well, i am not entirely sure about the page format, but i have added a few photos from my digital camera. it will grow i'm sure. hopefully there's something there to entertain the few people who stop in. the scrapbook link to your right will take you there as well.
when i was just out of college i moved home for a bit. at that time i was affectionately referred to as the bunny hugger. dad thought that was cute. he had to know that he was the one i got it from...mom was never interested in animals. since i was a little girl i had been with dad at the chicken house helping the babies hatch or out in the pig pasture petting the swine while dad told me they wouldn't hurt me....or sticking my fingers out for our calves to slurp on....or nursing a baby squirrel left in a fallen tree by our home....or nursing a baby horse after dad milked his mother (peanut wouldn't nurse, we thought he might be blind). i had woken up with a baby pony in the front yard....woken up to a baby deer in my bed, returned home from college to see the baby coon dad had been given to raise. there was always a new animal adventure.
even those stray cats i took in were his influence. at the mine where dad works animals are often dumped by the trash. the miners feed them scraps and sometimes bring one or two home. typically we have an outside cat running around. he also brought home an old bassett that had been dumped and found a home for her...we called her chleo...then there was the short-legged beagle a guy had dumped that mom and i adored. i called her pumpkin. so when i took in 9 kittens during my tenure with the folks it didn't seem like a big deal. he came home from work and wanted to know "how'd we get that herd of cats?!" i began to wonder if dad had lost his heart. i quickly learned differently. when one of the stray kittens fell into the cistern and had nothing to grab onto i freaked. i figured she was gone. my dad, with all his "damn cats" wouldn't let her drown. he grabbed a hoe and laid down on the porch and fished her out. i knew he was soft. no amount of complaining about having to step over them would change my mind. so i blame him for my bunny hugger status.
and when i moved home for those 5 months i did a lot of thinking about what was happening around me. dad had just gotten moonshine back then. he was a coonhound...one of a few we have on our place in indiana. they have a nice kennel with runs and water and heat. hay lines boxes that are dry and the runs are kept clean. the dogs live there by day but by night they are hunted. i had grown up eating venison from the deer my father killed that year. and as perry got older he was taught to hunt and he also would bring home something. we weren't wasteful and for me it seemed to make sense. my family was from a long line of hunters and i always knew that my dad was a fair man. he would never take more than we needed. in fact, i began to see a sort of spiritual connection between the hunter and the hunted....a sort of thankfulness akin to the beliefs held by our native ancestors. from hunters we had came...and as i looked through dad's fox fire and back to basics books i knew that my family would always be one of hunters. but this coonhunting. i couldn't justify it. i grappled with the idea and the death for naught. these banded creatures we didn't eat. the hides were sold, but never for a profit. the dogs would go out regularly with dad and trips were made to wisconsin. dad was in a coonhunting club and perry had joined with kodiak, his dog. it pained me to watch them when i first got home. it just didn't jive. i had been gone for 6 years at this point and i guess i felt a little detached from my roots.
i remembered my grandfather as i looked at the 5 foot tall coonhunting trophy in perry's room. he was always so good with his dogs and i even liked herschel and curly and all the guys he hunted with. they were always jolly old men with a hound on the front porch. their wives were good cooks, gray hair in a bun, dressed in polyester dresses that were years past their fashion.
i remembered julie, my first dog. she was a walker coonhound and i loved her. i didn't even recall the day i got her, but granny has a picture of her with me sitting on the ground. she was a puppy...my pigtails were about an inch long. i had shown her as a kid for any visitor..."sis, show julie". i'd prop her head with one hand and curl her tail with the other. she was such a good dog. i had a t-shirt back then that said, "proud to be a coonhunters granddaughter." coonhunting was a sport that was so huge in my family. i didn't know anyone else at school who had family into it, but it was a part of my history. i tried to put things into perspective, how could something i had been around all my life be repulsive? i wasn't very proud of my family then.
at one point dad had sent moonshine home with a fellow interested in going in on him...a partner per se. within a week dad had moonshine back and had treated him for an illness. he wasn't going into business with this guy. he hadn't taken care of moon.
i was home one day when a call came in. "tell jim i got a coon". i hung up and delivered the message. a friend of the family had set-up a box trap by the garden and caught one. dad and i drove over and put the trap in the bed of the truck. dad looked at the feisty little guy and commented on how unhappy he was. we headed home. when we arrived dad lowered the tailgate and pulled the cage forward. he told me to go inside and soon he followed. he had opened the cage door and left. the dogs of course were all in their home so they wouldn't endanger this little fellow....he was being given a free ticket out...to a new place in the woods. i thought about what had happened. this wasn't at all what i perceived it to be. my dad wasn't the evil monster my thoughts were making him out to be. he had compassion. he was willing to take animals that others might kill for getting in their gardens and give them another chance...sure they might be hunted later, but it felt different.
