The Breed

The mountain men were a tough race, as many selective breeds of Americans have had to be; their courage, skill and mastery of the conditions of their chosen life were absolute or they would not have been here. Nor would they have been here if they had not responded to the loveliness of the country and found in their way of life something precious beyond safety, gain, comfort and family life.

--Bernard DeVoto
Across the Wide Missouri

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.

Queen of the Mountain

Today mom proved what I'd been suspecting for awhile. When she's with my step-dad, she's a dainty, wilting flower who can't do anything but shop. When she's alone with me, she's a strong woman up for a real adventure. It's the weirdest thing.

Step-dad has been sick pretty much since they got here, so today me and mom hit the trail without him. She'd been saying she wanted to see snow before she left so I suggested snowshoeing up at Bear Lake. She always gets giddy in the snow. I figured it would be a stroll around the lake, at most, before scurrying back to the warmth of the truck. But no, we walked across the frozen lake not once but twice just because it thrilled her to walk on a frozen lake. She was throwing snowballs, falling and crawling in the deep snow, and then wanted to go UP the mountain! That blew me away. Of course she got winded not being used to the altitude and not having a lot of cardio conditioning, but I was proud of her. She said she wanted to buy some warmer boots and try real snowshoeing up the mountain next time she was visited. She was like a totally different person. I even pointed that out to her. I asked why, when she's around step-dad, she acts like a silly airhead who can't do a thing for herself and gets a chill with the slightest breeze, but when she's with me she wants to climb a snow-covered mountain in 30 mph winds. The answer was complicated and kinda cute actually, but seeing her out there being active and strong really filled me with joy. I love you mom.

Merry Xmas

Mom and step-dad have been in town awhile now. I love them both with all my heart.

I think I have what it takes to be a lonely old mountain man. I'm such an introvert. Even the people I love I can't be around too long before I start clambering for solitude.

Don't get me wrong. I love having friends and family. They're very important to me. It's just that people seem to drain my batteries; some more quickly than others. I need down time. Regularly.

When mom and step-dad come to visit, it doesn't take long for us to run out of things to do, mainly because Colorado offers little of the kinds of things they like to do. Or maybe it's just me. They are the poster children for upper middle-class suburbia. Mom's primary interests are shopping, shopping, fantasizing about having a bigger house, and shopping. And mom, bless her, wants to buy me EVERYTHING. I can't glance at something twice - a $1,200 bicycle, $200 designer shirts, a $5,000 bronze sculpture of wild horses - without her insisting I let her buy it for me. And she can't, for the life of her, understand why I don't just buy every little thing that catches my fancy. I try to explain that it's okay to admire something without feeling the need to possess it, but she looks at me like I'm speaking Greek. And doing anything outdoors more grueling than walking the Pearl Street Mall is pretty much out of the question. Try as I might, I can only spend so many hours in a week driving around Mapleton Hill and shopping the various malls and boutiques within 50 miles of home.

And sharing a bathroom. Do you have any idea how much toilet paper women go through? How is this even possible?

I look forward to late afternoon when mom and step-dad are pooped from a long day of shopping and lay down for a nap. I slip off to read Louis L'Amour or to write in my blog or just to lay down myself, close my eyes and imagine I'm in my fantasy cabin all alone deep in the mountains. What I wouldn't give right now to be there.

Go there. Totally go there.

I've always heard that tortured writers write the best stuff. Actually what I've always heard is that tortured artists create the best art, but I've heard it applied to a variety of specific art forms, including writing.

I love to write. My blog, often, is just me ranting or dreaming, but I think there's some good stuff in here. I've got some other writings that contain really good stuff. And I'd have to say all of my best stuff came about when I was either suffering terribly (as from my deep desire to be a cowboy-mountain man instead of a cube bunny) or when I was swept up with passion on a subject near and dear to my heart.

I also have to say I tend to blog most often when I'm feeling either deeply tortured or particularly joyous about something.

