Tell of Woe

Well it seems I'm in full-on blogger mode again, which means I've reverted to my Great Obsession.

It makes me want to laugh. Or cry.

It's finally snowing in Boulder. The wind is howling and we could get as much as a foot by tomorrow morning, along with sub-zero temperatures. Counting today I have four more days before I have to go back into the office. I plan to spend the majority of that time fireside knocking out a few books, doing a little blogging, and working on my novel.

So what brought my obsessive feelings back? Partly I wanted them to come back. I missed them, if that makes sense. I guess it's how I've come to define myself. It makes me wonder how I'd feel if I ever were to achieve my fantasy. I mean imagine you spent your whole life fantasizing of, say, going to Greece. Then you finally get to go. Upon returning home, what then? What comes next? Would you be satisfied thereafter? Or would you find that it was the obsession with Greece, rather than Greece itself, that you actually needed?

Partly my obsession was brought back by just not being at work. I haven't been in the office since last Wednesday. It's now Thursday of the following week. In the past week I've been to the Leanin' Tree Museum of Western Art twice, and that always catapults me back into hardcore Western fantasizing. It's one of the best little museums I've ever been to and the only art museum I've ever loved. It's in Boulder, it's free and open to the public, and it's usually very quiet so it's a good place to meditate on the things near and dear to my heart. And the art collection is amazing. Even my parents loved it. Often I'll go alone during some off-time when I'm sure to be the only one there and I'll spend an hour or two gazing into an intangible world that captivates me. Every sculpture, every painting is a moment frozen in time - yet they all tell a story, however brief, and give one a glimpse of what was and what would be, even if the stories are only based loosely on historical events.

The deep lines painted on an old Cherokee woman's face as she stares off into the desert at something only she can see; the cowboy about to be crushed by his sun fishing horse; the war party in the pale moonlight; the haunting spirit horse mourning the death of his warrior; the epic struggle between hunter and mountain lion; the tenderness of two cowboys at Thanksgiving in a rugged and unforgiving world; the packers after a successful hunt; breathtaking western landscapes with all their minute detail and a thousand things more. These images move me and haunt me; they fill my soul with something I can't get from the daily grind of "normal" life.

And finally, my obsessive feelings were brought back by getting out into the mountains. Rocky Mountain National Park is what keeps me sane, and it's not even the most perfect slice of the American West. That title belongs to Yellowstone, the only in-tact ecosystem in the lower 48 that still looks and functions more or less like it did before the arrival of the white man and all of his destructive ways. I think that when the day comes that I visit Yellowstone I won't want to leave. Wolves, grizzlies, wolverines, bison, untrammeled forests and meadows, snow-capped peaks and untamed rivers - Yellowstone is the last refuge of Wild America outside of Alaska.

For lunch today I sat down with a warm bowl of leftover homemade chicken soup: potatoes, carrots and dried oregano from the garden and chicken from a local farm. I served it with a leftover buttermilk biscuit I made from scratch for breakfast yesterday. In the glow of the Christmas tree I watched the snow falling outside, warmed by my soup and my thoughts. This is heaven for me, this moment.

I'm a philosopher. That's what I really am, no bones about it. I probably wouldn't make for an exceptional cowboy; I'm not reckless enough. I probably wouldn't make for an exceptional mountain man; I may not be tough enough. I don't make an exceptional analyst or businessman; I don't care enough. What drives me is a desire to become enlightened and to be inspired. What thrills me is to enlighten and inspire others. What comforts me is nature. What satisfies me is purpose.

I don't want to be a scientist; they care only for what makes a thing tick. I don't want to be a businessman; they care only for making money. I don't want to be an adventurer; they care only for the thrill of the moment. I don't want to be a politician; they care only for winning the game.

I think my calling in life is to be a teacher, a writer, a naturalist, a philosopher, and a non-academic historian. These things I am now, as much as I can be. I do want to know about science, I do want to have business sense, and I do want to understand the game. We need professionals in all areas I suppose. Thing is, I don't want to specialize in the activities. I want a bird's eye view of all of them, to understand how they form our world. I want to know who we are, where we came from, where we are going, why we do what we do, or don't. I want to inspire people to think beyond what makes a thing tick, to care for more than just money, and to realize that the game has no value but that which we assign to it. I despise the concept of money and accumulating wealth in monetary form. I despise the corporate ladder and the Western concept of "progress." Alas, this is the world in which I live, so I struggle to find a way to "earn a living" from the things I love, rather than from the unsatisfying activities that I know will work but leave me feeling empty. My body is clothed and nourished by my career success, but my soul is left destitute.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

I Wanna Be a Cowboy

The ad read:

"Ranch outside Gardiner, Montana is looking for a full time year-round experienced wrangler/ranch hand. You must have excellent knowledge of horses and tack, have general equine medical knowledge, trail clearing and packing, have the ability to maintain neat horse records and report routinely to ranch manager."

I think I'll cry myself to sleep tonight and try not to think about frying my eyes out in the cube farm on Monday.

Or maybe I'll quit the cube farm and find myself a ranch job. We only live once.

Beauty in Diversity

Late this afternoon I was cruising in my truck down a country road out on the eastern plains. The weather had been cloudy for days, and this morning rain finally started to fall. It was a cold, wet spring day and I was taking the long way home from the dairy.

All at once the rain stopped. As if the breath of God were blowing down on a frothy cup of chai, the clouds ahead of me broke apart and the sunlight poured through. In an instant I was under a blue sky. The rolling green countryside, dotted with big red barns and sprinkled with horses, stretched in all directions. The Rocky Mountains stood hazy and dark in the distance, and the world felt so alive. So perfect. Some lonely old country song came on the radio. I smiled. I cruised.

My day started early with the farmer's market, as every Saturday during the growing season does. Today we had the first of the asparagus! Unless you've eaten thick, tender stalks from an old plant cut early in the season, and just hours after harvesting, you've never had asparagus. That crap in the grocery store, even the stuff from Whole Foods, is only asparagus in appearance. I also picked up fresh mushrooms, a few pounds of crisp baby spinach, two dozen eggs from chickens that eat grass and bugs, ten pounds of anasazi and black beans, cider from last fall's apples (spent the winter in the deep freeze), purple potatoes, white and purple onions, green garlic, fresh goat cheese and a few other things. This afternoon, on the way out to the dairy for raw milk, I stopped by Rocky Plains to buy local, grass-fed bison, pork and chicken - steaks, pork chops, sausages, ground round, roast, marrow bones, Rocky Mountain oysters, bacon, etc.

I can honestly say the highlight of my week, and one of the highlights of my life, is the farmer's market. I can't tell you how happy - how downright giddy - I get over local, farm-fresh produce and the people who produce it. It isn't just the superior flavor and freshness or the nutritional value. It's more than the community aspect too. It's more even than the "green" aspect and the self-sufficiency factor. A big part of it is just the simplicity of the system. It appeals to me on such a deep level. There are no factories, no complex and convoluted chains of corporate fat cats, no elaborate distribution networks, no chemicals, toxics or synthetic additives, no vile marketers trying to invent new "products" with flashy branded labels, no wasteful packaging, no nutrition labels, no fads, no gimmicks. It's just sunshine, some nice farmers, some beautiful produce, and some very happy customers and neighbors. I dig that in a big way.

This year I'm planning to supplement my diet with some wild game. My ultimate fantasy is providing all of my own food, and having no use for the industrial food system. I shopped for hunting rifles after lunch. It's been a few years since I shot a gun and I haven't owned a gun since I left Texas. I haven't been hunting since my early college days. I took a few shots on the rifle range. There are a lot of options, but I think I've settled on a sweet Remington 700, vintage 1979. It's got a gorgeous woodgrain stock and all metal sights - today they're mostly plastic. This one has been well cared for and lightly used. It's a very good find. It's a perfect all-around hunting rifle, from coyote to elk. I'm prone to impulse buying, so I decided to think on it a few days. If it's still at the shop next week, then it was meant to be mine.

I have to say it has been a long time since I set foot in a gun shop. It was worth it for the culture shock alone. This shop is in Weld County, which is about as close in culture to rural Texas as Colorado gets. In fact, while I was there Texas came up in conversation. Some of the patrons were swooning over Texas' legendarily pro-gun politics. The employees' uniforms had the following quote printed on the back: "I'll keep my money, my guns and my freedom. You can keep the 'change'" with a badly drawn illustration of an American flag and a gun. A poster on the wall showed pictures of Obama and McCain on dollar bills, with the text, "Don't blame me, I voted for the American."

