The adventure of standing still.

November 23, 2013 / Gin Getz / 9 Comments

Morning, warming by the fire, with coats and hats and mittens hanging, dripping, drying. Outside, the snow continues, amasses, piles a heavy load. Just back from feeding horses. They are worked up, snorting and running about because there’s a big old bull moose out there who doesn’t get that he’s not welcome. Now safe and warm inside, I watch from the big south window at them milling around, but they’re still upset and won’t put their heads down to eat. All but Norman, who has his head down and wastes no time on such silly things that the others can take care of.

Evening, warming by the fire, with coats and hats and mittens hanging, dripping, drying. Just back in from a ski with Gunnar along the river, oddly still open and full and shiny black against the flat white landscape. Blurred lines in heavy snow. Soft silhouettes of geese, duck, hawk and eagle. Now warming my hands and pulling out dry clothes before heading back out to feed again. And still it snows.

Winter. So far, so good.

A big one rolled in and has remains with us for days. White sky, white ground, white on the horses backs, the dog’s nose, deep up to our knees. The truck is out. We are in. Here with a deep winter world.

The horses don’t particularly like it. It’s a warm wet snow which is harder on them than a cold dry one. It won’t last, but the next couple of days might be not fun. They are grouchy, short of temper, snip and snap and one another. I will not work with them now, but feed quickly, and walk away and wait for this to pass.

The adventure of standing still.

Remaining.

Time to write.

And to keep up with friends.

“A very simple life. I make it full yet not stuffed and filled, if that makes sense. Time to walk, think, write, watch the snow fall, and feel the cold outside then the warmth of the woodstove inside. We all rate success differently. I wouldn’t trade my life for anyone’s. And still a creation in progress, as you too show me, life always is, always changing.”

“I need seasons. Here, there, where ever. I need that balance of time like putting your garden to bed, letting it be, fallow and dormant, and then reawakening after a deep slumber. In summer I work. In winter, I dream. I know that’s kind of weird, and very extreme, but it works for me, and connects me more to the land.”

“Professionally, as a writer, I do not know. What is my responsibility? As writers… what matters most? A wonderful challenge presents itself. Truth or beauty? Responsibility, environmental concerns, social ethos, pathos, or simply… entertainment?”

Except for my love of my family and four leggeds, my love of the land is my greatest passion. Unlike Mr. Berry, who said, “I have never not known where I belong,” I have spent a lifetime searching. I have been on this mountain only a dozen years. I tried to leave her. I could not. Now I watch her standing strong in this volatile time when the trees are dying – not just a few, patches here and there – but mountain after mountain after mountain in these great big waves that turn blue and green into red and brown. And then I saw her burn. A hundred thousand acres up to a few miles away from my front door. Not much press. Not much people around here. Just trees. And trees don’t scream.

So… I’ll write. (No, I don’t scream much.) I’ll carry the burden of the world we love because we are here, we see, we feel, we are intimately connected with the land. And because the land can’t speak for herself. Or maybe she does. We just need to listen.

I’m no greenie, no environmentalist, in fact, I don’t want a label and don’t want to side up with anyone from behind a desk who likes to call me names. Maybe mother, wife, horsewoman, fencer, builder, baker, cook and cleaner… Mountain Mama. That’s about it.

Now it’s time this woman wrote about what she sees.

Final thought to leave you with.

On aging.

Forever looking forward.

When I was a little girl, I used to flip through the fashion magazines and say, “When I grow up, I want to look like that.” By the time I was twenty, I did.

Now at nearly fifty, I see a picture of a beautiful, classy older woman, like Doris Lessing at 90, and still I say the same.

“When I grow up…”

A quiet voice from a high, harsh mountain.

And yet today, she feels so soft.

The burden and blessings of home.

November 18, 2013 / Gin Getz / 9 Comments

The burden and blessings of home.

The dirt road out (and in) blends into white hillside, disappears with the last storm, strong winds set it smooth, a white horizon before the black timber. Defining lines disappear.

(before the last storms, looking back at the burned mountains from far down at the paved road)

Naked aspen and stripped spruce hold the bounty of another early snow, fat and plump and plentiful on otherwise blatant branches.

Smoke in a steady stream trickles into the pink morning sky from the cabin I find myself living in this time.

Passing time. A season. This one of change. After a decade of dormancy.

