Dear Cousin Prakash: I wish that I could have known you better

The gentleman sitting with the boy on his lap is Prakash and the boy is his son, Karthik. Next to them sits Akila, the wife of Prakash. Sadly, she is now a widow and Karthik without a father, as Prakash lost his life just before the New Year began when he was struck by a bus in India. Prakash was 42.

I call him "cousin" in the title to this entry not because of any relationship of blood between us, because there is none, but to honor him and the family connection that first drew us together on the evening of August 22, 2007. That connection was the pre-wedding reception of my niece, Khena, to his nephew, Vivek, held in Bangalore in the south India state of Karnataka. 

Now Vivek is my nephew, too, and, by my way of thinking, that makes his Uncle Prakash my cousin.

I have a project in my head that I long to carry out, and that is to journey back into the places of origin and current habitation of all of my extended family, from the Apache and Navajo Indian Reservations of Arizona, the Mormon heartland of Utah and Southern Idaho, elsewhere in the Rocky Mountains, the coast of California,  the Midwest, Deep South, the East Coast and now India.

My purpose would be to photograph as wide a swath of my family as I can, and to tell what I can of the stories of this large, diverse, family that could not have been imagined by any member of it a little more than one generation ago.

This is from the next day, August 23, 2007, at the wedding. The very beautiful young lady that Prakash holds is niece Vaishnavi, also known as Sonal.

By itself, my ancient, new, family in India is large and diverse and though I met many of them at the wedding, in most cases, these were fleeting encounters. I have been privileged to get to know a few of them a little better. Vivek, of course; his parents, Murthy and Vashanti, who not only put me up for my final days in India, but visited us here in Alaska this past May, after which we all went down to Alta, Utah, to celebrate the second wedding of Vivek and Khena; Nephew Vijay - Vivek's brother - and his wife, Vidya, a friend to all animals and the mother of beautiful baby girl Vaidehi, born this past spring even as her grandparents were visiting us.

Through Cyberspace, we communicate regularly and send pictures back and forth.

Vivek's cousin Ganesh took me on a tour of Bangalore and is also special to my heart. Ganesh has two sisters, Soundarya (Sandy) and Sujitha (Barbie), both of whom will wed next month - Soundarya on Valentine's Day, which is also Margie and my wedding anniversary, and Sujitha the very next day, February 15.

It had long been the plan of both Soundarya and me that I would return to India to photograph her wedding, as we have shared an exceptionally special relationship since we met. I call her "Muse" and many of my days have been brightened by the mere appearance of a "sandyz" mail in my inbox.

I thought that on this second trip to India, I would begin to track down my new family members of south Asia; I would photograph them, both in portrait and candid form, visit with them, and begin to learn their stories.

But there was a communication mixup, and Sandy's wedding wound up being scheduled during the one event taking place here in Alaska this winter that I absolutely cannot miss.

Prakash, his beautiful wife and energetic son were among those I had hoped to photograph and visit.

Now, I do not know when I will return to India. To be honest, given the kind of year 2008 was for me, I lack the financial resources - although for Soundarya and Anil's wedding - and Sujitha's, too - a lack of resources would not have stopped me.

But I will return, because my family in India is exceptionally important to me. When I do, Prakash will not be there. His ashes were set free at his funeral in Chennai, but I will still learn what I can of him, and of Akila and Karthik, who I do hope to photograph.

For now, all I can do is to send my condolences. 

January 1, 2008: Backyard moose, tots in the house, Iraq-bound Marine at KFC

In the morning (which, as I define it here, began about 11:00 AM and ended about 1:00 PM) a moose appeared in the backyard, as moose often do.

Inside, the fire in the woodstove burned hot. Babies - no, I can hardly call them babies anymore - toddlers Lafe and Kalib were happy and content.

Lafe's mother offered him a sip of soda pop from Burger King, where she and his dad had stopped on their way over to pick up their son after his overnighter here. Lafe gladly accepted.

We always cook a ham, along with potatoes, veggies, pies and such for New Year's, but, with all that has been going on lately, both Margie and I completely forgot about today's dinner. So, about 3:00 PM, we headed to KFC to get dinner there.

