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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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Sunday
Dec052010

Saga of the spatula continues; Bangalore girl

DateSunday, December 5, 2010 at 11:42AM

Today is Jacob's birthday, so yesterday I drove to Anchorage with Margie so that we could pick up the little ones and bring them home with us. This would give Jacob and Lavina a chance to go out on a date, just like they used to do before the babies came along.

As we drove towards town, we saw that this blue car had left the road and wound up on the other side of the fence. There were a number of police vehicles around, but I saw no ambulance. I hope this means that no one was hurt, but I don't know.

When we arrived at the house, we found Kalib with his spatula.

Lavina wanted me to take a picture of her and her boys in their Christmas jammies so that she could make a family Christmas card out of it.

Kalib put on his jammies, but still he kept hold of that spatula.

The idea was to get Muzzy and everybody posed, but Muzzy was shooting all over the place and Kalib had momentarily replaced his spatula with a shovel. All he wanted to do now was to shovel snow - Christmas card pictures be damned.

So, do you think I managed to pull a worthy Christmas card picture out of this chaos?

I don't know. I haven't looked at "the poses" yet. We will find out in time.

Soon, Kalib was dressed, had once again recovered his spatula and was ready to head back to Wasilla with us. 

When he realized that his parents and little brother were not coming, too, he cried a little bit, but held fast to the spatula.

Now it is late at night and Kalib lies in bed, next to his grandmother. The spatula is nowhere in sight, but still Kailb will fall asleep.

As for little Jobe, tied snug into his cradleboard, he has already fallen asleep.

 

And now, one frame from India:

Bangalore girl.

 

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AuthorWasilla, Alaska, by 300 | Comment3 Comments |
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Reader Comments (3)

Bangalore girl looks happy . the jammie pictures made me smile

December 5, 2010 | Unregistered Commentertwain12

That spatula cracks me up! Leave it to a little one to find the most unusual thing to be a companion. He will look back on these photos and smile and laugh when he is older. Perhaps he will become a fabulous cook as you have told us his parents are. The spatula is but a harbinger for even greater things to come! He may just end up being a famous chef, and he will always remember that first spatula (it looks like a nice one too, perhaps a Kitchen Aid or some other fancy brand!!)

The juxtaposition of your final frame from India is so thought provoking. Seeing these folks in this hot climate, running barefoot on the hard iron red ground, is so much different than your family sitting in the snow for the christmas photos. Your photos from India remind me that happiness is not based on obvious material wealth. Thanks for getting me out of that Capitalist-centric rut that we tend to operate within here in America.

December 5, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterAlicia Greene

I like how the India girl's arm is "connected" to the man with boy, even though it's not, physically. Jobe seems to be intent on you billl in all your photos!...

December 5, 2010 | Unregistered Commenterdahli22

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