“C’mon people now smile on your brother, everybody get together, try to love one another right now!” –The Youngbloods
Oh to have lived in the 60’s like my folks did no matter how young they were and in fact the young the “hip” thought had “the key to love and fear.” People like us that read and appreciate this blog understand that we’re still fighting the same battle 17 years into the 21st Century how to live that same song that was released in the summer of July 1967, indeed the Summer of Love.
I had to begin my article with that.
I need to write this down before I forget anymore. Turning 30 is barreling down on me and my mind is sharp except for the marijuana and domestic beer clouding my brain. That’s a joke! However, both are involved on this 86 degree late June afternoon as I write on my deck overlooking the Ozark forest my quarters are built on.
I haven’t been able to submit an article in awhile, letting down the subscribers as well as fellow staff members that need the good read to get them through. There’s not an easy reason to explain why. If I admit there’s been a cloud around the mind and Earth in general since Trump took office that’s admitting it’s affected me. So I have a few things to catch up on.
I should start on my experience with venturing into Colorado for Drock’s bachelor party at the end of April. The Jeep was loaded up and ready for the 12-14 hour trek to Buena Vista, CO in order to meet up with the rest of the party at the cabin at 9,000 feet. Leaving 1,400 feet of elevation behind, me and my brother were able to slowly adapt, or so we thought while driving into higher elevation of New Mexico and southern Colorado.
This was Thursday night trickling into Friday morning when I began to get drunken phone calls from Drock, Chad and Ryan asking for directions, beer, and cigarettes. I stepped outside to get some air and take a piss on this lonely highway in nowhere country Colorado shining a flashlight ahead of me to make sure the wild coyotes and bears were aware of my presence. The stars above were incredible with no lights and a part of me wondered what itd be like with a celebratory legal joint and brew once we made our destination.
Finally arriving at the cabin at 3 am Mountain Time everyone was already there. All the way there I decided I would burst into the cabin playing a song on the strapped up guitar around my neck but once I stepped out of the Jeep on this almost two mile high mountain the wind made no way for the grand entrance to happen. Shit better get inside quick! The fun was waiting and Friday was already creeping into the weekend.
No sense in delving out details from that night on. Sleep was rare on this night in the cabin as excitement for the next day ran high. Breakfast and coffee would get us going on this mountain morning in the Southern Rockies. As only two of us waked and baked I figured it was just my imagination of the stares we were getting from the DEA agent and his family. The blue hairs didn’t seem to care for these young bucks either pumping money into their small town economy but we would get out of there as fast as the biscuits and gravy and green chile omelettes would clear the plate.
Next, we must get to the liquor store was my thought I yelled it several times during breakfast. Nobody else was excited as they stocked up the day before. Chad pulled into the neighboring liquor store in his spacious 4 door Jeep Wrangler; me and LD not used to the leg room as we had the 2 door Wrangler experience for 900 miles the day before. I picked up some nice Colorado beers from some of the many breweries in the vicinity. Dale’s Pale Ale from Oskar Blues Brewery and Eddyline Brewing IPA were some of the soon to be enjoyed ales.
The grocery store was the obvious next stop, snow forecasted to arrive later that evening, and a crazy mountain cabin with 50 acres of its own to explore by the Arkansas River. Food was a necessary and “nobody will go hungry” is an important rule for any type of group gathering of friends and family. We weren’t long into the grocery run when we were followed by a mysterious creature of the produce or deli section. I wasn’t sure where he came from but the lackey was on a mission from his superior who made the assignment right in front of our eyes. I was on a mission myself and never stopped to chat with the fellow. Were we that suspicious looking?
As I cracked open my first beer of the day back at the cabin talks of going down to the River were in the plans. I rolled up a joint of Snow Dog and kicked back on the deck chairs outside looking over the mountains and deep valley below. The sun was shining and the impending snow was not in the horizon just yet. Half the group retired for a nap while me, LD, and Drock departed for the River. The lack of last night’s sleep crept on the party and I needed this hike to wake up. The temperature was in the 40’s, 15 or 20 degrees below the historical average for the last days of April and it’d be smart to keep moving.
