photography

Unworthy of a title yet

/ Gin Getz / 7 Comments

I am learning how much I have to learn and it’s often rather frustrating.

Harold, I am trying.  I have a ways to go.  Please don’t give up just yet.  Here, imagine the format like a waltz as I tried to type it, one-two-three, as I saw it done by William Carlos Williams. But somehow it is lost.  I won’t fight it.  Accept it.  Hope this works, though not quite the same.  Of course it would not be. Perhaps it wouldn’t work the way I indended either.

For Bob who thinks it’s always “nice” and is learning to say more.

 

Unworthy of a title yet

a love poem
a first for me
words we just assume
and so I tell you what I should have said
and maybe I will not
for I think you already know
without saying
with feeling
something in trust
completion
pride and assumptions
I am more whole with you
I am more of me
because of you
you let it be all me
when I need it to be
which really is far too often I say
and you say nothing at all
and let me rattle on
which I will do no matter
today was one of those days
I’m really up and down
I have always thought
the curse of the creative mind
passion puts one
out of balance
it comes in waves
swelling and curling and pounding
and drawing back to low tide
then again
maybe it’s just me
probably
I’m sorry
poise is nothing I have known
stability does not come easy
that’s one of the reasons I need you 
you are the rock to my rushing waters
today was a tide drawn out day
leaving the stench of the barren beach in the wake
tomorrow I will be better
and this much I do believe
tomorrow I will love you still
though I may only say so
in the darkness as our sweat cools together
and we are there tired front by side
which is exactly where I want to be
more complete because of you
funny how I am not afraid
when I always thought I should be
less of me and more of you

Re-working old poems

/ Gin Getz / 4 Comments

 

Because I can.

Because I am indeed feeling bold.

Because the opportunity presents itself

And I would be a fool to let it pass.

Because I have always written

Will always write

But don’t always learn.

Because friends, feedback, teachers and editors

Don’t appear every day.

And so I begin.

Re-working old poems.

In hopes of seeing words anew.

Or rather

New uses for old words?

 

 

Succumbing

 

The water lures me

As she has so many times before

 

Now emerging

 

Discreet

 

As a delicate muse in the woods

 

Her hollow voice tempting

In a distant primordial song

Of silver coins tossed from teasing fingers

 

Her sweet smell and silky sway and wave

Taunting down the mountainside

 

Am I no more than a voyeur

Standing safely out of reach

Dry on her precarious banks

 

Enthralled

 

While she takes no heed of me

 

 

 

I am but a hunched form

A leaning tree

Casting shade across her face

 

As her struggle to keep fluid

 

Ebbs and flows

 

In thickening waters below

 

 

 

And if I stand here long enough

Will I see her freeze

Watch her facade relinquish

To the static state of

 

Solid water

 

 

Welcoming winter

/ Gin Getz / 4 Comments

 

 

Seven degrees below zero Fahrenheit, and a foot of snow.

Winter has come.

Spread out her picnic blanket and begins to unpack her feast.

She has arrived early.  We take this as a gift, for our winter will be shorter this year, heading south to summer again in January.

The forecast predicts the “real” cold comes tomorrow. A rude awakening, they say.  If you weren’t ready for winter, you will find it regardless. It will find you.

We’re ready.

Yesterday we took the afternoon off (the weather providing a wonderful excuse to not work) and snow-shoed along the other side of the Rio Grande in virgin snow, looking back at our mountain, white again, horses and houses tucked into the snow laced trees, seemingly so little and far away. And I think of how far away another person today might be.  Any one else.  Miles away.  And you know I find comfort in such distance.

We follow the hillsides like waves, and again cross the river, now where she is open and as yet, still unfrozen.  That will come in time.  Many more mornings like today and it will not take long.  For now, however, there are no black depths lurking through solid white, but rather, she calls quietly and shows me her brown and green rocks at her soothed soul, and invites me to step in.

Snow shoes and all, we walk through the water.  All we can do is hope waterproof boots are just that, for turning back the way we came on our first trek of the season that proves more extensive than planned is not what we want to do.  You know how it is.  Once you start, you just keep going.  It’s so crazy beautiful.  You just can’t get enough.  Until all of a sudden, you had too much. And then you find yourself… exhausted.  And still with a ways to go to get back home.

