literary blog

Big Haus

/ Gin Getz / 17 Comments

(a rare photo of the three of us, thanks to Tomek, in honor of our anniversary, today…)

 

We sit before the campfire, just my honey and me, the big cabin behind us empty but for three old cats.  The house looms large.  Unused.  Wasted.  Too big.

I’m calling it Big Haus, for big is how it feels.  Approximately 2,200 square feet.  The Census Bureau reported the average size of a U.S. house in 2011 to be 2,480 square feet, a slight increase from the 2,392 square feet in 2010.  Looks like we’re pretty close to average.  Funny. I’ve never considered myself much a part of the norm.  This fact somewhat frightens me.  So much for being different, breaking barriers, stepping outside the box.

2,480 square feet, and still I hear a heck of lot of complaints.  The same old stuff.  Things like the price of gas being too high.  A fact for which I hold little sympathy. Seems to me you don’t HAVE to drive around alone in that big fancy truck or SUV.  Your God Given Right, you tell me.  Whatever…  What on earth matters most?  Cheap gas?  Get a life.

Bigger is better, or so I hear.  I’m not biggie size person.  I like small, simple, old-fashioned and conservative of natural materials.  What a concept.

Just last week there were two other people with whom we shared the house and the size seemed just right. But today, the upstairs is looming, the downstairs seems hollow, and the space in between is too much.

I think about heating it this winter, trying to keep it clean, wasted firewood and a full morning twice a week to keep the dog and cat hair in check.  I should have better things to do.

Is this the empty nest syndrome, grumbling about too much space to heat and clean and collect clutter?  I thought “empty nest” referred more to the sadness one feels when the children fly the coop.  This year I feel no sadness or loss, only excitement for the positive current and future life of my son. Dang, I’m happy for him, proud of him.  And sure, I won’t deny, a bit of excitement already for Christmas break when he’ll be back home.

Lessons I send a young man off with this year.  Same as last year.  Same stuff every year.  This is what matters to me.

1.  Live life fully.  Live each day with passion and purpose.

2. Be involved.  Take a stand. Stand up for what you believe in, who you believe in.

3. Be yourself.

How dull a life if lived without passion. How shallow a world if we stand for nothing.  How boring a person if not unique.

What else is there?  Half Life.  Living life without meaning, integrity, point and purpose. Direction and belief.

To live without a backbone along the backbone of our continent.  Spineless, drifting slowly to grave.

We are surrounded at times with a leisure class that cares more about cocktails than kids, more about gossip and rumors than building, growing, giving, sharing.   And heaven forbid, caring.

Like jellyfish, turning to mush in my hands as I squeeze my fingers to a fist.

The more they hold back, the more I want to push forward.  Suppression in the air stirs a strong desire to bust free.

Ah, yes. So there we are, out by the fire, our backs to the house that seems so big, so empty, so underutilized and perhaps even unnecessary.  And we start planning.  For the next house, you know.  Of course.  The one by the river.  Because although we’ve got the Little Cabin there for now, there will be THE house, our house.  Not a big house, not too little.  Just right.

Because life is not about yesterday.  Holding onto the past won’t build your dreams.  Take a chance.  Make a change.  Step out and stand up.  Participate in life.  Build it better.

And in the meanwhile, I’m here.  Big Haus.  Stocking up a lot of wood for winter.

The brass ring

/ Gin Getz / 6 Comments

Spent the better part of today dealing with mice and maggots.  Tomorrow I’m off to the ditch for the week.  Right now I have this to share.

We hear what we want to hear; read what we want to read.

Read between lines.  Really listen.  There’s more to it than you think.  It’s deeper.  Not as shallow.  Not if you take off your blinders and are willing to take in the truth.

Listen to the rain on the roof and dive into the place where you are.  In you car commuting to work.  In your trailer on a week’s adventure.  Home.  Same rain, same sound on all these different metal roofs.  Listen; really listen.  Such a sweet sound, no matter where you’re coming from.  The point is, be where you are.  And if you want to be somewhere else, change it. Do something about it.  Dream, and go for it.  Dreams are for creating reality, not hell.  Figure it out.  If it matters that much to you, risk it.

But don’t whine.  That will bring you nowhere but farther from the dream.

I wrote a reader a letter a few days ago.  A response to her upset, trying to cheer her up.  She took from it what she expected to read, deleted it, and asked me to resend.  Why on earth would I do that when she didn’t really read it the first time?

Don’t ask a question if you don’t want to hear the truth of response.  How many of us are guilty as charged?  My hand has been raised from time to time.

