Monday, December 14, 2009

Midair

While working in the west pasture, I heard the haunting call of the sandhill crane, a call that seems to come from within your head and simultaneously from all directions. It took me a moment to find the flock against the sun, but when I did it was startling: over 120 birds flying east-southeast in three V formations.

Did you ever notice how all the other birds quiet when a Sandhill calls? The Stellar Jays, the Chickadees, the finches that had moments before been chattering at me listened silently as their wiser relatives passed over. An Ojibwe elder once told me why: to paraphrase, he said the birds didn't know when to fly south. The bluebird tried leading, but he left too early and they ran out of food in the south. The chickadee tried, but he left too late and some of the birds froze to death. The hummingbird tried leading, but flew too fast and left some behind. Finally, the crane, the oldest and wisest bird, was the only one left. He knew when to leave, only everyone was so preoccupied with chattering and worrying, no one listened to him. Now they have learned their bitter lesson, and hush right up when the crane speaks.

As they passed by Saddle Mountain, a group of about forty birds split off from the others. They spread their wings and rode the drafts in circles, hundreds of feet in the air. I wondered if they were planning on resting, until I noticed the larger flock had seen them stop, and swung around in a big southern arc to rejoin the small, circling group. They all took up crying to one another, the small flock circling on a draft, the larger flock in disarray, trying to preserve their formation but unable to continue in any one direction. It was a disagreement! The birds were arguing! Their path was leading them directly over the West Elks, which must take a tremendous amount of energy to cross with the covering layer of snow. The small flock didn't want to cross the mountains tonight, and wouldn't be dissuaded.

A group of five split from the largest flock and headed off northeast, in defiance and impatience. They hadn't gotten far when the larger flock decided to concede to the decision of the original forty and head south. Wildly outnumbered, the five renegades turned and flew south too, racing to catch up. Their voices quickly quieted, as, united, they flew over Saddle Mountain together.

Friday, November 27, 2009

Happy Buy Nothing Day!


There’s only one way to avoid the collapse of this human experiment of ours on Planet Earth: we have to consume less.

Ask a representative group of people what is the greatest threat facing humankind in the 21st century and a number of suggestions will follow. Terrorism, hunger, poverty and pandemics will probably be among them. Few would probably say that the way we consume should be at the top of the list, but there's good reason to believe that this is in fact the correct answer – especially now, one day before the official UK Buy Nothing day.

The reason is simple. For all its sophistications, our modern culture and the mainstream economics that underpin it do not put a price on nature – and nature is set to be the ultimate limiting factor on human progress and welfare as we head toward the middle decades of this century. In some respects, the natural world is already central to our concerns as renewable and non-renewable resources are depleted, ecosystems are degraded and the climate's stability is threatened.

But the scale of our mishandling of the natural world is much bigger than this. One widely cited study, published in 1998 by US economist Robert Costanza and his colleagues, gives an indication of just how big. They set out to estimate the financial cost of replacing all the services provided to us by nature. The pollination of crops, restoration of soil fertility and recycling of wastes; the coastal protection provided by coral reefs and mangroves; the creation of rain by natural forests and the climatic stability that enables human societies to develop – all of these were estimated to be roughly double the value of GDP in that year.

(Text borrowed from Tony Juniper of the UK Guardian.) Buy Nothing Day: buynothingday.org

Downshifting to a less resource-hungry economy need not mean the end of comfort and security, or the beginning of mass unemployment. Going green could create millions of jobs, generate new markets, stimulate new technologies and provide opportunities for dynamic new businesses – and in the process conserve the natural systems upon which we all depend. New measures of economic performance are needed, ones that consider human wellbeing as coexistent with the health of the natural world, and account for the state of nature's capital.

While such a transformation, until recently, sounded like a utopian dream, it increasingly looks like our only option to avoid a humanitarian and ecological catastrophe. The moment has arrived to build a culture and economy fit for a finite planet – the only question is how. A good place to start is with ourselves, by working to change our habits and curb our excesses as individual consumers. And what better way to do this than buying nothing for a day?

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

words of wisdom from Mamie...

"I've been told that I've done things that most women just dream of doing. I'm not sure just what they were referring to. Maybe it was the rainy evening I hand-milked seventeen cows in an open corral. Or the years I did the family washing on a washboard down by the creek, with water heated over an open fire and then hung the clothes on the bushes to dry. Or maybe it was when I was leading a string of pack horses into the mountains and one went on the wrong side of a tree, rolling another horse down a hillside, and I was all by myself to get the mess untangled and the horses up on their feet again..."
-Mamie Ferrier, homesteader and founder, with husband Grant, of the Bar X Bar Guest Ranch (nee Smith Fork)

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Immersed in my lifestyle...

I am realizing today where my priorities are. My barn is cleaner than my house.

This morning I heard a radio commercial that asked, "What do you think when you identify this sound?" I thought, oh boy, more ice on the water trough to throw off with the pitchfork.

Joke was on me: it was the sound of shattering glass, a commercial for a windshield repair company.

Monday, November 9, 2009

Lost and Found

Orange oak leaves mask the ground. I am off my horse- he follows behind me, ears perked, attentive to my anticipation. I am prospecting. My eyes are straining, almost painfully, attempting to distinguish between bone-colored branches and bone, the ivory that once knew warm blood versus the ivory of dead wood.

Last year, some enterprising genius (tongue-in-cheek, there) purchases thousands of dollars worth of elk antler sheds and dropped them-- within view of our horse trails-- around the ranch. Then, he lied to guests and told them they were naturally shed... at 8,000 feet... in January.... obviously our ranch guests are not ecologists. Anyway, I'm told there's four sets that were never recovered. That's in addition to the multiple treasures fallen out of guests' pockets and wranglers' saddlebags. We're on a treasure hunt!

Tulsa wasn't interested in treasure hunting, though. Tulsa just wanted to gallop. No trotting, no negotiating rocks, no jumping creeks, just running as fast as he could. That limited my ability to spot the objects of my search. I found my new gloves, and a radio I lost two months ago (that thankfully still works). I found the skeleton of a steer, and the jawbone of a raccoon, but no elk antlers. Mostly I just hung on for the ride. Maybe the treasure was more in the air I breathe anyway, and the wind in my ears as we pounded along.