I had to laugh. My only other option was to blow a gasket. Not to get off topic, but I've recently reconnected with a whole lot of my old high school friends and acquaintances through the magic of Facebook. Probably ninety percent of them would think those shirts and posters were right-on. Even a half-way educated person would see the utter ridiculousness of them, but we're not talking about educated people here. Not even close to half-way. But does that make them bad people? I went to school with those kids, some of them for twelve years. I know they're not bad people. I knew them before we were old enough for politics and religion to come between us. The guys at the gun shop were just as nice as they could be. They were so willing to help and talk about this and that, share hunting stories, give tips on scoping out used guns, etc. They weren't pushy salesmen. I distinctly felt like they wanted to help. But the tiny world they live in doesn't allow them to see very far beyond their own noses. You know, I can remember a time when I supported George Bush. Yes, I mean DUBYA. I can even remember a time in high school when I thought segregation was a good thing, that blacks and Mexicans were all dirty freeloaders that couldn't be trusted. I went to church and Sunday school - I even voluntarily got Baptized because I thought it was the only way for me to go to Heaven. It makes me chuckle now. I remember the first time I saw a man with long hair. I was a child. I cried. My Aunt Kiku (Karen Sue - but as a baby I said, "Kiku!" and it stuck), among the most tolerant of the family (and that's not saying a lot), tried to explain that he wasn't a bad person just because he had long hair. It kills me to admit this, but I can remember a time long ago - long before I'd even heard of Hitler or the Holocaust - that I though genocide wouldn't be such a bad idea. Of course I didn't know the term. Hell I didn't know much of anything. I wasn't stupid, just incredibly naive, sheltered, brainwashed. I had no real concept of many of the ideas I was taught. Black people were just the scary homeless figures that lived in downtown Houston, a place our family very rarely ventured. They weren't real to me. They were like boogiemen - a scary thing I'd heard about but never really seen. It was easy to imagine wiping them out. Just like vampires and werewolves. All I knew was my tiny little world in Huffman and what the adults told me. Small Texas towns don't allow a lot of room for thinking, questioning, learning anything at all about the world beyond. I knew all non-white races only by their horribly racist names. But it was normal. We weren't angry or spewing bile when we said those words. It's just what they were, in our tiny little world views.

Moving off to college was rough for me. It was shocking. It was eye-opening. But I, unlike many of my old high school friends and acquaintances, DID go to college. I asked questions. I traveled. I experienced just a little more of the world. But I think the greatest driving force in my life was my sexuality. That, more than anything else, forced me out of the tiny world of Huffman. It was the hardest thing I've ever gone through. And I suppose that even today, as "extreme" as I would be considered by my hometown, I'm still tied to those roots. I still love the simplicity of country life. I love trucks and rifles and cowboy hats. I have no desire to be some kind of backwoods dumbass and get into bar fights (like plenty of people I've known in my life). I guess I just like the simplicity and the honest ruggedness that these things symbolize. Yet I've noticed that when I go home to Texas, especially when I visit my family or very old friends, I feel compelled to put away the cowboy hat. I want to wear fashionable city clothes and put on airs and talk about my job and politics and religion. I want to conduct myself in a way that separates me from them and puts me above them. I guess I want to say, "I am NOT like you!" But when I come back home - the home I've made for myself - I relax back into a way of life that, in many ways, fits well with my Texas roots. Isn't that curious?

My life is a dichotomy. I've said this before. There are two people living in my head: a Texas good 'ol boy and an educated liberal activist. Now if that ain't a fine how-do-you-do! I don't claim to know everything. In fact, the older I get the more I realize I know nothing. I don't want to fight with the conservatives because I believe in Obama. I don't want to fight with the liberals because I drive a Super Duty. At best I just want to be friendly with everyone. If not that, then at least just let me live and do my thing.

I do find a degree of entertainment value in being a Super Duty-driving, gun-owning, cowboy hat-wearing Obama supporter who gives money to Greenpeace. I guess it takes all kinds.

To Everything There Is a Season

A few tidbits of news, for what they're worth:

1. I'm lovin' the gym again. Since I've officially become a philosopher, I've also rediscovered my burning desire to have my arms rip the seams of my shirtsleeves.

2. I buy bananas and I don't care. Yeah I'm still mostly local, but you know, whatever. It's just a banana.

3. I'm taking Mom on her once-in-a-lifetime dream vacation for her birthday in April: Washington, DC. I know it's not all that exotic but she has dreamed of this her whole life (she hasn't gotten out of Texas much.) I've got the tickets, the hotel downtown, and a rough agenda scratched out. I told her tonight and she screamed on the phone. It took her an hour to calm down enough that I felt comfortable letter her hang up. I'm really looking forward to it.

4. I've stopped competing at work. I'm still going to learn some programming because continuing ed is a good thing, but I'm an analyst, not a programmer. I'm not the top analyst, but I get my work done and they're paying me well so I've got nothing to bitch about.

5. I'm buying a new truck. But not yet. The car is great and all, but I'm a truck man. I've already set up a financial plan for getting the ultimate truck, the wet dream of every cowboy or Texan who needs to feel like he's got a ten inch dick. Picture it: 2012 F-350 Super Crew long bed 4x4 Lariat in sterling grey metallic. The new super-clean burning 6.4 liter V8 Turbo Diesel engine (to be introduced next year.) Power everything. Heated leather seats. Navigation system. Towing package. Telescoping mirrors. Cab lights. Heavy duty bumpers, brush guard, fog lights, toolbox, and a whole lotta hell yeah! It's like my last truck, but with no expense spared. Why? Because I can, and because I want it, and that's all the reason I need. Watch out, because when I come home to Texas for Christmas in 2011, daddy's comin' Texas style!

6. Vegans annoy the caca out of me, God bless 'em.

Message

In the wee hours this morning I found myself fighting to stay asleep, to continue a dream I didn't want to wake from. But as it is with these things, my body would have none of it, and I was extracted from my fantasy despite my best efforts.

I dream a lot, and my dreams speak to me. But it isn't often I get a message like this.

I dreamt I was a character who was a hybrid between myself and Jack from the story Brokeback Mountain. I was taller, lankier than my actual self, with blended features both physically and emotionally. I was dressed in a dark brown, comfortably weathered cowboy hat, boots, a blue and white plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled up, faded wranglers and a worn leather belt with a big buckle.

I was floating in a river on a black inner tube, fully dressed. This river was lazy and murky and looked much like the Guadalupe. It flowed through forest and town, through places unknown to me. I remember the sky was dark and gloomy, but I could see. The time was neither night nor day, neither dawn nor dusk, but rather some perpetual, oppressive twilight.

I drifted silently down the river through dark forest, past farms and ranches, past suburban tract-house developments and back through the dark forest. I could see but drifted unseen. I passed one ranch where a fit, strong young cowboy was roping horses. He was completely naked but for his hat and roping gear. He roped a horse by the tail and dragged it to the ground. It lay panting and sweating in the dust, and the cowboy jumped off his horse and strode proudly around it, the glow of his lilly-white skin cutting through the dust that hung in the air.

"You're not a real cowboy!," I scoffed. "A real cowboy would never rope a horse by the tail!"

Other cowboys, fully dressed, gathered around to congratulate him on his accomplishment, seemingly unaware of his state of undress. My protests went unheard, and I was envious of his beauty and success. I drifted on past other homes and ranches and cowboys, past people walking dogs and having backyard barbecues, and no one took any notice of me at all.

Eventually I emerged from a section of dark forest and I drifted by a small house siting near the bank of the river. A familiar looking woman with a ghostly white face and thin red lips was standing in the back yard. As I passed she looked at me and asked with a soft country drawl, "Where ya goin', cowboy?"

"I don't know. I'm just waiting."

"Waiting for what?"

"I don't know."

"Well why don't you come on 'round the house while you're waitin'. I've got some wild stallions need ridin.' They're mostly gentle now. Mostly," she winked and turned away.

I hauled myself out of the river and walked around the front of the small ranch house. There was a dirt drive with a gate across it, which I passed through to get into the back yard. Lights were on inside the house, so I peeked in. To my shock, Memaw was standing in the window looking out at me. She was dressed very smart in a suit and looked healthy and strong. Behind her I could see happy people eating at a long table, but I couldn't see their faces. It looked so comfortable and inviting, but I didn't want to join them.

Memaw looked at me with a stern but concerned look, then walked away from the window.

The pale faced woman pulled an old van into the driveway and up to the gate. I ran to open it, and she drove in. Always she had this seductive smile on her face when she looked at me. It kinda weirded me out.

A moment later Memaw was standing next to me. "She's a washed up old celebrity," Memaw said to me of the pale faced woman. "She's got her eye on you, but you just mind your business and let me deal with her."

"Yes ma'am," I said, and she vanished again.

I spent hours riding the pale faced woman's wild stallions. I rode those broncs like nobody's business. They were beautiful and wild indeed - mostly shades of black and dark brown, with shiny coats, flowing manes and muscled bodies. They were full of the Sprit of the West - wild, magical, untamable. One could put their bodies in a corral, but one could never cage their spirit.

At first I was afraid, but in those moments when I sat atop the first wild horse, the cycle of life and death became clear to me in a way it had never before been. Death was as beautiful and precious as life, for they were two sides of the same coin. The Creator who had given the gift of life had also given the gift of death. They were not the beginning and the end, but rather doorways to different states of being. To waste a moment fearing death was to squander a moment of life. And so, fearlessly, I gave myself completely to the moment and for the first time lived my life to the fullest. I truly felt what it meant to be alive.

When all the horses had been tired out and had no fight left in them, I dropped to my feet and I leaned against the rail, dusty and exhausted, bruised and happy. The pale faced woman approached me. "I noticed you had a particular interest in that wild one there," she said, pointing to a yellow dun with an exceptionally free spirit.

"Yes ma'am," I said, looking into that horses eyes. I'd indeed made a connection with that one. We'd found something, some common ground, something in our souls I can't put to words. He was mine and I was his, and that's all I could articulate.

"Well," said the pale faced woman, "you'd better get him ready. I suspect it's a long journey home."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"He's yours. You gotta take him with you. When soulmates meet nothing can part them. That's how God made it, see."

