Got my horse. Got my dog. Don’t need no cowboy.  Or gaucho.  I can catch my own damn fish, thank you very much.

Bob leaves me for a week.  Horseback, working on a pack trip.  Ouch. Isn’t that what we do, together? He temporarily forgets we are a team.  I don’t.  He figures I’ll be fine.  Of course I will.  But how independent do you want me to be?  I think about wishing to soften with age, not get tougher.  I don’t want a heart like rawhide to match my weathered skin.

Before leaving he says he’s going to “take care of me.”  He forgets, and runs out of time. He throws four beers in a bag on the table and tells me to give them to Alcides and see if he’ll catch me some fish.

Guess what.  I drank the beers and caught my own fish.

I have taken off my wedding band and yet I still feel it there after ten years.  I’m mad.  Chances are I’ll forgive him.  He’s a good guy.  But I’m a woman.  And every once in a while, I need to be reminded that I’m a good one, too.  He’s not big on saying such things.  I tell him it is time he learned.  I’ll let you know how he does.

~                                             ~                                             ~

So I’m thinking.  About life.   Mine. Ginny’s.  Women.  Women willing to live life.  Really live.  Not half way, part way, or sort of.  It’s yes or no.  It’s life with gusto.  It’s having, well, if you’ll excuse the crude expression, just a little bit of balls.  Not too much of course. Remember, I don’t want to be tough.  I still want to be tender.  At just the right times. I want to feel. And I want to be willing to feel. To get out there and do, not just stay home and wish.  Take risks. You know what I always say.  Leap and the net appears.  Usually.  Because sometimes it doesn’t.  But landing on the ground isn’t all bad either.

No whining aloud. Stop complaining.  If you want change, change.  It’s up to you.  Do it. Or don’t, but don’t come crying to me if you haven’t even tried.

What do you have, and what can you do with it?  Look at Ginny.  She wants her life, and thus this book, to be an inspiration to others.  She has already been an inspiration to me.   Little things like living with MS barely slow her down.  Maybe her body, but trust me, not that mind.

I’m not going to judge you.  It doesn’t matter where you’re at.  This is what matters:  What did you do to get here?  And where are you going from here?  Everyone has their story.  This is mine.  And I’m working on Ginny’s.  What, my friend, is yours?

~                                             ~                                             ~

My thoughts are drifting to e-mails I need to check, arrangements that need to be made for our return trip.  Two more weeks.  Damn.  I’m not ready to leave.  You knew I would not be. But I’m not leaving yet.

Now is the challenge to remain Here and Now.  Now is when my mind starts moving ahead of my body.  My body is here.  I must contain my mind.  Remain present.  Keep my thoughts where my body is.  Live it.  Feel it.  Smell, taste, touch it.  Dive in, roll around, and rub it on.   Otherwise, I risk wasting the next two weeks, waiting for the future to happen, rather than enjoying this incredible place and time.  And what a time it is.

~                                             ~                                             ~

By day, the mountains turn to gold. Flaxen hillsides, flaming trees, yellow leaves caught in the wind.  “Lluvia de oro” as leaves fall like raindrops of gold.  Morning frost burnishes the broad grasses that grow by the little creek, as we jump from slick stone to slick stone, crossing to lead our horses in from pasture.  Crisp light casts long, sharp shadows mid-day.  The river a steel ribbon wrapped about this land on days when the sky hangs low and heavy.  On those days, the grease bush smells like burning sage when we brush against with wet jeans and the bright red hips of wild rose stand out shockingly as Christmas ornaments on a Christmas tree.  Layers of wool and down and the fireplace a welcome relief as we sit before a big blaze at night and talk about our day, today,  everyday.  Not tomorrow. We’ll discuss that after we wake in the morning, build another fire, have our matέ, and wait for the sun to hit this house.

~                                             ~                                             ~

We leave at lowering light, shadows stretching wide to absorb the valley withering pale, as sand would do in the wake of a swelling wave.  I am mesmerized by the motion.  Swirling sands around the horses heels, diffused light, filtered through dust so thick at times you cannot see the silhouette of the horse’s feet.  Constant motion of grey foot, brown sand, golden light, blending into a moving cloud, alive and changing, silent by the wind.  Look up or I will miss it. For at some point, the clouds give their last encore of scarlet promise, reflecting back the same first light of morning.  Then they fade, shades of grey and the earth and sky blend into black.

Last night another ride home in the dark. One more time. Riding back from Buta Mallin.  Bob leads Rolo the mule.  Our horses stride side by side, faster now that they are nearly home.  In the middle of a roughed out road we are unable to see, only the change of light where the mountain ends and sky begins told by the subtle variation of blackness and stunning sprinkle of stars.  We are talking, softly as there is little sound while the horses step out on this sandy portion of long ride home.  And there is nothing, no one, no other sound otherwise around us.