Thursday, November 5, 2009


If there's anything more hated than dandelions on the lawn, it must be cows. I woke up to it yesterday: COWS ON THE LAWN! SOMEBODY DO SOMETHING BEFORE THEY WRECK THE MANICURED PERFECTION THAT IS OUR FRONT LAWN! I grabbed Howdy and jumped up bareback. My good gelding goes straight to work, ears perked, body sinuous and eager. The cows are reluctant to move from the good grass, but file out onto the road... in the opposite direction that I want them to go, of course.

About 1400 cattle are pastured on the adjacent forest service land each summer, and each year end up occasionally on the ranch. (With 360 acres of fencing, do you really believe I have time to check it ALL? Not this year!) The cattle belong to neighboring ranchers, and have been using this range for years. They're more gentle than any forest service cows I've met previously, and they know their gates as well as I do. These probably know the closest gate is Second Creek, but they're hoping on staying in my pasture for the next week, so they're going to head south instead.

Strung out along the county road, I get the five head moving. Oh good, there's another five bawling to them... from behind my east pasture fence. I jump off Howdy (who is annoyed at having to be distracted from watching cows) and lay open the barbed wire gate onto the road. Might as well get them all together before they start tearing down fences. We walk back to the barn. If I have to push these cows nearly a mile to the next forest service gate, I might as well have the security of a saddle.

Gunner is waiting at the gate, so he gets to be the lucky one. There's a certain synchronisity when working cows by horseback. Your horse feels your energy, your attention, your focus, and moves almost with your thought. I didn't speak as we gathered the ten cows together, moving them, feinting and pushing them, circling them and guiding them on to the gravel. Now, I know you should only push cows at a walk, but I had chores to do, and herding stray cattle was keeping horses from being fed. I hurried them along at a nice trot, aiming for the Needle Rock Pass access gate.

Of course, as I mentioned, these forest service cows tend to be pretty sensitive to a gate (especially when I'm putting some pressure on them), and they were eager to jump through the break in the fence, onto L & M's cleanly mowed turf. I saw that first cow go and Gunner and I sprang forward, cutting off seven more. Gunner spooked hard left at the gate lying on the ground, and we leapt through the opening after the three strays. Cutting around them, we turned them back, and suddenly I hear my name. "Ciara! Ciara!" I look around. L is standing in her doorway, gesturing like Gunner and I should stop by for tea. I shout back "hello!" and she shouts something else but there are two pickup trucks coming down the road threatening to scatter the other seven cows and the three strays are headed in the direction I want them to go and I assume L treasures her lawn enough to forgive my rudeness but I'm obviously in the middle of something here. The cows jump and pop through the gate as though they are surprised at having gone through it, and I swing them in an arc to the north, toward the eventual gate onto forest service land, and away from the oncoming pickups and our neighbor Joe Cocker, who has chosen this moment to walk his two elderly dogs and probably wasn't expecting a wild stampede, not to mention TWO pickups (which is about what our road sees in a day!).

The cows are acting slightly insulted as I push them through an irrigation ditch, so when they sull up in a hole of scrub oak I back off and let them reconvene. I circle quietly around them and head up trail to open the locked gate. Gunner is jacked up and trots off as I mount, toward the cows which have split in two groups. A shifty-eyed Angus is already looking for escape. I push her ahead, and four follow. Three are undecided about moving, and two have wandered back toward the road. Hearing our movement through the brush, they hesitate, and slowly rethink their situation. My first cow walks sullenly past the gate. From holding in hesitation, we bound in leaps in a half circle, trying to turn her back without upsetting the others. The blonde cow gets the picture. She's had enough of this running around nonsense, and walks through the gate with her head held aloft, as though she's been affronted. I work the tail of the line and their herd mentality takes over, the last few eager to catch up, running through the gate like it's the sanctuary they've been looking for all along. They'll follow the trail over Little Coal Creek, and then around Land's End Mountain over the next day or two. I lock the gate behind them, pat my horse's neck, and turn back for home.

"Where did those cows come from," Joe Cocker asks as I greet him. Eloquently, I explain, "You know, the forest." Realizing I am mostly human and only part horse, and therefore probably should be able to communicate better than I am, I add, "There must be a break in the fence somewhere." Joe looks back up toward where the cows are snuffling around the sagebrush, lazily climbing the hill. "Don't they have someone you can call? You shouldn't have to do this yourself." The sweat on Gunner's neck is cooling and the adrenaline in my system is ebbing and I wonder how I can possibly answer that question. Finally, I just say, "I hope not."

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Skill or stupidity?

Push Gunner into a swift trot in the stiff sunshine. He is energetic, and as we turn the corner up Second Creek, he breaks into an enthusiastic lope. At that exact moment, a small black fly darts directly into my eyeball.

At this point, I consider slowing down. After all, a large foreign object wiggling its way under my contact lens is cause for concern.

However, it's a big bug. It should be relatively easy to dislodge. Plus it doesn't hurt, so I'm probably safe to keep loping.

Thus, I jab a finger into my eye to remove the nasty offender, and Gunner runs blithely on as Gunner does, tripping over rocks and throwing himself around corners. The bug works its way out, and I sit up, triumphant in my ability to see with both eyes!

It is at this point that I recognize the ridiculosity of what I had just done. I've spend all summer watching dudes cling with their legs, lean forward awkwardly, concentrate with all their ability to remember to breathe while learning to lope. Here I am, performing complicated eyeball surgery on myself while loping up a rocky, hilly trail. If I was anyone else in the world, this was a task I couldn't have completed. It was one of those moments when you realize just how lucky you are to be you.

Monday, October 26, 2009

The Cult of Canning Exposed

Since I'm a huge fan of canning now, even though I get a slightly queasy feeling in my stomach every time I think about how you can't smell, taste, or see evidence of botulism, I like to promote it mercilessly (although I try and stay away from bragging about the tons of tomatoes and hundreds of pounds of apples I have put up). This is a reprint from the High Country News.

https://www.hcn.org/wotr/con-the-cult-of-canning-exposed?src=me

I hate this time of year. The leaves crackle underfoot like the bones of tiny children. And the light takes on a certain harshness that reminds me that, even as I grow closer to death, I have gotten no closer to realizing my dreams.

Most of that is made tolerable with a dose of self-medication, but there's one autumnal rite that nothing can help. Beginning in August, adherents of this practice descend on U-Pick orchards like magpies on road kill, and by September, this cult – and yes, I think it can be called a cult – is engaged in a primitive ritual involving steamy kitchens, boiling water, blistered fingers and sterile jars.

