Once again we dive into the archives from the incredibly prolific career of travel author/journalist Felix Runwald. Runwald’s work, unfortunately, has been uncollected, due to the fact that it would be impossible to do so (it spans from the early twenties to today).

In this installment, I have selected Runwald’s coverage of the Exxon Valdez oil spill, which has recently resurfaced in the news due the case resurfacing in the Supreme Court. It was published in the April 1989 issue of Harper’s. At this point, Runwald was well into his seventies, and many say that his writing had begun to slip from that of an American hero to that of an American hero who was pretty cranky. You be the judge. 

When I first learned of the oil spill in Alaska I was angry. Angry at my assistant Tony for waking me up at three in the morning. Then, once the severity of what had happened had sunk in, I grew sleepy. Then I reached the next stage, and I was at peace with what happened, because I was asleep. But when I woke up for my morning jog two hours later I had a new feeling to grapple with: the feeling of dew-soaked pavement beneath my shoes.

Cut to three hours later: I’m encased in top of the line winter gear, on a helicopter, making it’s way to Prince William Sound in Alaska. I’m feeling cold.

The spill itself, by this point, has no doubt been burned into the retinas of millions of viewers of the wretched television box, but to see it right beneath your feet is an experience entirely all it’s own. The mysterious depths of the ocean made blacker, and more mysterious by another liquid: alcohol. The say that blood is thicker than water, and so too must oil be, for it floats upon the surface of the ocean, coating all it touches.

My helicopter touches down, and initially I am hesitant to exit. I send Tony out first, and when he returns safe and not covered in oil, like those horrible sea otters, I exit the craft as well. Initially I am unsure as to what I am doing in a place such as this. I am, after all, Felix Runwald. My breadth of work features socio-journalistic analysis, not enviro-criticism. As I kick a few oil speckled rocks forward, I find my story.

“Ow,” she says. I apologize and she cuts me off, recognizing me. At this point in my career the dance between journalist and female subject has become a familiar watusi, but one complicated by the addition of my third, and favorite, wife Janice.

I introduce myself to this volunteer, Anne, and immediately tell her that at no point in my reporting will we be making love. She seems disappointed, but understands. A resident of the area, Anne has been working all morning in the clean-up effort by washing rocks on the beach. I ask her where the dying animals are and she pauses for a moment, out of sympathy for the animals (or perhaps for what I will see when I find them? or because I am no longer interested in what she is doing?) and points to her right, further up the shore.

Prior to this day, I hated river otters, much preferring the far superior and patriotic sea otter, but to see such a fragile and pitiful creature, slathered in oil, lying directly next to the majestic sea otter, allowed me to see it in a different light. I put on a pair of rubber gloves for my protection, and gently caressed the dying animal’s head. While the river otter (I named him Phineas) surely had never read any of my work, I like to think that, in some small way, he could tell that I was more important than any of the other volunteers that surrounded him. As I brought the pillow to Phineas’ face to usher him gently into what my friend Dylan Thomas referred to as the “good night,” I thought I saw a small smile creep across the river otter’s face. Almost as if to say, “thank you, Felix. You’re a good man, and a great writer.”

The sad deed done, I then asked to help with the cleaning of the sea otters and gave the pillow to Tony so that Ann could wash it in between rocks.

I knew that clearly the Lord above was punishing America for adopting Alaska as a state, an issue I vehemently wrote on in the late fifties, and a large part of me wanted to encourage everyone to petulantly fling down their brushes and hoses and vacate to the continental 48. But deep down, I knew this wasn’t an option. We Americans stick together, whether they live in the states that are connected, the neat one with volcanos and attractive women or the stupid cold one. Though I was not a resident of this hateful state, together we stood as one, and I helped these Alaskans with the assisted suicide of a dozen river otters that day.

That evening, as the helicopter blades spun us into the air, I slapped Toby. Not for waking me up that early morning, but for not properly waking up America to this problem. I now humbly relay his apology to you, America. He also said he was sorry about making the wrong sandwich, so I forgave him for that as well.