Funny it would be now, in the snow, the time of year you’d expect us to curl into our cave and slow our breathing and wait out the long white season.

Instead we’re out there
in
of
a part of
together
with the elements

In snow so deep the horses have stopped pawing
we learn to breathe again.

Deep powder
Deep thoughts
Bury my burdens and cover the past
Watching each flake land on my hand
Remain for but a moment
Whilst a fairy dances within each one
Then turns to a drop of water against my humid flesh
And disappears
As will my burden
Vanish into the comfort of husband, home, four legged friends and a warm afternoon.

Maybe it will melt out. Some of it. Not all. Not for this season.

It begins. I accept, embrace, welcome with open arms.

The season of white descends, I tell to you with a shiver of excitement.

Silence in the snow as the river begin to freeze and traffic (what little remained from summer) has come to a halt. No one’s around for miles and miles and miles. No where I need to go. And next thing you know, the snowmobiles are out. At least the big old beast of a work sled with its gentler purr than the play sleds. Hauling fire wood. The best use yet for all these beetled killed trees. My version of a controlled burn. In my woodstove. And second best is this: Logs to build the walls of the next home we shall build together.

Death upon our own land becomes new life.

A grove of young trees
Needles blue green
Laden with seed cones
Red and ripe with life

Odd how beautiful and exotic it seems now here in the snow. Something I remember but have not seen in so long.

(Desire cultivating devotion.)

Lettuce seeds in the planters along the front windows have sprouted.
Things grow.

We say it’s too late to leave Nature alone to manage Herself, but I laugh to see her power of rejuvenation no matter how much we mess up. I may not have much hope in humans, but the Earth, I think she’ll be just fine.

Seeing the forest for the trees. Alternating with seeing the trees for the forest. Every needle. Brown and fallen on the snow.

And then suddenly.
The young ones bust through the whitewashed landscape defiantly. Holding the colors of the deep sea. Here so far from the warmth and waves.

Are we better to live our lives as sailors navigating in the wind
Or the seed gently accepting and landing where the wind will take her
Or do we strive to balance the two
Manning our own ship, but when the storm sends us off course, recovery may be found only in letting go.

I let go.
Toss the seeds to the wind and will see them only again when they have flowered.
Their sweet smell will draw me back.

last seasons remains
blushing
in the Early winter
as the young lover peeking from beneath
the comforter of freshly
fallen snow

I leave you then with this, this week, words of wisdom not my own, but those shared by the wise, wonderful, beautiful soul, Amy, of SoulDipper. She who sees well before me what seems to take me so long:

So be it.

I am done.

And back to living.

Where I’m at. (taking time for personal updates)

November 12, 2013 / Gin Getz / 5 Comments

Remedy for an empty nest.

Fill the nest back up.
Or at least the barn.
Get new horses.

OK, so it might not be a cure, but I swear it helps.

Kinda strange not knowing
where on Earth he is Now.

As far away as one can go.
The end of the Earth. Really.

Somewhere between here and there,
I know that much.
Not much more.

Heading south for winter, he is.
All the way to the South Pole.
Can’t get much further away than that.

And I am pleased, and proud,
and know he is living life
full and rich and brave and strong
and what more could a mother, woman and friend
hope for?

(Update from late last night:
He’s there!
A day ahead and a world away.
And what can I say but
-stupidly-
Keep warm)

We remain
Home.
Bob and Gunnar and me
a couple of old cats
a bunch of good horses
And a few I’m going to try to teach.

So much to do and
our list keeps growing
fantasies of idle winter days
replaced with
lessons in time management
we had our idle time this summer
when we should have been
busy

try to count on things, make plans, assume
More often than not it turns out
so different than what I had hoped for

but if different is neither bad nor wrong
then why can’t I stop planning
learn to let go and just go with the flow

because really you know
what a disaster that would be
when at the end of the day
if I lived like that

we’d all be sitting around starving
wishing I had thought earlier about
what we’ll eat for dinner

These are the six months I live for
the easier ones to leave
the hardest ones
the ones that have become me
are me

and nothing no one no where else
allow this wild time

Time to release
my wild side

Intoxication
Of the elevation

Bob’s driving home and I’m watching the digital numbers on the thermometer on the rear view mirror drop. Ten degrees as we climb our mountain. By morning, the thermometer reads one below zero (-18 C). Bob’s up before daylight rebuilding the fire then climbs back in bed. The cats have been sleeping on him and I am wrapped around him and clinging tight to keep warm. He is the only one now very warm, but probably can’t sleep with all of us latched to him.

