First a few more impressions on meeting Helen and then our Monday travels. Some of this is probably old news and repetitious so skip what you've read before.
I tend to be very intuitive about that first face-to-face with anyone. This time totally good vibes came at once. I was so pleased to feel them! We went in and sat down in a booth to wait for another of Helen's friends who was joining us.Actually I think I joined them. Well, no matter. All three of us are booklovers so there was a lot of talk about literature, Barbara, Helen's friend whose last name slipped right out of my holey brain, is a born-Alaskan with several generations of ancestors in the area. She works in/runs a book store and several other endeavors. Another busy lady..I gave each of them a book although neither one read much genre fiction but I hope they will at least give these a try. Helen got Back to Tomorrow and Barbara received Relative Dangers.
More names cropped up, other books and it felt as if we were just three friends who had not gotten together for awhile. A bit of background on Helen. I did post earlier about the Idita-Support Facebook page/group, I know. Helen is the owner/moderator, just one of her many projects, and kind of came to my rescue when I got a lot of the mushers there on my case with my 'carrying dogs' proposal. I just stumbled onto that site as a "recommendation"from FB which clearly already knows way too much about me! Still, it has proved to be one of those amazing serendipity non-coincidences which have marked this whole project from the first and really most of my life. I was meant to get acquainted with Helen Hegener and she with me.
She has her own multimedia publishing firm, Northern Light Media, and so far it focuses on her own writing and a video done with a former husband on the great musher, Lance Mackey. Lance won both the Iditarod and the Yukon Quest four times and both in the same year twice! That is a unique and amazing accomplishment. Helen is a tireless historian and writer, researching with meticulous care and collecting old documents, photos and such to illustrate her books. Can you guess where this is probably going? Yes, I think it very likely that Women Who Run With the Dogs will be a Northern Light book in time.
By about 9:00 a.m. on Monday, June 27, I was in Wasilla, just about ten miles over a couple of ridges from Palmer. We met in a parking lot on the main drag, familiar to me since that was where I caught the bus to go to Anchorage for my flight to Fairbanks in 2014. We went to a nearby Starbucks and chatted while trying to decide where to go, We ended up first at the ITC Headquarters. Helen knows Raymie and Barb Reddington well. They are the couple who operate the cart ride service for visitors there at ITC. He is a son of Joe Reddington and Barb is a Native Alaskan. They have a dozen or so dogs there and puppies when they have some available
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| Barb Reddington and dogs |
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| Hayfield Flats toward Chugach Mtns |
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| Lake Lucille; Sarah Palin's home is across the lake. (FWIW!) |
Barb remembered me from 2014 and we three visited for a bit. I had to get a few pictures of the dogs, of course! We had thought of going to the Knik Museum but it is only open Thursday through Sunday and the main lady, Diane Williams lives up at Big Lake and was not able to come down to do a private opening for us. I had been there and Helen never had, which is like me with Tuzigoot Ruins in the Verde Valley!
We ended up just driving around while Helen pointed out various things to me and we sat for a bit above the Hay Fields slough which sank to become swampy due to the 1964 earthquake which changes a lot of topography and almost trashed Anchorage off the map. Of course there were few moments of silence as we continued to talk about a zillion things.
After I dropped Helen off at her car which we'd left to use my rental, I went to the Wasilla library and looked at all their Sled dog related collection. It was not very large and I jotted donw a few titles to seek thru Interlibrary Loan or Amazon and other venues. Though lower key that the 25th, it had been a very good day!
I did not get a photo of Helen; Like me, she is clearly more at ease behind the camera than in front of it but I've included a few shots of our travels etc.
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