i watched the dogs. i watched my dad. at least 3 nights a week he was going out. i began to wonder how many other folks took their dogs out for 4 hour runs in the woods. and i thought about how hunting coons was their nature and it just didn't seem so evil anymore.
yes, i have no objections to hunting. i think it can be ugly when you get some idiot out in the woods with a gun...and yes, that does happen often, but when you live in a land like where i grew up (quick stats: county pop. 8,000, % hoosier national forest: 75%, stoplights: 0, blinking red caution lights: 2, fast food restaurants: 0, factories: 1 (only about 5 years old)) you can see the necessity. the deer and coon and rabbits are so insanely over-populated they tear-up everything. if they weren't thinned out then they would starve and personally i see hunting for population control as a little more humane than allowing a species whose predators have been depleted to starve and become diseased.
over the years i've struggled with my liberal friends. i think i have a different perspective than most because i come from a place like i do. many families have hunted for generations and have put food on the table that way. they have been growing and canning vegetables their entire lives. as much as anyone these days they live off the land. for those people hunting isn't a sick and demented way to destroy an animal? in fact i would be willing to wager that those people have a better grasp of what it takes to protect a species. they can be kind and caring to the land. and as far as i have seen the only jack-asses we get in the woods during hunting season come from the city (these are the ones you find wondering on your property without permission....or are like the guy on our property who nearly shot my cousin in the head...or the fellow who tagged a coyote with his deer tags).
it's a weird world to live in. every other month we would have a dead possum on the road by my house...someone hit it with a car. no one holds rallies or protests autos because they are cruelly killing animals. and i wonder what the numbers might be.
and a lot of people will moan and complain that hunting that is done without the intent to eat the animal is evil. and i guess at one time i saw their point. but now i recall frank, our raccoon who dad grew so close to before he left home on his own accord. and i think of old moonshine going out with dad...and dad coming home wet one night because he and moon have an agreement. if moon crosses a creek, dad crosses. and i wonder how a person can judge that which they have never known?
sure, they may argue that we are eating up our land by development and that we should stop taking land from the animals. to those people i invite you to crawford county, indiana. my folks drive over an hour one way to work. there are no jobs, no development, no nothing. the people eating up the land that these dear animals live on are those that surround our little refuge. and as long as the rest of the world continues to decide what is best there will be places like crawford where everything sits still and we bear no gains....and the outsiders looking in will condemn and shame us.....and then drive for hours to spend a little time in the beauty of our land, all too often leaving their trash behind.
sometimes you have to trust that there's someone who knows.
i've been in a bit of an expressive mood lately. i think i've been drawn back to a few things that make me happy. writing, genealogy....being part of a family. it's far away but it's forever. i am slowly realizing the importance of pursuing that in my life. mom says it's about knowing where to look. i know she isn't exactly speaking these words as an answer to this train of thought, but it seems to fit more broadly.
i look at the old photos folks are sending me. traces of me are in those pictures. there are stretches of ground that were cultivated by people with my genes. they were irish and german, native and scottish....catholics and dunkers. they owned slaves and they fought for the union. some fought for the south. they farmed tobacco....and were big name quaker preachers...some of the first settlers in pennsylvania. they traveled to texas and some came back to their old kentucky home.
i have stood in those fields and felt that sensation of belonging...as if their spirits are bouncing off of every atom in my body. it's the closest thing to heaven i've ever known. they were pioneers. they spread and belonged....they worked hard. they loved much...and they dreamed as often. that is what america has become to me.
last night began much like the last 4 days...i was down...sad...rock bottom emotionally. i was thinking too much, analyzing and depressed. it was not an ache, but a lackluster. things felt amiss....but then it came full circle.
i spent a little time on instant messenger with my daddy who once again gave me what i have begun to refer to as the coonhound update. moonshine's pups are becoming well-known at hunts as good dogs and my father is like a proud grandparent. he always tells me about this guy or the other calling wanting to know about puppies out of 'shine. that dog has been a blessing i suppose. he's taught me a lot. but more on moon later. i got a call.
mom calls and tells me to talk to perry, my little bro who i adore, in fact my only sibling. i was curious as to what he would have to say...and if this was just mom's way of cheering me knowing i've been sad and feeling insignificant. talking to perry is a rare and special treat and it was good to hear his voice. he was slow to explain and then suddenly told me the news...i am going to be an aunt. an AUNT!!!! in about 9 months the heavens will open and an adorable replica of perry and krissi will grace our family. i couldn't be any more ridiculous about it. it seems that this little piece of news is the most welcome tidbit. auntie april. i'm going to be the coolest aunt. i have already began to feel the ache of my arms longing to hold my niece or nephew.