So here’s what it comes down to.

Dreams.

And the excuse of money in place of balls.

Pardon me for being so blunt, but the truth can hurt, and I’m tired of being hurt because you don’t want to hear my truth.  Don’t want to hear it?  Then don’t ask.  Delete my messages and don’t ask me to resend.  Otherwise, here I am, letting it all hang out, with nothing to hide.

Here is my truth.

Money has nothing to with it.  In fact, wake up and smell the coffee (yes, the cheap kind, as even Folgers is a splurge for me).

Those who know me know how important money is to me, what a driving force it is for me, and how much I have had.  And the answer to all is NONE.  Yet I still hear quite regularly, “Gosh, you’re so lucky and live the life I wish I could.”

So I ask you this:  Why don’t you?  You’re the one with a college degree, a stable job, car or truck, health insurance for you and your kids, some sense of financial security and/or at least a plan on paying your way through the next nine months.  Good for you.  I don’t have any of those things.  But that does not stop me.

Those who know me know.  Money has not enabled me to do what I do, be where I am, live the life I have chosen.  Quite the contrary.  It’s my lack of money and my refusal to allow money to hold any level of importance.  Yes, I’m the most impractical person I know when it comes to money.  I have no stability and security.  The bottom line is this:  I have none, never have, and it’s never stopped me from doing/being what I want.

Check out my story.  A condensed version.

So there I was, in New York City, where I wandered around holding down odd jobs from receptionist to bartender sleeping in an odd assortment of slum apartments until I found a way to get a full scholarship to art school in New Mexico.  A crazy move which had nothing to do with luck or talent but far more to do with hard work as I woke up at 3 or 4 am to put together a portfolio of work all winter long before my 9-5 job, and doing a drive-away driving someone else’s sports car from Jersey to San Jose only weeks after getting my driver’s license because I couldn’t figure out any other affordable way to drive cross country.

Worked my way through school earning minimum wage doing simple wood work while living in the parking lot of college in a 25 year old Dodge Dart and later upgraded to an equally old Volkswagen microbus.  I dropped out of college to be a self supporting single mom.  Moved around a dozen times and took more odd jobs to feed and house (including a couple ones self built and without plumbing or power) my self and son.

Finally found (and this part could be called luck) an awesome position being the caretaker of a remote kids camp in some beautiful mountains with horses, cows, chickens and pigs.  I could call it all mine, treated it as such, but none of it was.  Didn’t matter to me.  Stayed there six years, during which time I started to hear that I was one lucky lady and living the life.  I felt I was. I owned nothing but the clothes on my back, not even a vehicle for several years, but gave them my all and got to live in “paradise.” When said paradise turned a bit south, I took a crazy risk and moved to Colorado with only enough money to pay for the trip, a kid, dogs, cats and bunch of baggage stuffed into a room between two creepy guys I was supposed to work for.  I quit, willing to be homeless and hungry instead if need be, but met this guy named Bob who needed a wrangler for the summer.  This part I guess is luck too.  Meeting the “right” person is not easy.  It took me until I was 36; Bob was 45.  It was worth the wait.

The rest is history.  Prince Charming and Cinderella?  Hardly.  Above and beyond dealing with cleaning up after tourists and burying foals and trying to keep hands and house warm through six months of sub zero temps, we’ve had to deal with the most horrible and horrendous family crap you can imagine and legal battles just to keep our home and business, all of which got us hundreds of thousands of dollars deep in debt.

That’s where we are now, only we quit our job which wasn’t paying the interest anyway and we’re figuring out the next dream to start building on.

I’m not complaining.  It’s important you know that.  In fact, I’m pretty darned proud of all this.

What I want to do in telling this story is prove a point.  Figure it out.  It’s never been about money.  Not stopping me.  Not enabling me.  I’m motivated by my dreams and willing to take some crazy risks.

Stop playing it safe. That’s definitely something I have not done.  For better or for worse, I don’t know, but I’m not the one clinging to safety and security and wishing I was somewhere else.  I’m trying it, living it.  Broke, every day deeper in debt in seems, but giving it a shot and enjoy the adventure along the way.

Stop using your lack of money as an excuse.  I bet you have more than me.  I bet you always have.  But you’re there and I’m here.  So, what’s your real excuse?

There is no brass ring waiting for you to grab and get the dream come true.  You gotta get out there, mine the metal, weld the ring, and hang in front of yourself like a carrot before the horse’s nose.  You gotta walk away from the safe and simple and fall on your face time and time and time again.

