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Celebrate what you’ve got!

By Michel Beaudry She says she’s just a simple farm girl. Nothing special. No reason to write a story about her or anything. But as usual she’d downplaying her talents.

By Michel Beaudry

She says she’s just a simple farm girl. Nothing special. No reason to write a story about her or anything. But as usual she’d downplaying her talents. For Bonny Makarewicz has carved out a sizeable niche for herself in the male-dominated world of photojournalism. A Whistler institution for the last 16 years — her work appears regularly in both local and Lower Mainland newspapers — Bonny is about to have a photo essay of hers featured in the travel section of the venerable New York Times. Nothing special indeed…

She likens her career to skiing. “If you want to be a better skier, you don’t hang out on the bunny hill watching bad skiers,” she says with that wonderful round-cheeked smile that so nicely underscores her Eastern European roots. “I’ve always strived to see good images in my head.”

And then she laughs. “It’s pretty straightforward as far as I see it,” she says. “Whoever thinks they’ve taken their best photo ever should quit being a photographer right now!”

I still remember my first Bonny sighting. It was during a World Cup downhill at Panorama Mountain in the early 1990s at one of the more photogenic sites on the course. As usual, there was an international scrum of old-boy photographers with massive lenses and big egos, each one jostling for the best shooting position. Off to the side a bit — totally calm and entirely composed — was a young woman snowboarder with a modest array of camera gear around her neck. And I recall thinking to myself: “What’s a boarder chick doing in this gang?”

Bonny laughs. “That was my first assignment for the Question,” she says. “I was so green and so inexperienced at that point — but I was young and keen and it really didn’t matter. Besides, even though I got my share of curious looks for being on a snowboard — I was the only rider allowed on the course — I got a lot of support from the other photographers that week.”

Although she’s shot her fair share of sporting events since that time, she definitely doesn’t consider herself just a sports photographer. “If one looked at my work I think diverse would sum it up best and that’s because of my photojournalism background. You get thrown into all sorts of different situations — from action to portraiture to being allowed one minute in a G8 heads-of-state meeting. You have to think on your feet and come home to file a good picture. You can’t say to your editor, the dog ate my homework or it was snowing too hard.”

But she wouldn’t have it any other way. “I like the diversity of views I get from my work.” She pauses. Smiles. “Every day is different,” she explains. “And my job is to get the very best shot I can regardless of the limitations I face.”

Bonny grew up on the banks of the Columbia River, just south of the old railway town of Revelstoke. “My grandfather homesteaded a section of land down by the river,” she says. “It was an amazing place to grow up.” She stops for a moment. Laughs again. “Still — I got out of there the moment I graduated from high school. There was no way I was going to end up barefoot and pregnant and living in Revelstoke…”

She learned her photographer’s trade at the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology. “We were a big family,” she says, “so there was no money to pay for post-secondary schooling. If you wanted more education, you had to pay for it yourself.” Never one to be put off by a challenge, Bonny financed her schooling by working summers at a local sawmill. “I never really thought about it. That was just the way we were brought up.”

It was that same determination that got Bonny on skis in the first place. “I guess I was around 13 or 14,” she remembers. “There was no question of buying new gear or anything so I went rummaging in our basement for skis and boots.” Being one of the youngest in her family, she knew there would be something down there that she could use. “The skis were way too long, the boots were too big, and I didn’t have a clue what to do.” She giggles at the memory. “I was terrified. The local ski hill, Mt. Mackenzie, wasn’t much by Whistler standards. But it was more than enough for me…”

Bonny soon got over her fears. And a lifelong love affair with sliding on snow was born.

Ironically though, Bonny’s first encounter with Whistler in 1986 was far from positive. “I was living in Kelowna at the time,” she recounts. “And a girlfriend and I decided to come out west for World Cup week. I was a Big White skier at the time and used to dry powder snow.” She pauses. Another titter escapes. “And what we found here was like nothing we’d ever experienced. The first day we skied in the rain and the slop. We weren’t impressed. The second day featured wet cement and it wasn’t much better. On the third morning we woke up to more rain and slush in the valley — and the announcement that they’d cancelled the downhill — and I said to my friend: ‘What are we doing here? Let’s go home!’” She laughs. “We drove out of town and said ‘Good riddance!’ got back to Big White and skied champagne powder for the rest of the week.”

Fortunately for Whistler, she gave the place another shot four years later. And decided to stay. “This is my home now,” she says “When you do the math: little crime, fresh air, minutes to a bike trail, minutes to the ski hill, freshwater lakes, great friends, dog friendly, fresh produce from Pemberton, no commuter traffic jams — it’s pretty much a no-brainer…”

But there’s more to it than that too. “For me, Whistler has a small-town feel and a big-town energy. Coming from a place like Revelstoke, I know how isolated small communities really are.” Another pause. “I mean, there aren’t many small towns in B.C. where you can go out for dinner past 10 at night. A lot of people leave Whistler for the so-called small-town lifestyle. But then they realize that small-town life can be pretty boring…”

Besides, she adds, “there’s so much to do here. The diversity of activities — the wealth of opportunities: it’s totally different than any other community in Canada.”

Which brings up one of her biggest peeves about Whistlerites. “People have to keep reminding themselves what a great place this is — and take advantage of it! Stop complaining and embrace what you have!” She cites a recent overnight hiking trip to Garibaldi Lake as a good example of what she’s talking about. “It was spectacular. And it reminded me just how lucky we are to be living in this great mountain playground.”

It’s not that she’s dismissing the fact that Whistler people have other serious issues in their lives. Or that the economic situation here isn’t always as rosy as outsiders perceive it to be. “Sure — we all get busy making a living,” she says. “But every now and then, you have to put your business aside and take the time to remind yourself why you moved here in the first place.”

She sighs. “At the end of the day I think life is easy when you know what you want. That way you make a plan and go after it. But it’s never that easy… too many choices, too many opinions. Maybe that’s our problem right now. We don’t know what we want…”

She shakes her head. A frown suddenly dances across her features. “Do you know what I mean?” she asks. And then her smile returns. “I think people here should take a moment every day to look around and see — really see — the beauty around them. We’re not at war. We’re not starving. And nobody is beating us up for our political views. In fact, we’re pretty well off by any standard you care to measure us by. We should be thankful for our good fortune…”