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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
Jan162011

On the seventh day: Kalib of the chocolate face; Jobe adores his grandpa

DateSunday, January 16, 2011 at 1:40PM

Okay. It is Sunday now - the first day of the calendar week, yet the one that much of the world has chose to recognize as the seventh, to be set aside as a day of rest.

To be frank, I do not think that I will rest much today, but I will try to stay away from my work as much as I can force myself to do so and I will spend some time with my daughters and Charlie, who came out and took us to breakfast today and are still here. I will also spend time with Margie, Jobe and Kalib, and probably get in a few words with Caleb, who is in the house but present elsewhere for the NFL pro-football playoffs.

So I will keep this blog post short and chocolate sweet.

I shot a few hundred frames Saturday, but I have not even looked at them yet - with the exception of this one, which is the very last frame that I shot, shortly before we went to bed.

Well, there was this one, too, which I shot not as part of the day's usual take, but on my iPhone, as he lay upon my chest, so that I could quickly send it to Lavina in order to her assure her that baby was doing good here, without her, at his grandparents house.

Not to boast or brag or anything, but, to be quite honest, I can never think of having seen a baby take so strongly and quickly to his grandpa as Jobe has to me. As you can see, he adores me. This is not a rare moment, captured well. This is just how it is with him and me. And it has been this way since he first focused his eyes upon the world and landed them upon my homely, graying, bearded face.

I have adored him for all of this time, and more, as well.

So, for today, the seventh day...

Tavra!

 

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

what sweet boys...enjoy the family day

January 16, 2011 | Unregistered Commentertwain12

Thank you so much for taking our boys! I can't wait to squeeze them and plant smooches all over them :)

January 16, 2011 | Unregistered Commenterdaughter in law

Such lovely boys! Our younger Grandgirlie is just Jobe's way with her grandpa. When she is visiting overnight, she must spend her waking up time in her grandpa's lap. It is a beautiful sight, expecially now that she is seven years old, long legs dangling, snuggled right there where she needs to be.

January 17, 2011 | Unregistered CommenterKathryn

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