The boots proved tight, our crossing worked well.  Except on the other side the wet boots and snow pants coated with dry snow, packing thicker with each step, and became quite heavy. The two mile trek back up the snow packed road seemed very long indeed.

We feed the horses double in the storm.  Three times their normal rations last night.  Icicles on their muzzles this morning.  Norman’s furry feet dangled with little snowballs, jingling almost joyously as he lifts his heavy feet to come find me feeding this morning before sunup.

Yesterday morning in the thick of the storm, watching Bob take the horse trailer down the road before it got snowed in.  We can ride the horses out when I am ready to part with them and allow them their winter pasture in lower lands.  They might be ready, but I am not.  Those that have spent most of their winters up here with us (Crow, Canella, Tres, Bayjura) do not find it odd to weather the storm and hunker down as the snow coats their backs.  They hide in the Aspen and gnaw the bark of the freshly dead trees while waiting for Gunnar and me to show up for their next feeding.

This morning the last of the elk have left their tracks across our pasture as they scramble for open grounds.

Now we enter the time of depth, physical challenge, silent connection, intimacy with the elements, isolation with earth and sky.  Alone need not mean loneliness.  For some of us it is a state of awakening.  An opportunity to flourish.  A quiet radiance.  The winter crystals bloom so brilliant, though are more fragile. Both created by and at the mercy of the sun.  Exposed to the elements of which they are a part. So delicate in nature, so susceptible to the whim of man.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Begin again

/ Gin Getz / 11 Comments

 

 

 

And so it begins again, as it has so many times before. 

I wake long before light to heavy silence.  You can feel it.  A pressure of sorts, weighty, though not oppressive.   I know.

I feel my way to the window and there is the view as I expect it to be and as it is for nearly half my days here.

The branches of the blue spruce at the same time laden and light.  The ground below bright and glowing as snow continues to descend in darkness.

This is the time the land shines and shivers.  It is her time.  When she is allowed to be solitary.  Nothing to give or take.  Demands washed over in white.  Pure and pristine in stillness and strength.  If Artemis was a season, she would be winter here.

She is out there, singing her own song, loudly but only for herself, with no one around to listen, comment, critique.  I hear her in intimate moments as the sound of falling snow.  I try to respect her space, walk lightly upon her with downy steps, and bow my head (and roll my eyes) in apologies for the sudden barking of my dog as he finds the tracks of a coyote that recently passed our path where we walk in the twinkling crystal light of fresh falling morning snow.

 

 

 

And where am I going?

/ Gin Getz / 13 Comments

The last of running waters. They say winter will be here tonight. The water and I await… this inevitable change.

 

Leaving what I love.

Driving home.  Headlights in the snow.  Owl and elk, coyote tracks and a snowshoe hare.  Only a dusting.  Perhaps it will be gone tomorrow.

We leave town.  Down past Airport Corner.  I will see no vehicle from here on up to home.  Even Freemon’s Ranch is still and silent for the season.

As if eyes almost closed.  We squint through snow shooting towards the windshield, whipping up and over at just the last minute.  A blinding tunnel vision.

It will not last.  We know.  By the time we reach the Reservoir, the sky is an even white, like a bed sheet draped over my head, tucking me in for the season.

This year is different. Every year is.  I cling to the early winter because it is all I have now.  Mid winter will take us south.  Far south.  South of the Equator.  South America.  Where the sun will shine north of us.

I never thought we would be “Endless Summer” season travelers when Winter is what we’ve lived for.  But who can resist an adventure?  And a big one lies ahead.  I can not say no.  We will go.  Four months in Patagonia.  It is summer there.  We will leave deep winter, dressed in long johns and parkas and heavy boots and riding on the back of my husband’s snowmobile with our dog balanced between us.   Somewhere on the drive to the airport perhaps we’ll slowly strip.  Leave the layers behind.  Go lightweight. Hawaiian shirts and flip flops.  Not really my style.  I think I’ll keep the Levi’s and cowboy boots and sweat it out if need be.