Yes, it is the season of canning, when people obsessed by food prostrate themselves on the altar of the root cellar of yore and "put up" the harvest. Then they brag about it.

"I put up 60 pounds of tomatoes this weekend," one of the followers told me the other day, her voice sticky with self-righteousness. "And today, as soon as I get home, 10 bushels of pears await me!"

I thought about saying, "I made it through 200 pages of Infinite Jest, and I think I finally understand the plot." But that would only prompt a reply like, "Oh, is that an heirloom tomato?"

Last week, the cult came close to home when my wife and mother spent a full day preserving tomatoes and salsa. This worries me. My mother generally avoided the kitchen when I was a kid. When forced to cook, she relied upon Kraft dinners and frozen enchiladas in tinfoil platters. My wife, Wendy, meanwhile, is alarmingly blasé when it comes to food-borne illnesses and ignores "sell by" dates. She probably figures if she poisons someone, she'll never be expected to cook again, which is fine by her. Still, the two of them forged ahead into the battlefield of boiling water and sterile jars.

Wendy's description of the ordeal was so awful that guilt compelled me to agree to participate in the next session. I wanted to educate myself first, though, and soon discovered that there's lots of lore on the subject. Indeed, there may be more people writing about canning than doing it. The cybersphere has exploded with blogs extolling the virtues of "putting up," and one even advocates a "canvolution." Another goes so far as to compare canning to sex.

Then, in the scariest chapter of one book, I discovered that canning really is like sex; that is, if you do it recklessly, it can cause various forms of bacterial infection. Canned stuff is a leading cause of botulism, the nerve toxin that can kill you. Tomatoes are especially prone to the bacteria, and so, the book says, one should always add acid to them before putting them up.

As I take another bite of the lime-free salsa made in my kitchen, I feel my eyelids drooping, and I have a hard time moving my arm. And when I ask whether they boiled the jars for long enough, I apparently slur my words beyond recognition, for neither my mom nor Wendy seems to hear me.

"Couldn't we just freeze these?" I manage to ask, eying the pile of tomatoes that we're about to can. I receive a caustic look in return; it's just not the same. And besides, as the manifesto of canning explains: What if the power goes out? No cult is complete without an apocalypse, and the canvolutionary's version of Armageddon includes freezers sans electricity regurgitating rotten produce. As with all end-of-days scenarios, the canners' version separates the saved –- that is, the people who have put up plenty of green beans and peaches -- from the damned -- those who put up nothing and now must spend eternity, or at least a few minutes a day, wandering the supermarket aisles.

So I throw plenty of bacteria-killing garlic, lime, and chili into the salsa. After the third burn-blister erupts on my hand, I ask myself: Wasn't technology intended to free us so we could spend time doing the things that make us human, like reading or watching reruns of Battlestar Galactica? Isn't that why our grandparents gave up home-canning in the first place? Or is it just because canned fruit is merely a slimier shadow of its former self, not unlike Mickey Rourke?

But five hours after it begins, our canning ritual is complete. I have to admit that the salsa looks beautiful in those jars. And it's going to be tasty come mid-December. I get the canning thing now. And to prove it, all of you canvolutionaries can come try some of the salsa I put up. Don't worry. I sterilized those jars really well. At least I think I did.

Jonathan Thompson is a contributor to Writers on the Range, a service of High Country News (hcn.org), which he edits in Paonia, Colorado.

comment by Sharon Karpinski
Posted by Jodi Peterson at Oct 07, 2009 01:22 PM
I both read and can, therefore I gotta protest one item in the Cult of Canning article. Tomatoes are NOT particularly prone to botulism. In fact, tomatoes, along with other acid fruits, are the only garden products that you can safely "put up" in a water bath rather than breaking out the pressure cooker, which is the correct approach for serious, industrial-style food preservation. Recently, some varieties of hybrid tomatoes have been bred to be lower in acidity, which is why the canning manuals tell you to add lemon juice to any tomatoes headed for jars but it's a precaution, NOT an indictment of tomatoes as botulism-prone. They aren't.

If you want to discuss the cult of canning in depth, you need to get into the real nitty-gritty of simmering kitchens and sweaty women hovering over that pressure cooker,which is how you process non-acid foods like the two hundred pounds of moose Sarah Palin probably packs up every fall. Pressure cookers truly are scary, right up there with food-borne death. My grandmother once blew up hers, along with four gallons of vegetable soup and part of the kitchen, when a carrot fragment clogged the relief valve. You could see where the cooker's lid hit the ceiling for years afterwards. Scariest of all: pressure-cooked, home-canned wild mushrooms. They can get you three ways, a must-have staple for the homicidal cook.

Sunday, October 25, 2009

Farm Animals Adapting to the Modern World

I hadn't been at the barn in a couple of hours, so when I returned to hear a beeping, I was immediately worried. A beeping? It didn't sound like a smoke detector. The horses were all fine, the truck doors weren't open. An apartment window over the barn was open, and I though Oh, maybe Anne left her alarm on, but when I walked directly under it the sound was coming from inside the barn.

Now I was nervous. There's a room in the barn that contains all the hot water heaters and electrical boxes for the apartments upstairs. What if it was some kind of alarm for a malfunction? We had a hot water heater malfunction and nearly burn the place down earlier in the year, so I ran to that door and threw it open... but nope, the sound was not coming from inside.

The bathroom was clear of any beeping. The wash stall was silent. My office? I opened the door.

My chicken cocks her head at me quizzically. She's perching atop my phone, looking for all the world like she's trying to figure out how to dial out. The phone is off the hook, beeping incessantly, and flashing, "invalid number."

No more 900 calls, Henny Penny.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

When the going gets tougher...

I rode out from the barn solitary and slightly off-kilter. I had my machete and a bottle of water, my wild rag and my multi-tool. Why was I feeling like I was driving a car and had forgotten to fasten my seat belt? Oh right, my chinks. It was a bad day to forget my chinks.

Gunner and I blazed trail, looking for a new way up Second Creek Ridge. I've never ridden in Texas, so I cannot comment on the tortures of cholla cactus, but let me tell you, if it's anything like scrub oak, it's hell. The going was so rough I rode home with my wild rag in shreds and my boot sole torn off. Unsuccessful: no new trail today.

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Bad Day Under the Aspens

It was her tone of voice. Over the radio, a brief call: "Ciara, this is Jessalin. We're up at Safari Cut. I need you here."

