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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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Friday
May142010

I wake up on a hard day and look right into the eyes of a good black cat

DateFriday, May 14, 2010 at 12:33PM

I had a big post planned for today and this image was not a part of it. Before I went to bed early this morning, I selected 24 images from which to build today's post, put them in a folder and then selected 22 more which I put into a separate folder as raw material for tomorrow's post, as I will be traveling and it might be difficult for me to put one up.

I believe both posts would have been quite good. Tomorrow's would have had particular impact to long-term readers familiar with the people who appear regularly in the part of my life that unfolds in Wasilla.

Instead, I am posting this single, solitary, blurry iPhone photo of my good friend Jim. It is the first and so far the only photo that I have taken today. I took it right after I woke up, before I got out of bed, as Jim lay upon my chest, looking at me.

In my mind, it is appropriate that it is blurry, because to me, when I first wake up, the world is a blur, anyway.

Right now, especially. I suspect that everyone has days when the course of life seems unbearably hard, when the day ahead seems to be an impossible one. Today is such a day for me.

I must leave for Anchorage in about six hours to catch my flight to Phoenix. Between now and then, I have about six days worth of work to get done. I don't know how I can do it. In fact, I can't. I must also finally get my hair cut, my beard trimmed.

But that's not the hardest part. It's always like this when I leave home. It's never any other way. I always think that next time, I will be efficient and organized, but I never am.

The truly hard part is that I am leaving to say goodbye to a friend. And I hope to hell I get to Arizona in time to do so.

I don't know if I will.

But Dustinn tells me that the doctor says his dad is the toughest man he has ever treated, that no other patient of his has ever endured so long through the same trials.

Yes, he is a tough man, the toughest kind - yet also the gentlest kind. And good. A truly good man. A talented man. A great artist, fantastic musician, poet and humorist, husband, father, grandfather and friend.

So I yet remain hopeful that I will reach him in time.

Vincent Craig, I love you.

AuthorWasilla, Alaska, by 300 | Comment8 Comments |
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Reader Comments (8)

I am also hopeful you will reach your dear friend Vincent in time.
Take good care.

May 14, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterFunny Face

My thoughts are with you and your friend.

May 14, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterMichelle

My thoughts are with you, and all the family and friends of Vincent.

May 14, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterLisaJ

sending good thoughts and save travels

May 14, 2010 | Unregistered Commentertwain12

Have a safe trip. Praying you will make it in time. Thoughts and prayers to Vincent and you.

May 14, 2010 | Unregistered Commentermocha

Godspeed and good thoughts. Hope you are able to be there in time.. Its amazing how in a blink of an eye, life and what is important...shifts...

May 14, 2010 | Unregistered Commentersallahdog

Your vast family of friends will be thinking of you. Godspeed!

May 14, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterGrandma Nancy

I am so sorry. May Peace travel with you.

May 14, 2010 | Unregistered CommenterKathryn

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