The hike down to the Arkansas River was literally down, more than we had projected looking at a map. We made it through the Pike/San Isabel National Forest backlands with beers and familiar spin-reel trout catching weapons we had brought that’s been through previous expeditions. We had various luck catching fish but walking along the banks of the Arkansas River on a beautiful Colorado day like this was pretty memorable. The clouds were beginning to roll around in the early afternoon, something I’ve been told and seen for myself a mountain tradition this time of day. “Storms across the valley, clouds are rolling in” as John Denver’s “Back Home Again” goes.
The hike back was both exhilarating and debilitating as the mountain air attacked our lungs full force. On our arrival back to the cabin, most everyone was trying to get back up and around, food on the stove, music blaring from the newly found Alexa device, and Dixie cups being lined up in the familiar 10 cup triangle for beer pong. Chad was not feeling well, looking like altitude sickness for the Beach bum, and my empty handedness of fresh caught Rainbow Trout had made his day even worse. My stoned stories of the wild wilderness we had just came from were no match for grilled bacon wrapped mountain trout. Chad has pointed out the rest of his high experience in his article, and all I know was the trip wasn’t going to be the same without him.
Saturday was the last full day for the Bachelor Party, snow had enveloped the mountains, and plans were being thrown around how to maximize the day. After a big cabin breakfast of everything we could throw together from hillbilly scrambled eggs to bacon and biscuits and gravy we found ourselves down at the local outdoor gear shop and was led to a few back roads that ended at Cottonwood Lake, a perfect snowy mountain lake that we were the only inhabitants of. Only mistake was not having fishing poles ready in the vehicle we had taken. If only Chad were still here I thought, he would’ve never let us not take fishing poles on our way anywhere, possibly even buying a new rod and reel combo at the outdoor shop last minute we had left from.
Drock gave us a brilliant idea of going to the Cottonwood Hot Springs next as we passed it coming down from the lake, a resort holding several natural hot spring pools. The snow was falling and outside of the pool felt like a frozen hell in just some basketball shorts posing as swim trunks and the pools were a 110-degree heaven. Big Horn sheep were roaming near the resort on the mountain connected to the property, a majestic animal enjoying the hillside next to the pools.
The storms had missed this part of Colorado, sticking to hammering the lower elevation of Denver more northward of us and getting back to the cabin after another round at the grocery store was inevitable. A big fabulous dinner had been planned for the evening including steak and crab legs that were prefaced by a bison chili that was demolished from the get go. Beer pong was the dessert, or so I remember and wondered if we would end up at the Lariat for the free music. Drock, as the man of the weekend who would soon be getting married had never doubted getting back into town that night and seemed to be in the mood to dance to the afro funk band that was playing in the bar
ATOMGA, that afore mentioned afro funk band did know how to throw a party and the Lariat was pretty exciting that night. More craft brew was to be consumed, despite the young, narcissist bartender who couldn’t understand the value of a platter of beer pitchers that needed to be found at the pool tables we would soon occupy. The end of the weekend was creeping in, and with the snow that had fallen over the last day or two had finally demolished my hopes of taking Independence Pass to Woody Creek. There would be other times.
I should include sports that were happening at that time and besides the end of the first month of major league baseball and a few college football spring games, the NFL draft was the big leader in events that weekend. We had no tv to keep track of the rounds throughout the weekend but I did know that the lowly Cleveland Browns, god bless them, had drafted Myles Garrett, a stud 6’5, 275 lb defensive end that dominated the SEC for the last three seasons. For the sake of Browns fans, have hope he can help turn your shit around as the Cubs in baseball proved you don’t have to be a loser every year.
Trump’s 100 days ended that weekend. And by now in this summer month so many things have happened, none of which have lead to an impeachment. The madness doesn’t make sense and I have thought over the last few months that I would wake up from this nightmare. Was this the reason I got kicked out of two bars after Drock’s wedding in Kansas City? Or was it I needed to make my way down to the honky tonk in which this local KC country band Playing For Horses was doing service to Gram Parsons covers. After returning from the Midwest I couldn’t take it and holed up at the Chief Motel in Fayetteville after living for a week at White Rock Mountain deep in the Ozark National Forest at one of the cabins the hippie owner rented to me for cheap because he understood the strife. 2017 has been weird so far…
-TD
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