Some days I wonder what the heck we’re doing living here. Later on, that very same day, I wonder how I could ever leave.

Finally I leave you with these words for thought.

An observation on the Forest Service.

For those who live here, see.

We are willing to make observations based upon what is before us, what is happening, and common sense. It’s a matter of survival here, responsibility, connection.

On the other hand, many of those that come in to try to Manage (their term, not mine, though I believe even they are beyond maintaining such claims here and now) well, do as their told, say what they are supposed to, do their best to maintain of control of that which they will never.

My apologies to the wonderful men and women who remain within this Big Business because they care, and actually do see. I know there are plenty of you. The Cindys and Annes and so many I’ve had the honor to know, observe and work with… But I see so much more, and I’m tired of it, seeing the nothings happen and the so much spoken, the time wasted and the obvious ignored. I am sorry.

The latest bit of paid propaganda from one of their finest Yes Men is entitled (I swear to you): “Dead trees do not equal more fires… maybe.”

Really. When you’re done laughing, let me tell you this. As the title suggests and the piece confirms, it is no more than a way to get around admitting they have no clue…

However, rather than admit that then be free to open their eyes, look and think, they recommend this: let’s hold off on common sense, observing the obvious, and let’s wait for those scientific studies to be completed… which usually take a while, as we’re stuck sitting on our hands and can’t quite make it out there … there, where it is happening… there, where all of those folks who live, see.

What do you really need to comprehend the world around you, including the greatest of mysteries?

Beyond the front door.

October 18, 2013 / Gin Getz / 1 Comment

Bear tracks in the snow
on the front porch of the Little Cabin

he cleans up the last of my homemade cheese
sour and spoiled and I forgot to clean up

he steps on the bucket with which I gather wood ash
from the old cook stove
Crushes the metal side

and smears the mirror we keep outside under
which we hang wet coats
To dry in the intense high altitude sun

How many times have I see such marks
on the outside of cabin windows or inside of the old dump truck
stinking and smelling of last winter’s trash

who but me, my son wonders,
claps their hands in glee
to know her porch is chosen and shared

Wild enough
a rosebud
Ripe to bloom

awaiting patiently on my front porch
and all I need to do is reach

what I have been waiting for
may finally be here.

in my temple

outside
beneath heavy clouds
grey at noon
pink in evening
anointing me with soft snow

I sit back on hard rock in cold wind
and feel the bliss of eternal passion
in the wail of the still open waters
tears before the silence
of the deep freeze

Though far too much for me in summer
the crowds within a half mile of this dirt road
I have never found any place
As wild
as it is
in winter

Here

as far away from traffic and telephone
and gossip and a grocery store
from sound and synthetic stimulation
from humidity and heavy air
open trails and exposed flesh

far away from you

The wilds call

Here I have wide white wild wind
and really, I wonder,
what more do I need

maybe I already have

enwrap with
wind and white and wide open
remote, removed, far, far away

and for now I find myself
Here
Home

and am glad to find the world surrounding me
A world you know nothing about
and care for even less

or perhaps you have a picture
of where you once were that looked a little like this
But it wasn’t won’t be and is not

for this here and now what I see and what I do
Is mine
and not all of it do I chose to share

glimpses I allow
Open the door and let in the wind
with a swirl of brown leaves and white flakes of snow

and I may let out the smell of
fresh bread and warmth from the woodstove and
the sound of my boys’ laugher and

my dog barking and the cats purring and
my heavy breath and labored beat of my
heart as I have only just returned from

seeking out the last of the wilder beasts
from the big back yard a place where few remain
Where even big game seeks solace in lower ground

They say it’s the highest, hardest
place to hunt in the Lower 48

what I hunt
is just as elusive
within me

Winter here is a more wild, harsh and remote

place than any I have been to

any place I choose to be

though summers at times are hard to endure

This one was different
drought, fire, floods
evacuating all but us,
silence like winter
only it was warm
And we were waiting
in eerie silence
for something
more than flames and smoke
or the feeling that maybe it was time to leave
stuck in silence in a time there should have been children laughing
And the only noise you heard was
rumors as destructive as wildfire

