Clark James Mishler posted a daily portrait each day in 2010; Ranju - three studies

Earlier in the day, before I drove to the Anchorage Museum of History and Fine Art to see a 165 image slideshow edited down from Clark James Mishler's "2010 Portrait 365," I took my usual walk - now part of my preparation to get fit for this summer's upcoming Brooks Range hike.

As I walked, this raven flew overhead.

Come evening, I did not want to drive to Anchorage. I just wanted to stay home and edit pictures. I am so far behind on editing pictures, I don't know what to do. I could spend all day, every day, for the next couple of months editing pictures and I would still be far behind.

But I wanted to see Clark's pictures and to give his project a plug in this blog. As for Clark himself, he needs no plug. I doubt that there is a better known or more successful photographer working in Alaska than Clark James Mishler. In fact, I think I can say almost without a doubt that he is the most successful editorial and commercial photographer in the state. He is a hard-working, intelligent, superb shooter and a good business man. He has earned every bit of his success.

Clark, btw, is the fellow that the sharper focus is on. But don't let the fact that Bob Hallinen of the Anchorage Daily News is in the blur mislead you into thinking that he is less of a photographer than anyone. He isn't. 100 years from now, when someone figures out what photojournalist created the most powerful and important body of photojournalistic Alaska work from our time period, I predict that Bob's name will top the list.

He'll be dead and it won't do him any good, but people of the time will study, ponder, and be amazed.

And Bob loves ravens.

It's just that this night the focus was on Clark's "2010 Portrait 365" Project, so I put the focus on Clark. One day, when the opportunity presents itself, I will put the focus of this blog on Bob.

From my own experience as I stuggle to make a post on this blog every day, I can tell you what Clark did was absolutely amazing. Each day in 2010, no matter what he was working on or what he was doing, Clark shot at least one portrait and every day posted a new portrait on his blog.

He did not miss even one day - and he is carrying the effort over into this year.

There were times when the day was drawing to a close and Clark had nothing, but he would always make the effort, if neccessary, to go out and find someone, stop them, get the picture, or shoot an assitant, or perhaps even himself.

At least one day came to an end when the only portrait that he had was of a dog. He wondered if it was right to include a dog in the project, but decided it was.

Of course it was right! Never mind that the dog's tongue was a bit gross and slobbery - it was an excellent image and that dog deserved to be in the project - and that dog would not be the only one to be portraited in this project.

A cat would have been good, too.

Hey! That gives me an idea of project for my own! 

2012 Cat Portrait 365 project!

It is already too late to take on such a project for 2011. The problem is, sometimes I will go into a village and there will not be a single cat living there (yes, I always ask). I will want to spend some of my time in 2012 in villages. I can't discriminate against a village just because no cat lives there.

Speaking of which, I did not succeed in posting an image in all 365 days of 2010. I think I would have, but I got into places that the logistics made it difficult or even impossible to post.

Even under the best of circumstances, it is a huge challenge to post an image every day - especially when you it must be one specific type of image, in this case a portrait - but Clark did it.

Even more challenging is to post a good portrait every day. Clark did this, too - and many, many, many of the images are simply excellent. The breadth and depth that he has captured is phenomenal. 

After he showed us the 165 selections from his 2010 project, Clark put on a quick demonstration of how he often uses a very small, compact, portable lighting system that he can carry just about anywhere.

Clark likes to play light against dark and that is what he did here, on the spot, with his simple lighting system.

While our fundamental subject is the same - Alaska and the people in it - Clark and I approach our work with philosophies that are in many ways the exact opposite of each other.

Clark is a sharp-shooter, and I am a quick-draw artist. I can sharp-shoot, and Clark can quick draw - as his photo of Joe Miller taking his one glance of the debate at which he otherwise refused to even look at Senator Murkowski so deftly proves. But basically, he shoots sharp and I quick draw.

Clark shoots with strobe and artificial light not only in his studio and at night but in broad, bright, daylight. In this way, he effectively creates a style that subdues the background and puts the emphasize sharply upon his subject. His colors are rich and vibrant, his contrast strong. He looks at a scene with an eye to making it look better and more visually interesting than it might appear to be at first glance.