I'd been forking partially moldy hay to a bunch of stray cows we were holding in the arena for some neighbors, but I jumped in the Dodge and spun the tires to get back to the barn. Cisco was still saddled, and I was wearing spurs. We ran that half mile without hardly breathing.

Jess told it like this: "I don't know what spooked them. Yosemite jumped and I grabbed the bit, but it only kept me in the saddle a moment longer. I thought I was probably the only one who had come off, but when I gathered my wits and looked back, I could see a pair of legs here, a pair of legs there. I radioed immediately; I didn't think it would help to wait until I had done a full check. Thanks for getting here so quickly."

The owner of the ranch sits grimly, holding her arm, a black eye developing. Her friend and guest lies in the fetal position, complaining meekly. A trained First Responder arrived forty seconds after I do. Things are neatly packaged, efficiently handled, wrapped up within and hour, and we ride and pony six horses back to the barn.

First real accident of the year, with a little more than a week left to the season. Doesn't that just figure. My poor wrangler has stiffened up and is limping. I send her home with an ice pack.

I finally get back to the cows at the tail end of this long day. Their water trough is empty by now, and I turn the hose on and they crowd around, nine of the thirteen pushing around the fifty-gallon tank. They raise their heads and with their flat noses shiny and wet, ask with big dark eyes, "What could possibly have been more important than us?"

Friday, October 2, 2009

Nature's Way of Making a Joke

Archery season ends on Sunday, and we are still elk-less. Yesterday we drove up the forest service road and spotted a herd of nine cows and a large bull grazing near the top of Little Sand Mountain. We crossed the river on foot. "It looks like there's a game trail up that draw," Levi said, hopefully. Or, there's a choked mountainside of low-growing scrub oak, so thick you cannot see sunlight on the other side, interspersed with various boulder fields where no rock lies stable, capped with a near-vertical, hand-over-fist climb up a sandy slope growing only with dead shrubs that trick you into thinking they're securely rooted, only to break off in brittle clumps and threaten to leave you sliding backwards on your head. Of course, when we got to the top, the elk weren't there.

The Birth of Applesauce

Sunday, September 27, 2009

First Batch

I bought myself a canner-- a momentous purchase in the life of any ranch woman. It's a black speckleware beauty, looking like it's been lovingly bathing Ball jars in hot water since long before I was born, rather than simply waiting on a shelf at Ace Hardware for some naiive but enthusiastic young woman to come along. Now that she's here, we're canning like mad. Eight golden jars of applesauce sit gleaming on the counter. It feels like the county fair; I want to place blue ribbons by them each and write a comment about their smooth texture and hint of cinnamon.

Really, I should admit, there are three second-place jars. Our stew pots weren't big enough for my expansive and overzealous applesauce imagination, so we used the dutch oven for the first batch. Of course, the dutch oven has been strictly used for cooking over the coals, and the acid in the apples quickly soaked up the color of the charcoal-like coating, turning my first batch into a sort of grey-green concoction. Alas, three of my jars look like some kind of witch's brew. I'm calling the whole project a "win!" nonetheless, since despite the hardware clerk's comment that we would be so sick of canning we'd turn my pot in for scrap metal, we are anything but sick of it. In fact, the two of us are so enthusiastic, we've started planning a garden! (Surely, I am yet again overly enthusiastic and grandly imaginative, but that should only provide some funny stories to laugh about come spring.)

Friday, September 25, 2009

the boots i destroyed today while breaking trail through killer scrub oak

Reckless and With Abandon

Cisco and I flew from the barn like we were beating the setting sun to its horizon. He wore new shoes that sparked on the rocks, and I told him to run for the pure joy of it, to run for the feeling in your lungs and your muscles that says you are alive. We bucked and spooked and snorted past a black bear, and galloped up a sidehill like a rocking horse possessed. I only realized I was separate from my horse when I saw my hand reach up to adjust my hat.

The alpenglow made the mountains blood red, and Needle Rock stood stiffly black against an orange sky. We gave thanks with our every gasping breath. On the way home Cisco worried his bit and I just rode, unaware of myself as an individual, just another part of the firs and the river and the rock.

Thursday, September 24, 2009

Fading Season

The first snow of the year fell two days after we buried Meeker. He came in that morning shaking, and with swollen eyes. Jess had to kick and push and shout to get him up. I was in town, watching men who understand the foreign language of mechanics repair the skid steer tires for the tenth time. I was impatient with Levi when he gave me the message-- I had been trying to get into town for two days now! It wasn't until I hung up that I realized the severity of what he was describing to me. As I drove home, I told myself sometimes the severest of symptoms portended only a mild colic, and I stopped at the drug store for some infant gas relief drops. When I first saw him, his head was dragging as Levi walked him in circles. If we stopped, he shivered relentlessly, and swayed as if to topple.

It was Saturday, it was impossible to get ahold of a vet, and I knew he was gone. When Dr. Shull called, it was to say he had to put down a horse in our neck of the woods, and would come out after. Rob radioed in then: "I'm on the saddle above Tater Heap. Levi, you'd better step up your game: I've tagged out." He had killed a cow elk, and we were in for an eight hour ride to get it out of the wilderness.

Saddling and feeding the packhorses kept me from dwelling on Meeker. Watching Cameron and Levi drive away with the horse trailer, I faced the knowledge that I couldn't rely on anyone for help-- I was fully responsible for Meeker. He'd perked up some by the time Dr. Shull arrived. His gums were pink, and he'd drunk some water. Dr. Shull seemed hopeful until the elbow-length glove went on. His small intestines were distended: he'd twisted a gut. I made the call without thinking of anything except getting Meeker out of pain-- "It'll take me fifteen minutes to get the trailer back her to transport him to a pasture where we can bury him. Would you wait?"

Jess and I led him into the cattle pasture, and I told Meeker he could lay with friends. I pointed out to Jess all the depressions where other horses were buried. "That's funny-- I walked around here one day imagining all the buildings that once stood where these stones lay, and really they were graves."

I held Meeker's head as the liquid in the pink syringe coursed into his veins. I was thankful I didn't have to pull a trigger. He fell after just seconds, and we sat with him until the gasps had ended. Jess lay a sheet over his head to keep the flies off.

I hated to see him lie there. A horse is a partner, a friend to be trusted and relied upon, not buried or forgotten. I hated leaving him, and debated taking just a lock of tail. For other horses, I've had someone else skin them out, or save their tail, and then tan it and turn it into something useful or decorative, something to remember the horse by. But it had always been someone else-- I'd never been faced with the task of handling a dead horse and been completely alone.

