Welcome to Edmonton from Wesley Pedersen. Saturday June 7, 2008

next photo from 2008  index page

Wesley was riding his bicycle along 112 Ave at 95 St. in Edmonton at about 10:30 am. He was cruising down the sidewalk, hauling a green garbage bag filled with pop cans. He crossed the lights and he looked blissfully down the Avenue caring only where he steered and probably hoping not to hit anything substantial. I was walking on the Street looking for someone to illustrate the more impoverished parts, and large they are, of Edmonton. He came to a stop with his legs on either side of the crossbar of a fairly new bike. He smiled and agreed to have his mug shot. Cool, he thought. As I was lining everything up, he took out his cel phone to check something. Later, I finally noticed, blind as I am, a continual stream of people with grocery carts and bicycles taking various streets to the bottle depot a couple of blocks from where Wesley and I stood.

It was a cool morning, occasionally raining and about +13C. This is what he told me.

Age: 36 / Favorite Book: also, any Stephen King, see Kirk Purcel (KP) in this series.

Born: Thompson, Manitoba in the back seat of a car during a snow storm
The Best Thing: the birth of his daughter Samantha and his son Mike who is named after a friend who died from a drug OD.

The Worst Thing:  He fell six stories through a skylight. He had been sitting on a window sill reading. It took  time to learn to walk again, he said. He damaged his small intestine. That was January 17, 1998 just after a number of the other photos in this series were taken.

Note: He quit taking heroin on June 17, 1998. He drinks, writes, and plays songs. He works at managing games in Dobco Carnivals during the summer, in Calgary, Edmonton, and Vancouver, he says.

High School: St. Joe's and Victoria Composite High School in Edmonton.

© D. Wall