Lately I've been thinking a lot about how deeply I sank into my own misery over the last few years in my longing for another life. Not that my life is bad. It's quite good. It's just that often I feel like I'm in the wrong place and time, that's all. Anyway, often during those most intense moments I had (what seemed to me) the most brilliant insights, and created vivid imagery in my own head by blending fantasy with reality. What I'm trying to say is, I wish I'd put these down in writing because they'd make a damn good book. Actually some of them I did put down in writing, and fortunately the others are still burned into my memory so there may be hope yet for recalling the emotion that brought them into the world in the first place.

I've been relatively unmoved for a good many months now. I've managed to keep the cabin fantasy subdued and settle into a routine at work. This is good and bad. Good, obviously, because I'm not constantly fighting an emotional battle between what is and what I wish for. Bad, however, because it feels too routine, and a little bit like I've given up my dreams. Bad also because without the torture I have nothing pushing me to write or have those deep insights which bring me a sort of joy that I just can't put into words. Strange as it may sound, going deep enough into one's own world and having such insights or creative flurries or whatever they are is actually a kind of natural high. And when I have written as a direct result of such a high I've always gotten compliments and been told things like, "wow, you really need to be a writer."

I guess its in these moments that I can truly write from the heart, and maybe people pick up on that.

So I'm starting to actually miss being tortured, not for the tortured feeling itself which is miserable, but from the exhilaration, the creation, the self discovery it brings. Of course this makes me wonder if it's really the cabin I ever wanted in the first place, or if that was just my subconscious choosing something I could be so close to but not actually have in order to induce maximum, prolonged torture for the purest and highest high. :0) Hey, it IS possible, and if nothing else I try to be open minded and consider all angles.

So tonight I sat down and tried to put myself back in that place. I tried to recall some of my best moments and put down into words things that have been haunting me for too long. I closed my eyes and retreated within. In my mind I walked in the sand by the creek. I sat on my horse looking out over the ridge. I stood at the window peering out across the darkening meadow. My senses came alive and I was there. The scent of a moist pine forest after a summer rain. The texture of rough-hewn planks beneath my bare feet. The splash of icy snow melt on my face at the break of dawn. The sight of a moose ambling in the distance. It felt so good. The hard part is coming back.

Eclipse and Stuff

Tonight is the big eclipse - a very special full lunar eclipse occurring on the winter solstice. I read it'll be about 100 years before this happens again. We were going to go down to the observatory at CU to watch it but the sky is obscured by clouds. It happens.

People. Why do I continue to let them disappoint me? No one's perfect, I get it. I just wish people could a.) have a little more respect for one another, b.) get at least a few facts before jumping to conclusions, and c.) stop being so childish. Is that really too much to ask of a sentient race in a supposedly enlightened age?

I need a wilderness cabin. And some eggnog. Fortunately I do have the latter.

Back from the Dead

So I guess my blog isn't actually dead, because here I am.

I just sat down and read through some of my old entries. Wow. I can be pretty intense.

So what's new? I got the horse but she turned out to be way more work than I wanted, but as much as I feared. I had my heart set on a Morgan or a Quarter Horse, but this Thoroughbred sorta fell into my lap. She definitely lived up to her breed's description as a hot blood and wasn't suited for the kinds of things I wanted a horse for. I actually wouldn't have minded putting in the time, but I do have a full time career. Weekends weren't enough, especially considering I couldn't even spend every weekend out there with her. So now she's living the life of a cow pony somewhere in cattle country.

We took a trip to Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument, which was really great. We saw and photographed a lynx which was just awesome.

Work has been going well. I've managed to take my obsession for self-sufficiency and a cabin in the woods down a few notches, which I think explains why I haven't been posting anymore diatribes about society and office jobs. It's still something I fantasize about regularly, I just haven't been obsessing over it.

We've decided to start trying to meet new couples in the Boulder/Denver area and that's been fun. Feels good to be social again, especially since I don't have to go to the bars to do it.

And I guess that's all I feel like writing about today.

The End

It's been real.