I brought the skinning knife out and tested its blade-- too sharp, I thought. If I get nervous I'll go right through a finger. Thankfully, I am not a squeamish woman. The first slice took the most courage; after that, it took me a simple half hour to flesh out his tail. It took me at least that long to get ahold of a neighbor with a backhoe and enough free time to come out and dig me a hole. What an awkward phone conversation.

The 14-foot-deep hole was bitten into rocks. I didn't have to think much for the two hours it took to be dug. I went home and silently cleaned his tail. Now that it was removed from a swollen, lifeless carcass, it became something of beauty again, something of the gentle ex-cowhorse it had been a part of. I rubbed a mixture of salt and ash into the skin, grateful for this thing to remember him by.

The men came home around 6:30. I'd been a strong women, stoic and quiet over the death of one of my horses, but I found myself concentrating unnecessarily hard on the simple process of unsaddling a pack horse: take the smooth leather strap, push it out of the keeper, brace it against his shoulder and pull it loose of the buckle... When Levi said, "Let's go unhook this trailer," I almost said no.

I shoved a rock under the trailer's rear-most tire, and looked up to see Meeker's fresh grave. Behind the trailer I put my face in my hands and cried. Levi came walking back, silent as a cat, and put his arms around me. "I should've stayed here with you," he said. "I should've realized you needed a hug earlier." I didn't tell him, but I was glad he hadn't, or I would've broken down into quiet sobs earlier, before the work was all done.

Today it snowed on Meeker's grave, covering the scab evident in the grass of the cattle pasture. It reminds me that all things heal, an dI am grateful for the gentle horse he was, and grateful he is resting under the shadow of the mountains.

Monday, September 21, 2009

In Constant Pursuit of Quarry

On Wednesday, Levi took me dove hunting. Yes, doves. This is definitely a moment in my life that I look at and think, man, if this was five years ago and you asked me to go dove hunting, I would tell you where you could stick it. But I decided not only to be a gung-ho girlfriend, but I also figured this man isn't going to say the right prayers and ask the doves to honor him and all that like I do, so it's probably going to be nicer for them if I'm along, rather than just getting killed. Dove hunting involves wearing camo, sitting under a tree watching birds fly around, or strolling leisurely around cornfields, then dropping to your knees like you're in a war zone every time a bird takes flight. It was generally more enjoyable than elk hunting can be, since you don't have to wait (or worse, hike) through multiple freezing-cold hours of the night or sit motionless and silent for way too long while your legs cramp up and you have to pee, and instead just enjoy a hot cup of tea from about 7 til 10 in the morning. (Don't get me wrong, I love elk hunting. I just get cold really easily.) While I was trying hard to be a good sport, I did have a difficult time when he would actually shoot a bird. Instead of being ready with a "good shot!" or something else a supportive girlfriend would say, every time a bird fell I would gasp in dismay, or blurt out, "oh no!" I would then apologize, but Levi didn't mind. He understands I'm not good with killing stuff. We brought home five little doves. I saved one's beautiful wings. At the end I asked him for his chewing tobacco, and he started laughing and said, "Did this stress you out that much that now you need a chew?" But I just wanted it so I could leave a little behind with some dried sage in honor of the birds.

We got home and took a long nap, which was really welcome. When we woke up, Levi said, c'mon! We're hiking to the big beaver pond and going elk hunting! I was like, "We have twenty horses. Can we please ride instead?" So we rode up the trail doot do do do doo, dressed in camo t-shirts, with Levi's big bow and his hunting pack. Levi's horse, Dollar, loves hunting, and camo, and all kinds of boy stuff, so he was excited too. I rode Arapaho, which is Levi's horse's half-brother. Arapaho doesn't really like hunting, he likes hard-boiled eggs and brightly colored windbreaker suits, but I thought since they were brothers and friends they could keep each other company. We got up near the beaver pond, and started hiking. Suddenly, I heard a bugle! It was a really pathetic bugle for an elk, but I was just sure that's what it was. Levi has terrible hearing-- he has very little hearing in his right ear since a snowmobile accident a few years ago-- so I said, did you hear that? It was a bugle! We glassed around with his binos, and spotted a very large 5 x 5 bull elk with two cows and a calf on the opposite side of the drainage. They were on the move, and looked to be dropping down to the creek below us! Levi only has a cow tag, so although we were impressed by the bull, we were looking at the cows instead. We had just climbed this huge slope on horseback, and now the elk were below us and looked to be descending! We ran past the horses, and ran down the mountain, probably about 3/4 of a mile, leaping rocks and skidding and jumping creeks. We got to a point just above the creek, and sat down to see what they were going to do. Well, the cows decided to head into the aspens to eat. We rested for an hour, keeping an eye on their movement. Finally, they started moving again--- up. We spent another hour watching them graze their way up the ridge and over off the horizon. We slowly hiked back to the horses. We still had about 20 minutes until "shooting light" ended, so we walked up to the small beaver pond. I'll be damned if there wasn't a lone cow elk, grazing along the fringes of the pond. She metered in at 72 yards, which is a LONG shot for Levi. He opted against it, and we watched her wander closer and closer. It was so exciting, waiting. She was just literally giving herself up-- she was grazing broadside to us, and kept looking over at us. Because she couldn't smell us, she didn't run away, but we didn't move, either. Darkness kept descending. Finally, she was only at 50 yards. Levi pulled and aimed, thought about it, and brought the arrow back down. She moved a step closer, and he pulled and aimed again, and let fly! She leapt into the air and jumped about four leaps away, then moved into a patch of scrub oak. By this time it was too dark to be able to see exactly what she was doing, and you had to watch her sort of out of the corner of your eye to see her movements. She appeared to be itching her side, like she was pulling at the arrow. She hadn't run off, which was a great sign-- an elk shot badly can run a LONG distance. She shuffled around in the scrub oak, and then came wandering slowly back to the edge of the pond. She moved with her head down, and stumbled a bit. She took her time. I was cold and getting colder. The stars were coming out. She wandered back into the scrub oak. I listened for her to fall, or to bed down. I was praying she would give us a sign, so we wouldn't get up too soon and spook her, meaning we'd have to chase a wounded elk up the mountain in the pitch black night. I told Levi I thought we should wait until ten thirty. It was nine. I was in a t-shirt and light cotton hiking pants. My clothes were all back on my horse, a 1/4 mile away. My legs were cramped. I couldn't see anything. There were scary noises in the dark, and I wondered if a bear or a mountain lion would smell the blood and come check it out. The coyotes started howling, and the stars were out clearly now. I was shivering all over, and my teeth were chattering. Levi sat behind me with his arms and legs around me, which helped a lot. Finally at nine thirty, he couldn't wait any longer. We tip-toed over to the edge of the pond, watching, using his headlamp to pick up sign. A footprint here-- a scrape here. Followed up into the scrub oak, but no sign. No blood, though, either. We walked back along the edge of the pond, moving slowly, placing each footstep carefully in case she was lying alive in the bushes. And then we saw it-- the arrow, lying in the rocks. No blood at all, and one edge of the broadhead dinged up from the rocks. We looked back to where we had been sitting. He shot high! At this point I was like woo hoo! Thank goodness-- no having to pack out this huge elk in the darkness, and be up for the remainder of the night (and most of next morning) butchering. let's get the hell out of here! But Levi had to satisfy himself that indeed, it was a clean miss. We wandered around looking for blood droplets for some time before we turned for home. It was such a relief to find the horses standing quietly, and to put on all the extra clothing I had brought along. There was no moon, and we were riding through forest, so it was truly black. At this point I was extremely grateful I had ridden Arapaho-- we had used him to gather the herd one night, well after sunset, when a fence had broken, and I knew he was trustworthy in the dark. Horses have good vision in the dark-- although not as good as a cat's, it's much better than ours. Nevertheless, it was even a little too dark for Arapaho! He put his nose to the trail and followed along, trying his best to avoid rocks, and me riding blind, holding a hand in front of my face to push away branches that scraped my skin. Twice, he lost the trail and wandered off along a cattle trail until the brush got too deep and we both realized the error. We just turned around, retraced our steps, and met the big trail once again. It took us about an hour and a half to get home, but we made it safely. What an exciting night!