As we were leaving, I saw a marine, talking to a KFC employee who was taking a break. As I walked past, they suddenly hugged, to say goodbye. "I love you," the worker said. "I love you, too!" the Marine responded. I knew the moment was going to be brief, so, as quickly as I could, not realizing that my shutter speed had accidently been dialed back to 1/10th of a second, I pulled my G10 pocket camera from my jacket pocket and got off one blurry frame.

My impression was that the KFC worker had served in the military himself, for it seemed to be that kind of love - one soldier to another, one Marine to another - that had been expressed.

The Marine headed out the door toward his vehicle, where others waited for him. I stopped him before he could get there, and he was happy to pose for a snap.

Private First Class Bonty is stationed in North Carolina, is not from Alaska but has family in Wasilla and had come up on leave to visit. He departs for Iraq in two weeks.

There was much more that I wanted to ask him, of course, but Margie had taken a seat in the car and was waiting for me. He had people waiting for him.

I also wanted to go back into KFC, to talk to the worker who had hugged him, but his break was over and he had gone back to work. Plus, Margie was holding a box of hot wings that Jacob and Lavina had ordered, and we had to get it home while the food was still hot.

And this how the first day of year 2009 began for me, right here in Wasilla, Alaska.

Happy New Year! New Wasilla Dairy Queen opens to sell ice cream at 30 degrees below zero; neighborhood fireworks, cop stop

Waiting in line in the drive-through at the new Wasilla Dairy Queen.

It being New Year's Eve, I was looking for a wild time. I was driving about in our Ford Taurus with its smashed-in rear end wondering what I could do. I drove past an electronic marque that showed the temperature at 26 below* - okay, so I exaggerated just a bit in the title. Unless you think in Celsius. In Celsius, it was -32.  As I approached the Dairy Queen that has been under construction for the past couple of months, I wondered when it would open. And then I saw the sign that said "open - 24 hours a day"!

Yeah, this would be wild! I had never been to a Dairy Queen in Wasilla before! No one had! This would be great!

*This is pretty warm compared to the cold regions of Alaska, where temperatures right now are in the -40s and -50s; wouldn't be surprised to hear of some dips into the -60's.

So I hurried home to see who might want to share in this adventure with me, then returned with Margie and Lavina. We got in line at the drivethrough. We placed our order - a Butterfinger blizzard for Lavina, a Hawaiian Blizzard for Margie and a small vanilla cone dipped in chocolate for me. As you can see, whoever was in the vehicle in front of us also ordered a cone.

You could click on the picture and see it a little bigger.

I refused to accept the ice cream cone, because it had not been dipped in chocolate. The girl is looking at their electronic copy of my order to see if, in fact, I had ordered a cone dipped in chocolate. She saw that I had. She sent the cone back. It came back dipped in chocolate.

It was good, but it was exceptionally small - the smallest small cone that I have ever had. If I had realized it was going to be that small, I would have ordered a medium.

It was probably better for me that I didn't know.

As midnight approached, I was back in the house. People were tired and had already gone to bed. I was appalled by this, but that's how it was. Jacob was still up, watching football, running back and forth to take care of toddler Lafe, Kalib's friend, who is spending the night but who does not seem to sleep for more than 20 minutes at a stretch.

I could hear fireworks going off all around. So I decided to go out and get a few pictures. These are not official fireworks, just fireworks people shoot off in their yard. It is not legal to do this, but they sell fireworks just up the road in Houston and nobody cares that it is not legal, including the cops, who could not possibly arrest everybody shooting off fireworks.

So I took a short drive, and shot a few frames through the window, when I would see a rocket going up in front of me.

The car was just about out of gas, so I went and put $5.50 (at $2.45 a gallon) in, because this car will not be with us long enough for us to burn much more gas than that.

On the way back home, I saw this car pulled over, with two police cars parked behind it. 

Despite the fact it was very early New Year's morning, I will not speculate as to what cause our good Wasilla police had found to pull the car over.

Oddly enough, it was directly across the street from where I got rear-ended just before Christmas.

After the visit to the ER, Kalib is left to ponder a different side of life

Kalib plays with a toy in the waiting area to the emergency room at the Mat-Su Regional Hospital.

This is how it happened: At about 11:00 PM, I headed back to my office after taking a short break. To get there, I had to pass through the living room, open the garage door and then walk a few feet to my office door. As I passed through the living room, I saw a pleasant scene, almost idyllic. 