Stardust

There's a horse I've been thinking about buying. I've spent the last few weeks riding some but mostly just hanging out in the pasture with her. I've also been studying natural horsemanship and Equus, the language of horses.

Last night I went out to the ranch and we had a nice chat. I did all the talking. :0) I told her that this morning I'd be back and we'd try a Join-Up. It would be her opportunity to choose me, rather than the other way around, and that would be the final decision.

So this morning I arrived at the ranch bright and early. I went out into the pasture and we said our good mornings. I took her into the round pen, and the ritual began.

I set her to running, which she began with an exuberant kick. Her breathing quickened, her ears perked up, her eyes were wide. I adopted a dominant posture, and kept strict eye contact as she circled me. After a few rounds, I made her change directions. This went on for some time. I was calm and in control, she was excited. And then I saw the first sign: her left ear turned like a radar dish and locked on me. I kept her running, and looked right into her eyes. Then her head turned slightly toward me, and her circle tightened around me - the second sign. Then a slight head bob, and then a deeper one. Still I kept her running, changing directions every 5 or 6 rounds, and kept my eyes locked on hers. Then her lips quivered and she started licking and chewing at the air, and dipped her head all the way to the ground in a sign of submission and acceptance. She was saying, "Okay, I think you might be worthy of being my leader. I'm ready to make my decision."

This was my cue to stop. I immediately dropped my rope, turned my back to her, slumped my shoulders and looked at the ground. I was saying in Equus, "Okay, I'm ready for you to make your decision. Will you choose me as your leader?"

Immediately she stopped dead in her tracks. This was the moment everything was leading up to, the moment that would make or break this budding relationship. There was total silence, except for the wind rustling in the cottonwood trees. I couldn't see her behind me. What was she doing? Was she just standing there? Was she even looking at me? Will she choose me or leave me standing here all alone? It felt like an eternity.

And then I felt it: a puff of warm air on my neck and the little hairs on her nose tickling my ear. My heart skipped a beat. She chose me. She chose me. Her head came over my shoulder and I reached up and rubbed her forehead. I turned toward her and she pressed her face into my chest. I was careful not to look her in the eye, but whispered my thoughts to her as I rubbed her face. After that she followed me around the pen, no leads, no commands. I took her back to the pasture and whispered a few more thoughts to her, smiled, and removed the harness. She ambled over for a drink, turned and gave me a long look, then quick as lightning the dust around her erupted with another exuberant kick and she bolted out across the field kicking and joyous, as playful as a kid on Friday after school.

"Let's do this."

Addendum: Yesterday evening, before this morning's Join-Up, but after I had told her about it, I lay down in the tall grass near this horse and watched her and the rest of the herd graze. The sun had set behind the Rockies and the sky was a dark, liquid blue during those long twilight moments. Cricket chirps replaced those of song birds. Field mice stirred. Toads emerged from their burrows to gulp down grasshoppers, and bats took flight. The prairie dogs had retired to their burrows, and I saw the silhouette of a distant coyote trotted along a ridge on the horizon. The meadow took on a new life, the life of night things. The chill of Autumn was settling on the plains, and the stars were spectacular; just spectacular! They looked like white diamonds tossed across deep blue velvet, and I felt like I was looking into eternity. I thought of the cowboys, the pioneers before them, and the Native Americans before them who must've spent countless nights looking up and dreaming. I thought of all the people who have ever gazed at the heavens and been overtaken with wonderment and awe. Ah, to be so tiny and yet so special as to have a metaphorical milisecond to peer up and into an unfettered sky and gaze deep into the cosmos, and to have the wits to appreciate it is just, well, miraculous. It was a splendid moment, precious and fleeting, and all the world felt right and good.

It was in those moments that I decided, should this horse choose me, I will name her Stardust.

And so it is.

You Can't Hide Your Lyin' Eyes

So the Fourmile Canyon Fire, which has been burning the mountains west of Boulder since Monday, is now officially the worst wildfire in Colorado history - not for its size but for the nearly 200 homes it has so far burned. They're still fighting it but it looks like Boulder is safe. A rain shower last night even cleared the air of the choking smoke.

