While taking care of final income tax matters, we stumble upon a tea party; the bad good news is that we have a tax refund coming this year

Poor Margie! She had been working so hard on our taxes, but today it paid off when we learned that we have a refund coming. This sounds like good news and it is, but the reason is bad. Being self-employed, I pay my taxes quarterly and I paid enough after the first quarter of last year to cover the entire year.

That's because I earned very little money after that. All because I stood upon a rolling chair to take a picture.

But this, the year of the great recession, is also going to be the year that I get going again.

As we went out to settle these tax matters and to dine at Taco Bell, I found myself in a perplexing situation. I needed to turn right out of the Fred Meyer parking lot onto the Palmer-Wasilla Highway toward the Parks Highway, but this kid was sitting there on his bike, waiting for a break so that he could cross the road.

Several times, a break came and I could have gone, but it must not have looked a break from his perspective, because he just sat there. Still, I could not go, I could not assume that he was going to just sit there, because his is a precious life and I could not make such an assumption about it.

So I sat and waited and waited and waited.

Then finally he went. I turned right, immediately thereafter.

Up ahead, someone who I do not even know insulted me. Or maybe the insult was directed not at me, but the driver of the red car, perhaps the white. Or maybe the driver of the black truck described himself. Perhaps he takes pride in being recognized as such.

Before we left the house, we had seen news clips of people holding "tea parties" across the country. I didn't even think about the possibility of a tea party being held in our little town, but, of course! This is Wasilla. People here love tea, and would not pass up a chance to stage a tea party.

As for the website posted on the sign, I checked it out and you can, too, right here. It also contains a link to Glenn Beck's website, who the website creator holds in high esteem. 

One day, I hope to photograph and interview Glenn Beck, as part of a project that would also have me interview and photograph Senate Majority leader Harry Reid, Democrat from Nevada, for both share a common bond that in an odd sort of way links each to me.

I'll probably never find the time or the money to do it, though.

Plus, I have other priorities that rank above this part of the project.

Once, in Dupree, South Dakota, I bought a piggy bank. It was ceramic, red, made in Mexico and it looked Mexican. I thought that if I put just one quarter a day in it, in just a couple of decades, I would have saved so much money that I could retreat from all jobs and fully dedicate myself to my work. So I put the first quarter into it.

That night, some kids stole it. The next day, I found the shattered remains of the bank spread across the sidewalk. The quarter was gone. I did not feel bad about the quarter, but I felt bad about the piggy bank.

I have never managed to save anything, since. And though I dabble at it here and there, I remain financially unable to dedicate myself fully to my work.

I think I am going to be a pauper in my old age.

If I can have a hut, enough food to eat, and be able to sit there and write, intelligently, I won't care. I would do that right now, but too many people depend on me to keep a roof over their head.

I have said it before: I have observed enough of this life to come to one conclusion about God-granted rights. God grants us but one right - the right to struggle to survive for as long as we are able. Not to survive, but to struggle to survive. 

Beyond that, God gives us no rights at all. How many people die on their first day of life? All these exercised their one God-given right, but it didn't work out for them. We envision rights, we create political systems and codify the rights that we desire in Constitution and in law and then we fight with each other about what these rights mean; we defend the rights that we seek even as we try to take away those that the other guy seeks but that we find offensive, be our reason noble or petty, informed or based on emotion.

Should these people in this picture and those who feel as they do find full success in their quest, I wonder what kind of rights I would be left with?

The light turned red for me, right here, beside this lively boy.

Very recently, many Americans rose up to take their country back and succeeded. Now others, most of whom thought they were taking the country back when they elected George W., want to take it away, again.

I drive on from the tea party and see joggers on a bike trail. I admire joggers, not necessarily for their politics but for their jogging discipline. I don't jog, but I do ride a bike. 

And so passed this day as seen from my Ford Escape, right here, in Wasilla, Alaska.

Today, part 2: We get ashed by Mt. Redoubt

Melanie, wearing her ash mask in the parking lot of the Arts building at the University of Alaska, Anchorage.

When I left Wasilla for Anchorage, the sky was clean and pure, deep, blue, the mountains gleaming stark and white against it. I thought about taking some pictures, but I had already taken quite a few pictures today and I expected to take several more at the play.

I did not want to spend the time editing and processing the white mountains against the clean blue sky pictures, since that is not an uncommon scene around here.

Now, I wish I had taken those pictures, just to show the contrast. It happened so fast. 

As I neared Anchorage, the sky suddenly darkned, the air in front of me became hazy, fine dust - ash - swirled about cars as they drove through it.

Mt. Redoubt has been blowing off and on for days now. The ash has gone here and there, but has always missed us.

Now, all of sudden, it had hit us. 

Or at least Anchorage. I did not know if it had hit Wasilla.

The tower at Merrill Field. No planes were flying.

