Grown-up Austin

Austin watches the Blazers lose.

This past week we were blessed with the presence of my younger sister's son, Austin. He lives in Palmer, Alaska, a suburb of Anchorage, with his wife Starr and their three children. Justice and Jada just might be the cutest little girls on the planet. (Judge for yourself below.) Their little brother, Ashton, is a spittin' image of their dad, who in turn is a Mini Me version of his dad, Kevin.

Austin is an animal control officer in Palmer, the seat of Matunuska-Susitna Borough (borough = county), about 40 miles northeast of Anchorage. It's right next to Wasilla, the little town made famous by its former mayor. (You know who I'm talkin' about.)

Anyway, the borough sent him down to Portland for a week of professional training offered by the National Animal Control Association. He joined 30 other officers from around the country for workshops at a local community college and, fortunately, had a little time to explore Portland on his own before and just after the conference ended. He was pretty resourceful, riding the light-train from near the airport to downtown and back.

I met up with him on Tuesday night for what I hoped would be a real treat -- the Trail Blazers vs. Houston Rockets game at the Rose Garden. Argh! The Blazers played horribly and lost by 16 points. In fact, I think they trailed from start to finish.

It was fun being with Austin because he's so knowledgeable about the NBA and its players. I overlooked the fact that he's a lifelong Lakers fan and a big Kobe Bryant supporter.

On Friday, Lori and I picked him up from the mall near our house and treated him to dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant in our neighborhood. What a delightful evening. He loved the food, which we anticipated. But we had such a great talk over dinner and then back at our place.

Jada and Justice

Each of my two sisters has only one kid, so Austin has always had a special place in the family. It's been hard not seeing him as frequently as we'd like, especially during his growing-up years in Dillingham, a small fishing village on Bristol Bay that's 300 miles from Anchorage and very hard to get to. It was natural that he'd develop a love for the outdoors, including fishing and hunting, and not surprising that he would work for some time on a commercial boat. He'll turn 30 in November and it's wonderful to see he's blossomed into a solid, stand-up guy: self-confident without being cocky and a young man who clearly loves his wife and cherishes his family life.

I attribute a lot of this to his service in the U.S. Navy, which appears to have instilled in him a nice balance of self-discipline, tolerance and patience. At dinner, he told us of his travels to Singapore, Ghana, Senegal, Spain and Portugal. For the last few years, he lived in Port Hueneme, just outside Santa Barbara. He used his military benefits to buy his family a home in Palmer and he seems just really comfortable with himself and his situation.

My sister Cathy raised him mostly as a single mother, following Kevin's death in an auto accident when Austin was still a young boy. He and his family stayed with us overnight last summer when they were en route from California to Alaska following his discharge from the Navy. We hadn't seen him since, so it was a real treat. Cathy has every reason to feel proud. Austin is a great young man and someone I'm proud to call my nephew.