I'm suffering from a severe lack of purpose. Big news, I know.

A couple of weeks ago I had another one of those moments where I decided reluctantly that my life is great, my job is great and I just need to settle in and enjoy it. And I did, mostly. For two weeks. Ish. But I knew it was fleeting. One can have everything in the world, but if one doesn't feel fulfilled then it doesn't matter much.

This much I do know: it isn't just the desk job aspect that I don't like. It's also the core of my job function that turns me off. I'm almost as sick of GIS analysis as I am of staff meetings and TPS reports. Surprisingly, however, I have found some spark of interest in web mapping; that is, making interactive , functional mapping applications for use over the internet. That's what's been keeping me moderately entertained at work lately. As long as I'm in the GIS field I definitely want to take my career in that direction for as long as it can hold my attention. Though still I know it's just a smokescreen; a distraction from the things I truly long for.

Anyway I decided to really try and get my mind off cabins and mountains and horses, but I'm like a mountain man junkie: I can stay clean for a little while but inevitably my thoughts start turning back to the things that consume me. It's a constant battle. That's why I'm blogging at 9AM on a Thursday morning instead of working. The blog is my attempt to help me organize my thoughts and get back to work, instead of heading out to the ranch or "running down to Boulder Horse and Rider - just for a few minutes to see what's new." Yeah right.

Gerard spent several weeks in Western Colorado and Montana this summer for an internship. He and some fellow student researchers were camping in remote parts of the Rockies studying pikas. At first, he said, it was beautiful. That gave way to pain and misery after the first day, because he wasn't accustomed to the rigors of "roughing it" and of spending so much time physically working and hiking. But after a couple of days he physically and mentally adapted and sort of fell into it. From that point on, he said, it was just awesome. I know the feeling. Every time I've been on an extended wilderness excursion or even in a physical working environment I've had the exact same experience. Gerard described Montana as the best. "It's very wild," he would say with a dreamy look in his eye. They saw bear, bald eagles, and heard wolves howling at night. The photos are stunning. Gerard lost 15 pounds during his time in the wilderness and didn't even notice. Mind you that was 15 pounds of "cushioning" he'd put on in the last few years since he pretty much gave up the gym. He looks good. He says at home he eats when he's bored. He exercises little and isn't really motivated to hang out at the gym and go mindlessly through some contrived routine. I very much know the feeling. This is a huge problem in modern Western society. Our lives are too soft and entirely too contrived. I despise the clock and the calendar like you can't imagine.

I once had a professor in college who was an archaeologist. He described a project he worked on where he lived in very primitive, stone age conditions for a month, and he described the same kinds of experiences that Gerard had. Even years ago when I was sitting in his class I was dreaming of how awesome that must've been.

I have another friend who was in the Peace Corps in Africa for two years, and he too described these experiences. He rarely got to call home. While talking to his mom on the phone shortly before his return to the US, she asked what he would be most happy to see upon coming back to the US. He said, "I can't wait to have a microwave again so I can easily heat up some water to take a bath." She paused. "Keith, you know we have hot water that comes out of the faucet here." He had to think about it a moment, then realized he had completely forgotten! I desperately need an experience like that.

In a scientific experiment conducted in Australia, a group (all volunteers of course) of older Aboriginal men who had lived the majority of their adult lives in the city, were asked to try living in the wild for six weeks. These men were all overweight, suffered from high cholesterol and high blood pressure and all the usual stuff. For six weeks these men lived in the Outback: no electricity or running water, no grocery stores, nothing. They had to make, catch, cook and gather everything. In six weeks all the men had returned to a normal, healthy weight and their medical problems had vanished.

I'm not saying life in the wild is all roses. It's the fact that it isn't that makes it so appealing and superior. There's a saying that there's no such thing as a free lunch. Modern society certainly offers a lot, but there is a high price to pay for all this luxury and softness, and I think I'm about tapped out.