that their laced up ‘burb isn’t as proper as they think. As her husband fights to win her back, Meryl grows increasingly attracted to a handsome sheriff, recovering from his own loss. But first she has to get through Christmas.
Funny, sad and sweet, Divine Moves reveals the forces that derail our lives and the sometimes divine intervention that keeps us on track.
http://www.amazon.com/kindle/dp/B00H1...
Published on December 03, 2013 16:04
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Tags:
authors, books, chicklit, christmas, ellyn-oaksmith, kindle, kindlebooks, reading, romance
Free Book Contest -- Worst Christmas Gift Ever
Go to https://www.facebook.com/EllynOaksmit... and share your worst Christmas/Hanukkah/Holiday gift ever and win one of 5 free e-book copies of Divine Moves. Contemporary romance with a groove!
Published on December 03, 2013 17:25
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Tags:
adventures-with-max-and-louise, authors, books, contests, divine-moves, ellyn-oaksmith, free-books, kindle, kindlebooks
Free Book Giveaway Coming soon
Keep an eye on Amazon.com for Divine Moves freebies. Free e-book giveaway coming soon!
http://www.amazon.com/Divine-Moves-El...

Published on December 19, 2013 12:00
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Tags:
authors, divine-moves, ellyn-oaksmith, free-books, giveaways, kindle, kindlebooks
Sneak Peak of Unreleased Book -- 50 Acts of Kindness
When Kylie's angry rant at a pregnant employee goes viral, she attempts to rehabilitate her image with 50 acts of kindness in 50 days.
Will it work?
http://ellynoaksmith.tumblr.com/post/...
Will it work?
http://ellynoaksmith.tumblr.com/post/...
Published on December 19, 2013 12:06
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Tags:
authors, divine-moves, ellyn-oaksmith, kindle, kindlebooks, writing
Free e-book DIVINE MOVES 12.20
One day only, free e-book. A funny look at modern families.
December 20th
http://www.amazon.com/Divine-Moves-El...
December 20th
http://www.amazon.com/Divine-Moves-El...
Published on December 19, 2013 20:47
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Tags:
adventures-with-max-and-louise, authors, books, contests, divine-moves, ellyn-oaksmith, free-books, kindle, kindlebooks
Free Books!!! Today only!!
Published on December 20, 2013 08:33
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Tags:
adventures-with-max-and-louise, ellyn-oaksmith, free-books, giveaways, kindlebooks, reading, romance, writing