I will say farewell to my mountain for winter.  Close up our home, farm out the house plants, dig my nose deep into the hair of my horses as we bring them to lower ground.  One last whiff of their sweet smell, each one of which I am so familiar I could identify him or her blindfolded by scent alone.

And the twist to this story:  it’s all for the sake of writing.  Part of becoming a writer, or rather, expanding, evolving…  A chance to complete another story.  A good one at that.  I’ll save the details for another time.

There’s more to it than that.  There always is to every tale, isn’t there?  And this one won’t end otherwise.  In this case, there is, “For the sake of adventure.”

Because life is too short for Woulda, Coulda and Shoulda.  I’d rather stick with, “Sure, I’ll give it a try.”

 

Water and light. Perhaps for the last time this season.

Where is this going?

/ Gin Getz / 3 Comments

 

 

My apologies for the incomplete post sent to subscribers on Monday.  Seems the pictures made it, the text got lost in cyber space.  I am sorry for the mess up.  Fortunately for me, I saved the text in a Word document, and was able to make the corrections.  If you have not seen the proper post, please click here.  Anyway, a good reminder to self:  Back up, back up, back up…

 

Today our country heals.  Months of negativity and division, for what?  Really, I don’t get it.  Enough!  It’s over, folks. Our country spoke.  We spoke.  Accept it.  Live with it.  Love it or leave it, but stop complaining.  I’m done with the negativity, and opinions and beliefs that are better kept private.  (What you do behind closed doors is YOUR business.  Please, can we keep it that way?  I really don’t want to know…)

Time to move on.   To good things.  If you want them better, make them better. Stop whining.  Bottom line.  Wake up, smell the coffee and see the sunshine.  Life is good.

Back to where I was before The Detour.  Today, I share with you this:

 

Where is this going?

 

We turn within.

This is the season of solitude.

Darker days.

Coldness descends.  Slowly.

The trees stripped. Exposed.  Nothing to hide.

Barren.  Gold fades to brown fades to grey.  We await what we know will come, when our world becomes swathed with white.

It is coming. Winter.  When our chilly cocoon enwraps us, cuts us off, shuts us in, draws us together, those of us that remain. We’re in this together.

Times are changing.  The weather faster than the people.  November is not what it used to be. Eleven Novembers and I’ve yet to see a storm stay, stick around, and shut us off this time of year, but the threat chased the people off long ago.  Stories of the one that gotcha.  Vehicles caught and stuck and buried and remaining until the following June.

No longer.  Seems like late autumn is becoming a lingering of summers end.  Giving us glimpses only of early winter.  Tempting, teasing, eluding.  Broken promises.

Fifty degrees at ten thousand feet mid day today.

Elk in tall timber at high noon as we ride above tree line, southern slopes completely clear of the last little storm.  They are not seeking solace from hunters, who have left long ago, but needing the shade.  Comfort in the coolness of trees.

Where is everyone, we ask each other, just the two of us, outside on another crisp and cool November morn?  Lunch on the deck, afternoons in shirt sleeves.  Sun leaving a line on exposed flesh where the leather of my worn work gloves ends.

Someone else should still be here.  We feel selfish.  Our little secret.

Too much good weather.  It’s exhausting.  Just when you thought it was due time to take it easy and work inside.  Balancing my books will be very late this year.

We take a break and drive to town.

Quiet streets and empty sidewalks.  Every face is familiar.  The few that remain, hard core, cold blooded, solitary in camaraderie.  Silent understanding.

Driving through Creede at winter’s dawn.  You know every truck and every driver.  You wave.  That is my favorite part.  No more anonymity of summer.  No strangers remain.

Front row parking outside and the only one shopping inside at Rare Things and San Juan Sports.  Room at the bar at Tommy Knockers.  Tables to choose from at Kip’s.  Time for hugs.  For catching up.  For another beer.

 

 

Detour

/ Gin Getz / 5 Comments

 

Today I lighten the literary load and lower the photographic standard.  I’m just going to tell you a story.  Plain and simple, in words and pictures.  A story about yesterday.

Going to the other side.