"But have no place to ride or keep him! I don't even own a..."

A voice from behind interrupted, "What he meant was that he'd be delighted to take that horse." I turned and Memaw was standing there. "Now you go get that horse ready to take home with you," she said to me.

"But Memaw I don't have..."

"Do it now and don't back talk me," she said. "Go on."

"Yes ma'am," I said and walked to get the horse. Later Memaw was next to me again. "Memaw, you know I don't own anything but the shirt on my back. You know I'd love nothing more than to have a ranch and take this horse, but..."

"But nothing," she interrupted. "You've got a ranch. All of the arrangements have been made."

Her face softened. She leaned in, kissed me on the cheek, and whispered, "That's why Memaw is here. I'm always here looking out for you. Now you saddle up that horse and ride home to that beautiful ranch in the mountains just like you always dreamed. Don't ever look back, don't have any regrets. I love you." And with that, she disappeared.

I started to wake up then, but as the dream faded I could see from the back of my yellow dun a vast ranch in a green valley ringed by forested, snow-capped mountains. There was an elk herd grazing by a clear, cold stream. A small cabin sat off in the distance, with warm yellow windows and a thin stream of smoke coming from the chimney. There was no human development for as far as I could see in any direction. There was no traffic, no strip malls, no pollution, no greedy corporations and no office cubicles. There were no clocks. It was just me and my horse, clear blue skies and a wild, unspoiled wilderness. The whole thing hummed to the timeless cycles of the seasons, was beautiful for its own sake, and answered to no one but God. It was heaven, and I was home.

Austin Christmas 2009

I finally made it to Austin yesterday. I loved spending time with my family and friends in Houston, I really did. But I shed no tears for leaving Houston itself. Though, I must say that Houston has really come a long way in the last ten years or so. Many of the ghettos have been redeveloped and are now quite nice. I'm just not a city guy. During the three hour drive from Houston to Austin, I felt my stress melting away as the urbanization dwindled and the rolling hills appeared.

Last night I had a fantastic dinner at East Side Cafe and walked around our beautiful capitol. This morning I immersed myself in Texas culture. Among other things, I bought a proper pair of boots, handmade in Texas of course, and ate barbecue at Rudy's. Then I spent an hour looking at and test driving the new Super Duties. I know, I know. I didn't buy one. I wasn't even tempted. But it doesn't feel right to come to Texas and not spend at least a little time behind the wheel of a truck. I actually found my dream truck - the one I'll be driving when/if the day comes that I get my ranch. But the $60k price tag, the 12 mpg fuel economy and the fact that I live in Boulder rather than on a Texas or Colorado ranch, ensured that, for now, the environmentalist in my head got his way and the cowboy had to keep his mouth shut. The cowboy has at least found some consolation in those new boots.

How Quickly We Forget

Yesterday I saw my Aunt Snoopy, mom's sister, for the first time in nearly a decade. (Nearly our entire family has odd nicknames, and some of us have multiple nicknames that are used interchangeably. I need to sit my mom down and find out where these names came from.) I walked inside of Aunt Snoopy's "new" (to me) house and it was like a blast from the past. My family never seems to evolve. People get older, even get new houses, but it's like they're stuck in a time warp in terms of what's going on in the mind.

I love my Aunt Snoopy. She's as sweet as can be. But she, along with everyone else down in this part of Texas, have reminded me how different my life is today. They've also reminded me why I am the way I am. My Boulder friends wonder why I bought a Ford F350 Super Crew long bed 4x4, love my cowboy hat and dream of a ranch? They need only visit my family in Texas for a day and all of their questions would be answered. It even slapped me in the face.

Snoopy's house is pretty typical of what you'll see if you visit any household belonging to a member of my family: American and Texas flags flying on the flagpole out front, huge framed emblems of the Seal of Texas on the walls, mounted deer heads and other assorted animals placed around the house, paintings of cowboys, sculptures of cowboys, references to cowboys, trinkets and fridge magnets and t-shirts and coasters and dishes with Texas symbols on them, signs out front that say things like "We don't dial 9-1-1" next to an image of a pistol, sprawling property with several big trucks in the driveway, etc. And then there's that thick Texas accent. I swear I don't know how I ever lost mine. Maybe it was the same force that took me to college and out of Texas. I'm one of only two of all the family with a four year college education, and both of us left Texas. In fact, after we left Snoopy's house, mom and I drove around the country a little bit just looking. I commented how beautiful it was and how I still can't believe you can buy a huge house on 20 acres of land for $150,000 out here. I could have a garden that goes forever and all the horses I could stand! And every house has a Super Duty, standard. But mom said she didn't want me to move back. "I would love nothing more than to have you close to me, but you'd be miserable here. You're better than this. You would never be happy living around all of these backward rednecks. You'd miss the mountains. You'd miss Boulder. You'd miss being around all of those smart, educated people and doing good things for the world." And she's right of course. I'd have no friends here, not now. I've evolved too much. Kinda made me sad, actually.

Then this morning I awoke to rain - hot, steamy rain. It's the day before Christmas eve and it feels like a tropical rainforest outside. I read in the news this morning that Boulder is going to have 10 inches of snow on the ground by Christmas Day. I have friends there who are going skiing. There's a live webcam of Pearl and 11th on the front page of www.dailycamera.com. I've been watching it for the past hour. You can just see the restaurant Salt on the left side, and to the right is the Boulder Bookstore. People are walking on white sidewalks and I miss Boulder deeply.

It's funny. I really do love Colorado and Texas in equal but different ways. They are both home to me. I'm reminded of my road trip to Austin last summer and that moment when I realized there are two loves in my life.

Blast from the Past

Yep. That feels real good.

Another Week

One morning this week I was standing at the bus stop when a lady walked up to me and said, "That hat looks great on you!"

I smiled and said thanks, and that seemed to be it. To my amazement she actually turned and walked on. But then she stopped, turned around, and asked...wait for it...waaaaaaaaaaait for it....

Are you a cowboy?

Well hell, you really can't blame people for asking I suppose.

It snowed most of the day today, there was a troublesome bear near my home that the Colorado Division of Wildlife spent most of the day yesterday trying to persuade to leave town, and Apple unveiled a new super cool mouse to replace that P.O.S. they've been making for the last couple of years. That's all I know today.

I'm going to have some apple pie and hit the sack.

Ghost Rider

This is my 100th blog post. On blogger, anyway.

I went out for lunch today. There was a woman who kept staring at me. When I was paying at the register, she came up beside me.

"Are you a cowboy?" she asked.

I pulled out my wallet and flipped through some bills. Without looking up I calmly asked, "What's a cowboy?"

"Well it's...do you...um...are you...well I don't know!" she gasped.

Nobody ever knows.

There was an awkward silence. Then the lady at the register pointed to my belt buckle and said, "He's from Texas!"

The woman, apparently satisfied with that definition, said, "Oh!" and smiled. She stood there looking at me a bit longer, apparently just completely amused. I paid, smiled and then bid them both good day.

I didn't have my hat with me. I wasn't wearing anything by Rockmount. Hell I even managed to get all the way through lunch without letting out a rip-roarin' YEEEEEHAWWWW!!!!! I thought I was pretty inconspicuous. Must've been the boots and the belt.

I still don't get it. Not once in 33 years of living in Texas was I ever asked if I was a cowboy, "real" or otherwise. Once there was a guy I came across at a parade in downtown Austin who wanted to fight me just because he thought that that's what men with cowboy hats did, but that was something else altogether.

Of course there were stretches, sometimes several years, when I'd retire the hat and boots to the closet and dress like I'm supposed to - you know, wear the current fashion that everyone else is wearing. One such time was during my last year of college and a couple of years right after. I was sitting in class one day and a professor (who was not a Texan) started raging against cowboys, and especially cowboy hats.

"I don't understand why people still wear those things. It's stupid! Nobody needs to wear a cowboy hat. The Old West is dead and gone!"

Needless to say it pissed me off royally. But it also drove home a thought I'd already been kicking around: that I was about to graduate and become a "professional" and should probably start dressing like a cubicle bunny.

I remember the day I moved to Austin. I was renting a room in College Station and I was so ready to get out of that one horse town. I came home and announced I was leaving. I loaded up my belongings, all of which I fit in my pickup in one trip, and headed for the Big A. I was cruising down that Texas highway wearing a cheap black cowboy hat that never quite fit right (it was all I could afford at the time) with the windows down and Redneck Girl blasting on the stereo. I had stickers of the American flag and the Rebel flag on my bumper, and I was as happy as I could be. I had no job, no home and only one friend in the whole city, but I knew there was opportunity. Life was going to start anew. I ended up crashing on my friend's couch until I got things figured out, and the first thing I did when I got my first paycheck was buy that salad plate-sized belt buckle with the Texas seal on it, the same one the cashier pointed at today. That was over ten years ago.

But I digress. After graduation from college I went to the Men's Wearhouse and bought one pair of slacks, one nice button up, one nice black belt with a very fashionable, ultra-modern tiny silver buckle that didn't actually fasten but instead used friction to keep itself closed (some of the time), and a pair of polished black leather dress shoes with a square toe - apparently a statement that said, "I'm professional, but still laid back." It was just enough to outfit me for job interviews. When I landed my first job I bought a few more pieces, but eventually the slacks gave way to Levis, though I still wore the button ups most of the time.