Remember the advice my vet gave me after I lost another foal?  “Only those who have, lose.”  Be willing to lose.  You’ll never really gain if not willing to let go.  Leap!  And the net appears.  Only some times it doesn’t.  So dust yourself off, and get back to the drawing board.  Only make sure the picture you’re drawing is really, really magnificent.

Yes, I remind myself this too as I sit before the drawing board once again, skinned knees and all.

Listen to the wilds cry

/ Gin Getz / 9 Comments

Listen to the wilds cry

Confessions heard in dying trees

An intimate look at a big forest ravaged by tiny beetles

If anyone had told me ten years ago that the hills as far as I can see and beyond would be filled with such death, that I’d be surrounded by miles and miles of mountain hillsides draped with dying trees, up to the top of tree line on both sides of the Divide… I would never have believed.

I believe now.  For this is what I see.

Green turned red, brown and grey.

We try to be optimistic.  See the few green trees remaining.  Some smaller Spruce, and of course, the Aspen.  Glimmers of hope.

It’s not enough.  Look at the rest.  It’s dead. Dead, damn it, dead!  We are living surrounded by death.

I try to find the beauty in it all, and if the light is just right, it’s there, you can see the softness in the setting sun on the dying needles.  A more open view when you’re in the woods.  But really, that’s it.  It’s dead, death, and lots of it. It gets to you some times.

Genocide of the mountain and we sit back and say there is nothing we can do.  Rape of the land I love.

It’s not that bad, you say.  There’s still so much beauty, so much goodness, so much life.  Oh, I know.  I see it every day.  I do my best to appreciate.  Wildflowers, grasses seeding out, steel grey clouds, trout surfacing the river, captivating colors in the rocks, a rainbow, a sunset, the flash of the blue bird on the old cedar post.  But there is also so much death.  And dark clouds do get gloomy, intriguing as they may at first appear.

Cheer up, you say, it’s still so beautiful and always will be.  Oh, I promise you, I know and I see, very clear and very deep.  For I am here, remaining when your fairy tell ends.  This is our home, our reality.  So how can I turn a blind eye to this devastation?

I saw a stand of smaller trees, two, three, four inches in diameter, standing dead with tell tale signs of beetle kill.  Dripping sap turned hard, pin holds and chipping bark, needles falling off like rain, teardrops of the wilds as I ride by horseback and brush too close to death.  I tip my rim forward and let the needles fall onto my horse’s mane and neck.  He is used to this.

This was not supposed to happen.  None of this was.  I remember the first such ravaged land I saw, devastated by the beetles, back fifteen years ago or so in Carson, New Mexico.  Didn’t know what it was back then, as we watched the four and five hundred year old pinon trees that were here when the Spanish settled, wither away in one season.

I’ve heard all the “expert” opinions, and know it’s just a guessing game.  It will only get the pinon, or perhaps the ponderosa, scotch, limber, lodge pole, fir, bristlecone, spruce…  It will only kill up to eight thousand, then nine thousand, ten thousand feet…

Last year they even told us once it’s dead it might not burn as bad.  Colorado learned the hard way this year.  I don’t want to call it all “lies.”  The intentions of the so-called know-it-alls might be good.

Face it.  No one knows.  I’m tired of hearing predictions that don’t pan out and ideas to fix the forest or save one single tree that just won’t work when the entire view – yes, miles and miles and miles, how many millions of trees – die before me.

Death.  That’s the problem.  It’s not that it is ugly per se, though most of us who live in it still have a heck of time finding true beauty in the rolling red hillsides or one individual, unique dead standing tree, just one more in a forest of so many.  The problem is that the hills and mountains that once sang with life and promise now stand silent, stripped and exposed like a bleeding heart.  Our trees have been raped and killed.  And not just one or two or a hundred or so.  But mile after mile, mountain after mountain, millions and millions and millions of trees.

Dead.  Don’t tell me it’s a natural cycle and it’s all going to be OK.  I’ve heard enough of that.  You’ve proven you have no idea what you’re talking about, what is happening. But it’s happening.  It’s happened. These trees are dead.  These mountains are dying.  It’s death and it’s ugly and it’s real. So stop sugar coating the view before me because I take off the green tinted glasses and I see red and brown and grey.

I’m tired of lies.  Of guesses.  Of ignorance for which I am guilty too.  I’m tired of listening for what I want to hear, taking solace in the latest glimmers of hope like blind faith, as the plague continues to spread and we place our bets on how far it will go next year.