The other side… of the Rio Grande.

Soon of course we will be further.

The other side… of the equator.

But for now, I’m here awaiting winter.

And since it’s slow to come, we’re quick to head out and enjoy.

We saddle up, my sweetie and me.

Me on my little Arabian, Flying Crow (Fadjurz Ideal).

Bob on Crow’s first born, Tresjur of the Rio.

We start by crossing the river, our mighty Rio Grande.

After ten years of drought, this fall she runs with mild manners.

And down in the hidden crevasse below the bluff that cuts through our land,

Where sunlight is only scattered now and for the next several months,

Ice has begun forming

With strength and gusto and an unspoken belief in being undisturbed until mid May.

And here we come.

Horses with steel shoes.

Breaking through

Slipping

Splashing

Curious pawing.

Legs spread out wide under them, under us, but still above the water on the slick white fresh ice.

Thicker than we thought it would be.

This is not the river we have asked them to cross before,

Thin and liquid and loose.

Our maiden voyage to Sweetgrass Meadow on horse begins.

Working with the horses fear and trust and overcoming.

Then amused and impressed with their inquisitiveness in exploring a new trail,

A place they had never been,

No horse had been for probably fifty years or more.

A more adventurous time and place

Long ago and far away

That a few of us who still dream of finding a land untouched

Still long to be.

And then arriving where we want to be.

On the otherside.

At Sweetgrass Meadow.

Our secret oasis.

There because we found it on Google Earth and knew we could find our way.

And we did.

And the horses found the grass as sweet and pure and perfect as I knew they would.

And thus the adventure was worth it,

For us, for them.

And complete.

As we find our way home on the familiar side of the river

Where the horses know the way.

 

Crossing the frozen Rio Grande.

Chosing an alternate route.
Stopping for a picnic at the bottom of Sweetgrass Meadow.
Me and the boys.
Letting the horses rest.
Enjoying the sweet grass of Sweetgrass Meadow
Lovely little Arabian.
On the other side.
Gunnar von Getz.
Crossing the Rio Grande again.
Almost home.
From the other side.
Looking up the Rio Grande.

 

(click on any of these pictures to see a larger image, then hit the “back” arrow to return to the post)

 

What brought it on…

/ Gin Getz / 34 Comments

We’re in the kitchen talking about the harder days.  Before running water, hot water heaters, finished walls and trim work.   Long before luxury items like curtains, matching plates and book shelves. Our first year here. The summer of the three of us in a one room cabin. Though we moved to a larger cabin for winter (offering room to initiate a budding new relationship), that season even the septic line froze. We hauled our water downhill on a push sled and were grateful for a nearby outhouse.

I think what scared me most was the cold.  The stories worried me, which I believe they were meant to do.  Funny if you consider that no one else had lived here before us.  So where did the stories come from?  The rumor mill, at work again? Finding factual accounts and figuring out the truth takes time.  I could not get firsthand reports.  There were none.  Only exaggerated stories and distorted memories.  No problem.  Learn to write the book yourself.  And no disappointment from expectations.

Just the same, comfort is not what attracted me then or now.  Financial security and emotional stability don’t appear to be regular parts of my life.  Though maybe by my age they should be.

I thought a lot about this last night.  I couldn’t sleep. An itching that wouldn’t let me be, trying to figure out where my life was taking me.  I guess a self induced session of self reflection brought on by another birthday.  Forty-six.  Middle aged.  Time to grow up?  I think not.

What then?

At this stage in my life, I should have some labels.  There’s comfort in that.  I lost the one of Mother when my son went off to college.  OK, then.  How about my career?  Outfitter.  No more.  Guest Ranch owner/operator.  Barely.  Ditch Digger.  Yes, but… It is somehow lacking in, well, finesse for a middle aged woman. Writer?  I’ll take it. Writer.   I use that term daringly with great expectation and demands placed upon myself.  Too often I have trouble believing that what I give is worthy.  Who doesn’t?  Anyone who contemplates the meaning of life, their point and purpose, will question their self worth.  Won’t they?  And yet, many days I feel I have nothing to give… but words.