Blackness enveloping, still and clear, the stars reflecting on the river below us. The final switchback, giving in completely, the closest I hope to be to blind, as my mare suddenly turns left and begins the final decent and I am surprised to be this far already.  I am absorbed in the darkness.  I am complete and meaningless, a part yet unimportant all at the same time, at the moment, this very moment, when all I hear is the rush of the river below and the slap of the horses’ steel shoes on the rocky ground.  There is nothing else to hear.  There is only to feel.

Our last visit with Ginny.  For this trip.  It is not “goodbye” but rather “see you later.”  You know that’s how I am.

And yes, of course I forgave Bob and slipped that ring back onto my finger where it belongs.  That’s how I am too.

Here is another great post from Gin!  As with the last few posts, this is Karen (shall I call myself, “The Phantom of the Blog”? ) posting from the states (Texas for that matter).  For those of you who may be new to Gin’s blog, for the time being she is in the rurals of Patagonia and  has extremely limited internet access so she emails me words and photos when she is able and I put them on this blog.  This is an incredible post from Gin so grab a cup of coffee or tea or whatever you like and sit back and enjoy!

The day begins as we leave this house that currently feels like home along the Rio Trocoman. Just for one night.  To see Ginny at her chacra in El Huecu.  I have missed her and it seems as if it’s been a while since I had a hug from the other Virginia and a healthy dose of her stories, laughter and contagious passion for life. Coincidentally, it is Bob’s birthday.  Not that I have anything planned, nor anything purchased.  It’s been months since I went to a store.  Though I wrote him a poem on a handmade card by candle light this morning.  I think at times my words are my greatest gifts.

We take off in the still early morning before the sun rises high enough on the mountain to the north east to warm our little lush pocket along the river.  We are horseback, heading out for the six hour dusty ride across the arid foothills of the Andes to see Ginny.  She is worth it.  Our horses are laden with our double sleeping bag, some tortas fritas to share with Sky, and a few gifts for Ginny, including a long branch I cut from a Lombardi poplar tree in the pasture just outside her studio, now strapped on to the back of Bob’s horse, the leaves now turning a vivid, glowing yellow and ready to sprinkle down like the golden kisses Ginny once told me would come in the fall.

We stop for a break mid day at Buta Mallin to visit with Sky.  We arrive in perfect time to help dig out her septic system which has been clogged up after twenty years or so of use, and collecting socks.  Go figure.  We are amazed as Sky finds what appears to be a perfect match.  Apparently old polyester does not decompose.  I am grateful for the fragrant mint she grows in her herb garden just beside where we are working.

We arrive at Ginny’s as the sun is lowering, welcomed by warm and familiar faces.  And the luscious smell of goat meat roasting over the fire.  Jorge is preparing an asado for Bob’s birthday.  The full moon rises and we are out there feasting by the fire with good friends, new and newer, somehow dear, one and all when joining together to share in a simple celebration out in the warm early autumn air.

The feast is topped by a masterpiece cake perfectly prepared by Ester.  Crema de leche and dolce de leche and decidedly delicious.  Our silly rendition of the American birthday song and a candle for Bob to make a wish for the upcoming year, and I can only imagine the love inside of him as he stands there somewhat uncomfortable being the focus of attention, which is not a place Bob chooses to be.

~                                             ~                                             ~

For Bob

Eight at night and the rain continues.  I’m back home by the Rio Trocoman. The rain has not stopped today.  Nor has the fire died.  I have been here writing since returning from this morning’s horseback trip to our “kiss and ride” where I left you to begin your week long adventure where you will be working for TA at the Ranquilco on high country pack trip.  Modestly, as is your way, sharing more of your gifts from your fifty years of pack trips.

I have worried about you all day, wondering if you might come home, the trip delayed, the thought of leaving on a drier day more appealing and more practical.  Maybe it is to you.  How many times have you had to saddle and leave in the rain and remain wet for the duration of your pack trip?  And here you go again.  Though somehow I hold the hope that it is drier here and tomorrow the sun will shine and although you will be out a little higher on the mountain in your half of our double sleeping bag, I will be home sharing our bed with Gunnar in my half.  May my love reach you as you curl up at night under a tarp and try to keep warm without me.

I sit here warm and dry and wrapped in wool by the big fire, with the dog on a blanket at my feet.  Soup boils and I am sipping tea and the only other light is a candle in the antique silver holder next to me and I wish you were here and feel foolishly incomplete without you.  And somehow wrong for being so comfortable! How lucky I am to have someone I miss already and you’ve not even been gone a day.