Side note: I was not wearing my hat the day Professor Anderson went on her anti-cowboy tirade. If fact she'd never even seen me in my hat. It felt like being secretly gay and having to endure some small minded anti-gay ranting. The fool never realized who she was unloading on. And frankly I'm surprised she could get away with that in Texas. It may be true that the "old west" is gone. Even most modern ranchers use pickup trucks, four-wheelers and even helicopters to round up cattle and wild horses because they're just a lot faster, stronger, more dependable and less dangerous than horses. But cowboy hats, aside from being particularly useful and comfortable in snow, rain and harsh sun, are part of the cultural heritage of the United States, particularly the Western states, and most especially Texas where virtually all cattle drives originated and where that greatest of all American icons, the cowboy, was born. Texas, more than any other state, has clung to this cultural heritage and embraced it. It has always had a presence in my life and I have always cherished it. I may not be roaming the plains and roping cattle, but I'm fascinated by the fact and the fantasy of the old west. I have a special place in my heart for Texas and all that she is, good and bad. And I have an obsession with the lands west of the Mississippi and all of the truth and myth contained by this mysterious, rugged and insanely beautiful place.

Soon after college I found myself dissatisfied with the professional life of a cube dweller and started dreaming hardcore about heading west. WAY out west, which is what ultimately brought me to Colorado. And here, surrounded by a serious western wilderness and living so close to my fantasies of a rustic mountain life, it was only a matter of time before the hat and boots made their comeback in my life. I tried dressing like a professional cube bunny at my current job, but most people I work with don't bother with anything other than typical street wear. So I resurrected my Wranglers, my Texas belt buckle and treated myself to a closet full of new Rockmount shirts which I wear pressed and starched. And to top it off, last summer I bought my dream cowboy hat from Texas Hatters, the official hatter for the state of Texas: 100% top-quality beaver felt, hand crafted by a master hatter, perfectly tailored to my head. I toured his shop and he showed me all of his equipment, much of it over 100 years old. He helped me select just the right felt blank that would become my hat. It took him a week to make it, and then it had to be adjusted and readjusted until the fit and shape were exceptional. Then he sewed a natural leather band in it, hand tooled with my name, and fitted it with a custom leather hat band which I designed. I left that shop just as proud as you please. I don't give a rat's ass what anyone else thinks about it. I love it. And now when I go to work I may not look like a cubicle bunny but I'm damn sure dressed better than anyone else. (There is one other guy who wears a cowboy hat - he's a retired rodeo cowboy who, after a series of debilitating injuries, decided that an office job would be better for his health. He also dresses pretty sharp.)

I can't explain it, though I've tried many times. It just feels right. I'm happy when I'm walking in the rain or the snow, wearing that hat and my boots and my coat and looking out across a gorgeous mountain landscape - no one to keep me company but the lonesome howl of a chilly wind. I'm happy when I'm cruising the back roads in my pickup on a gorgeous summer day - windows down, music up and jaw-dropping scenery all around; with nobody to bug me or ask if I'm a cowboy. I'm happy sitting in the tall grass of a Rocky Mountain meadow in Autumn, watching herds of elk bugling among golden aspen groves, with no human close enough to be more than a speck in the distance.

The sad thing is I really don't want to be alone, at least not all the time. I just want to be with people who understand me. But I guess that's asking too much, considering I don't even understand myself half the time.

Cowboy Up

Today I went to the Boulder Horse & Rider to buy a pair of jeans. It's Boulder's version of a feed store. In Texas, feed stores are generally huge and carry all sorts of farm and ranch supplies, clothing, animal feed, hay and some sell tractors and other machinery. Boulder's version isn't quite that. It's a very small shop with bagged "specialty" horse feed, a small selection of grooming supplies and clothes, some books, saddles and a few other odds and ends for the discriminating Boulder horseperson. It's locally owned, and they're one of only two clothing retailers I know of in the entire city that don't sell $200 designer jeans - and they're the only retailer that sells Wrangler (which are made in the USA.)

The owner is usually there when I drop in. She's nice, at least from what I gather in our short chats during my irregular, infrequent visits. She's the outdoorsy type, though I get the impression she's a bit pretentious and probably a gossip. She was there today. I walked in and she immediately started chatting me up. "So are you enjoying this gorgeous fall weather!?" she said with a big grin. I smiled and nodded. She kept talking but I wasn't really listening. I'm normally more chatty but I wasn't in the mood today. Eventually the chatter faded and I found my jeans.

I browsed some art she sells by a local farrier named Andrew. He's a young guy with a gift for painting. When he's not shoeing horses, he paints himself, his wife, horses and his cowboy friends in watercolor. I've been collecting his art, but there was nothing new today.

I browsed some saddles. I know of one saddle maker on the entire Front Range who still makes saddles the old fashioned way by hand. I haven't met him yet, but I'm keen to interview him and get a tour of his shop. These were not those kinds of saddles. They were all shiny, mostly made of synthetic materials, amply stuffed with synthetic padding so that they ride more like a pillow than a proper saddle. They were machine stitched and I could picture them rolling off an assembly line in China. They looked like something you might find in a furniture mega-store; lots of black pleather and chrome-esque bobbles. They were godawful ugly and modern looking and had no personality. They don't even look like they belong on a horse.

I was about to checkout when a book caught my eye. It was a book about packing, and there were several photos on the front of cowboys packing up horses and mules in some dreamy mountain wilderness. I perused the pages for a long while, looking through black and white photos of cowboys, probably in the 1970's, demonstrating the various stages of packing, leading, trail clearing, tracking, camping, cooking. I didn't see anything terribly modern in the photos. From the canvas bags on the mules to the hats on the cowboys, these guys and their equipment looked "all natural." To my great pleasure, I noticed they specifically mentioned what we today refer to as the "leave no trace" philosophy. They may have been just a bunch of horse-packin cowboys, but they had respect for nature and keeping the land clean and minimally impacted. I had to buy it.

At the register the owner asked, "Are you a packer?"

I didn't look up. "Just dreaming," I mumbled.

"Oh you need to go! I just came back from a packing trip up in Montana! It's so gorgeous! You need to take your horses up there! This is the prettiest time of year!"

Her words grated on me, probably because I don't have any horses to take anywhere. She was a publisher in her previous life. She made a lot of money then decided she wasn't happy, so she sold everything and moved to Boulder and bought herself a million dollar ranch, a herd of horses, and opened this little store for something to do when she wasn't riding. It's people like her that keep people like me out of the running for land around here. She doesn't have to work. I do. But instead of buying her dream ranch out in the wide open spaces of West Texas or Montana or Wyoming or less populated parts of Colorado, she's right here playing in my back yard keeping property prices higher than working people can afford. Consciously I can't blame her, but subconsciously I'm ripping her a new one. I'm just being a crybaby.

Just then a BMW pulled up and a short thin 40-ish woman dressed in expensive synthetic riding clothes came in.

"Babs!*" the owner cried.

"Sweetie! It's been too long!" Babs replied, opening her arms wide. Kissy-kisssy, huggy-huggy.

"Oh Babs, how's the new darling treating you?"

"Oh," Babs exclaimed with a comically dramatic exasperation, "I've been riding Sasha now for what, two weeks? Well, you'll just never believe blah blah blah..."

I walked out the door. These people have every bit as much right to own land and horses as I do, and it isn't their fault or their problem that they ended up with the riches to do so and I haven't (yet, anyway.) I still can't help that it pisses me off, and I can't help feel that I'd make better use of the land and appreciate it more than these spoiled Californians who just come out here to play. That doesn't justify anything and nobody ever said life was fair. I realize it's irrational and wasteful to let it piss me off. These people don't deserve my scorn, so I just brood quietly to myself or let it leak out in this blog. This weekend when Babs is out being frustrated with the nuances of her new $100,000 polo pony, I'll be reading my little book and dreaming that I'm one of those cowboys in those old black and white photos, packing up a $300 mule and a $1,000 horse for a long trek into the serenity of some distant mountain wilderness.

*Babs wasn't her actual name, though it was something equally cutesy and pretentious. I just can't recall it.

Elk

Yesterday in Colorado two bull elk (mature males) were found entangled with each other due to barbed wire which was wrapped around their antlers. This is rutting season, and males are battling one another for dominance and females. In this case it seems some stray barbed wire became entangled in their antlers and essentially tied the two animals together at the head.

This all happened just off the road I take to work every day.

Fortunately, several ranchers found the animals and were able to cut the barbed wire off. (No, that's not me in the black cowboy hat below, but I wish it had been!) The two elk, upon being freed, ran off into the mountains apparently unharmed.

Oh and by the way, that beautiful golden meadow where this happened is slated for development. It's home to elk, mule deer (yesterday I saw a mule deer with a huge rack lying in the grass there), coyote, prairie dog, fox, hawk, rabbit and innumerable other creatures, but some developer is chomping at the bit to turn it all into a quick buck (for himself.) Yep, it's been sold to the highest bidder, which means a developer. It will be paved and covered with cookie cutter houses and strip malls. There's a huge sign erected by the developer in front if it right now proudly displaying the fact, and doubtless there are Americans who just can't wait for this "useless" meadow to be turned into more cheap shopping opportunities (because God knows Americans just don't have enough cheap places to buy crap!) After all, that toxic MADE IN CHINA stuff isn't going to buy itself! Who cares about good 'ol American wilderness and the spectacle of nature's ancient rituals? We need more plastic garbage and cardboard houses!