My child’s children will never see these mountains as tall and green and lush and majestic as I once did.  But no longer do.  Now I see red.  I am red with anger.  The mountain may silently weep.  But I can rage loud as the color red.

 

(…to be continued)

 

OK, friends, readers and passer-bys, on that happy note… I’m off again this week for another round of ditch camp.  See you at the end of the week.

Monsoon season

/ Gin Getz / 7 Comments

The thermometer on the porch reads thirty five when I wake up.  Grass out on pasture is laced with frost.  Yellow leaves of cinquefoil stick to my damp boots like polka dots. All morning it looks as if my squash plants are going to give up and give in to that sickly, mushy green of a frozen plant, but they do not.  They survive.  Not to say they will ever produce.  Just staying alive here is asking a lot for a crook neck squash plant. My little Arabian shows the first sign of fuzz from his winter coat, though the ranch raised ones shrug off the rain that drips down their manes and muzzles.

The monsoon season has settled in.  The hot and dry of May and June are but a misty memory. And when this pattern passes, the first chill of fall will find us as always unprepared, wondering how it came so soon, and where did the summer go.

It’s an arduous land, make no doubt.  Even now, in the easy season of summer, when tourists come and go, smile and laugh and play and leave their world and worries behind as if this were some wild park at Disneyland.  They will all be gone by winter.  Ok by me, as I’ll remain, but I’ve never been much for the social scene.

So here we are in mid July and the weather site on the internet we check each day has rain clouds for as far as one can see in the forecast.  This is how it should be, I am reminded, but I still remember summers in other places, hot and dry, where we swam naked in the river or sea, sand between my toes (yes, bare feet!), sat out in shirt sleeves and shorts at night under the stars, and took a siesta mid day.  Our spring this year was as close as it gets, with the never ending blue bird blue sky that made one long for a bad ass cloud to break up that blue and whirling dervish dancing of rain and hail on the metal roof.  Now we have that.  Every day.  Now we’ve got the monsoons, and it’s hard to complain because it’s greening up the pasture (sorry, it can’t do much for the red hillsides killed by those nasty little black beetles).

And I try to enjoy every wet, damp chilly storm and rainbow spreading across pasture knowing the fast and furious spell of summer will slowly sink into the comforting cradle of winter…

Lost.  

Amidst the changing landscape of green hills turning red and brown.

Give up, give in, fall deep into the darkness.

I try to stay afloat.  So hard in the rushing currents.  Waiting for my island to capture me, hold me up, pin me down long enough for roots to grow, flowers to bloom, seeds to take shape for next year’s dreams.

Wanting the yellow brick road to appear before me.  Instead there is a discernible path of last year’s aspen leaves still untrodden and I need to find my own way.

But this morning there is hope, relief, as I watch the footprints of my polka dot boots trailing behind in the frosty grass.

Last night’s rain lingers in low heavy clouds not yet broken and gone, and promising to renew again by mid afternoon.

For now there is cold wet ground before the morning sun.

Silver droplets on the railing

Each with a little world within them

Enter and lose yourself inside and away

Beads of rain clinging to the bottom of the rusted steel railings like welding lag or a row of sparkling diamonds dripping from a rough cut mine.

And inside each one are upside down images of brown and green hills over layered grey skies

Deep stratum of clouds, draped like velvet and barely moving

A lacy veil slung low along her hips in her slow dance of summer

Languid in the early hours

Like thickening water waiting to freeze

And by afternoon rain on the roof will drown out the sound of the growing parade of ATVs

Where for now the wilds are swept away in the murky waters of the monsoons

But I remain here

Hungry for more of whatever she hides

Starving for the wilds

 

Down for the day

/ Gin Getz / 8 Comments

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Otherwise known as Discontentment in Paradise

How can I be anything other than peachy when so many say I’m lucky just to be here (but can’t see all I did to get here)?  As if a pretty face would be enough.  Or in this case, a pretty view.  For better or worse, I’m not that shallow.  And surely, my friend, you’re deeper than that too.  Aren’t you?

Give me a minute.  I’ll try to get my thoughts together, at least in some semblance of order. 

Or just let them spill out randomly.  That will do, too.

Hang in there with me on this one.  I think you might relate.

I’ll start with the “down for the day” part. 

Here it is, a new week, and I’m trying for a new perspective, but not achieving the positive outlook I was hoping for.

Was wondering why I was so down yesterday, and still not quite sure as nothing is wrong, per se, especially when you compare my current state of affairs with the hard times, heart aches and traumas so many others are going through, or troubled times I’ve gone through myself. So what right do I have to whine?