When we got back to the barn, we put our horses away and I went to shut up the barn. My chickens roost on the saddles, but only one was there! Now, we're down to three, since one was murdered by raccoons the other night. But the other two were nowhere to be found. We walked around looking for them, but couldn't turn up a feather. I checked the mangers (where they like to lay their eggs) and the grain bins, and heard a rustling inside one. Thinking a chicken had flown up to steal some grain, I looked in, and who do you think was in there? One of those loathsome raccoons, trapped! Obviously, we'd just come in from hunting, so Levi handily stepped up onto a riser, and neatly dispatched the villainous little killer with an arrow through the brain. I found my missing two chickens in the morning, thankfully alive.

Thursday, May 7, 2009

life is about always learning...

1 . Money isn't made out of paper, it's
made out of cotton.
2. The Declaration of Independence was written
on hemp (marijuana) paper.
3. The dot over the letter 'i' is called
a 'tittle'.
4. A raisin dropped in a glass of fresh
champagne will bounce up and down continuously from the
bottom of the glass to the top.
5. 40% of McDonald's profits come from the
sales of Happy Meals.
6. 315 entries in Webster's 1996 Dictionary
were misspelled.
7. The 'spot' on 7UP comes from its
inventor, who had red eyes. He was albino.
8. On average, 12 newborns will be given to the
wrong parents, daily.
9. Chocolate affects a dog's heart and
nervous system; a few ounces will kill a small sized dog.
10. Orcas (killer whales) kill sharks by
torpedoing up into the shark's stomach from underneath,
causing the shark to explode.
11. Most lipstick contains fish scales.
12. Donald Duck comics were banned from Finland
because he doesn't wear pants.
13. Ketchup was sold in the 1830's as
medicine.
14. Upper and lower case letters are named
'upper' and 'lower' because in the time
when all original print had to be set in individual
letters, the upper case' letters were stored in the case
on top of the case that stored the smaller, 'lower
case' letters.
15. Leonardo DaVinci could write with one hand
and draw with the other at the same time hence,
multi-tasking was invented.
16. Because metal was scarce, the Oscars given
out during World War II were made of wood.
17. There are no clocks in Las Vegas
gambling casinos.
18. The name Wendy was made up for the book
Peter Pan; there was never a recorded Wendy before!
19. There are no words in the dictionary that
rhyme with: orange, purple, and silver!
20. Leonardo DaVinci invented scissors. Also,
it took him 10 years to paint Mona Lisa's lips.
21. A tiny amount of liquor on a scorpion will
make it instantly go mad and sting itself to death. (Like some people I know)
22. The mask used by Michael Myers in the original 'Halloween' was a Captain Kirk's mask painted white.
23. If you have three quarters, four dimes, and
four pennies , you have $1.19 You also have the largest
amount of money in coins without being able to make change
for a dollar.
24. By raising your legs slowly and lying on
your back, you can't sink in quicksand (and you thought
this list was completely useless.)
25. The phrase 'rule of thumb' is
derived from an old English law, which stated that you
couldn't beat your wife with anything wider than your
thumb.
26. The first product Motorola started to
develop was a record player for automobiles. At that time,
the most known player on the market was the Victrola, so
they called themselves Motorola.
27. Celery has negative calories! It takes
more calories to eat a piece of celery than the celery has
in it to begin with. It's the same with apples!
28. Chewing gum while peeling onions will keep
you from crying!
29. The glue on Israeli postage stamps is
certified kosher..
30. Guinness Book of Records holds the record
for being the book most often stolen from Public Libraries.
31. Astronauts are not allowed to eat beans
before they go into space because passing w! ind in a space
suit damages it.

Thursday, April 30, 2009

from a story by the greatest writer I know

She still won’t shut the fuck up, only I don’t want her to anymore. If she stops talking I’m all alone. If she stops talking I have to start listening to myself and I hate everything I have to say. And maybe I’m in love with her. Only I hate the way she says her name or the fact that she’s wearing sandals in the middle of winter. Maybe I’m in love with her even though I kind of hate her. Maybe I just love her for tonight. And maybe I just hate her for eternity.

(-Dieter)

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Rural Towns



"I should hate to spend the only life I was going to have here in being annoyed with the time I happened to live in."
-Robert Frost

Don't mess with ladies on facebook

http://www.mediabistro.com/agencyspy/what_the/addie_uses_facebook_to_bust_drunken_thief_113473.asp

I like girls with ovaries.

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Monkey Militia

A chimp that deliberately fashions discs of concrete to later hurl at zoo visitors is being hailed as definitive proof that the apes plan for future events.