While I have made a few exceptions, it has been almost dogma to me that I work only with the light that I find, as that is the light that the life I am photographing is taking place in. When the light grows dim and dingy, then my pictures grow dim and dingy and sometimes very noisy, too, because if I cannot properly expose an image at my highest ISO rating of 6400, then I will underexpose by one or two stops and then do what I can to recover the image from out of the dark frame.

Clark's images all seem to be perfectly exposed. He must blow one now and then, but it sure doesn't look like it.

As he showed his slides, I wondered just how wise I have been to stick so closely to this philosophy all these decades. The fact is, Clark had many excellent images in his slide show that, under my basic philosophy, I simply could not have taken.

I have this little project that I have begun on Iñupiat artists. I am thinking maybe I should artificially light much of it - but I do not want to carry big studio lights around. I think I will go visit Clark and see what more I can learn about his portable lighting system.

In this self portrait with me, Clark and Bob, I am reminded of western movies that depict the time period between 1890 and 1910 - you know, the movies where the cowboy, sheriffs and gun slingers that made their reputations in the days of the wild west have passed their prime and are headed toward old age.

But they don't know it. They don't accept the idea. They keep their guns loaded and woe be to the young hotshots who live by different rules and underestimate them.

A few minutes after the post-show conversations had concluded, I found myself sitting and waiting at a red light. My mind was elsewhere. I was unaware of my surroundings. Suddenly, I realized that this grader was about to flash through the intersection, ice flying.

Oh no! I was too late! There was no way I could get the shot! But I grabbed my camera from my lap and fired anyway.

Quick draw artist.

I would have hated to have missed this moment.

It was just too damned exciting.

And these three with Ranju of India:

I will stick to the theme of portraiture for my India pictures today: Sri Ranjani "Ranju" in the arms of her aunt, Sujitha Ravichandran, at the Bangalore wedding of Soundarya and Anil.

Ranju gets a better view of the world, thanks to Manoj Biradar, Suji's man.

Also in the picture is Bharathi Padmanabhan, Ranju's mom, and, at the right edge my daughter Melanie, who looked so beautiful in her Indian saree and, just barely, Brindha Padmanabhan. 

There is an event scheduled to happen between Manoj and Sujitha on February 28. I want to be there. Right now, it looks pretty impossible, but I am not ready to give up the hope just yet.

Bharathi and daughter Ranju.

View images as slides

Two views of the cats on Charlie's t-shirts: full front and rear, too; Ketchup in an empty restaurant; big mid-winter meltdown; Ramz - the girl who defended the tiny goat

Charlie showed up wearing this t-shirt. This is the front view.

This is the rear view. Charlie suggested that we all go to Anchorage and stroll through the Fifth Avenue Mall together, drinking coffee from cat mugs, but none of the rest of us wanted to join him there.

It seems that I have lost the ability to sleep - except for those blessed moments when I just crash. I find myself typically going to bed between midnight and 2:00 AM. It takes me too long to go to sleep and after I do, I might sleep for close to an hour and then I wake up and just keep waking up, multiple times each hour until finally I just give up and get up.

So far this week, I have not felt like cooking and besides, the steel-cut oatmeal was gone and so were the frozen berries that I put in it.

Family Restaurant opens at 6:00 AM, so for the last two days in a row I have headed over there at that time.

Both days, I have found the restaurant eerily empty.

Just me and the ketchup.

And a waitress or two.

Cooks in the back, cooking just for me, waiting for the crowd to start coming in.

I get in the car and leave to drive home. The fringe edge of the crowd has finally begun to arrive.

Corner of Seldon and Church Roads, on my way home from breakfast.

Despite the fact that I am peripatetic by nature, I have not had much energy for walking lately. Still, I must walk - especially since I have begun to lay the plans for a big Brooks Range hike this summer.

So I go walk, and this dog comes barking. Back in the trees, I hear a man shouting at the dog. He orders the dog to come back. The dog does not. The dog keeps following me, barking and barking.

The man keeps shouting orders, all of which the dog ignores.

In time, the man's voice fades into the trees.