This whole thing just makes me glow incandescent with rage. Not only can elk not breed without being tied up in our junk wire, but soon the very meadows where they've been breeding for longer than humans have even existed will be strip malls and tract houses. Is nothing sacred anymore?

Buckin' Hay!

A bale of hay is about 1.5 feet wide, 2 feet tall and 3 feet long. It weighs 40 to 60 pounds depending on how fresh or moist it is, and it's held together by two very tightly wrapped strings or wires.

I just bucked 160 of those bad boys. That's a minimum of 6,400 pounds. I feel more alive than I have in a very long time. I only regret that the pile was so small.

This morning I went out to the ranch. The woman who asked for my help saw me pull up in my truck. "Well," she said, "since you know how to handle a truck, you get to drive." She tossed me keys to a Ford. Moments later we were hitching a four horse trailer to an older model Ford F-Series. It was pretty much my truck but 6 or 7 years ago, and now with the extra length of a horse trailer. She and I and another guy jumped in and headed across a field, down a dirt road to a neighbor's property, and found a thin Mexican fella waiting beside a stack of hay at least 20 feet high and as long as a small house. We loaded the bed, then the trailer, then headed back to the barn. It took some fancy maneuvering, both forward and in reverse, but I drove that big mama in, around, and back out of that barn like nobody's business. The windows were down, the dust was up, the engine was rumbling. Hell yeah!

Why does this make me so happy? Partly because it brought back good memories from childhood. Partly because I wasn't pecking at a computer. And partly because, when the work was done, I could stand back and see that something real and tangible had been accomplished by my own two hands. It wasn't some virtual thing, some rearrangement of photons in a plastic box. It wasn't something everyone could have a petty little opinion on and suggest I tweak this or adjust that or modify something else. This was something raw and physical, something with an undeniable presence. It was a big, sturdy stack of horse feed, and because it existed horses would get to eat for a few more weeks.

To "buck" hay means to throw a bale, and mostly that means moving it from the ground to up over your head. It doesn't take too many bales before you start to feel muscles you never knew you had. Talk about a workout! Chest, biceps, shoulders, back, legs and lots of lower back and abs. I've bucked hay before but never this much in one go. It was awesome. I'm filthy, covered in a fine dust and lots of dried grass bits. You might also be surprised at how sharp hay can be. My forearms are pricked and bleeding all over. Funny thing is I didn't even notice until the work was done and we were all standing around BSing (which is one of the best rewards of ranch work, in my opinion, but it's only good if you earn it first.) I noticed the blood when I felt my forearms stinging. "Huh," I thought. I loved it.

But the work wasn't actually over. We also unloaded a horse trailer full of pine shavings used for horse bedding, and then I spent two hours riding. Have you ever loped around on a horse? The lope (in Western riding) or canter (in English riding) is basically third gear for a horse, one step down from a full-on gallop. It's an incredible feeling, kinda like flying. It's so smooth and rhythmic. Your upper body stays relatively motionless, while your hips lunge forward and fall back with each stride. It's almost like an erotic dance. You can feel every contraction of the horses body, and when you've been riding a while you can sense his every footfall, his every twitch. Riding has little or nothing to do with audible or visual cues. It's entirely about body language. A slight motion of your foot or leg or arm and the horse responds accordingly. Likewise, every motion the horse makes you respond to. There's a continuous feedback loop of information between a good horse and a good rider, all unspoken, and when done right it will appear to an observer that the horse and rider are of one mind.

And now for a late lunch of homemade buttermilk biscuits with butter and home canned fruit preserves, fresh milk (just milked yesterday!) and scrambled yard eggs with bacon. After that, a siesta followed by some guitar on the porch watching the sunset. I suppose at some point this weekend I'll have to sit behind this damned computer (for more than just blogging) to pay the price for my wonderful day.

Where Do I Belong?

Today I visited Colorado State University in Fort Collins. I had an appointment with an advisor in the Animal Sciences department. The purpose was to investigate their veterinary and equine science program.

When I first moved away from home, it was to go to college. I went to Texas A&M intent on entering vet school. For various complicated reasons I've probably blogged about before, I ended up moving to Austin and finishing with a completely different major at Texas State.

Today was about revisiting that original academic urge. CSU is an agricultural college, and Larimer county is the agricultural center of the state of Colorado. It's pretty evident just from driving around. Trucks like mine are common, and it's the only place in Colorado I know of where cowboy hats and big belt buckles are common enough that they don't elicit a response. Except from girls, which I find are, on the whole, extremely attracted by them. It's an odd place, Fort Collins, because it's also an extremely progressive town. It's a pairing I tend to like.

I arrived on campus, parked easily enough and went inside. On my way to the office, I saw a nameplate that said "Temple Grandin." The Temple Grandin, author of several popular books including Animals Make Us Human? Indeed, they are one and the same. Cool.

I found my way to the advisor's office. Brock Nelson was my age and wore polished cowboy boots, starched jeans with creases down the front, a tooled leather belt and a western shirt. He was well spoken with a slow, soothing western accent and a deep voice. We had spoken on the phone previously for about an hour and he invited me to come up and spend a half day talking with faculty, staff, students and tour the facilities. We talked at length about my current career, what I like and don't like, my cabin in the woods, the animal science program, the equine science program, vet school and career opportunities. I also spoke with several other interesting people, including an equine veterinarian who shared bits of his vast experience. He pretty much confirmed what I already knew: vet school isn't going to do it for me, though I didn't share that conclusion. I'm not that dedicated a student. Even if I were, the career wouldn't satisfy me. Still, I had to reconfirm it to quell that nagging voice in my head that keeps trying to suggest ways to get out of a desk job and into something more physical without having to live under a bridge.

During our conversation, farriery came up several times. A farrier is someone who cares for horse feet. This includes shoeing, trimming and other forms of maintenance and preventive care. Apparently 90% of horse ailments involve the feet. Without feet, a horse is nothing, and for all the heft and power of a horse, their feet are terribly delicate. I'd been toying with the idea of farriery for the better part of this year and had intended to ask about it. Mr. Nelson mentioned that a former student and personal friend of his had put himself through vet school, paying all of the $125,000 cost by working as a farrier for the four years he was in the program. To my surprise, I was informed that farriers make really good money. According to several sources at CSU, a decent farrier earns as much as I'm currently making sitting behind a computer. I haven't verified this with independent research. A good, established farrier I'm told makes twice that. And what's more interesting is that farriers not only have no degree, they need not have any formal education or even so much as a certification to perform their duties. Farriery is a very old craft, and though you can go through farrier programs to learn the basics of the trade, you only become good by being an apprentice. It's one of the few truly old tradesman's jobs still in practice. Apparently, like farming, no one is going into it anymore. But unlike farming, there's no mechanized corporate solution, so demand for truly skilled farriers is very high.

As we were wrapping up the meeting, I ask Mr. Nelson directly about farriery. "I've got a guy you need to meet." He rifled through his desk, pulled out a post-it with some scribbles on it, turns on the speaker phone and dials. A strong young male voice answers.

"Mr. Masterson, Brock Nelson here," says the advisor.

"Yes sir! How are you, sir?" replies the voice.

A brief exchanged ensued. Mr. Nelson had written a letter of recommendation for Mr. Masterson who just graduated with his master's in animal science at the tender age of 25 and now wished to enter the vet program. Mr. Masterson was apparently an established and well regarded farrier who did some work for CSU. He was incredibly polite, lots of yes sirs and no sirs and thank you sirs. Mr. Nelson discerned that Mr. Masterson was on campus working out at the equine facility this very afternoon, and asked would it be alright if he sent over someone who'd like to know more about farriery. Mr. Masterson expressed his enthusiasm to meet me, I thanked Mr. Nelson copiously, and headed out to the equine facility.

The equine facility is a pretty good distance from the main campus. At one time it was right on the edge of town, but now cookie cutter houses and town homes were closing in on the property. It still has a remote feeling, because the property is pretty big and has an unobstructed view of the mountains. It's what you might expect of an equine facility: dirt roads, big gravel parking lots, arenas, livestock chutes, lots of dust, big trucks, cowboys and, of course, lots of horses. I parked and wandered toward the arena. A couple of young cowboys walked by and nodded politely. Horses grazed in the shadow of the mountains. The arena and stables loomed ahead, and a massive truck pulling a 6 or 8 horse trailer cruised slowly by raising a thin cloud of dust which give the whole place a sort of movie-scene feel.

I entered the airy arena, walking slowly, taking in the sights and smells and sounds. The arena was covered and the dirt freshly graded. Massive doors on either end were open and a 70 degree breeze swept through. Light entered through skylights, illuminating horses in pens along both sides. A young girl outfitted for English saddle walked past leading her clip-clopping horse, and she gave me a smile and a nod. Across the arena I could see a couple of horses and some people milling around them. Mr. Nelson said I could find Mr. Masterson there working.

I approached. The two horses were tied to a hitching rail and two young girls stood facing them, chatting quietly with each other. A man was on the opposite side of the horses, fiddling with the foot of one. I couldn't see him clearly, so I walked around.

"Mr. Masterson," I said.