I wanted it to stop, all right. I hate to breathe this stuff. Imagine glass ground to the consistency of powdered sugar. That's what ash tends to be like. It hurts to breathe the stuff.

Flags near Merrill Field.

I did not want to drive the car through it, either. Ash is not good for cars. I hope my filters all did their job. Better replace them soon.

When I got back to Wasilla, it was even worse.

It was simply awful in Wasilla. In some zones, almost like a blizzard.

I had no choice but to breathe the stuff.

Jacob and Lavina reached the house at the same time I did. They had been out shopping. They reported that when they stepped out of Fred Meyer's, they got struck in the face by tiny rocks falling from the sky.

That must have been one hell of a boom.

If this keeps up, I am going to have to get some masks for Margie and me.

Today, part 1: Before the ash fell - Scenes from my walk; hot water heater ruptured, replaced

I had barely begun my walk today when I came upon this moose. If you look closely, you can tell that it is the very same moose that I came upon yesterday, the one that inexplicably scared me. Well, today I redeemed myself. The moose did not scare me at all. I hung out with it for awhile and we visited. I learned that its name is Gertrude. 

Gertrude has a calf nearby and I photographed it, too, but I want to get this done and get to bed, so I will leave the calf out of the post.

A little further on my walk, I saw this kid on a four-wheeler.

Please note that this is not a state trooper, but a Wasilla police officer who is taking the driver's license from the poor sap in the van. (Should you ever happen to read this, poor sap, please do not get offended. Sooner or later, frequently or infrequently, we all do our time as poor saps.)

Even though they call this area Wasilla, and the mailing address is Wasilla, it is just beyond Wasilla city limits and the Wasilla police did not used to have jurisdiction here. Remember how I told you about the time I had to make a citizens arrest on the drunken ice cream lady and hold her as my prisoner for one hour while I waited for the Alaska State Troopers to come, because the Wasilla police would not?

Or did Wasilla finally incorporate my neighborhood and I just didn't hear about it?

I hope Wasilla did. I am tired of paying all these sales taxes to Wasilla and not getting any direct benefits back.

So maybe this cop who has pulled this poor sap over is finally a direct benefit.

As I neared home, a Tahoe stopped on the road beside me. It was Jacob and Muzzy.

After that, somehow, I wound up walking the rest of the way home with a St. Bernard.

As I neared the house, I saw Jake pulling someone who had slipped into the culvert directly in front of our yard out of it.

Jacob and the guy he pulled out.  Jacob told me that this guy is new in the nieghbor and has three big dogs.

If I were to tell this full story, it would take all night, so I won't. Suffice it to say that, this morning, when Margie got up, she heard the sound of rain hammering plastic, but it was not raining.

The sound came from the crawl space beneath our house. It was hot water, pouring out of our ruptured hot water heater through a vent in the floor down into the crawl space.

So here is this Don, putting a new hot water heater into the laundry room.

Don attaches the natural gas line to the new hot water heater.

As for us, we were $1000 poorer than we were when we woke up in the morning.

That was a pretty hard blow to take.

Don lives in Anchorage where he has a plumbing business. We did not hire Don, Sears did. They keep him on contract just so he can help people like us out.

Don has been coming out to the valley to install water heaters and do other plumbing work for 20 years.

Besides Sears, we also checked Lowes, but they would not have been able to install until maybe Tuesday - and their installation fee was higher, even after the $90 emergency fee to have Don come out on a Saturday was added into the Sears installation fee.

Kalib with pan that he wants us to fill with hot water. He wants to boil a fish in that pan, that's why.

I have no time for this blog tonight, none at all - but what the hell, here it is

So here we are this morning at IHOP, Margie, Lavina, Kalib, me and our waitress. There's a pretty dramatic story behind that cup of coffee, and I thought I would tell it tonight, but I'm on deadline and haven't the time.

Someday, I will tell the story, if I don't wind up in Hell, first.

Pioneer Peak, from the stoplight immediately before the Taco Bell turnoff. No matter how crazy it gets around this place, guess what?

I can look any direction I want and Alaska is still out there.

And that feels good. I cannot tell you how good it feels.

Only Alaska feels that good.

Did you know that I love this place?

The place they call Alaska?

Damn, I love it!

A late afternoon drive on Schrock Road.

Lavina barbecues pork chops. They were damn good, scrumptious.

Muzzy invades and marks the red dog's territory. Red Dog can't do anything about it.

It's free, but I was afraid that if I took it, someone would shoot me, anyway. People are always getting shot around here for taking free TV's. Afterward, the shooter removes the "free" sign and claims he shot in defense of property.

Not a single shooter has ever been convicted.

I never take these free TV's.

That's why I'm still alive today.

Jacob turns Kalib's stroller loose on a hill.

Jacob and Lavina get into a game of "catch the stroller." It's Lavina's turn to catch.