The dog is still following, but barking less now.

The dog seems unsure of itself, now.

Maybe this is the farthest the dog has ever been away from home on its own.

The dog is probably wondering what it got itself into.

Soon, I will be home in my office with the cats, Jimmy and Pistol-Yero. 

They do not bark and they do not chase people down the road.

They just hang out in my office, knock things off my desk, counters and work table, spill my coffee, break my cups, prance across my keyboard when I am typing, interrupt my work and sit down on my lap every time I get on a roll. Sometimes, they even delete pictures!

So far (I think) I have always discovered each deletion in time to undo it.

They drink water from my fish tanks and throw up on the rug.

I sure do love these damn cats.

I see the tail of one them right now. It hangs down from the window sill beneath the cat, who is covered up the drape. He is looking outside at some creature that he would like to hunt - a raven, maybe. A moose, perhaps.

If so, that creature is damn lucky there is a pane of glass between it and the cat.

This is about as bad as a mid-winter warm-up can get. Well, not quite as bad. It hasn't rained all that much. The problem is, even through all the cold weather, we have had a dearth of snow and much of that had already been scoured away by the wind, even when the temperature was still cold, where it ought to be.

I read the part in the Anchorage Daily News that said this warmup was the result of Chinook winds. The Daily News is wrong. These winds have blown in off the Pacific. Chinook winds are caused when air flows down off mountains, warms up and spreads across a valley or plain.

My dad was a meteorologist, so I know these kind of things.

The Daily News is wrong.

This blog is right.

Here I am, on my 4:00 PM coffee break, which I got started on just a bit late. I have been to Metro. where Shoshana served me my Americano and cinnamon roll and told me that she and her boyfriend greatly enjoyed their New Year's jaunt to Chena Hot Springs, even if the temperature was 40 above instead of 40 below, where one would want it to be.

And here is one from India: Ramz my niece and Facebook friend

Recently, Ramz invited me to become one of her friends on Facebook. Ramz Iyer is Soundarya's cousin, but sisters is also a word they use.

I accepted the invitation, of course, and was very touched when I looked at all her profile pictures and saw one where she was hugging a small goat close to her chin and was smiling big. I have pictures like that of Soundarya, too.

Another of her Facebook friends, one closer to her own age, responded with this comment:

"dont u feel eeew!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Ramz retorted:

"i feel more eew wen ppl eat it ! rader dan carrying it ! i luve animals ! nd nyways .....it was neat nd tidy !"

The friend eventually replied:

"i was just kidding,"

Ramz stood her ground:

"but I was not !"

I was pleased and proud.

I just went and took another look at her page. Her new profile pic depicts her as a platinum blond with blue green tint in her hair, dark blue eyes and a tattoo on her pale face!

I remain: pleased and proud!

View images as slides

To find, to lose, to find and lose again - my India take vanishes into digital ether; I search, I plead

I shot only one frame all day yesterday and this is it - two ravens through my car window as seen through the drive-through line at Taco Bell and this is how I wound up there:

I had it my mind that when I could, I would sort through my India pictures and put together some sort of package on Soundarya to share with the family. I did not know where those pictures were and I dreaded the search to try to find them.

Behind and to the sides of my computer monitor, my desk was a clutter of hard drives, cables and wires - a couple of dozen hard drives, in fact - some of them plugged in, some of them not. I had once known where everything was on those hard drives, but over time, in the constant juggle and shuffle of digital information - moving images from this drive to that, then erasing from here, etc. etc. etc., it had become a tangle of confusion.

I came up with a system in my head to finally get on top of it, but to do so would require that I remove the harddrives from the enclosures they came in so that instead I could just insert and take them out of hard drive docks at will.

I checked with an expert and he said, yes, this would work - I could just remove all those drives from their enclosures and this would free them up for use in the docks.

So I did, and it took me a long time, because once I would figure out how to take one sort of enclosure apart, the next would be completely different and I did not have the right tools.