I can best describe Mr. Masterson's physical appearance as "burly" and probably the handsomest redneck-type I've ever seen. He stood a little taller than me, had thick black hair covered mostly by a battered old cap, light olive skin, and a facial hair density that could supply three men. He had thick chops and a goatee, but he had several days of stubble growing in between which almost filled out a full beard. He had thick curly hair on his arms and popping out the neck of his t-shirt. He wore dusty boots, baggy jeans and a leather belt with a large buckle. I couldn't read it because he was also wearing a style of chaps which covered most of the buckle. I'd bet money he didn't workout in a gym. Instead he had that characteristic hearty, powerful physique that comes from years of physical labor. But his most captivating feature were the eyes. Big, deep brown, friendly, calculating. They were simultaneously full of light and mystery and were framed by youthful skin free of blemishes and wrinkles.

"Yes sir!" he said, coming to his feet. "You must be Mr. Roberts. Pleasure to meet you," he extended his hand.

I reciprocated, "I am, sir! The pleasure is mine!"

My God it was a macho moment.

His hand was rough and dirty, his grip was firm. He looked me directly in the eyes, which I love, and which most men rarely do.

And so it began. Immediately I noticed he was very different with me than he was on the phone with Mr. Nelson. With Nelson, Masterson was almost kissing butt, which you might expect considering the circumstances. With me, he was lecturing. I briefly explained that I had an established, successful career, but was exploring other options. He immediately jumped into telling me how to go about figuring out what I want in life, what mistakes not to make, and other things I'd either figured out years ago or at least learned enough to know that he didn't have as many answers as he thought he did. I didn't interrupt, and I probably couldn't have if I'd wanted to. He hardly took a breath as his thoughts flowed from his mouth. Curiously, all the while he worked furiously. He never missed a beat moving between two horses, cleaning their feet, trimming their hooves, fitting them with new shoes, stepping reflexively over a steaming pile. I listened politely, examining his every move, listening to his every word, and just trying to absorb the environment I was immersed in. His verbal outpouring flowed seamlessly from one topic to another, and I learned his opinions on "horse people" and other farriers, his disdain for text messaging, and the finer points of a good work ethic. He also really despises authority figures and won't tolerate being told how to do his job.

Farriers, I learned, not only shoe horses, but they actually make the shoes they put on the horses. A large part of what a farrier does is blacksmithing, which is done onsite out of the back of his truck. And apparently farriers are all (or at least are predominately) men, because when referring to them Mr. Masterson always said, "his" rather than the more generic, "they." At one point he was telling me about the tools of the trade. "Now, you'll need a truck. What do you drive?" he asked.

I said, "Ford F-350. Crew cab, long bed." He paused for a moment, took what I perceived to be his first breath since I arrived, and nodded his approval.

"Now you'll need a shell for it," he continued by listing items and their costs. As he was doing so, he was selecting blank shoes from a rack in the back of his truck and placing them in a portable firing oven. He never stopped moving, always doing something productive, and returned to the shoes when they were glowing hot. He pulled one from the fire and placed it on his anvil and started alternately pounding and tapping on it in a clearly skillful manner, subtly altering the shoe's curves. As he worked, he flipped hammers and files and various tools in his hands like some kind of blacksmithian circus act. He made it look like he'd been doing it for longer than he'd even been alive and I was captivated by the spectacle.

Then the whole world began to move in slow motion. He stood up, pulling his attention away from the hot iron. He looked directly into my eyes and waved his hands around to make what I was sure was a very important point about something. His lips were moving and I know words were coming out, but I was completely transfixed. I could hear nothing, I could think nothing. My eyes were flooded with what was probably the manliest thing I had ever seen with my own two eyes. It was the very definition of masculinity. A brutally handsome, educated, self-employeed, rugged young man standing with his hips tilted, leaning into me to, asserting his dominance in a friendly but extremely confident manner. He was the master, I was the apprentice. He was the possessor of an arcane and privileged skill set belonging to one of the most masculine of all trades. His skin glistened with sweat and dirt. He was wearing chaps -real chaps for real work. Before him was glowing iron and a black anvil. In his hands were heavy, mysterious tools. To his left, his rig and all his equipment. Behind him, horses - massive beasts that would completely submit to him as he scraped and hammered on their feet. And as the backdrop, the Rocky Mountains and a liquid blue sky.

Now I ask you, what more? What more? By God, what more could possibly have made this moment more beautiful? It will be burned into my mind until my dying day.

Eventually, fortunately, I did come back to Earth. And Mr. Masterson did, eventually, relax his jaw. I'm not sure what was going on initially, but I think as we got to know each other and I had a chance to get a few words in, he was able to relax and a real two-way conversation could begin. I don't know if he was just checking me out, testing me for something, or was maybe on the defensive or nervous, but I definitely got a sense of a wall coming down. I could clearly see him warming to me over the two hours or so I was there. He eased off the authoritative lecture and started offering useful advice, such as suggesting that I ride with a farrier sometime. Then he suggested maybe I apprentice. Then he offered that he might be looking for an apprentice, and ultimately he asked if I'd be interested in apprenticing under him.

It all sounded good to me. It was really interesting the way he could clean up a hoof, eyeball it, and then pound a horseshoe into the proper curves. He can also build shoes from scratch and is capable of whipping up special shoes for horses with special needs. He also claimed that the very best farrier he knows of pulls in an unbelievable quarter million a year. He said the really good guys he knows won't even leave the house unless they're going to pull in $700 that day. The income claims are intriguing, almost unbelievable and so I'm taking it with a grain of salt. But he encouraged me by reminding me that farriery is something I could do part time on the side to figure out of I like it, if I'm any good at it, without having to give up my current career. And, he'd be happy to take me on as his apprentice - or even just out for a single day if I only wanted to check it out. Well you don't have to ask me twice. Soon, we ride.

After my experience with Mr. Masterson I was in a mood. I don't know what kind of mood, but it certainly wasn't bad. I left the rural setting and returned to the reality of Boulder. I hadn't been in town five minutes when I was sitting at a red light. A cyclist on a recumbent came pedaling toward me. I was quietly staring out the window still lost thought, when the cyclist looked directly at me and flipped me off. It took me a moment to register what had just happened. I was in no way doing anything offensive. I wasn't even moving, and the cyclist wasn't even on the same road as me. And it was definitely me he flipped off. And this wasn't some punk kid either. He looked like one of those uppity holier-than-thou "greens" and my immediate thought was he flipped me off because of what I was driving. I don't know that for a fact, but I can't think of anything else it could possibly be. I thought of the pink-haired lesbian and her eco-smirk about my truck. I told Gerard about it and offered nothing in the way of why I thought the cyclist might have done it. Gerard immediately said, "It's your truck."

So then I was pissed off. I just don't understand why someone would judge someone else, a complete stranger, based on ONE thing. Be irritated by it, fine. Even if you don't know who I am or why I might need it, you can still hate big trucks I suppose. But I've met exactly one person in my life who I think is probably "greener" than me by virtue of his living like a pauper and being a 90 pound locavore vegan, but I know NO ONE who I think tries harder to support the community and make smart environmental choices as a whole (my truck, my one real weakness, aside.) Who is this asshole who thinks he can cast judgement on ME? I guess no matter who you are, no matter what you do, now matter how hard you try, someone is still going to find something to hate you for. It's just funny because I never in my wildest dreams thought that I of all people would be judged by freakin' LIBERALS. Welcome to Boulder.

In the morning I'm going to spend a couple of hours bucking hay at the ranch.

Ridin' Steel Horses

Did you know that 100 years ago the automobile was touted as being the pollution-free transportation of the future? In big, crowded cities like New York, horse pollution was a problem that made smog seem like a joke. Horse manure was a terrific problem and nearly everywhere it lay where it fell. Even when it was picked up, it was just dumped in someone else's back yard. Even dead horses tended to lay where they fell, liquefying in the streets. Aside from the stench and unsightly appearance of it all, flies and disease were rampant. In addition, city horses could only work about 5 years before they had to retire. They required a lot of feed and water, couldn't move a whole lot of people per animal and had a hard time trudging up hills - especially when pulling carts. In 1872, an outbreak of horse flu ripped through New York wiping out much of the transportation and causing a serious carcass problem.

There were about 3.5 million people in New York City in 1900, and about 75 million in the entire United States. Today the population of New York City is well over 8 million, and in the US there are about 300 million of us.

Can you just imagine if we were all still riding horses? I think we'd already be extinct.

But we aren't. We're here, riding the horse of the future. Rather, the "horseless carriage" as it was called back in the day. The car was the solution to pollution. It was clean by anyone's standard in 1900. It didn't drop dead and rot, spread diseases (or catch diseases) or leave steaming piles of fly magnets every half hour. It could last well over 5 years with proper maintenance. Of course, paved roads weren't common at the time and the Interstate system hadn't even been conceived of. Outside the city the horse was the only alternative to walking, but inside the city the car had everything going for it, except that it was too expensive for most people. But Henry Ford changed all that with his brilliant idea of the assembly line, and in 1908 the Model-T started rolling off the lines and into the hands of the masses. In a generation the horse went from being transportation to being recreation - from daily necessity to play thing.

I thought of this last week as I was grooming a horse named Sunny. Horses fart a lot. They poop a lot. They pee a lot. They sneeze big slimy dirt-filled boogers a lot. It's astounding how many offenses a single horse can produce in a short period of time. And they aren't nearly as cooperative when I've got a brush in my hand as my pickup is when I've got a garden hose and a towel.