Now it's Jacob's turn.

The game of catch is over, but the fun isn't.

Jacob, Lavina, Kalib and Muzzy.

Three fellow photographers at the Iditarod Restart - for one, Governor Palin rides to the rescue

If I had searched, I could have found several more tons of my colleagues as they wielded their cameras at the Iditarod Restart in Willow, but I didn't, so I only photographed the three that popped up in front of me.

This is Jim Lavrakas of the Anchorage Daily News, who I first met 28.5 years ago. He was shooting for the Daily News then as well. The Daily News has always had an extremely talented photo staff and Jim is one of the best.

If you doubt this, then please take note of the extremely difficult technique that he uses here to photograph the race. It is called the "Lavrakas Two-Gun Technique" and he spent over a decade perfecting it, but finally mastered it on July 22, 1994.

Jim's theory is that the photographer should always hold two cameras in his hands, on either side of his vision, but never bring the viewfinder of either to his eyes. He then focuses each eye on a different subject. Then the photographer, like the two-gun gunslinger who, with dead-on accuracy, simultaneously fires in multiple directions, shoots both cameras at the same moment.

In this case, a Super Cub was flying overhead while down below a little boy was reaching over the fence to high-five a passing musher.

I did not see the results myself, but I understand Jim caught both moments grandly, in perfect unison, as he always does.

I have tried this technique myself, but have never succeeded at it.

This is Wayde Carroll, a fine architecture photographer who also conducts photo safaris not only in Alaska but Costa Rica as well. As you can see, Wayde also employs some pretty sophisticated technique. He asked if I would pose for a portrait so I did. He threw in some light with the umbrella held in reverse.

Then I shot this portrait of Wade.

We photographers like to go around shooting portraits of each other.

We want someone to remember us when we're gone.

And this is Al Grillo, who shoots for the Associated Press. He is a most likable guy and I often come upon him anywhere in Alaska, and I also see his pictures from all over the state published regularly in the news. This has been the case for many years.

I commented on this. "You've got a really good job," I complimented.

"If it wasn't for all the interest in Sarah Palin, I wouldn't even have a job right now," Al answered. As AP does its part to keep our governor focused in the national eye, they tend to send Al anywhere in Alaska where she does something that might be noteworthy.

And there I find a second reason to be glad that Sarah Palin is our governor.

I found Al kneeling in the snow at a gap in the fence. A bit later, an official hall monitor came by and told him to move, that he could not be there.

Al protested. He told the hall monitor that he was with AP, had press credentials and was acting within his right and duty.

"I don't care who you are or what credentials you have," the hall monitor fired back. "You have to move, now."

But Al didn't move, and for this I was mighty proud of him.

The hall monitor walked away, murmuring threats that Al had better have vacated that spot by the time he came back.

Then a lady who was standing behind the fence (that's her elbow in the upper left corner), piped in and told Al that she knew Governor Palin personally. "I've got her phone number right here in my cellphone," she spoke authoritatively, "I can give her a call right now and she'll straighten that guy (the hall monitor) out for you."

Al gave her a polite smile and kept on shooting.

This is not a photographer, but a kid named Ian, who lives in Palmer. I took this picture as the second musher to come out of the chute passed by, waving at the friendly crowd as he did.

Ian told me that he loved the Iditarod. "It's lots of fun," he said. "It's exciting."

When it was all over, and after I had visited and photographed Rose Albert, as seen in yesterday's entry, I discovered that I was hungry and wanted to eat. Given the setting, only a hot dog would do.

I found this stand, selling "Reindeer Dogs," made of genuine Alaska reindeer.

I ordered one, plus a bag of Lay's Classic Potato Chips and a super-chilled Pepsi that the lady pictured above pulled from the ice chest that had protected it from freezing altogether.

I bit into the reindeer dog and discovered that it was mostly gristle and fat. It was hot, so that fat oozed out in great drops of oil.

Oh, geeze! It was good! Scrumptious! Just what I needed.

When I think back upon it, I wish that I had bought two.

There were still mushers leaving the chutes as I pulled away, hoping to beat traffic that I knew from experience would come to a standstill. As I did, these two tiny kids, towed by a snowmachine, zipped by.

As I neared Miller's, where I bought the chocolate-dipped ice cream cone recently pictured on this blog, I came upon this scene and found that someone had been pulled over by a state trooper. 

How I love this place! How could I not? Can you see how beautiful it is?

It is an honor to get ticketed in such a place as this.

Still, I was glad that the honor went to someone else, and not to me.

A little further down the road, I turned off the Parks Highway and onto Pittman, towards home and on that corner passed by this familiar roadside tourist shop. It was a great reminder of the thrill of the Iditarod.

Soon, the tourist season will begin. Many tourists will pass this shop and they will gaze upon it with proverbial wonder; they will realize what a majestic and beautiful state they have the privilege to pass through.