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A blog by Bill Hess

Running Dog Publications

P.O. Box 872383 Wasilla, Alaska 99687

 

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Wasilla

Wasilla is the place where I have lived for the past 29 years - sort of. The house in which my wife and I raised our family sits here, but I have made my rather odd career as a different sort of photojournalist by continually wandering off to other places to photograph people and gather information, which I have then put together in various publications that have served the Alaska Native Eskimo, Indian and Aleut communities.

Although I did not have a great of free time to devote to this rather strange community, named after a Tanaina Athabascan Indian chief who knew Wasilla in the way that I so impossibly long to, I have still documented it regularly over the past quarter-century plus. In the early days, my Wasilla photographs focused mostly upon my children and the events they participated in - baseball, football, figure skating, hockey, frog catching, fire cracker detonation, Fourth of July parade - that sort of thing. 

In 2002, I purchased my first digital camera and then, whenever I was home, I began to photograph Wasilla upon a daily basis, but not in a conventional way. These were grab shots - whatever caught my eye as I took my many long walks or drove through the town, shooting through the car window at people and scenes that appeared and disappeared before I could even focus and compose in the traditional photographic way.

Thus, the Wasilla portion of this blog will be devoted both to the images that I take as I wander about and those that I have taken in the past. Despite the odd, random, nature of the images, I believe they communicate something powerful about this town that I have never seen expressed anywhere else. 

Wasilla is a sprawling community that has been slapped down hodge-podge upon what was so recently wilderness of the most exquisite beauty. In its design, it is deliberately anti-zoned, anti-planned. In the building of Wasilla, the desire to make a buck has trumped aesthetics and all other considerations. This town, built in the midst of exquisite beauty, has largely become an unsightly, unattractive, mess of urban sprawl. Largely because of this, it often seems to me that Wasilla is a community with no sense of community, a town devoid of town soul.

Yet - Wasilla is my home and if I am lucky it will be until I grow old and die. Despite its horrific failings, it is still made of the stuff of any small city: people; moms and dads, grammas and grampas, teens, children, churches, bars, professionals, laborers, soldiers, missionaries, artists, athletes, geniuses, do-gooders, hoodlums, the wealthy, the homeless, the rational and logical, the slightly insane and the wholly insane - and, yes, as is now obvious to the whole world, politicians, too.

So perhaps, if one were to search hard enough, it might just be possible to find a sense of community here, and a town soul. So, using my skills as a photojournalist and a writer, I hope to do just that. If this place has a sense of community, I will find it. If there is a town soul to Wasilla, I will document it. I won't compete with the newspapers. Hell no! But as time and income allow, it will be fun to wander into the places where the folks described above gather, and then put what I find on this blog.

 

by 300...

Anywhere within a 300 mile radius of Wasilla. This encompasses perhaps the most wild, dramatic, gorgeous, beautiful section of land and sea to be found in any comparable space anywhere on Earth. I can never explore it all, but I will do the best that I can, and will here share what I find and experience with you.  

and then some...

Anywhere else in the world that I happen to get to, such as Point Lay, Alaska; Missoula, Montana; Serenki, Chukotka, Russia; or Bangalore, India. Perhaps even Lagos, Nigeria. I have both a desire and scheme to get me there. It is a long shot. We shall see if I succeed.

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Tuesday
May262009

Melanie and Buddy at the banyan tree

DateTuesday, May 26, 2009 at 9:43PM

This is Buddy, my nephew-in-law, but I just call him Buddy, or nephew - I don't waste time with the inlaw part. As I move through my India take, I expect Buddy to become a familiar sight in this blog. He is a college student, studying hotel management and in the not too distant future hopes to land a training job on a cruise ship.

Maybe he will then cruise to Alaska. If he does, Melanie and I plan to go a port that he will land at and take some ice cream to him. Chocolate ice cream, with little chunks of donut and raspberries frozen into it.

He is standing inside the multi-sectored trunk of a banyan tree near Murthy and Vasanthi's house.

Cobras are known to sometimes hang out here, especially during heavy rains, but Buddy is not afraid and neither am I.

Nor is Melanie afraid.

She is not wearing a saree. She will need one for the wedding. Where will she get it?

I was going to show you, but I am just too damn tired. Jet-lagged big time.

I will show you tomorrow.

Unless I sleep all day.

That would be nice.

I don't think it will happen.

My computer screen grows blurry in front of me.

My eyelids keep falling down.

Maybe it would help if I ate cake.

But there is no cake.

What am I to do?

AuthorWasilla, Alaska, by 300 | Comment2 Comments |
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Reader Comments (2)

Wow, while I read your blog I feel am traveling along with you guys. I know am being selfish can you sequence your posts according to the dates and places.

May 27, 2009 | Unregistered Commenterkavitha

i picked u up thru an article on a maine bookshop in the nyt. i am fascinated with the north. my late dad spent 15 yrs in the yukon and, of course, wasilla is now famous. but that's not the point. i'm not in the habit of reading blogs, but there is something about your prosaic/everyday/poetic sincerity that draws me in. zach on maui

September 30, 2010 | Unregistered Commenterzach

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