Pardon me if that sounds too plumped with self pity. I don’t really need the violins brought in for this.  What am I trying to say then?

Something about confidence.  Or lack thereof.  I read the words of others who have found success with their writing (and yes, success is a relative term, so here I mean that which brings one a sense of purpose and by which one feels defined), and compare them those of us (yes, that would be me…) who still do not believe in ourselves, or believe we have something worthy of giving.

This does is not make me feel worse about my state of being as not-yet-successful-writer, but rather, challenges me to grow up. Oh no!  Become that person. Start being today the person you wish to be tomorrow.  For what is the difference between she and me?  It is not in the number of books she has published and I have not, though I have used that as an excuse for the past few years.  It is in the voice that speaks back when I look in the mirror.  How easy it is to forget we are in charge of that voice. I need not look ahead with down cast eyes and hushed words and whisper, “Yes, I write…”  Perhaps it is time to look straight ahead, boldly make contact with the grey eyes staring back at mine, and speak in a loud and joyous voice, “Yes!  I am a writer!  And I am honored to share my words!”

Man, that sounds good at least.

Mild retreat

/ Gin Getz / 7 Comments

 

Bring it on

Ready for winter.  The wood shed is packed full. Ten cord of beetle killed spruce, split and stacked and ready to burn.

I have confession to make.  In the form of a hydraulic wood splitter.  Gone for me are the days of wedge and maul. Cheating?  At times I think so. Power tools.  Machines. Something ten years ago I (foolishly?) would have said I never needed.  I may not need it now (at least, I certainly am not going to admit that) but I do like it.  Makes the job go faster with much less effort.  Hard to complain about that.  Though the Mountain Mama in me isn’t always so convinced.  The draw towards traditional is bent out of shape by the noise of motors, moving parts, bells and whistles. This still seems a bit wrong to me.  But my ditch digging shoulders love it, and the job is done, so what can one really complain about?

The hay shed too is filled.  Stacked with small bales piled ten high to get us through the worst of winters.  The horses have already bushed out with their longer winter coats.  The smallest of them, my little Arabian, Flying Crow, started his early this year.  I think by the end of August.  Taking no chances.  Being “hot” here only lasts so long.  And that’s not very long at all.  Cold is a far more common state of being.  He’s been here long enough to know.  By now even memories of his barn and stable in the lower ground are long gone, I’m sure.  He’s a true mountain horse now.

Next we’ll fill the pantry and freezers, though I’m guessing we won’t need three hundred pounds of flour this year.  Forrest will only be joining us for Christmas break, so the cookie jar will empty at a much slower rate, and freshly baked bread will last us an extra day or so.

Yes, I’m ready, thought nothing but sun and mild temperatures are in the forecast.

Will I complain about that?

I think not… What I will do is lace up my hikers, or saddle up my horse and enjoy…

46

/ Gin Getz / 17 Comments

Days are as deep as we allow ourselves to dive, and life is as rich as we make it.  Ok, so it’s my birthday, and although I’m not looking for the extra love and attention (no, really…well… maybe… sort of…), these days always bring out a bit of selfishness in us all, and draws out our contemplative nature.  Another year gone; another one starting.

I’ll start with words of wisdom shared with my son, Forrest.

  1. Start being today the person you wish to be tomorrow.
  2. Remember, it may be what you do NOT do that you could regret when you one day look back upon your life, not what you have done.

 

46.  Somehow that sounds much older than 45.  Middle aged. Mature. Maybe it’s time to grow up.  Instead, I learn to accept that a part of me never will.  Childlike is not a crime.  I can live with it.  I can love it.  As I tend to do with the playful nature of my husband.  Maybe Growing Up is over rated.

Twenty years ago I didn’t think that.  Fun as I may have had back then, I looked at age as freedom.  Assuming age brings wisdom (and really, that is questionable, but probable, as long as we keep our eyes, mind and hearts open). Wisdom opens doors.  Within one self as well as out in the world.

Wisdom comes not only with age but with love of learning, love of living.  And isn’t that a wonderfully childlike state of being?  At any age.

So here’s to accepting growing older without completely growing up. Ever.

And all the while, being open for wiser days ahead.