Probably none.  But I’m going to do it anyway.  We all need some time to vent, don’t we?

As my honey reassures me, “You can’t be up all the time.  Not if you’re really living, feeling, observing, soaking in and an active part of the world around you.  Some things will bum you out.  Some days will be worse than others.  Some days you just wanna kick the cat…”  OK, so that last part actually came from a book by Zig Ziglar.  And no, anyone who knows me knows I won’t really kick a cat.  My three kitties can attest to that!

Anyway, sometimes I just don’t think the thing to do is fake it, pretend it is all ok, sunshine and bunnies, hunky dory and picture perfect.  Sometimes we need to get real, get mad, allow ourselves a day of being down in the dirt. 

And this pile of dirt I’m talking about now?  Well, I just realized I am exactly where I was, only with less. And I don’t mean a positive downsizing.  I mean, less to do, less work, less money (though larger debt), less identity, less going on, less direction, less sense of point and purpose, less sense of self and sense of giving and belonging.  Not a good place to be.  I’m not outfitting, not running the guest ranch business full time, not “really” mothering as my kid is grown up, not writing well as the manuscript has not sold yet so it’s hard to keep convincing myself it is all worthwhile.  I’m not really homesteading or even feeling at home as the home I’m living in is for sale, and we’re waiting to build anew. 

Yes, I know.  Look around and you’ll see some wonderful stuff.  Starting with and topping the list of course are Bob and Forrest.  I could go on with a hefty list, no doubt, but that’s not the point. I worked mighty hard and took more risks than most to make what I have possible, and still… I want more. 

Look around me and you might see many things that so many shallowly search for but aren’t willing to walk away from safe and secure to make happen.  As if they were handed to me.  Easy to think it was so simple if you don’t know where I came from.  We all have a story.  Came from somewhere.  And hopefully are going somewhere, too.  Where are you headed?  As long as it’s not the same place you were yesterday, for that place and space no longer exist. 

A friend puts it all into words I wish were mine:   “…Restlessness or discontent is part of the syndrome of our beings. I look for people who have achieved their “perfect” life..and wonder if they have compromised.  If they even know they have. Have they settled for less ?”

The human state of longing.  Is anyone ever fully satisfied, or is it human nature to want more?

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The other side

/ Gin Getz / 2 Comments

“You were made to contribute,” I read and these words felt strong and true.  But what do I have to give?

Isn’t there’s more to my calling in life than providing a vacation for tourists?  Building my world so others can enjoy it for a brief stay away from their own reality.

“Instead of wondering when your next vacation is, maybe you should set up a life you don’t need to escape from.”  Seth Godin.

I believe this and have tried to live my life this way, yet I’ve been providing that escape for others.  And doing so is what has enabled me to live the life others dream of, but don’t dare to walk away from safe and sound and secure to create.

Have I no further talents, gifts, abilities, that can help in some way?

Seriously, life is hard sometimes.  Why can’t the answers just present themselves?

 

I’ve been told they are out there.  Be still, silent, and listen.  I don’t hear them yet.

I try to find a quiet time alone with her.  Hear her wisdom.  In wind and water and hard earth beneath my feet.  Above the river, across the river.

Here, our Rio Grande, her stories are not old, but fresh and new, like fairytales heard as a child.  Here, only miles from where she emerges from snowbank and spring to tint, trickle and trail the mountains and wind her way through my land, my world, my dreams.  Here, she is new water, strong and pure, not yet softened and slowed, diverted, polluted.

Step in, she calls me.

And I do.

I thought you would be harsh, blunt, cold, shocking.

Instead I find you have softened with age, sun, seasons.  You are summer waters.  Childlike.  Or very, very old and wise.  Hard to tell the difference in your silver face.

Rolling over rounded rocks, as have I.

Take me to the other side, I ask of you, in a current too strong to remain.

And now I walk above you. And am there.  On the other side.

Washed away by white noise of the river.

Stepping upon last year’s leaves still untrodden.

Extremely lucky, just a few initial thoughts

/ Gin Getz / 4 Comments

photo by Forrest

 

Now she rains

Cool and wet, green and lush

Wilds washed away

In a land of extremes

Balance is hard to find

With the pendulum swinging widely

Wildly

Only over time

Does balance blanket

A soothing shelter upon her soil

 

Flashes of the white of winter

The deepest blue sky

You ever were lost beneath

Drawing you in and back and beyond

Alone and silent and still

Arrested with an unforgiving chill

 

But now she finds me

Restricted to raingear, cabins, confines

And conversations where I remain so out of place

Who knows when I will no longer be able to remain reserved

Lashing with fire and fury and rage

Open the doors to the cage

And let the wild beast roam free again

 

Hot as a southern summer night

When here and now the monsoons douse passion

And barefeet and shorts and sunburn shoulders

Suffocate beneath down and wool and oilskin

 

My uncertainties are never doused

Fed well by water, sun and snow

The one element to flourish

In this land of harsh elements and extremes

 

 

I share our latest project, my latest dream, with a visitor from out of town, out of state, for I’m already far from town.