To simplify a complicated story, by the time I finished, I discovered that six of my harddrives were of an earlier design and would not seat into the docks, so I could no longer read them. Plus, two harddrives would seat and spin, but would not sign on to the computer. So I made four trips back and fourth to Machous were Bruce helped me reconstruct those that needed reconstructing and tried to help me bring the two that would not read back, but they had gone bad and could not be brought back.

During one of those trips back and forth to Machaus, I stopped at Taco Bell and picked up an order for myself and another for Margie, who was not feeling good.

In my office, I carefully searched every drive that could be read - and was horrified to discover that my India take, #2, when Melanie and I went to the wedding of Soundarya and Anil, could not be found.

Although I blogged the wedding, to this date I had not found the time to go through the big majority of the thousands of photos that I took afterward. I know there are some good pictures of Sandy in there, along with many other things from those times that Sandy and Anil were off by themselves and Melanie and I were traveling elsewhere with Vasanthi, Murthy, Buddy and Vijay.

All this now appeared to be lost, vanished into digital ether. If I could not somehow find them, then all I woud have from that trip would be the few low-res images, mostly from the wedding, that actually appeared on this blog.

I searched and searched and searched, venturing into the shadow areas. At one point, I thought that I had found a set, for I did find folders for those dates - but the folders were empty.

They are only photographs and their loss is a tiny and insignificant thing in comparison to her loss - but still, photographs are all that is left. I sank into despair. My body shook and my hands trembled.

I realize that what I am about to state is going to sound really corny to some, but it is how it happened, so I am going to state it. Not knowing what else to do, after a day-and-a-half of searching but not finding, I said aloud, "Sandy! I need your help! You've got to help me."

After I spoke the words, I suddenly noticed one of those tiny, portable, black plastic hard drives that you can buy at Wal-Mart, sitting beneath the computer tower on my desk. I always take two or three of these into the field with me, so that I can make duplicate copies of everything that I shoot as I move along. After I get home, I dump the images into my big harddrives and then erase these little ones, so that I can take them back out into the field the next time I go.

I picked up the little drive and plugged it into the computer.

The India take was all there.

Coincidence, my brain tells me. My heart wants to believe otherwise.

The truth is, I do not know. 

I now have the pictures, but Sandy is still gone.

Even as I type this, I am loading those pictures into my Lightroom editor. This is the very first image from that take - it is Melanie as we wait at Ted Stevens International Airport to board the first of the four planes that will fly us to Bangalore.

And here we are, Melanie and I together, reflected in the window of the underground train that shuttles passengers between various terminals at the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.

Now we have left Chicago, enroute to Mumbai.

And here we are, in Mumbai.

In Mumbai, we saw a sleepy little girl.

Now we ride the shuttle that will take us from one Mumbai terminal to another.

Through the shuttle window. What you don't see is the heat. Despite the late hour, it was stifling hot. We are about to board the flight to Bangalore.

Now we are at Murthy and Vasanthi's in Bangalore, where I fell asleep. It was Sandy who woke me up - Soundarya Ravichandran. After I rubbed the sleep from my eyes, I took a picture of her and this is it. The next day, she would wed and would become Soundarya Anil Kumar.

I now have many pictures to sort through and edit. This barely begins it. It is going to take some time and I do not know where I am going to find that time.

I know that I promised that I would not let this blog dwell where it seems to be dwelling, but one does not just turn away from an experience such as this and suddenly find that it is over.

Still, it is my commitment to now get back on track and to blog about other things. After I have a picture package ready to share with the family, perhaps I will put up a few more up here.

I suspect that this will take me about one year.

View images as slides

Soundarya Anil Kumar - "Sandy": April 13, 1979 - November 22, 2010

Upon the death of my soul friend and muse, Soundarya, I am left to bear the unbearable grief and to ponder the meanings of love, in all its variations, in the many different ways that it comes to us.

There is love of blood and kin, love that we are born into and that descends from us – the love that we feel for our parents, our brothers and sisters, our grandparents, our cousins, followed later by that powerful love which we feel for our children and grandchildren – so strong; the love we feel for our nieces and nephews.

There is the love of romance that we strive for, seek out and when lucky find sublime, other times foolish, and sometimes only deep and bitter heartache.