Lavina was sitting on one couch doing something in her laptop computer. His back propped against a chair, Jacob was sitting on the floor reading out loud to Kalib from one of his many books - perhaps one that he had gotten for Christmas or his birthday; I'm not certain.

As Jacob read, Kalib crawled about the immediate area, exploring things to the sound of his father's voice.

I quickly passed through and sat down at my computer. I had not been there for more than a few minutes when Margie stepped in, Kalib in her arms. His eyes were wet with tears and I saw the scratch marks fresh on his face.

I immediately rose from my chair.

Kalib studies the mechanics of the toy.

Margie informed me that Martigny had scratched him, and that Jacob and Lavina were on their way to the store, to purchase an antispetic cleanser that would be mild enough for a baby. I went back into the house with the two of them, and then I cleaned the scratches as best I could with just warm water.

Kalib protested, howled, jerked and twisted throughout the process. When I finished, I could see that the scratch on his upper lip was quite deep. So I called Lavina and told her and we decided to take him to the emergency room.

As I later put the story together, even as Jacob read to him, Kalib crawled from the living room into the kitchen. Suddenly, before anyone discovered that he had crawled out of sight, the peace that I had witnessed only minutes before was destroyed by the sound of something crashing to the floor and a sudden, loud, cry from Kalib.

Martigny then dashed out of the kitchen and hid.

Kalib had been scratched. I think Martigny, who had always been so good with Kalib, was caught by surprise by the falling object and Kalib, who had undoubtedly caused it to fall.

In panic, she lashed out.

It is a very difficult thing to keep your eye on a toddler 100 percent of the time when he is awake and about, but it only takes seconds for a toddler out of sight to get himself into true trouble.

After his name is called, Kalib gets weighed.

The nurse checks his vitals by attaching a high-tech device to his toes and pulling his sock over it.

Kalib in the arms of his mom, just before the doctor begins his treatment.

Can you imagine how hard this is for his dad, to have to hold down this little son whom he so adores?

The doctor does his work. He does not stitch but rather glues the separated sides of the deep wound back together. We are instructed to just let the glue wear off naturally. When its job is done, it will be gone. The smaller scratches are expected to disappear in due time.

The deeper gash on Kalib's lip will leave a scar, but if we keep the sun off of it, it will be less of a scar and in time may hardly be noticeable. Right now, there is little sun to keep off of it, but we will be in Arizona soon. That means sunscreen, and a big hat.

After the repair is done, a sobbing Kalib is comforted by his mom - who, I must say, is as loving, caring, and dedicated a mom as I have ever seen. She is a wonderful mom, and a great daughter-in-law. I love her dearly.

The same goes for his dad. His dad is a much better dad to Kalib than I was to him. Up until this happened, Kalib had never experienced any hard physical contact; I don't think he had ever even been scolded. No, nary a voice had been raised against him and he had been subjected to no physical discipline.

And now, all of a sudden, he been scratched by a cat that he had hung out with. His grandpa had washed his wounds while his grandma held his arms as though she were a straight jacket, then he had gone to the hospital where the people who had always been nothing but loving and gentle with him had ganged up on him along with a stranger - an old man with white hair and white beard and the nurse and had not only restrained him, but had inflicted pain upon him - for his good, yes, but could he know that?

He was left with much to ponder.

Yet, he has forgiven us all. He still greets us all with a smile and he laughs, but he seems a little quicker to cry and to get upset, and a little slower to calm back down again.

The culprit

Tonight, I prepared 11 photos to place in this entry, eight of them taken at Mat-Su Regional Hospital during our trip to the emergency room with my little grandson, Kalib. But it is 1:23 AM right now and I have had a busy day. I have another one ahead of me shortly.

So I will save ten of those photos for tomorrow and tonight will run only this one, taken shortly before midnight.

Yes, Martigny is the culprit who sent Kalib to the emergency room. Some may wonder why she is still here, but this is her home. Where else can she be? Plus, the whole thing was a fluke, brought about by an unfortunate event that caused Martigny to panic and lash out, not so much at Kalib but at whatever happened to be in front of her during a terrifying moment.

We are taking action to make certain that such a thing does not happen again.

I would explain, but I have to feed my tropical fish and go to bed.

I am very tired.

There are many tired people people tonight, right here in Wasilla, Alaska.

Most of them are asleep.

But I'm not.