First I hear I’m crazy. Then I hear it must just be luck.  I’ve heard both before.  Funny how it always comes from those standing on safe ground.  Unable to see what it took to get here.

It starts with a dream of biting into the succulent peach and letting the sweet juice flow freely.  Then climbing the tree and stretching out, reaching to the edge of the limbs to pluck the ripest fruit.

Can you see more than the results? There I am, eating that ripe juicy peach.  I make it look good and easy.  Now.  But don’t you know?  It started with a dream.

There is a price to pay for dreaming.  One must step out on that limb to make dreams happen.  And it seems like out there where the wind whips and balance is a bit shaky, you might wonder at times if in fact you are more than a little crazy.  But that is where you’ll find the luck.  That is how you make dreams real.  They don’t seem to materialize on solid ground while sitting around.

Sure, one could choose to stay safe, secure, easy.  Remain on this side of the river because there is no road, no bridge.  Me, I’ll say, let’s build a road, a bridge, and cross the river, and go where the rest aren’t willing to go.  And there are my boys, hammers, shovels and saws in hand.  Because no one said we could not.

Luck is found out on the limbs.

That’s where you’ll find me, even if I fall from time to time.

 

Ditch Diaries

/ Gin Getz / 2 Comments

 

Year six, week one.

Heading higher.

My self, husband, son, dog, six horses…

That’s all.  Enough.  Perfect.

Away from those here to get away.

I lose myself, my home, my sense of peace and solitude. I find it again.  There.  Isn’t it odd? At Ditch Camp.

Some say it sounds so romantic.

Working in the high country.  Maintaining a trans-continental water diversion ditch deep in the Weminuche Wilderness, over a mile long across the Continental Divide.  Hard work and horse power.  Just us, our family, our stock, side by side, push pull, sharing the work, the camp, the views, the silence…

And then there is the reality.  Sore muscles. Sleeping on a thin pad after a day of working to the point of shaking, unable to lift the shovel or pull the saw one more time.  Rain, cold, dirt, bugs, no relief from a camp fire due to the fire ban, and not quite enough sun in the morning to dry your jeans and work boots before dressing. Digging cat holes and squatting in frosty grass under dripping trees. Hamburger Helper and iceberg lettuce night after night because I’m too darned tired to cook and seems like we never can get enough calories in us up there.  Leading hungry horses to pasture in the cold wet morning and back to the trees at night.  Care and complaints of horses that would rather be back home on pasture, and know the way.  Picking at the hillside, cutting roots, lifting rocks and shoveling soil, leading the draft horse, saddling and unsaddling in the rain.  Pulling the cross cut saw, in out, back forth, over and over and over again in a rhythm like breathing only… harder.

And you know.  I love it.

I give you this to read for the week.  It is long.  It may take you all week, if you care to read that much.  And if I can keep myself from writing more, for my mind gets going and is hard to stop…

Day one.  Arriving at camp.

It starts with packing along the dusty road with stranger after stranger driving by looking at us getting the packs on the horses as if we were a roadside tourist attraction, there for no more than their viewing pleasure.  Some slow long enough to whip out their camera and take a quick shot.  Most drive by as if we’re one more sighting of wildlife to add to their list to tell Aunt Jo back home in another town, another county, another state, just like it was when she used to come here for her one week a year to get away…

But she’s not here, and we’re not a tourist attraction, and I’m tired of my life being on display and those that find my life a curiosity or think we built our life for them.

And tired of sucking the dust of yet another ATV driving by anonymously.

Dust follows us as we fall in line, in unspoken unison, and ride our horses across the dam of the reservoir.  Up the first section of trail we still hear the whining motors, following us like haunting nightmares.  And then it is gone, all gone, over, and we are left alone in silence in the Weminuche Wilderness.  And that, my friends, is where I want to be.

