;)
Isaac Killigvuk is a whaling captain from Point Hope, and when he came dancing toward me at Kivgiq, extending this watch in my direction, I at first thought that he wanted me to take a picture of it before he gave it as a gift to someone.
Then I realized that he was giving it to me. This meant that I had to go out on the floor and dance with him. Despite what I do to make a living, at heart I am a terribly shy person and I do not know how to dance. Every Kivgiq, I do dance at least once, but I pick a very crowded invitational fun dance and then go hide in the crowd.
Now, I had to dance in front of everybody. Worse yet, Isaac dances with such soul, power and grace, that I knew I would look pitiful and awkward by comparison.
But something happened that I would not have expected. I took the watch and then, as I watched Isaac's movements, I suddenly felt something inside me; it started out in my back and then moved into my arms and legs and then they started to move. I danced. People clapped. They cheered, they shouted.
When the dance ended, Isaac and I embraced. I was about to run off and hide but the crowd shouted, "more! more!" And so I danced again, with Isaac, the whaling captain whose father once drifted away on the ice and then, after an amazing experience in which he found himself not so alone as a person by himself on an ice floe would expect to be, drifted back again.
Now I owe Isaac a gift. All I have to give is photographs and somewhere in my hap-hazard, chaotic, 35 mm film archive there are some of his late father. I think I know what I must give to him.
;)
Always, the women of Wainwright dance with such grace and beauty.
;)
Such beauty.
;)
Suddenly, the dance leader's motions are interrupted by the rush of a tiny girl.
;)
The dance continues. You can expect to see the girl in motion in this line in future years. She is Kara and her beautiful mother is Taktuk.
I want to make a good Kivgiq spread, but so far I have still only touched a small percentage of my take, and it is late and I am tired. I will try to get in at least one more sample. Maybe tomorrow, but I don't know. Tomorrow is going to be a busy day, but I am planning to take a break to see if I can get Margie into a a movie theatre in Anchorage.
;)
And here is a bicyclist, right here in Wasilla.