I won’t forget this summer
and I can’t say my memories will be fond
Though you know how that can happen with time

There will be no ribbons for you my friend
only miles beside me
beside our horses

freedom you tell me you
need
spoken in loud barks

after a coyote
a half a mile away and
you’re hot on his heels

reckless they may say
but I see a heart bigger bolder and braver
than any I have known

at times I confess I thought to
Train him, teach him, subdue him
and break him like a old swayback horse

finally I have come to know
These things can’t be taught
and come only when we learn to let go

the wild beast that ran away
And when I awoke
on my doorstep he was waiting for me

Wintersong

October 11, 2013 / Gin Getz / 3 Comments

Wintersong
sung in silence
hung low and dark
where even secrets be not told

as snow falls heavy
hard on still soft ground
not yet ready for approaching
freeze and black and

long nights and endless blinding white
leaving her mark
covering traces
evidence of suffocation

It comes earlier this year
every year
how does one keep track
when tomorrow is as unsure as memories

the view subsides
and voice is muffled
whispers left unanswered
screams a part of the wind

But wake my friend
and see the last signs of life
defiant blades of withered grass still standing strong
and the last leaves tired and shriveled holding tight to

bits of color yellow gold
before the white wash comes and covers
and warmth from the sun burning
through to one tiny bit of

exposed pale flesh and
maybe
that will be all
until the end of spring

Labored poem of love and leaves

October 10, 2013October 10, 2013 / Gin Getz / 4 Comments

~

~

From the open window I hear
the metallic guttural cry of
elk bugling in the back yard

descending on around so near my home
covertly in the black and cold
of this arduous night

tell tale signs of
snow in higher grounds rousing bulls to
drive their herds down

and on the roof above me
continued heavy tapping of the last of
swollen beads of rain

as the temperature continues to fall
and I await the ensuing silence
telling me in the wordless way

it has all turned to snow

even down here
Down here at nearly
ten thousand feet high.

And the poem I so labored
is no longer valid

No longer matters
No matter works

about the graying sky and stripped leaves and
the last of the golden ground

But I wanted to write it, to
share it, to help you see it, and
Now I wake to a whiter world

and wonder what part of it matters
What part of it did I think you’d like
Would you want to hear and see

The picture I was painting for you in words
And what part of it can I
crumple and use to start

the morning fire
while I sit before the flames
coffee cup in hand

watching the steam rise
and words burn.

abandoned branches
bequeathed bare
suddenly slender nimble fingers
orchestrating a secret song in the wind
luring in the long winter

and the golden
leaves are pressed back
into the earth from which they once were born
seeds to bloom again
next summer

Places like this.

October 3, 2013 / Gin Getz / 2 Comments

There are days I must wander
and wonder where and why
and keep going only

to find
myself at
places like this

and then
it all comes together or perhaps
no longer matters

just becomes
a matter of trust
and I go along no matter

how far and how hard and how hungry.
And my eyes cloud with tears and
the wilds tease and the wind

embraces and the mountain leads
me to where I do not know
but I trust and my dog follows and we go

and there we are.
And really,
I ask you,

my friend,
what matters
more?

And then there was rain.

September 13, 2013 / Gin Getz / 2 Comments

~

~

Days lost in the fog of fever
While rain pours outside silver smeared windows

Another day it rains
Now the feast drowns the famine
Clouds cling to the wet hillsides
Like lonely children
Lost
Trying to find their place
Amongst the blackened moss and fallen needles

The dog stays close
He has never seen me sick
Heard me cough
Remarkable the sensitivity of our four legged friends
How much I have to learn from them
Start by looking
Listening

The sound of the hard rain against the metal roof
The rush of the running creek
That has been silent since spring

Now I am grateful for the beetle kill
In a twisted sort of way
Presently burning in my woodstove
A plentiful supply

In lower grounds
Flooding streets where pavement breaks
And here above the asphalt

We are washed clean

I remember every person who reached out
During the fires here
And each offer for us and our critters to stay
When it was our time to be at risk

I remember every person who did not

Which do I choose to be
Now that I have the choice
Lest I forget my family and friends
As their time of need
Swells upon them

My first journal was a diary, one of those little baby blue faux leather books with a decorative lock and key in which I put false hope. Paul Proknoun, my boyfriend at the time, stole it, ripped it open with ease as the faux leather was no more than thin cardboard, and inspired by what he read, I suppose, shared wild but untrue stories and a passed a photo around class he must have torn from his father’s hidden Playboy magazine of a woman he said was me. I was not yet in a training bra and although in hindsight perhaps I should have been flattered, I was not. I was mad.