Although similar claims have previously been made about chimps using tools to collect food, what sets Santino – a 30-year-old chimp from Furuvik zoo in Sweden – apart, is that his behavior, and therefore his apparent state of mind, when collecting the ammunition seems markedly different from when he launches his attacks.

“The chimp has without exception been calm during gathering or manufacture of the ammunition, in contrast to the typically aroused state [when he throws the rocks],” says Mathias Osvath of the University of Lund, also in Sweden.

Unlike previous claims of pre-planning in apes, Santino’s planning doesn’t seem to be driven by a current emotional or physical drive like hunger or anger, but in anticipation of an event later in the day.

“Nothing like it has as yet been reported from the wild, nor from any captive chimpanzees,” says Thomas Suddendorf of the University of Queensland in Australia. “Controlled experiments are now required to determine the nature of the cognitive processes involved.”

Ape arsenal

Josep Call of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, agrees. “It is the first report on tool making - that is, the concrete disks – to achieve a future goal,” he says. “Future planning may turn out to be more widespread than initially thought.”

Santino originally started collecting and throwing rocks shortly after becoming the dominant male in his group at the age of 16. He typically collects rocks from the bottom of the moat that surrounds his enclosure before the zoo opens, and stores them in piles on the side of the island that faces the zoo’s visitors. He also hacks pieces of concrete from the artificial rocks at the centre of his enclosure and adds them to the piles.

However, Santino’s rock throwing is confined the summer period, when the zoo is open to visitors, and the desire to throw his discs seems to wear off after about six weeks. The chimp is also more inclined to hurl his missiles in the morning, rather than in the afternoon.

‘Mental simulations’

“These observations convincingly show that our fellow apes do consider the future in a very complex way,” says Osvath. “It implies they have a highly developed consciousness, including life-like mental simulations of days to come. I would guess that they plan much of their everyday behavior.”

However, Nicholas Newton-Fisher of the University of Kent in Canterbury, UK, cautions that with observations of a single individual it is difficult to generalise.

“A skeptical reader might question whether there is a causal link between the caching and the throwing. The location of the caches may simply be a function of retrieving them from the water.” He adds that Japanese macaques are also known to cache stones – although they don’t generally throw them at passers-by.

Osvath says that zoo caretakers try to stop Santino’s attacks. “Sometimes they will keep him in during the morning, and only let him out once the visitors have arrived. It’s very hard to stop him because he can always find new stones, and if he can’t find them he manufactures them. It’s an ongoing cold war.” He adds that since chimps don’t have a good aim, and throw underarm, there haven’t been any serious injuries.

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Salt of the Earth

I am pretty far out [of town], but Progress will catch up someday. When I am bumbling around in a wheelchair, a sharp real estate salesman will drive up and offer to buy and sell my outfit. Not for cash, of course. Who would want to give an old woman cash? How about trading for peace and comfort in some nice clean house in town with a porch and rocking chair?

"Young lady," he'll say (that's what you get called when it no longer applies), "you can't make it here any longer. Your fences are down. Your corrals are falling to staves. Your pipeline has rusted away. Your trees are dying for lack of care. Your house is too much for you. You cannot cope with a place so large. I'd like to see you resting easy. You could have a little house in town and be comfortable. No hard work to do. No insoluble worries. Let me have your little ranch for my client, and you..."

"Just a minute," I'll interrupt. "This nice quiet home you want me to trade for-- is it located where I can hear a cow bawl?"

"Oh no. It's near the doctors and the hospital and..."

That's the moment I'll lower my ear trumpet and sic the dogs on him.

-Eulalia Bourne, rancher. From "Women in Levis"

Thursday, February 19, 2009

on the "angry list" again...

"Late winter in the midwest has a way of sitting on you like a pile of grandparents."
-Doris #12

Monday, February 16, 2009

Police: Powder that led to evacuation was pudding

EAGLE, Colo. (AP) — Authorities say the mysterious white powder that prompted evacuations at the Eagle County sheriff's office last month has been identified as instant pudding. The powder, a parking ticket and a $35 money order were in an envelope that was mailed to the sheriff's office Jan. 13.

The incident prompted an evacuation, and two employees who came into contact with the substance were quarantined until a hazmat team determined the material wasn't toxic.

A report by the Eagle Police Department says infrared sensor equipment was used to identify the substance as Jello-brand instant vanilla pudding.

Police say the Colorado Springs man whose name was on the ticket has been on vacation and officers were only recently able to interview him. They say he had no explanation for the incident, other than to say he is "not a clean person" and that he probably picked up the powder while paying bills on his messy kitchen table.

The agencies involved have concluded there is no reason to continue the investigation.



http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gNY0ImSDI7RyZHLiXRYBU2SrkO7gD96AU0M01

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

how many miles

In my tremulous fear of what was next I couldn't help but note the details, like a crime scene before the crime. The table was brown, the sort of pattern meant to mask crumbs and grease marks and spilled malt. My sunglasses lay next to my left hand; I kept touching them obsessively, afraid I would forget them, that I would have to face the long walk back to my truck, tears streaming down my face, without the not-quite-bulletproof glass to shield me. Below us, a hundred people milled, waiting for a hundred more to step out of the gates, faces shining, recognition beaming, excitement palpable and smelling like vanilla and fried chinese. A hundred hugs below us, right now. A hundred welcomes, hand-lettered signs, suitcases taken from hands like it was a privilege to bear them for the returned, the prodigal sons. Voices raised in tones of delight, unheard sighs drifting up to the skylights as lovers reuinited.

I didn't want to look at his face, because he was already gone. A year is a long time, and with him, there was always the chance it could turn into forever. I wondered if the brown pattern on the table would hide the bloody viscera dripping off my heart as it lay there between us.

A hundred, hundred hellos. Just one goodbye.

Monday, February 9, 2009

Zombies.


http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_3188631.html

Neighborhood Watch

There's a lady and a dog-- they look a little stressed. Maybe hassled. She is not bundled against the cold as well as she should be. Her dog does not stop-- he hurries to keep up with her.

Parked in front of me, a woman searches through her car, leaving no cushion unturned. She wears a yellow coat over a purple outfit. Does she want attention? What is she missing? An earring? Money? Or is her frantic search a metaphor for something else?

Mom in her new white station wagon yawns. Do you think the kids kept her up last night? Is she sick of it all? Is she picking them up now? Is she running away? Her hair is a mess.