There is the love that we share with friends – sometimes we slip easily into it, sometimes, we meet and do battle first and in our combat discover respect that leads to friendship. There is the love that we earn with each other by working hard together, sometimes enduring hardship as we do.

There is another kind of love that if a person is lucky, might happen half-a-dozen times in one life. It is that love that you recognize at the very moment you meet a person. I use the word, “recognize” because when you meet that person both you and she feel that you have always known each other, that you have been bound together at the level of the soul for your entire existence.

This can be the love of deep friendship, or of romance, or both.

This is how it was when I met my friend, the late Vincent Craig, whose funeral I took readers to in May. It is how it was with Margie – in fact, this recognition came to me weeks before I met her, when I first heard her name spoken. I loved her the instant her name struck my ears. Before I ever laid eyes upon her or even saw her picture, I wanted to marry her, to make babies with her and to spend my life with her.

I first met Soundarya in August of 2007 at the wedding of my niece, Khena, to Sandy’s cousin, Vivek. At the moment I looked at her I felt a warm feeling of closeness, as though I had always known her, that she had been my friend for all of my life and would always be. I did not ask for this friendship, I did not seek it out. It was just there. I would never have mentioned or even hinted at this to her or to anyone else, but after the wedding feast she asked me if I would walk with her.

As we walked, a bird landed high in a tree above us and Sandy delighted in that bird. She saw baby monkeys, leaping across roofs and jumping onto window sills and was again delighted. When she spotted a kitten in a yard, she squealed with pleasure and made the woman who owned the kitten hand it over her fence so that she could hold it for a time. 

And there has not been a day since when I have not felt the bond that was just naturally there between us.

I feel it now, even though she is gone, but now it manifests itself in the midst of a huge new hole torn into my heart. I will carry this hole for the remainder of my life, for it can never be filled. There are many other holes there.

The number just keeps growing.

I call her "Muse" because when I returned to Alaska following my first trip to India, I began to think about my photographs differently. I had always tried my hardest to make my photographs good, even though most of the time when I shoot I feel that I am creating nothing but junk, yet I never let this feeling stop me but I always work to create a decent picture that might speak to a large audience.

After I met Soundarya, I began to shoot my pictures for an audience of one. My photography became an effort to interpret my world in Alaska to a young woman who had spent her entire life in the equatorial tropics of Southern India. I felt that if I could successfully interpret my world for her, then perhaps I could interpret it for anyone.

Before I went to bed last night, I tried to call her three times to see if I might somehow lend her comfort after the tragic death of her husband, but I failed to reach her. Why didn't I call her ten times, 20? Why did I use Skype?

So I sent her an email, told her about the Iñupiat song, "praying for you," and since I am not much good at praying myself, went to bed with that song in my head, my brain struggling to project the words and message from Arctic Alaska to a grief-stricken soul in tropical India.

This morning, I tried to call her again at her brother's number, but the phone system refused to recognize that number.

Then, at lunch time, I set out to walk from the North Slope Borough to Osaka Restaurant, and was amazed to see this beautiful moon hanging over the ice of the Arctic Ocean, but in my stress, grief and worry, I had forgotten my camera.

I went back and got it, and shot this picture - as an interpretation of my world in Alaska for my grieving muse, Soundarya, in India.

It was very near to this same time, perhaps during this very time, that she decided this world had become too painful to bear, that she was going to join her husband.

So that is what she did.

It is a decision that I strongly disagree with, but there is nothing that I can do about it. I want to, I keep thinking there must be some way I can, but I can't.

After I got the call, I spent some time just walking, trying to stay away from the roads, because I did not want anybody to stop and pick me up. I bought a coffee from Thelma at Aarigaa. It was hot when I began to drink it, but soon turned cold.

I just walked and walked. Sometimes I shouted. Sometimes I screamed. 

At one point, I noticed this other person walking. 

Right now, I want to do but one thing - to go home, to hug my children and grandchildren, to tell them how much I love them, to scritch the cats behind their ears. I want to hold my wife close to my heart, for a very, very, very, long time.