Privacy is not something I take lightly. You see where and how I chose to live, don’t you? And trust once lost takes close to forever to regain.

Perhaps it was this experience and resulting anger and fear that later inspired me to burn ten years of journals and memories of teenage angst rather than risk them falling into the wrong hands. As if anyone would have really found them that interesting.

And perhaps it is because of this infatuation with privacy and trust that I raised my son with my journal open at my bed stand and knew it was as safe as I kept him… and his.

I imagine there was a time or two when in his youthful anger and inevitable mother-hatred stages he may have stolen a peak as I imagine too the weight of guilt that then pressed upon him was punishment enough. Besides, I bet there was nothing there of interest to his then adolescent mind. Middle aged woman angst?

Similarly I have trusted my husband like few I know can. And I consider this an irreplaceable and indispensable element of our beautiful marriage.

Trust.

In a big plastic storage box from Wal-Mart stacked on a cedar shelf down at the Little Cabin labeled MEMORIES in black sharpie ink are the results of the thirty years since then, that fated year of burning, erasing the past, allowing room for the future, now tucked in a box filled with spiral bound pen and ink recollections that may never be seen a second time. And more than likely, none of those words and stories are worth a second glance. At least, I don’t need to remember them.

There still remained plenty of angst. Writing about loneliness from a moonlit desert with my head and shoulders sticking out of the tent in which I found myself alone, escaping another failed relationship. Frustration, poverty, hurt, confusion… Finding nature while scouring the New Mexico mountains for the elusive magic mushroom and seeking solace in the solitude found on the top of a wild mountain with my dogs on each side of my skinny tanned legs sticking boldly out of my levi jean cut offs.

Maybe someday I’ll read them over. Do something with them. Maybe not. Maybe someday my son will want to read them – I told him he could – though I think he knows me well enough and respects my past as… past. Over and done with. Maybe a curious grandchild, a little girl who sees me as the strong tough woman I am now (or will be hopefully when and if she comes into my life) and finds comfort in knowing that I wasn’t always this way. That I too have weaknesses. Faults. Soft mooshy spots. Insecurities. Problems that exist only in my head, but there are pretty weighty. That life isn’t always easy, and probably isn’t meant to be, because easy for the most part is pretty dull…

To date, I can say my life has been neither.

I don’t know why I am sharing this with you now
I guess I’m just feeling reflective
Thoughts swirling on the shifting surface of brown waters

Imagination flowing
With the waters rushing down our dirt road
Chartreuse green pasture
And wild waters of the Rio Grande

Writing from a state
In which I am living
But from which I may never belong

A bunch of pretty pictures and one not so happy poem

May 29, 2013June 24, 2013 / Gin Getz / 8 Comments

Thoughts in spring time

And the sun shines

and warms and

tells us it’s all ok

and we smile and

Look around as aspen leaves

open and green the hillsides

that otherwise remind me

of death

And the light is high and flat

and my cheeks burn

and we say, yes, this is how

it should be, but

something deep inside

is nagging and we try

not to listen but

it won’t go

away. And then

we have another

glass of wine and wonder

if we can wash it

away but all it does is

make it louder and then

We want the rain and

the snow and the clouds and

darkness and want to turn

within and feel instead of

see and then we know we’ll

find what we are looking

for. Do you know? I wonder

if I ever will.

Colorado

May 13, 2013May 14, 2013 / Gin Getz / 5 Comments

You wake to the smell of the familiar lover you find yourself next to in the blinding sun of early morning spreading across the pillows like spilled milk and you wonder how on earth you got your self in this position again.

Place in parts. The individual intimate parts of the land you know. Some say “like the back of my hand” but I liken it more to knowing the back of your lover’s hand. Or back of his neck, the soft spot under his arm, the muscles, the moles, the curls of hair and prick of untrimmed toe nails. Knowing the land as you know the lover, a shared intimacy that comes with time and touch and silence and lying down together waiting for something or nothing to happen. And is it these private insights that change your relationship from lust to love. From sightseeing, to being at home. From being an observer, to being a part, blending, belonging.

