Aki prefers the house to outside on days when the Taku winds slam down 7th street. From her perch on the couch arm she can watch workers struggle toward the Seward Street Steps against 70 mile per hour gusts. I’d be sitting with her today if not for work.

The Taku winds plague Downtown Juneau when high pressure sets up over the Yukon Territory and a big low moves past British Columbia’s Queen Charlotte Islands. This engine forces already cold winds across the ice fields bordering Canada and Alaska and then down upon my town. They wander in random directions through the downtown streets, much like the tourists of summer.

Last night, dressed in quilted snow machine clothes and beaver hat I climbed the three vertical blocks from Alaska’s capital building to Chicken Ridge. It was 15 degrees but felt more like 10 below thanks the Taku blowing up the hill. One of the young legislative aides passed me wearing only the business casual uniform of his trade. (No hat, coat, boots, gloves, scarf, sweater). Should he be admired for his toughness or pitied as a fool?

The winds let us taste  a northerner’s purgatory but they also bring beauty by stirring Gasteneau Channel with wind spouts and shrouding sunrise in blowing snow.