- Phillip

Ice Cream on the Fly
by Phillip May

         I can’t begin to describe the beauty of Alaska. There are mountains and tons of wildlife to be found in the open terrain; the scenery is just beautiful. Alaska is also beautiful in a different sort of way, a way in which one can’t really describe. The only way to describe it is to say that when you come to Alaska, you feel something change within yourself. You not only see the beauty with your eyes, you see it with your heart. Many people who come to Alaska feel this way. Kathy Rider, the manager of Central Charters, a fishing and charter company in Homer, Alaska, has experienced this type of beauty. “I used to own an ice cream parlor down the boardwalk on the spit. I sold that and went and lived in the lower forty-eight, but I missed Alaska too much. I just had to come back,” Kathy said.
         In 1992 Kathy came to Alaska from her home in Idaho to run an ice cream shop on the Homer spit. “I bought an ice cream parlor just down the way there. Just think, an ice cream parlor in Alaska,” Kathy said. The parlor was Kathy’s pride and joy, but unfortunately things began getting tougher and she had to sell the parlor. “It was hard to get winter jobs, and I wasn’t living here [in Alaska] in the winter, so I was traveling back and forth all the time. It was just too hard, but I loved the ice cream parlor, so I built it up and sold it,” she said.
When Kathy left Alaska she moved around, living in the lower states. Nothing she saw anywhere else compared to the beauty of Alaska. “I lived in Washington, then Connecticut, and then Florida. I was kind of a gypsy for a while,” she said. She missed Alaska too much, so when she got the offer to come back and manage a charter company for some friends she said yes in a New York minute. As for now Kathy enjoys what she does, especially since she can look out the big window in the charter shop and see all the wildlife that Alaska has to offer. “One day I looked out one window and counted forty eagles. Not many people get to see that, especially at work. I just think I have the greatest place to work,” Kathy said.
         Kathy can see the beauty of Alaska through her window, through her eyes, and most importantly through her heart. Alaska not only has the beauty to take one’s breath away, but it also has the beauty to affect and touch a person’s life. Kathy has been so touched by this beauty that she now lives in Alaska all year and does not plan on going anywhere soon. Alaska has the power to change lives. It has changed Kathy’s life, and I know it will change the lives of many others as well.