Recent studies have suggested that all of the world's livestock - horses, cows, etc. - produce nearly 20% of all the greenhouse gases being released into the environment. That's more than all of the world's planes, trains and automobiles combined. The combined global farts alone produce a whopping 1/3 of all the methane being released into the environment, and methane is a far more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. Right now there are over 600 million automobiles on the planet. No one knows how much livestock there is, but there is at least 1.5 BILLION cattle.

At my conference last summer in Austin, one of the presenters mentioned a study wherein psychologists determined that people, on a subconscious level, identify their car as a horse. Apparently Chrysler used this information to give "eyes" to the Jeep by making the headlights round, and sales shot through the roof. Indeed years later when they shifted back to square headlights, customers revolted and the design was swiftly changed back to round where it has remained since. I don't know how much truth is in that, but I've always thought of my vehicle as my horse in some sense. It has always given me freedom - freedom to run and to roam. I even bond with my vehicles, silly as it seems, and in years past was known to spend hours detailing my pickup. I've heard it explained that the American frontier and our vast dependence on the horse for so many generations, along with the lingering fantasy of the American West is what gave rise to the American love affair with the car - particularly among American men. Psychologists tell us this ultimately goes back to thousands of years of horsemanship and roaming.

There's this Boulder hippie who works down at Whole Foods - young guy - long ponytail, scruffy beard, skinny, vegetarian. He's about as green as a Boulderite can get. And he drives a jacked-up, beat-up old white Jeep Wrangler with black flames down the side, and the thing's nearly as old as I am. It totally doesn't fit his image. "It's the only thing I do that's not 'green,'" he'll tell you. "But it's my horse. I love it. I gotta have it." His comment strikes a chord.

I suppose all of this is on the forefront of my mind because of all the time I've been spending around horses lately. Just about everyone I know who rides or has ridden frequently has numerous stories of being bucked off and sustaining injury. I decided to do a little investigation. Turns out that horseback riding is many, many times more dangerous even than motorcycle riding, which itself is far more dangerous than driving a car or truck. We're talking orders of magnitude here. This of course led to looking at injury and death statistics for lots of activities, learning about fears generally held in modern society, and facing up to some of my own fears as well. For example, I'm not in the least afraid of spiders or snakes, though I do have a healthy respect for them. However I've always been irrationally terrified of a shark attack. I've never lived within 100 miles of the ocean (and maybe that, in part, explains my fear.) I don't think twice about jumping in my pickup and going anywhere at all, but put me out on a mountain above tree line and I can't stop obsessing over a lighting strike.

Yet the chances of me having a life-altering accident in an automobile are far, far, higher than being eaten by a shark or struck by lightning. In nearly every scrap of literature on riding horses, we're urged to wear not just helmets but protective vests due to the high rate of injury. In our society you're considered odd, to say the least, if you refuse to drive for fear of an accident, but it's nothing at all to be afraid of bugs or sharks or lightning. Why is this? I think it's familiarity. I suspect that over 100 years ago, few people feared riding a horse because riding is just what one did. It's how one got around, got work done, moved things. Likewise, despite the risk of car accident, few people today think twice about riding in one despite the risk.

And then of course there are those who believe that when you're time's up, it's up. Nothing else matters so why worry about anything.

So these have been my thoughts the last few days: horses and pickups, technology and tradition, cowboys and urbanites, life and death. Sometimes it seems like everything is so jumbled up. I'm not saying they were necessarily better, but the "old days" have a certain appeal to me if for no other reason than that life was pretty clearly defined. You're born, you get married and have kids, you work, then you die. Depending on your perspective, that may or may not sound appealing. The appealing part is you didn't have to worry about the millions of choices we have today. You don't worry about getting hurt on a horse, you just ride. You don't worry about finding the perfect career or the perfect life-partner or living in the perfect place; you do what you can, you love who you're with, and you live where you are. More than likely that meant you did what your father did for work, you married the girl next door for better or worse, and you lived your whole life within a few miles of where you were born. Again it's not the formula that's necessarily appealing, but the simplicity behind it that's appealing. I honestly wonder if kids today aren't so screwed up because they're plagued by choices. They have so many options they don't know what to do, and end up not doing much of anything constructive. In my own experience, graduating from high school was like stepping in the center of a giant labyrinth with a thousand doors all going to places unknown. At first it seems like a wonderful thing: endless possibility. But you soon realize it's got a dark side. You can't go through all the doors and you can't see how any of them end. Does having more options really bring more happiness? Numerous studies have shown that pre-arranged marriages produce couples that are far happier than our system produces. That's evident from the divorce rate and the proliferation of online dating and social networking. As for me, I became obsessive about which road to take after high school. What might I miss or suffer by choosing one instead of another? How far do I go down one road before I turn back and try another if this one isn't doing it for me? Had I been born over 100 years ago there might have been only two or three doors, tops. At least I'd have (or I think I'd have) the satisfaction - the peace of mind - of knowing this was my life's path, that I didn't make any mistakes because there were no other options.

Or maybe I'm just perpetually wondering "what if" and romanticizing things I don't really understand. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

New Mexico

We just had three awesome days in northern New Mexico. We only visited two cities, but three days really wasn't enough.

Our first day was in Taos. Taos is a small town of less than 5,000 people but it's a popular skiing and shopping destination. Most of the buildings are adobe (or are made to look like adobe, in the case of McDonald's and other chains encroaching on the area.) Taos is also the location of the famous Taos Pueblo, pictured below. This is sort of a Native American condo complex and is believed to be between 1,000 and 1,500 years old. People still live here, making it the oldest continually inhabited structure at least in North America. About 150 people live in the structure, but there are many other detached adobe dwellings around it which are nearly as old and are also inhabited. Electricity and running water are forbidden, and the village's water supply comes from a creek than runs through it. The Tiwa Indians call this village home and it's the first Indian village I've ever been to.

You have to pay a fee to get in. You also have to pay a separate fee to get your camera in, and you can't take pictures of Indians unless you get their permission first. And probably you have to pay them to do it too. I didn't try. The Indians were actually pretty shy and secretive, though one little old raisin of an Indian woman shouted at me, "Are you a real cowboy!?" to which I replied, "Are you a real Indian!?" She laughed heartily and asked, "Can you ride?" "Of course," I said. She dismissively waved her hand and said, "You need to move here to Taos!" as she turned and walked away.

These people are really poor. Most of them have set up shop and sell little trinkets, and every shop sells the exact same stuff. It was such a strange experience. You get a definite impression that they resent us (Americans) for their current state, though you can't blame them. We destroyed their culture and now they're reduced to letting us pay to walk around peeking in their windows for amusement and selling us worthless trinkets. Imagine if we were conquered and ultimately confined to living our lives out of our suburban tract homes, and the only way to make a living was to allow our conquerors to pay us a few darseks to walk around our streets and lawns taking pictures and asking stupid questions about the tattered remains of our culture. I have a lot to say about this but there's still a lot of vacation to cover.

We also got a glimpse of what the Great Plains once looked like before the arrival of the white man: literally thousands of bison grazing on a ranch that was so big we couldn't see the borders.

Perhaps you've heard of Earthship? They build (or sell plans for) completely sustainable, off-the-grid homes. They're made of local materials (usually dirt and rocks right from the ground) as well as recycled materials (mostly old tires to build the wall structures). They generate their own power from solar and wind, harvest their own water, are passively heated and cooled, and even clean their own waste water. One of their communities is right outside of Taos. One of the homes is open for tours.

To get to the Earthship community, you have to cross the mighty Rio Grande, which isn't so mighty this far north as it's still pretty young. It has, however, carved a mighty gorge. The bridge that spans it is 650 feet above the river, making it the fifth highest in the US. There was no good vantage point from which to get a photo of the bridge and I was standing on it to get the picture below.
We encountered portions of the old Route 66 several times, which was just cool. I always pictured James Dean cruising with the top down across the gorgeous desert landscape right at sundown.

We normally camp when we take a road trip, but since our destinations weren't National Parks or other necessarily outdoorsy locales, we decided to stay at bed and breakfast inns. Those are always preferable to corporate chains. We stayed right downtown in both Taos and Santa Fe, so we were always walking distance from everything. In Taos, the first inn we went to was (as nearly all are) an adobe. This one was particularly interesting because it was originally a fort and was something like 400 years old. It had also been haunted, but the owner told us in all seriousness how they'd brought in a woman who sent the troublesome apparition packing. Unfortunately there was no room at the inn. Fortunately the one next door had a vacancy. I highly recommend that if you're ever in Taos, you stay at Casa Benavides. It's close to everything, it's beautiful, the rooms are huge, and we met some really fun people at the community breakfast. And the food was delicious. Oh, and right next door to The Casa is Kit Carson's house. Kit Carson, as you may recall from high school history, was the most famous mountain man of the old west. He played a tremendous role in "settling" the west (ie. bringing about the destruction of the culture he admired and who now sell trinkets to their conquerors.) He's buried right around the corner and nearly everything in town is named after him.

