A blog by Bill Hess

Running Dog Publications

P.O. Box 872383 Wasilla, Alaska 99687

 

All photos and text © Bill Hess, unless otherwise noted 
All support is appreciated
Bill Hess's other sites
Search
Navigation
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.

Blog archive
Blog arhive - page view
« Jobe on the phone, a biker in the snow, along with other big vehicles; blogging with Jimmy | Main | I take a walk with Shadow »
Thursday
Feb252010

Dogs; Democrat; original Tea Party supporter with a new alternative monthly paper; cat snot on my lens

As I walked down Seldon, Dodd Shay pulled over to talk. He had a new pup riding with him. Dodd is the fellow who owns that part of the marsh where I most recently photographed two moose, property where certain sorts of snowmachiners and four-wheeler drivers ignore his "no trespassing" signs, charge in and tear up his property.

Dodd wanted to let me know that he plans to start going to Metro Cafe at 10:00 AM Thursdays and would like it if Democrats would come and join him for coffee and conversation.

Cars kept coming, so he pulled off Seldon onto Tamar and he and the pup, Scotty, got out of the car.

As we chatted, this car turned onto Tamar. The occupants were very taken by Scotty.

Scotty. Dodd and his wife Carol raise dogs that assist people with various needs. Dodd hopes that Scotty will become a breeder.

As they say, "lucky dog."

That's Jared on the left and his fiance on the right. She told me her name, too, but I forgot it before I could take it down. Jared showed both Dodd and I where he lives and said if we ever need any help with anything, just come knocking.

Someday, we may get a chance to talk more and maybe he will tell me about the tattoo. 

I was driving toward Metro Cafe at 4:00 o'clock when I spotted this dog ahead. The dog made no attempt to get out of the way of any cars, but just kept running in a straight path. Drivers honked their horns, but the dog just kept coming at them until they pulled to the right.

I slowed way down, because I did not know the dog would do.

Sure enough, just before I reached it, the dog changed lanes and then started running down the road, directly in front of me. It ran and it ran and it ran. I had to drive very slow. I only honked when there was no immediate traffic coming in the opposite direction, but my honks did not phase the dog.

Finally, it left the road and ran off.

I do not know where it was going and I don't think it, did, either.

I hope it reached its destination safely.

Longtime readers have probably observed that I come upon dogs in bad situations all too often. I can't judge, because I do not know the circumstance that resulted in this dog running down a busy road.

Through the Window Metro Study, #1961. That's Josh Fryfogle. He is "Editor and Writer" of a free monthly publication called Make-A- Scene: The People's Paper. He points at the paper's logo on his shirt. I must confess, I had never heard of Make-A- Scene before. He gave me a copy. It is newsprint on an 11 x 11.5 format. Part of what Josh does is to seek out valley stories on restaurants, businesses, and the great political stories of the day.

Inside the pages, I found three articles with Josh's byline: Jalepeno's - his account of dining at Jalepeno's, where I sometimes dine as well. He had praise for Jalepeno's and I would agree with that. The second was titled, Belly Dancing, and it described an adventure he had with his ten-year old son on a Saturday night at Bombay Valley restaurant. Although we haven't since last Father's Day, we sometimes eat at Bombay, but there have never been belly dancers.

Josh says they are going to be there every Saturday now, so I guess I will have to go see them.

He describes it as a pretty wholesome experience - oh well; I'll go check it out, anyway. One of these Saturday's. Maybe not this one. But perhaps.

We will see.

Tea Party Bait and Switch was the third story. I was going to suggest that if you want to read it, you could go the website, but I just went there and it is not yet up, although another of his stories, The Man-Made Religion of Climate Change is, so you can read that, if you want. Summarily stated, with a number of quotes from the University of East Anglia email scandal, Josh counters the contention of what some say is 98 percent of the research climatologists who think that we are in a potentially disastrous period of climate change brought on largely by man-made activities.

In Tea Party, as an early supporter of the movement and a man who waved signs for Ron Paul and waved at Sarah Palin as she drove past, Josh laments that the Tea Party is being co-opted by "the Neo-Conservatives who had previously taken over the Republican Party." He is pretty disgusted with both Democrats and Republicans and, while he once had hopes for Sarah Palin, is disappointed in her, too.

It would take too much space for me to try to sum up all that he said in the article, but I suspect it will show up on the website, soon. He does say, "I am ready for real revolution and, if need be, I am ready to invoke the Second Amendment! And I know I'm not the only one... 'Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable' - John F. Kennedy."

So there you have it - in the morning I come upon Dodd Shay who wants to start getting together with Democrats at Metro Cafe and in the afternoon, I meet Josh, Tea Party original, who is ready for revolution.

I wonder how such revolution would unfold here in this valley that Josh, Sarah Palin and I share with a whole bunch of others of many and varied political and religious belief? 

In this valley, most of us do own guns, be we left-wing, right-wing, middle-of-the-road, apathetic. It seems to me that we have all been exercising our second amendment rights all along, but what does it mean that the time might come that we need to "invoke" them? That we get to shoot each other, because we do not all see the world the same?