At first it is the big picture that pleases the eye, draws you in as the sultry dancer seduces with waving silks and swaying hips, and you stand there mesmerized but too afraid to touch. Time passes. You begin to see closer. Flaws, imperfections, rolls and wrinkles. Beauty when the veils are dropped and the land remains raw and real and exposed as the leafless trees of early spring and attraction is not as bright but must be felt perhaps more than seen. This has happened here. I wonder if it will happen there.

Another beautiful day in paradise. Another beautiful place. From one to another. Here, there, No, it is not all the same.

Paradise lost and found. There if you’re looking but if you look too hard, say, for something specific, the big picture or the sudden change or the answer to all your problems, you may only find disappointment. Who knows what you’ll find?

A river of tears

cutting

through a crying land

I had forgotten the tremendous loss of life that spreads around me here, a skeleton’s cold embrace, and am told to see only the green but half my world is turning brown. And sadness, loss, despair are no less part of life. The part we too often feel or are told “it is best” to brush under the carpet. Until we begin to see the carpet bulge. The hillsides turning brown. Dare we lift and look in earnest or do we prefer to wear those blinders and see only what we want to, what we are told to see?

Every day this week rain, hail, snow and sun. A year in a day. Every day. Here is Colorado. Where we’ve had snow every month but July, and even then have dodged snow banks or crossed drifts lingering from the season before while horseback in the high country. The world above tree line where air is as thin as skimmed milk and the sun as intense as wild fire.

Colorado.

Where our pasture is shared with an equal number of working horses and wild elk and they graze comfortably together.

Where moose droppings are left outside the outhouse.

Where warmth is rare. Mid day for maybe a month and still those nights will bring a chill.

This morning the smell of damp earth. Familiar earth. Earth on which I have birthed and buried, laughed and cried. Land on which I’ve built a home, raised a child, fallen in love, and seen seasons come and go and familiar faces do the same and where I’ve felt unwelcome in my own home for far too long and stories swell like stormy waters I never meant to navigate and I am still just looking for a place to belong.

Seeing signs. I suppose we see what we want to see. Sometimes we look for confirmations. At least I do. I take a pen and little notebook in my jacket pocket every day when I hike or ride. You never know when inspiration strikes, and I’ve found it’s quite likely when out clearing my mind. I’m hiking along the trail across river where the snow banks still remain hidden from the sun. I’ve gone far enough for today. I’m supposed to meet the boys back at the bridge for a mate. I’m already late. You know how it is once you get going. Sometimes you go too far. At least, that’s known to happen to me. So, I’m maybe a third of the way back, back tracking. Inspiration strikes. I reach for my pen and find only a new hole in my old pocket. Damn it, that pen could be anywhere. Think about it. It could be back up the trail, or anywhere between here and home. I take maybe a half dozen steps and there, no more than ten feet from where I noticed it missing, is my pen in the middle of the trail, waiting for me to write the words I did not want to forget.

Another sign. I tell myself what I have so many times before. Leap and the net appears. Only this time it is scary. I guess it usually is, but more often than not we can only see the situation directly before us and forget about the challenges we tackled six months ago, the last time we leaped. Anyway, this time it involves my career. Writing, representation, selling myself, or not, and I hate this part and had been hoping it was taken care of at least for now, only I sort of knew that wasn’t really the case because I was going against my personal beliefs by working with someone I didn’t like working with because I was pretty sure he didn’t like working with me. My ego is too fragile for that.

Stay safe and don’t risk change and remain exactly where you are even though you know where you are is not where you belong. Or… leap.

Well, what do you think I did? I wrote my agent and told him it was time to change. So once again I tell myself, leap and the net will appear. Only instead, on this afternoon’s hike, I’m thinking about this, a little bit scared and a lot bummed out, and a feather appears in the middle of the trail where I happen to be walking. And not just any feather, but a hawk feather. And I’m guessing “my” hawk who came back to visit us so late in the season last year after the ground had been covered with white and the other such birds had long since left.

This was the sign I needed.

Leap, and maybe the answer will be even better than falling into a net. Maybe, just maybe, you’ll spread your wings and learn to fly.