In Santa Fe we stayed at Pueblo Bonito, which I also recommend. The food wasn't anything special, but everything else about it was wonderful - especially the free margaritas. We checked in and the lady behind the desk said, "Are you a real cowboy?" I sighed and smiled but didn't say anything. I think she understood I was getting tired of that question. "Can you ride?" she asked, right on cue. "Of course," I said. She smiled and said, "Put on your hat." I put it on. She looked at me for a moment, mouth slightly agape, and said, much to my surprise, "Yum!" For a second there the way she was looking at me made me wonder if she was going to pounce from across the desk. Gerard stepped up and told her she needed to lay off the margaritas. Turned out she was a "real" cowgirl and lives in a 400 year old adobe on her New Mexico ranch. She was also a "bull whisperer." We learned this over margaritas with her and a really gorgeous couple from Denver who also happened to be staying there. You just don't get that kind of experience at a chain motel.

Aside from Pueblo Bonito's offerings, the food in New Mexico really was quite good. If you're ever in Santa Fe and you want some truly delicious, authentic Northern New Mexico cuisine, you need to try La Fonda. It's the second best Mexican/Southwestern food I've ever had, right after Fonda San Miguel in Austin.

Other Santa Fe notable attractions include the San Miguel Mission Church, which is said to be the oldest church in the United States and was built around 1600 out of, you guessed it, adobe. It's right next door to what is said to be the oldest house in the US, an 800 year old adobe which is not inhabited and is closed to the public. Another famous old church, The Loretto, is not made of adobe. It's a lot fancier, and it's now privately owned and isn't really a functioning church anymore. Instead it's a money maker for the owners who wasted no time in putting in a well-stocked gift shop. What's all the excitement about a church? It has a miraculous staircase. I don't know that I'd call it miraculous, but it is quite beautiful and certainly is a work of art. The story goes that the church was built but the designer "forgot" to design in a staircase to access the balcony. No one apparently noticed until after the church was finished. Then some guy shows up in the 1870's, builds this amazing spiral staircase with no nails, no glue, no pillars or columns, and disappears. The builder remains anonymous and the staircase truly was a work of art. Churchy people said it was a miracle from God and claim that even today engineers can't figure out how the staircase stands, but that of course is BS. The bishop, shortly after the staircase was built, decided it needed to have a banister so that was added after the fact. I guess he felt the miracle only extended far enough to keep the staircase standing, but not far enough to keep is geriatric butt from falling off. Geez, you'd think God would at least have had the foresight to know the old man needed a hand rail.

Anyway, we loved New Mexico. It's really beautiful, and I just love walking around all the adobes and the roasting foods, the bright red ristras which are abundant, to say the very least, and the intense presence of a hybrid Indian-Mexican culture. Gerard, having grown up on the border with Mexico, was like a kid running around as memories came flooding back. Agua fresca, roasting corn on the cob, the nostril burning aroma of roasting chiles, dark skinned people lining the sidewalks selling jewelry and trinkets - it all reminded him of his roots. He said the market area was a lot like Mexico, but without the trash and crime. I'd say that's a pretty fair observation.

Kitty in the Hay

There's a kitty at the ranch where I ride who loves people. She's probably the sweetest, most affectionate cat I've ever seen. She was distracted by a horse just long enough for me to get this shot, then she immediately went back to pawing all over me.

I really like being out there on the ranch. It's so quiet, yet there's life everywhere. There are probably two dozen horses, a few cats, a couple of dogs and more barn swallows, barn owls and other birds than you can shake a stick at. The prairie dogs are innumerable and, unless you get within arms length, are completely comfortable sharing their little bit of the prairie with you. Coyotes are a common sight, even in broad daylight. Last week two of them streaked past me just two dozen yards away. There are also a few ranch hands and various other people coming and going all the time, but the place just feels like the clock is ticking a little slower than in the city. It's the kind of place where I can pull up in my truck and instead of a 17 year old lesbian with pink hair, a peace t-shirt and a nose ring hissing with a condescending eco-smirk, "Gawd that's a big truck. What do you need that for?" as happened in the Whole Foods parking lot awhile back, I'm greeted by a 20-something cowboy with a size 30 waist and tight Wranglers who says with an envious grin, "Wow, that's a nice truck. I wish I had a truck like that." (Okay, I'm biased, but fitting in is fitting in!)

It's the kind of place where you can wear a cowboy hat and no one stares at you, and no one asks if they can wear your hat. It's the kind of place where you can just sit in the hay for an hour watching the ranch critters do their thing, and it doesn't matter. There's no place to be. There are no phones ringing. There's no sound of traffic, no electronic calendars, no meetings and nothing plastic or glowing or buzzing or florescent anywhere in sight. Just a cool breeze through the barn rafters, the occasional distant neighing of a horse, and the sound of a tawny kitty purring in the hay next to you.

I've been taking advanced riding lessons out at the ranch, working with different horses, beefing up my riding and handling skills. It may sound cliche, but I think working with animals teaches us a lot about ourselves and the world. One thing about me that quickly comes to the surface is my buried desire for instant results. That surprises me because I thought I had moved beyond that. Probably I have for the most part, but there's definitely some of it still lurking inside my brain. Personally I think that city life does that to a person. Just about everything these days is instantaneous. You want something, you hop in your car and go buy it or go online and have it delivered to you doorstep the next day. You want music or you want to watch a show, you want to talk to someone or meet new people, you want a meal or anything at all, you've got your computer, your iPhone, your restaurants, your car, your internet and a thousand other ways to make your wish come true with virtually no effort and no waiting.

One of the things I like about cooking, eating locally and seasonally, and about not having a microwave in the house is that if I want to eat something I have to prepare it. There is a cost associated with my food beyond the price tag, and that actually makes eating a much more satisfying experience. There are no bags of junk food in my kitchen and no zapping anything so I can't eat within 1 minute 30 seconds of deciding I want to eat something. This also reduces temptation and works as a built-in system for ensuring the quality of my food. It has completely broken me of the habit of snacking.

Working with horses is the same kind of thing in the sense that you don't just go pick out a horse, hop on and expect an experience as predictable and controllable as your car or your microwaved frozen dinner will deliver. Horses are living things. They have brains and therefore have moods, personalities, likes and dislikes. They experience fear and pleasure, and their chemistry doesn't mix the same with everyone. Hop on an exceptionally good horse and you might get what you expect, if he's in the right mood and nothing unexpected comes up. Hop on a horse that doesn't have all these things going for it in that particular moment and you could be in for some frustration, to say the least. From my own experience and from discussions with the instructor, frustration due to unrealistic expectations is a common problem with people who spend more time on a computer or in a coffee shop than on a horse.

I've also taken up guitar recently and have found the same challenge there. Learning to play music can be incredibly frustrating and takes practice, practice, practice, day in and day out, for years. I grew up playing the piano and I remember how difficult it was in the beginning. Actually I suppose it never really got all that much easier, because as my skills improved my instructor bumped up the challenge. But with time and patience I progressed. Everybody wants to play the guitar or learn a foreign language or possess some other skill, but a lot fewer people are willing to put in the work to get it. I'm not ragging on anyone. I face the same challenges and I haven't always been as persistent as I should have been. If something's hard, it's hard not to quit.

It's been said that anything worth having is worth working for and I do believe that's true. People who are given things are rarely as appreciative of those things as they are of things they fought long and hard to get. I think part of my motivation to take up guitar or become a better horseman comes from my desire to have more meaningful things in my life. I mean, don't you ever get bored and think:

"Is this all there is? I've got a good job, I make enough money. I could just eat out all the time and sit at the coffee shop for an hour each morning and never really have to fuss over anything, learn anything new or do anything that doesn't directly contribute to my immediate comfort. So why do I want to spend so much time and money on things that require so much work and that in the end won't even increase my salary?"

Maybe it has something to do with that old saying about idle hands or maybe there's just something restless in me. I don't know. I can enjoy a coffee shop or a nice dinner out as much as anyone, but I'm just not satisfied making my life super cushy. It's like I want to introduce a little pain, a little hard work, a little something so I can feel like I'm alive and not just curled up on the sofa watching life go by. And it needs to feel real, genuine, not manufactured. For example, I'll never get into cycling. It's a great hobby and I think Lance Armstrong is cool. But for me, I'm thinking: "Where the hell am I going?" There's got to be a destination, a greater purpose. Cycling or mountain climbing, while in moderate amounts can be fun, feels like busy work to me. What's the point? But things like growing my own food, harvesting it and then preparing it actually has a very important purpose in and of itself. Playing the guitar and riding horses are similarly justifiable in my mind, as they fit into my grand scheme of self reliance.

Picture this: my cabin in the woods (as I've described many times). I saddle up and take a string of horses into the wilderness for a week-long hunting trip. When I return I've got hides to tan, a new bearskin rug and a supply of elk/deer/moose meat that will last until next season. I've got a garden to tend, a cow or goat to milk. I've got canning to do, meat and trout to smoke, butter to churn, a root cellar to stock, beer to brew, wood to chop. I've got horses and dogs that need tending, a hog that needs butchering, a cabin that needs repairs before winter. And when I'm resting I can fill the air with the lovely sounds of the harmonica or sing lonely tunes to the mountains as I strum my guitar on the back porch on a cool summer's evening. That's what I want. Those are "hobbies" that mean something to me. I get tingly all over when I think about it.

So in the mean time I spend my free time trying to wring the vestiges of the city from my life and my body, ever trying to push my life down that dirt road that leads home, my cabin in the woods.