By Hal Walter
Many of us move to the country or the mountains to carve out a rural existence with the idea we are going to simplify our lives, get away from the craziness. Somehow it doesn’t always work out this way.
At least it hasn’t for me.
This notion occurred to me on a recent Sunday morning as I was quietly grinding away with a hacksaw at welds on a driveway cattle guard. On the other end was a 1,200-pound horse named Jack with his hind leg caught in the big steel grate made of angle iron and plumbing pipe.
My neighbor Lorie had called early that morning B.C. (Before Caffeination) with the emergency. I got there and found the horse had yanked the cattle guard right out of the ground and dragged it by his hind leg for about 30 feet uphill. The good news, I told her, was I didn’t think the leg was broken even though it was a bloody mess.
So we calmly tried to take the cattle guard apart with manual tools while frantically taking turns calling veterinarians. It was, after all, Sunday morning.
Oddly I didn’t find myself surprised by any of this. In fact, the frenetic pace of life lately leaves very little to be surprised about. I’ve been plagued by so many distractions and minor details that I am having a difficult time keeping track of all that is going on and all I need to do.
Writing and editing projects are always simmering on the backburner. Parenting an autistic child is demanding and draining. Lately, screenings of the film “Haulin’ Ass” in Avon, Salida and Boulder have been a diversion. And projects at the ranch I manage have required overseeing a team of Amish handymen as the owners ready the property for sale.
I’ve been told I need to make a list.
Colorado Country Life, a magazine that looks sort of like this one and arrives in the mailbox at about the same time each month, offered me a nice fee to write an article on pack-burro racing, a subject I have just a little experience writing about. The editor gave me about a month to write the piece. I told her no problem.
Naturally, I spaced it out until a couple of days after the deadline. Like I don’t need the money or anything.
So I had to call and explain that I had totally forgotten about the assignment, had never missed a deadline, etc. I thought about offering up Mike Rosso’s phone number to back me up on that slightly embellished deadline claim, but it wasn’t necessary. I was granted an extension and I frantically set about writing the story, remembering the Jack Nicholson character in the movie Wolf: “Don’t hold writers to deadlines. They’ll only turn in rough drafts.”
Meanwhile, I’ve been fretting about the film screenings, which would not be a worry except that I had been asked to speak at each of these events. Public speaking makes me anxious. At Avon I would need to introduce the film, answer questions from the audience, and do a reading from my book. At Salida I would only need to do the reading and then be on a Q&A panel. But an experience blanking out in front of an audience years ago leaves me nearly paralyzed with anxiety about public speaking.
So I made notes, and practiced. The Avon Library event went pretty well. The next night at Salida would be before a larger audience at the SteamPlant, but the reading was almost too well rehearsed for me to totally mess it up.
The audience at least was made aware by the film of my son Harrison’s challenges. So nobody, including me, really flinched at the disruption. As I was introducing my reading, his mom led him down from the balcony seats. He was screaming “Dad, you stop talking! You go turn a card!” Apparently turning a card is a disciplinary measure used in his second-grade classroom for infractions like talking out of turn. He had a valid point – maybe if I feel this way about public speaking I shouldn’t agree to talk to a crowd.
The Amish are interesting folk. The first day on the job I learned they can drive a tractor, operate chainsaws and other power tools, but they pay a guy to drive them there in a van. The Amish are hard workers, and after a few days the projects at the barn, and inside and outside the two houses, began to take shape. Of course all of this required keeping track of the labor and materials. More details for my overtaxed brain.
It’s sometimes difficult to know when the Amish are around. There are no telltale vehicles of course, and if they’re not running power tools, they’re so quiet. They even talk softly among themselves. One day I arrived at the ranch for chores and decided the Amish guys weren’t there yet. I did a couple of tasks outside, then I opened the barn door and was pulling the hose inside to water the horses. Right about then, one of them silently stepped around the corner from the tack room. I’ve been surprised by bears and a bobcat over at that barn, but an Amish guy materializing from the darkness really startled the crap out of me.
Back to Jack, where we began this tale. He remained calm but it was clear I was getting nowhere with the hacksaw. Finally veterinarian Kit Ryff answered his cellphone. Lorie served coffee while we waited for Kit’s arrival. He sedated the horse, cut the cattle guard apart with a power saw and Jack walked out of the trap. The horse had cut tendons on the front ,but no broken bones. Kit sewed up the wound, bandaged it and splinted the lower leg.
This confused horse would continue to walk this crazy world!
Hal Walter writes and edits from the Wet Mountains. You can keep up with him regularly at his blog: www.hardscrabbletimes.com