For Ginny

It is not possible to look ahead and see how and when and from where we’ll say goodbye this time, for the thought seems unreal, impossible, and unpleasant, though I know that day approaches.  At this point, I keep my focus on two things.  First, of course on the book.  It is taking on a life of its own and consuming me this week.  I am happy to let it and give myself to the muse and find myself unable to hold back the flow of words, only struggle to keep my fingers moving fast enough to capture the surge of thoughts, roaring like spring waters.  It is happening, Ginny.  Your book!  And I believe it is going to be very good.  The second thing is how to come back.  Longer.  Maybe to live. I feel we are not done, but only beginning.

Really, the thought of saying goodbye to you, to Sky, to this little Spirit horse, to these trees,  to the wind and water that have become me….  I will think no more of such things for now.

For Forrest

And now today is your birthday, Bud.  Happy Birthday to you, my son, my friend, my team mate and partner and at times my guide, my creative equal and often inspiration and now physical superior (there, I finally admit you are stronger than me!). Twenty.

And I remember you being born.  I suppose most mothers do.  The things that change our life forever.  For the better.  The things that matter most.  The one thing I always wanted.  You!  And oddly enough, this mothering thing is even better than I thought it could be, which I thought was pretty good.  And that’s because of you.  Who you are. The gifts you bring to the table of this growing relationship.   They are as plentiful and full as your open mind.

I guess somewhere along the way the line connecting mother and son is rebuilt on friendship and a growing adult relationship.  Not that I’ll ever stop caring.  I care about those I love most, whether I’m your mother or not. I’ll worry, I’ll advise, I’ll think, plot and plan, I’ll lose sleep and gain grey hair and still wish I could do more.  I’m just that sort.

Of course there is so much more I want to say, to share. Boy do we both have a lot of stories to catch up on together.  I’ll guess we’ll have to wait.  For now I’m down here in Argentina.  You’re up there in Canada.  Both lives and worlds are pretty amazing.  And next thing you know, you’ll be meeting up with Bob, on another crazy adventure which involves snowmobiles and fine Scotch  (though not the two at the same time, please) and I’ll be back with my horses, my cats, a new batch of chickens and crossing that bridge we built together, awaiting your return.  There’s no metaphor there.  That’s the real thing.  Though think of all that bridge can mean.  Teamwork, crossing the uncrossable, finding a place of our own, making peace, open souls, exploring and being brave.  And a lot of hard work.  Another dream come true.  I have lots more of them to work on.  And I can’t wait to hear and maybe urge you on to come up with a mountain of dreams yourself.

Let them soar in the wind with your growing spirit.  Or perhaps it is a spirit awakening.

I love you, Bud.  Happy birthday to you!

More stories than I can share.  Some for the book, a few for you, many no more than to feed my soul.  Which here and now is full and rich and on fire. Alive with rushing wind and water.

This morning I am horseback with Bob to our “kiss and ride,” a mile up river along our side of the bank.  He crosses and heads to work at the Ranquilco, helping with their current hydro power project.  Gunnar and I and my little mare run home to get the bread rising.  Many a morning, we make it back in half the time it took us to get there.  This morning it takes longer.  Teaching the neighbor’s dog, Charlie, the routine.  His short little legs must move four times as fast as Gunnar’s to get him half as far.  We can wait. 

Now I sit out between the house and the river, soaking in the first sun I felt in days.  The river sings softly behind me.  My mare in the shade to one side of me, the two dogs snapping at meat bees on the other.

Now I can be still, quiet, focus.  Sit down to write.  That’s where I am now.  Taking a break from The Book work.  Coming up for air.  And such air there is.  Much more than at the altitude from where I came.  Much more of everything here.  Or everything I’ve been looking for.  Which is more of less, at times.

Starting with the horses.  Here not as a hobby but as an essential. Transportation.  The only way in.  Learning the local tack, new straps and knots, saddle blankets piled high like the princess and the pea. Bridles and reins of silky soft and skinny tanned leather we spoil ourselves with and are quick to buy anew with the slightest signs of wear and tear, here replaced with rawhide.    A lamb carried to camp horse back, slaughtered and hung in the shade tree, and cooked over an open fire to feed the hungry crew. Salad passed around in one big bowl with one fork and one napkin to wipe up the sweet sauce that drips from the carrots and onions down a greasy chin.  Beer in big bottles passed person to person, as wine from the bota and mate from the gourd. 

