The Daily School Bus: Parked outside the bus barn across the street from Barrow High School

...at 10:10 AM this morning.

I saw my first school bus as I walked to breakfast this morning little bit after 7:30, but my iPhone was in my pocket. By the time I could get it out and activate the camera the bus had turned the corner before it ever even reached me. Buses would have been rolling regularly for a while after that, but I was tied up getting situated and didn't see any of them.

Don't worry. There will be plenty more buses for me to snap in Barrow. 

Text added at 10:59 AM. The Squarespace nightmare continues - day 52 and counting.

Barrow beneath the half-moon

Downtown Barrow, Alaska, beneath the half-moon. The temperature is 19° - above zero. Very, very, warm for this time of year, but standing in the stiff breeze it does not feel all that warm. The big storm blew in a bunch of warm air. I suspect it will cool down pretty fast now, but I haven't heard the forecast yet.

Text added at 10:42 AM. The Squarespace nightmare continues - day 51 and counting.

Another day spent in two places at once

Wait! "Where is Jim?" You challenge. "Isn't he always there with you, assisting you in your work, sitting between your eyes and your computer screen or upon your shoulder?" He could be on my shoulder right now and you would not know… So how can you even ask such a question? The truth is, he is curled up on his own chair, about 3 feet from mine and is taking a much needed nap. He needs lots of naps and I never deny him although sometimes he denies me my sleep. But most often, he just makes me a little more warm and a little more comfortable and able to rest a little better than I would if he were not there. But not always… but Jim is not the point of this post.

The point is to let you know I have spent most of this day sitting here in my chair in my office in my house in Wasilla, but at the same time, I have spent the day up north. Mostly in Nuiqsut, but as you can see, here I am about to land in Barrow. This is how I live when I am picture editing – in two places at once. I am not as far along as I had hoped to be by now, but I am making progress. I will get to the end product, but I am totally confused about what very few pictures to keep for publication, and which thousands to set aside to await the day when some scholar now in diapers or maybe not even born can pore over them in the future and wonder about it all.

"The guy was nuts!" He will say. "But damn! He loved his work! He loved the north! He wasn't really tough enough for the north and he was totally disheveled and unorganized, but he loved it anyway, and somehow managed to do a fair number of things and produce a good number of works - although never as much as he wanted to do or thought he would do."

Uiñiq is trickling in to the Slope

It has taken longer than I had hoped, but Uiñiq is finally trickling into the villages of the North Slope. The US Post Office is slowly putting it into mail boxes. They have yet to deliver it to all the villages, but the process has begun. It should be done before too long - but don't be surprised if this "not too long" is still another week or maybe even two. When it comes to delivering magazine rate mail to Slope villages, the Post Office can be v--e--r--y s--l--o--w - especially to Barrow. Often Barrow is the last Slope community to receive Uiñiq in the mail.

There are copies in Barrow and because of this, I have received a number of inquiries from concerned residents wondering why they had not received theirs and asking how they could get one. I have also received some requests from former residents of the North Slope asking how they could get a copy. Former residents of the North Slope (once a part of the North Slope, always a part of the North Slope) can call Noe Texiera at 907 852-0200, request one and she will send it to you.

I would like to thank North Slope Borough Mayor Charlotte Brower for making this possible and those on her staff who worked to make it happen. I kind of hate to single anyone out, because they number too many and I will leave names out; probably some I"m not even aware of. I must thank Kathy Itta, my contract manager, and Noe, my primary liason, Richard Camillieri - Chief Advisor to the Mayor and Jack Frantz who worked closely with Richard and did what to me is the mystifying, impossible task of working through all the legalities to put the contract in order. Fred Parady has moved elsewhere in the Borough but helped initiate the process. My friend, Roy Ahmaogak, along with his father Savik and family, hosted me in Barrow.

As I wanted to follow one village through its final preparations, I began the Kivgiq 2013 season in Nuiqsut, where I was hosted by Kuukpik Corporation under the direction of Isaac Nukapigak and with the support of Joe Nukpapigak, Bernice Kaigelak, Nellie Nukapigak and all the staff, with full cooperation and assistance from the Uyaġaġviŋmiut and Kuukpikmiut dance groups, led by John Ipalook and Laura Kunaknana.

Then, of course, there were the 22 dance groups hailing from all eight villages of the North Slope Borough and beyond, from Aklavik in the Northwest Territories down to Kivilina and Nome, current home of the King Island people. Such strong spirit these dancers, singers and drummers brought! Such powerful energy! Such beauty performed with magnificent skill! What a privilege it was to be there, to witness, to participate.

Anyone who doubts the continuing power, strength, warmth, beauty and endurance of Iñupiat culture in this modern, swiftly changing and ever-threatening time need only to witness Kivgiq. Along with opportunity, the challenges this world has brought and continues to bring to the people of the Far North are numerous and great, the trials often hard and bitter, the tears many, but at the core there is laughter, strength, resilience and perseverance - manifest so beautifully in the dance.

Wrapped in the sweet, hymnal embrace of their community, Johnny and Lloyd go to their graves

August 22, 2013: As his sons Jordon and Joe join the other pall bearers and carry my good friend Johnny Lee Aiken down the aisle of Barrow's Ukqeagvik Presbyeterian Church, the choir and congregation sing, My Savior First of All. They sing in Iñupiaq, and their voices blend together in a gentle, sweet, beautiful loving caress that wraps around all present. It is a communal embrace, both around the family to assure them that Johnny was loved and cherished in this community, will not be forgotten and those whose pain runs deepest will find support through the darkest days, and around Johnny, whose body may rest in this casket but whose soul, it is strongly believed here, has begun a new and exciting journey and has already been reunited with loved ones and the Savior he himself embraced before his death.

Johnny Lee Aiken, April 26, 1988. His father, Jonathan Aiken, Sr., had just harpooned a bowhead whale. Eli Solomon had followed with a shot from the shoulder gun. The whale had disappeared briefly beneath the surface, come back up, rolled over and died. It was an intant kill. "Praise God!" Kunuk had exclaimed as he raised his hands above his head. 

Johnny flung his arms around Claybo Solomon. They embraced.

August 21, 2013: The day before Johnny was buried, the community had also gathered in the same chapel for the funeral of another hunter who was well thought of in Barrow and across the Arctic Slope - Lloyd Nageak. He, too, would be carried out of the chapel wrapped in the sweet, loving, embrace of the community singing My Savior First of All. Before that, speeches of remembrance were made. Hymns were sung.

"How Great Thou Art!" Lloyd's brothers and sisters sing, with much help and support from the community.

Glimpses from Lloyd's life, as seen at his funeral.

To family members and friends of Lloyd and Johnny: I must leave here in just over an hour to begin my journey to Nuiqsut and from there on to Cross Island. I still have to pack. Yesterday, an unanticipated work-related emergency arose and I simply had to deal with it. It took the better part of the day and I did not complete it until midnight. I have made an initial pass through of all the photos I took at the funerals of August 21 and 22. I will still make and post the special albums for family and friends after I return home, sometime in mid to late September.