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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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Wednesday
Mar242010

Kalib bonks Mom and Grandma on the head; horses run to Ron; Margie and Jobe

DateWednesday, March 24, 2010 at 4:00AM

As I leave for Boston, enroute to Nantucket, early Wednesday morning, I had told myself that I would put only one picture in this blog tonight, and write no more than two or three sentences.

But I did not know that Kalib and Jobe were going to drive out with their good mom so that they could see me before I left.

I was conducting a phone interview when Margie came in to tell me they were here and I had to shoo her off. I was talking through an almost invisible headset, so she did not know I was on the phone and kept talking to me even as the person I was interviewing was answering my questions and I was trying to type them down.

When I finished the interview, I came into the house and this is what I found: Kalib, about to bonk his grandma on the head as his mother fed his little brother.

Then he bonked his mom on the head. Thank goodness, he didn't try to bonk Royce.

Next, he bonked himself. He did not try to bonk me. I felt a little left out.

At 4:00 PM, I took Lavina and Kalib to Metro and then we sipped our drinks as we took the long way home and drove past the Mahoney Ranch horses. As you can see, the horses were on the run.

We drove down to the end of Sunrise, turned around and drove back and there we saw Ron Mancil, in the midst of the horses that he had just fed.

As I drove along this road, I thought how quickly I will be in a totally different kind of environment. I am always eager to travel and to see new places and meet new people, but at the same time I always hate to leave home, too.

Margie and Jobe.

At this time tomorrow, I hope to be sound asleep in Massachusetts. 

I'm such an insomniac that I can't guarantee it.

Or I might be working on this blog, posting pictures from my travels.

Now, I must finish packing and then go to bed.

AuthorWasilla, Alaska, by 300 | Comment5 Comments |
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Reader Comments (5)

can't wait to hear and see all about it Kalib and Jobe are just adorable

March 24, 2010 | Unregistered Commentertwain12

So good to see Kalib and Jobe. My how Jobe has grown! Those cheeks of his are just too cute!

I do hope you get to post pics from Massachusetts! I grew up there,although on the opposite side of the state from where you are, but still, any pics of "home" are always nice to see!

March 24, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterLisaJ

The picture of Kalib bonking himself on the head.. Cutest picture ever.. And Jobe keeps getting cuter every day too.. :)

March 24, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterAsh

I think Kalib remembers what happened to him when he tested Royce's patience some months ago... (ouch)

March 24, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterKarenJ

Boy, Kalib was in high spirits wasn't he?

March 25, 2010 | Unregistered Commenterdebby

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