The frantic searcher decides she can spare no further moment searching, or finds what she's looking for. Either way, she doesn't look terribly happy. She runs away, her bag bouncing and purple heels clicking. I can understand that. We've all got a long way to run.

A man in a truck talks on a cell phone, stone-faced. His truck says Midwest Garage Door Repair. He slams on the brakes as both he and a semi try to turn into the same driveway. I wonder if he swears. I wonder if he's thinking his whole day has been like this.

The lady and the dog are back. Her cheeks are red, and she still yanks him along. No potty breaks, they're on a mission. Time takes precedence over nature.

Another man on a cell phone gestures wildly at the red light. He forgets to signal. Maybe he's talking to the garage door repairman. Maybe he doesn't know how to get to his final destination.

A cop waits patiently at the intersection. He pretends to ignore me, as all cops do. He speeds away with a trademarked impassive face they teach in police school. He knows he has less purpose in life than I.

Two girls in a new car chatter. One searches her purse while the other flips radio stations. One has unnaturally blonde streaks in her dark hair. She probably thinks it looks pretty. They look like every other teenage girl I've ever seen.

There is a mailman across the street. He is intent on his purpose. He is short. There's a box in his bag. Maybe it contains jell-o molds, or a bomb. Maybe there's lingerie beneath the 'discreet brown packaging' the company promised. Maybe it's the contents of a dead grandmother's purse. He doesn't seem to care. He's forgotten it's there, intent on fitting the newspaper through the hole in the door. I wonder if, while on vacation, he habitually checks doors for the size of their mail slots.

A man in a white Pontiac drives by too quickly for me to tell whether he's laughing or crying. Does it matter? The two are so closely related. Both cause a reaction in people around. Is that why he does it in his car? To escape a reaction?

An old man with a handicapped sticker in his window watches a windborne leaf dance through the intersection. Both are slow and solemn. I wonder if he is sad in his old age. I wonder what he cares about now.

A man puts his arm across the seat back next to him, as though expecting someone to be there. As he turns the corner, he glances at the seat and withdraws his arm.

A truck driver from the Beverage Services Corp. turns on his four-ways, as though that makes up for the fact that his truck is blocking traffic. He drinks his soda as though it gives him the courage to face life, and gets out.

An old woman with heavily teased hair in a brand-new turquoise truck narrowly averts a collision with a tiny silver car carrying a big dog. Had the semi been a foot to the right, there would've been a crash. A foot to the left would've saved both drivers some heartbeats.

There's a guy with a pink van. I wonder why he chose pink? Or is it a company truck? All he can afford? Has he the extraordinary ability to look past physical appearances?

The mailman is on my side of the street. He passes me. He smiles too late, but it's okay since he was probably thinking about mail slots. He hasn't got a box anymore.

A pretty, disheveled blonde talks to her two dogs in the back. She is smiling and laughing, and they are too. She sees me, laughs at herself, and smiles at me. She is the first happy person I've seen.

Behind her, two young men in a little car stuff whole powdered doughnuts in their mouths, and talk about the mound of stuff in the back. I wonder if their whole college life is like that-- stuffing whole powdered doughnuts in their mouths. Will they, at 37, 42, 55, be sitting behind a desk, or in the break room of a factory, stuffing whole powdered doughnuts in their mouths?

Or perhaps I judge wrongly. Perhaps the doughnut stuffing will discreetly occur in the halls of the Supreme Court or the neurosurgery ward. Maybe they'll end up on tv endorsing powdered doughnuts and demonstrating how to stuff them whole into one's mouth.

A loud, rusted-out Ford stops at the light. Mom and son don't look like they fit in around here. She has a cigarette barely clinging to her lower lip, and he desperately needs to wash his hair, by society's standards. I wonder what brings them to the city.

A Japanese trio in a Japanese car pull up closely behind, hugging the right curb. Mama gestures excitedly, her mouth moving like those wind-up chattering teeth. She wants papa to pull up next to the Ford. He manuevers the whell and chatters back, sure he cannot fit. Her spasmodic motions cause him to reconsider, and he squeezes in next to the truck. Boy sits in the back, around 14. His hair is perfect. I wonder if he blinks.

The man from the Beverage Services Corp. gets back in his truck and grabs for his seemingly life-sustaining pop. I wonder if, as he pulls out at an oncoming car, it is bad driver juice. Maybe, like pop rocks, he is explosive when mixed with soda.

I am hungry, so I pull out a sandwich. A man with dyed-blonde tips to his hair looks at my meal, then at his watch. Not time yet, he must be thinking. Too bad his tummy can't keep time.

A woman passes, carrying a violin. She does not hold it fondly. I wonder if she loves what she does. I look at three frowns framed in three driver's door windows, and wonder if anyone does.

Sunday, February 8, 2009


"'But man is not made for defeat,' he said. 'A man can be destroyed but not defeated.'"
-Old Man and the Sea

Lack of compass points


"I am glad that I shall never be young without wild country to be young in. Of what avail are forty freedoms without a blank spot on the map?"
-Aldo Leopold

Saturday, January 31, 2009

One of those dreams...

It was like we were hostages in a video game, only the game was so hard we never got released. I was walking down the street in a bad part of town. Suddenly I'd been kidnapped or something and was in a warehouse with the rest of my high school senior class, except, seemingly, my friends.
Somehow our captors brainwashed everyone, so it was like a cult. There were festivals and celebrations in our warehouse, and daily scheduled activities.
The brainwashing didn't work on me. I was miserable, and missed my family so much. I didn't participate in any of their stupid activities, I swore at the guards, I peed on the flood, and I screamed punk rock songs at the top of my lungs. Whenever my captors (who I'm fairly sure were from an 80s metal band) tried to make me participate, I'd fight and spit and bite. They were always stronger than I. I even tried beating other members of the cult, hoping to get kicked out or wake someone up, but they just smiled and dragged me along where ever they were going. I was so scared of their blank stares.
A kid I knew hung himself. They left the noose hanging there, as if to tempt me, but I didn't want to kill myself. I wanted to see my family too badly.
There were two tall windows in our warehouse, and I would sit at them and watch the outside world. They faced the open door of the warehouse opposite to ours. One of our 80s metal dude captors was always standing there trying to lure passers-by in. I got the impression it was where the video game began, where our would-be rescuers entered, never knowing the hostages were right behind them.
I was so miserable. After I woke up, I was still miserable. It threw my whole day off.