It continues with the best day ever, the best ride ever, on the most difficult horse I ever rode, ever trained, ever learned to trust in the mountains.  Yes, my Flying Crow. He rose to the occasion, hunkered down to work and got the job done, ponying two mares and half of camp, and leading the rest.  Faced his fears when I asked him to – and he has so many fears.  Elk on trail, moose at camp, and innumerable boogymen that I couldn’t see.

Which reminds me.  About chasing moose, the mother and baby.  Gunnar did that.  Again.  People tell me it’s dangerous.  I’m not saying it isn’t and I’m sure not saying it’s good.  But I always thought he could handle himself, do his job of chasing wildlife away from his horses, and return unscathed. He’s a true shepherd.  It’s his job.  He has his own boundaries.  It’s not about the hunt; it’s about getting them away from his charge. And if you see this little shepherd chasing off the big ugly moose, there is a tinge of David versus Goliath and a twisted smile, though I swear I wish he wouldn’t do it.

It ends with us there. Horses picketed or hobbled, heads down grazing.  Sun setting behind the Rio Grande Pyramid there in view before us.  Tent and tarp set.  Tools leaning up against a tree, including the cross cut saws I so carefully sharpened and oiled and prepared for the onslaught that awaits them tomorrow.

The silence settles us.

We sit under the tarp with dinner in paper plates leaving grease stains on our jeans and boxed wine in enamel mugs and we breathe.  Just breathe.  And really, that is all I hear at first.  The breath of my husband, my son, my self.  My dog there with us.  A few relaxed snorts from the nearby horses.  And life is very good.

In time, there is the scratch of my favorite pen on paper.  I actually missed the sound, the feel, the sight of my scribbled writing pouring from cold hands, light streaming from the little headlamp strapped around my wool capped head, while the rest of me stays warm in the double sleeping bag, tight against my tired husband, so close beside my son and dog.  The four of us in the so-called two-man tent, and there lies a difference between many a two men, and my family.  Here.  Now.  No place we would rather be.

Day two. The real work begins.

Twenty trees cut and cleared from across the ditch this morning.  The cross cut saw sings with joy after the hours spent sharpening and setting the height of the scrapers and taking such pride in this old tool that once came off the wall of the log cabin as no more than a nifty rustic decoration.

Only four and half more trees cleared in the afternoon, including but half of the Big One that fell since we inspected the ditch only weeks ago.

Rain begins.  Jeans soak in the moisture as we hope does the ground.  We seek shelter under needleless trees that provide little protection.  Instead we hunker down, wrapping ourselves under our raincoats, knees to chin, backs again the bare trees, and wait it out.  The rain proves more tenacious, and for this we are grateful for we know the mountain thirsts.  Yet we long then, selfishly, for a campfire which might bring us warm and dry again.  Barring that, a sunny morning and enough time before work to hang the jeans in trees and set the boots on rocks to dry before the work day begins anew tomorrow.

That evening our plans change.  A new horse to camp decides she has had enough and it’s prime time to go home.  Bob retrieves her.  Another, however, becomes upset by the matter, and runs around with the new found freedom of having lost his hobbles.  Gunnar always runs with his horses, and ran beside this one too. I swear I saw the look of joy on Gunnar’s face right before the horse turned sharp and kicked back sideways and got Gunnar hard in the head.

Day three.  Rest, recovery, and a little work.

I did not sleep much last night.  Having had nursed my son through a head injury just months before, I kept a vigil and checked on Gunnar throughout the night.  From time to time I drifted off and dreamed about packing him out of the Wilderness on horse, figuring out the logistics of which horse to ride, to carry my dog, to leave behind, what to do with camp two hours from the trail head and two hours more to the vet.  He just needs to get through the night, I kept thinking.  I don’t want to ride the steep trail blind in the darkness while holding my dear dog instead of the reins.

My dreams drifted back and forth between my one-eyed dog, a haunting of my old Zorg, the first shepherd I had who taught me one eye was plenty for keeping a good eye on me; and my mom and dad who had recently endured a car wreck.  We headed to camp before hearing the final word of their well being, and there I was, worried…

We awoke to a little sun and a lot of hope.  Gunnar’s eye was swollen shut but we were pretty sure the eye was not damaged. The bleeding in the nose continued but seemed to be draining the swelling of his horribly swollen bridge.

We cleaned the dog, the blood on our clothes, our sleeping bags, the tent, and laid everything out and in the little bit of sun to dry before the rain began again.

By late morning we put on still wet jeans and boots and return to work, hoping to get in a few hours of bucking before the rain, leaving the dog resting beneath a nearby tree, close enough to hear us sawing as he tries to watch us through his one good eye, and falls in and out of needed sleep.