Thanksgiving in Barrow is a unique and beautiful thing and I had planned to stay through, to cover it, blog it, and then after I returned to Wasilla to have a late Thanksgiving dinner and late birthday party for Lisa, my youngest, who just turned 25. Now, I just want to go home to be with my family, so I guess that is what I will do.

As for my soul friend Soundarya, I want to reach backward in time, to call 20 times, 30 times, 40 times... to reach through our cell phones, wrap my arms around her and say, "Hang on! Hang on! You can get through this. You will always feel the pain but still you can get through it and you will laugh, you will smile, you may not believe it but another young man will come along for you and you will love and be loved and will live a life that is good and fulfilling."

I can't do that. She is gone. That is that.

So I will go on and I will laugh and I will smile and I will love and be loved and will live a life that is good and fulfilling, but not a day will pass that I do not feel this horrible loss that I suffered today. This blog will not dwell upon this loss or upon my lost Soundarya, but will move on, as life always moves on.

And Sujitha - Ganesh - you must get through this, too. You must! You must! And your beautiful parents! Vivek, Khena, Vijay, Vidya, Kavitha... Murthy, Vasanthi... on and on this list can go... Barathi, Brindha... on and on

Please note: I have disabled comments for this post*. I know I have many readers with big hearts who will wish to offer words of comfort and condolence and I appreciate that, but I do not wish to read any words of consolation. And if you wonder how I could write this in this situation - this is how I deal with grief. I write. And I take pictures. This is how I get through it.

It is now nearing 3:00 am. I must go to bed. How do I do that?

Thank God that I am not in a hotel but am with the Ahmaogak family. They understand grief, they know love and they give love. They have given it to me in abundance.

Soundarya!

*Thanks to a couple of comments left elsewhere, I have realized that it was unfair of me to close comments here. I just felt that I could not bear the pain of reading those comments, but this was wrong. If anyone reads this and is moved by compassion to say something about Soundarya, I must open the door for them to do so. So I am now, nearly 36 hours after the original posting, opening this up to comments. I realize that multitudes of readers have already passed through and that there would have been some among them who would have commented but who now never will, but for any late comers, or returning visitors, the board is now open.

View images as slides

A pushing boy, a walking man, a mountain in alpenglow; the lovely Sujitha of Bangalore, who so badly wants to come to Wasilla

This morning, as I walked, I saw this little kid pushing his pedal-powered four-wheeler up his driveway.

And in the early evening, I saw this man walking past Wasilla Lake. In just three months or so, there could be young women in bikinis lounging about on that beach just to his right.

I'll bet some of you looked at this picture and didn't even know there was a beach there, or a lake.

Here I am, stopped at a red light on the corner of the Parks and Palmer-Wasilla highways, looking back at Pioneer Peak through my driver's door rearview mirror.

My niece, Sujitha, has been in this blog before and I am certain that she will be here again. She is a regular reader and every now and then she leaves a comment. She did yesterday, and she badly wants to come to Wasilla. She wants to meet Kalib, she wants to meet Margie.

She wants to meet all of her Alaska family. So far, she has met Melanie and she has met me.

I took these pictures, along with one of her and her true love, Manu, the day after the wedding of her sister, my special friend Soundarya, to Anil. In my 2009 review of May, I posted the one of Sujitha and Manu, but I haven't posted these.

Until now.

Sujitha, we all want you to come to Wasilla. So hurry up. 

Sooner or later, we want your whole family to come.

Here she is, with her grandfather, Natarajan. I took these photos in the Bangalore living room of Murthy and Vasanthi, the parents of Vivek, who married Khena, the daughter of my little sister and made us all family.

Here's Sujitha in that same living room nearly two years earlier, taking part in a women's ceremony for the Lakshmi, the Goddess of Wealth and Beauty. That's Vasanthi holding the flame and my good niece Vidya, who loves animals, behind.

Sujitha.

I have photographed but the tiniest hint of the magnificent nation of India, yet, I have so many images that I have never even had a chance to take even one look at myself, and I know there is some good material in there.

I still hope that in the future I will somehow find the time to go through, do an edit, and put up a whole bunch of posts.

If I do, I will mix it all up with Wasilla, just like I did here.