I learned to cook in France and for years we all figured I’d continue a career as a chef.  I chose cooking for my family instead.  Now I have a whole new techniques to learn.  Like rules to abide to.  Someone told me “Gaucho’s are picky about what they eat.”  I think of the other places I have lived and travelled.  The French countryside.  The Greek Islands. Homesteading with the California bounty.  New York chic and New Mexico green and red.   Are they more demanding here?  No, just more limiting, not wanting new, change, innovation, a different way.  And oddly enough, I can accept that.  Not that I want to close my mind and not try new, for this simpler way is new for me.  But I can understand and even appreciate the simple cooking. Goat, stew, squash, potatoes.  Peel the potatoes but not the beets.  Whatever.  When in Rome.  If you don’t like the soup, get your hands out of the pot.  I would like to keep mine in.  The more I stir, the more I love the aroma.

I hear people longing for things they miss. I don’t know what.  More ease.  More comfort.  More accessibility, communications, distractions, conveniences.  Probably more variety.  I’m here thinking it’s a great challenge.  How long can I make a little last, and how easy to know what is for dinner.  Likewise, I remember taking tourists on pack trips.  Five days out, that’s it, and they’d be itching for a Coke, a bath, a bed.  Sure they would miss the sound of wind and water, but they weren’t ready to live with it.

I know I’m not living like a gaucho.  I’m still living it up.  Fancy windows, European antiques, and even with one room blocked off, still more space than we can spread out into, sweep up and keep warm. This house in which we’re staying is truly the lap of luxury, lacking little but things I’d rather live without anyway, like phone service, electric lights and a gas stove.  Maybe a few simple additions I might be wanting for, if I was to stay here forever.  Like a spatula would be nice.  But Bob fashioned me one with a disposable metal lid and a stick from a nearby tree.  It’s not the first time we’ve resorted to such innovations.  For those who have been with me a while, you might recall the time at camp the boys had to whittle me my utensils before I could flip an egg.  I swear breakfast tasted better that way.

And yet what I thought was simple back in the States seems still like so much more than here.  Excess. Waste.  Too much. I’m trying to learn.  Keeping an open mind, even if the minds I try to understand at first appear so closed.  Perhaps it is this closing off, accepting what you have, and learning to not look beyond which allows for contentment.  Tradition holds greater power here still than change.  I both respect and admire that, and know it is nothing I was born with, being raised in a culture of change.  But can I learn to live in it?  Can I change – in this case, change my ways of constantly evolving and wanting to see, have, know and do more, and learn to accept this here and now that has so captivated me?

I will never be of this land, and may never quite fit in.  Do I anywhere?  And who really “is” the land but someone who is maybe nothing else and clings to a title instead of a sense of self?

But maybe I can live here.  Be accepted for who I am, here and now.  Where I was and what I did don’t matter.  I don’t want to lose myself, and try to be what I am not. Yet somehow I think maybe I can find more of me here.  Finding more with less.

Do you really need to see so far beyond the mountains in which you live?  Will you be content if you already have?  How will we know if we do not try. Farewell and good riddance to the isle of sugared cereals and more options of wines that you’ll try in a lifetime.  Isn’t red and white enough?  Here, there are but a few spices.  Oregano, cumin, chili and sweet pepper.   Here, there is no refrigeration.  Meat slaughtered weekly and hung in a screen box under the pear tree.  Take only what you can eat before the flies lay their eggs and the meat spoils.

This takes longer now.  The air is cooler.  Even now mid day in the full sun. A tingle of autumn in the first of yellowing grass and fading hillsides and teasers of golden leaves on the regal Lombardi poplar trees defining the edges of the occasional homesteads, perfect rows, little green lines in the otherwise arid mountains.

You can feel the first of the change of season.  The river may never be warm enough for me to bath in again this year. In the earlier mornings, I’m wearing my wool hat and still my fingers are slow to dance on the keyboard when they are this cold.  My thoughts turn to the wood we split and stacked earlier in the week.  I’m holding out.  I worry about getting soft.  Think how cold it would be if I were back “home.”  Still snowed in. 

Now I’m sitting here warming up with the dogs and a mate and today’s big blue and thinking of yesterday’s heavy layered grey.  Hopes of rain and sound of wind through the willows and river rushing over the rapids.  Bundled under a borrowed shawl of Ginny’s, almost like having her hands wrapped around me. Encouraging me. Write, sister, write… Let’s get this story out there. So much to share!

I suppose if there were but one story to share with you today, you’d ask to hear the one about the branding in the high country. Though I am certain I have already taken up too much of your time.  So once again, I’ll let the photos tell the story instead of my words.  

And now I return to writing, what I came here for.  Only to find the words, and so much more.