Evening.  We have decided to leave tomorrow. Gunnar should be able to just make the two hour trek out to our truck and trailer, and if not, then surely we need to get him to the vet.  We have completed our saw work for now, and cleared the ditch of a total of thirty obstructing and fallen trees.  There will be more.  Plenty more.  The beetles provide us with job security.

I once heard a fat man can fall trees.  And sure enough, I’ve seen this to be true.  But a lean lady sure can buck one up clean.  Just a little something to think about…

An hour before sunset.  I leave the boys resting in the tent with the poor pup and talk a quick walk up the North Fork trail to test out my new camera (more on that at a later date) and soak in the changed view of the now brown hills in golden light.  Beetle kill.  I count fifty one trees fallen across this short section of trail and I wonder the fate of horse traffic and travel in the Wilderness.

Day four.  Heading home.

Fourth of July and we dread leaving the higher country early when what we want is to be there, not back here with the tourists and traffic and dust and noise.

But we make it home safe, set the horses free on pasture with the rest of the herd, and sneak down to the Little Cabin where we have not been able to spend time yet this year.

For the dog, we say.  So he will not be disturbed.  So he can rest and recover.  We blame it on him.  It’s easier that way.  Though I’m not sure I’ve fooled anyone.  My unsocial tendencies are well known.

And there we are at night, in the little cabin with rain falling hard on the metal roof and old warped glass windows, the wood cook stove chugging away with dinner in a steaming pot on top, where our insatiable appetites are allowed to find their fill, and warm dry thick real beds envelope us for the best night sleep it seems we’ve had in ages, Forrest in the top bunk, Bob and me in the middle, and Gunnar in his bed beneath us.

We’ll go back in a couple weeks.  Let the dog recover, the horses get their fill.  Spend our time working on some other projects around the ranch and at neighbor’s that need to be finished up first.  Then, we’ll return to our higher mountain home.  Get away; get back to our work, wilds and silence.  A strange balance.  I’ve been told it’s unreal.  But that’s not the case at all.  In fact, it is very, very real.

(a bunch of additional photos posted on Facebook)

Crossing waters

/ Gin Getz / 2 Comments

The river sounds like rain

And is louder than my thoughts

For but a moment I am lost

And realize there is no place I would rather be

A silver lined droplet of hope

For the seemingly eternal conflict between heart and soul

Spark and dousing

For here I have found such wilds

And such confines

And the balance makes me dizzy

I hide here like a child

Knees to chin

Sitting silent dog and me

On fragile moss covered rocks

Where so few feet have stepped

And hopefully never will

Across river

Among the tall trees

Spotted sun

And columbine

My little bit of solitude

A chance to get away from those who came to get away

I’m hoping there is more to me than past and present

Here and now

Stand and confront the rushing waters

Look into her depths like a crystal ball

Answers floating downstream in the bubbling white foam below

I walk the still precarious planks with the Rio singing underneath

She has no answers for me today

Close to home

/ Gin Getz / 3 Comments

If a horse could cry.  I can.  And I do.

Tears flow freely; rain does not.

I cannot stop crying and know my tears do not help unless they can turn to rain.  I am not a religious person, but I find myself praying.  For others.  For the mountains. The animals.  The trees.  My beloved trees…

I think of all the wilds, the wildlife, and what happens to them now, what happens next?

Here, we have rain.  Just a bit, though I suppose it is enough.  Or is it just luck?  Lightning strikes aren’t taking hold. The fire to the south of us is relatively contained.  The rest of the state is not as lucky. This time.  Some time, of course, it will be here. It will be us.  Our mountain.  Our wilds and wildlife. We await. This year.  Next.  Three years from now.  Who knows?  The time bomb upon which we balance precariously in hopeful ignorance.

In my dreams there is fire and smoke.

I can no longer appreciate the red of sunset, for fear it is inspired by flame, for knowing it is enhanced by smoke.

My country is burning.  Though not yet close to my home, I think of all the other homes, built and feral, up in flames.  Now we know it is but a matter of time.

Computer data, scientific models, and the Forest Service.  They said the beetle killed trees wouldn’t burn as bad. This summer, we see they do. Dead timber forests are safer than green, they said. But what burns best in my wood stove? Pardon my lack of science here. I wonder what happened to common sense based on observation of the world around us.

I read an article entitled, “Screaming Trees.”  The tears begin again, for I hear their cry.  How few have heard the silent wail?  We wear our blinders, find a green patch, turn our backs to the ravished red hillsides, and think it is all OK.

Until it comes too close to home.