after perry and i hung up dad called to get my social for insurance purposes (i'm a beneficiary) and mom took over the call. "so what do you think?" i told her i couldn't wait. she laughed. as we hung up the phone i said to her, "goodnight, grandma!" she giggled like a little girl. i know she has been counting the days until this occasion.
shortly after my talk with the folks i got another call....my friend and everything is square between us once again. i think deep down i knew it would be, but it still made me sad. now, the decisions have to be made about new year's eve and the weekend prior....john, if your around then i may have to beg you to join me for a beer in san fran (that is if tickets and hotels and all that other stuff falls in-line...i do hope i'll be there).
yesterday was day 7. my seventh day with guitar in hand for more than 30 minutes. i went through the normal repertoire: wish you were here intro, metallica's one intro, marley's redemption song intro, ben harper's burn one down intro, jingle bells, and beethoven's ode to joy. i tweaked out portions of here comes the sun and ripple, and even went on to try a little more on a jewel song i used to like. i went through my instructional book and learned a few new chords: E7 and A7. both are simple shifts with easy pivots. the transfers have become more fluid. i am still overly-concerned with my strum and have hoped to see a person "play" a guitar and then perhaps method would click, but they all looked so different.
brad said, "just strum." but what i wanted to know....up, down, up, down...give me something i begged....a pattern for chrissakes! he wouldn't and before i could believe it i was making my own way. i found the sounds that latched onto the chords i was picking and while i still do way to many G to Em switches i have begun to add more to the mix. it's a wonderful feeling to hear the sounds meld together. and a part of me feels a new addiciton growing into place. i may never be a rock star, but one day i may be able to play like one.
i hated south park after the movie. i wouldn't watch it because i just didn't think little kids spouting off profanities over and over and over again was in the ballpark of funny. i fell asleep in the backseat of the car at the drive-in....i was exhausted after trying to find a space to park....imagine the crowd at a double feature of south park and the wood...they weren't the most peaceful bunch. and i believe since i left that crowded and rocky parking lot i have stayed away from south park giving props only to the hanukah song (a.k.a it's hard to be a jew at christmas) and the robert smith saves the world story.
last week we were flipping channels in search of something to entertain our bored selves and we stopped on south park. it was the one where cartman's dawson creek trapper keeper tries to destroy the world...very, very cute. and once again i am reminded of the powere of not taking ourselves to seriously. south park's jab at the sickly successful efforts of marketing staffs to put into the hands of teens and children the over-priced replica's of simple items plastered with our modern day pop culture heroes...now that's comedy.
this weekend we watched the episode with the evil bearded cartman. cartman said hella a lot. i laughed because he reminded me of an old silly roommate and how as a teenager i used words like ka-wink-i-dink. cartman and i are nothing alike...but he is hella cool, more so than i ever was. is he trying to save the world?
i realized it yesterday when for the 30th time this fiscal year i watched the tail end of pretty in pink with a pouty andrew mccarthy and molly all dressed in self-professed own creations.
i stopped the remote to see the final fifteen minutes of the flick. after all, these movies shaped my perspective on interpersonal-relationships in the 80s when i was growing from a country bumpkin mud-shaper, hole in the knee kid into a young lady interested in boys and the romantic interludes and heartbreak that come along with that.
pretty in pink, the breakfast club, 16 candles........all were favorites and there is no way on this earth that i could account for how many times i have seen each. i would almost bank on twice a year for each movie....the cast of those shows seemed to have us by the ear in those days. molly trounced from one movie to the next. i saw the pickup artist....and even the one where she gets pregnant in high school. most told of love....the true kind, where odds stack so high they seem insurmountable, but somehow molly finds a way.
it is because of molly that i believe that you can be a poor girl with a bum for a dad and a runaway mother and still get the cute rich guy to fall in love with you...or you could be the pitiful forgotten 16 year old overshadowed by your sister and still wrangle the best-looking senior in your school. love is love right? it stings at first, but comes up roses eventually. ain't no mountain high enough.
molly also taught me about friends. those guys who follow you around all of your life who claim they love you. well, they really do....and like ducky in pretty in pink....or anthony michael hall's character in 16 candles they ultimately want you to be happy. they'll deal with their feelings and remain your friend. in molly's world her happiness and friendship were more important than some one-sided attraction these guys carried...and in the end they usually were able to move on, sometimes getting the rejected rich and beautiful chick that molly's man cast-away.
yes, molly's world had me fooled. i thought that the hoods and the geeks and the weirdos could hang right alongside of the preps and the jocks. that there are more commonalities than we can see. that it's o.k. to want something that seems so far out of reach. and it can work out in the end. that true friendship is loyal and nurturing and above all endless.