Is this what John F. Kennedy meant?

Be assured, Carmen is a good person and in running her cafe, she needs to keep her door open to everyone, liberal, conservative, left-wing, right-wing, extreme, moderate, mainstream, fringe.

Maybe some interesting discussions will take place inside. May such discussions always be peaceful and civil, even if some of the minds thus engaged are turbulent.

As I drove home in round-about fashion, I saw this girl running alongside the road.

I don't know if anyone overtly noticed, but each picture in this post has a soft, hazy, area. It's most pronounced when there is some backlight, such as in the picture of Jared and his fiance.

It's because of this guy, Pistol-Yero. I was trying to get a close-up of him when he touched my lens with his nose. I could not find any lens-cleaning cloth for a long time. Now I have found some, but I am not certain that I got it all. The tiny, recessed lens of this s90 pocket camera is very hard to clean.

I will always love Pistol, though, no matter how many cameras he messes up.

There's Royce, walking behind him. Royce is hanging tough.

PrintView Printer Friendly Version

EmailEmail Article to Friend

Reader Comments (10)

A couple days ago two lanes of traffic slowly followed a tan-colored chihuahua as he ran fast as could be down several blocks of main street. I had to turn off on my way to my mom's and the little dog was still running...evidently he knew where he was going. None of the rest of us did.

February 25, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterWhiteStone

I would love to be a fly on the wall at your meeting of these folks. But I trust you'll let us know how the conversation goes.
Thanks again Bill!
YOU light up my life!!

February 25, 2010 | Unregistered Commenteraview999

I just have to ask, why would you assume that Jared was possibly in the military? I hope it wasnt based on the tattoo across his fingers, because as young as he appears he certainly wouldnt have gotten that tattoo while serving, because its against regulations to have tattoos on your hands(at least in the Navy and USMC).I also, as a military veteran and military wife for over 16 yrs, never once saw someone serving with a tat that stated such a thing.

February 25, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterLisaJ

Thank you for that information, Lisa. It was a bad assumption for me to make. I guess I thought about military people who I have met and their tattoos - but, no telling when or how they got them. I will remove that assumption.

February 25, 2010 | Unregistered Commenteranonymous

http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/zoa/mwmap3.php?map=usa

Hello Bill,
Mike wanted me to forward the above website to you. It's the METAR for every weather reporting airport in the country. With a single click a pilot without a plane can still check out his favorite hangouts. It will keep the dream alive.........
Enjoyed the beautiful golden retriever puppy and of course always glad to see Pistol-Yero & Royce.

February 25, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterFunny Face

loved the shadow man in the previous post. yes you do find the wandering dogs. around here, i only find their footprints, not the animals themselves. a man who walks alone is a man who thinks deeply about life. or is contemplating its beauty and complexity. see, people are getting fed up w/the do-nothing congress and are forming in little groups from the east coast to north to alaska. good! we'll show em!

February 25, 2010 | Unregistered Commenterruth z deming

Hope I didnt come off rude Bill, as I didnt intend to be. Like many veterans I have a tattoo, but it represents the pride and love I have for this country and the time I was able to serve her. Definitely share the story of that gentlemans tattoo if you ever learn it, as I would be curious to hear the story behind it. Heck, I have to admit that now I am going to be keeping an eye on hands around town so I can ask if I see him :)

I do love your blog neighbor, and its one of the very first things I read every morning!

February 25, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterLisaJ

If you have a revolution in Alaska and seceede do we in the Lower 48 get to trade cabbage for oil in the manner of the way we got cheap oil before the Pottery Barn War took off in Iraq?

February 26, 2010 | Unregistered Commenterconchscooter

Whitestone - I'm glad that he knew where he was going and I hope he got there safely.

Aview - Should I be there when any such discussions take place, I will, indeed.

Thank you, Funny Face. The dream remains alive - as you would see, if you could see the movies that play in my head when I sleep.

Ruth Z - I for one am more than fed up. I have lost my expensive, poor quality health insurance and, of course, I am going to need what it could have provided me had they not raised their premiums so high I was forced to drop - plus a lot more, because It was a rotten plan.

Lisa, No, neighbor, you didn't come off as rude. You educated me and caused me to wonder why such a thought ever came to me. Btw, anonymous above is me. I did not realize that my log-in had time out. Thank you.

conch - Someday, I must do some serious blogging about our Alaska cabbages. We grow the biggest cabbages in the world, right here in this valley, so I don't think we will be trading our oil for cabbages any time soon.

February 26, 2010 | Registered CommenterWasilla, Alaska, by 300

Pisto-yero looks slim from that angle. I'm glad to see Roye hanging tough.

March 1, 2010 | Unregistered Commenterheidi

PostPost a New Comment

Enter your information below to add a new comment.
Author Email (optional):
Author URL (optional):
Post:
 
Some HTML allowed: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <code> <em> <i> <strike> <strong>