Appalachia

So long honey, babe
Where I’m bound, I can’t tell
Goodbye’s too good a word, babe
So I’ll just say, “Fare thee well”
I ain’t a-saying you treated me unkind
You could’ve done better but I don’t mind
You just kinda wasted my precious time
But don’t think twice, it’s all right

 Bob Dylan

These past few weeks have reminded me why I built Black Dog Ridge. It’s Appalachia broad and full, and I am well contented here. 

Saturday Brittany and I met Kenny and his clan and Krystal and her gang for lunch at Hill and Holler and then we all went to see Sleepy Hollow at the local theatre. It was nice. A nice day. We walked by the anthropology sight where Steve and Kim are working and we saw Steve digging out a plot — looking for some ancient artifact or some sign of things past. He and Kim are pretty remarkable people. Super educated, traveled, kind, studious but funny and great beer drinking partners. Lewisburg is lucky to have them. We are lucky to know them.

After the theatre we took the long way home — Marti right up between us on the center console. It was a beautiful bright sunny Autumn day and the leaves are doing their colorful death dance.

Coming up the lane on the drive home, it happened that we were listening to old Pete Seeger tracks as we passed the house below Black Dog Ridge. ‘We Shall Overcome‘. This house has Trump flags all over the place and some Jesus shit too. It was a bit surreal for us to be singing (well, just me) a historic slave song that is emblematic of activism while driving by a house flying a flag promoting a racist for president. But that’s the way shit goes down these days. 

Back at BDR, Brittany took Marti on a walk and I moved on dinner. Smoked chicken on the Green Egg, Cannelloni beans with shallots and a touch of pesto. I also cooked chicken gizzards for Marti as a treat and made chicken stock from the carcass of a chicken we had cooked a few nights ago. I had all 4 things going at once along with tending a fire in the outside fireplace and drinking an old fashioned and smoking a cigar. I did the beans and gizzards at the outside kitchen so I could watch the chicken temps and enjoy the fire. For music I mixed it up with Haggard and Willie Nelson and Kenny Rogers and Townes Van Zandt. 

As David Allen Coe would say ‘if that aint’ country, you can kiss my ass’.

My cooking game is strong. Since returning from Nashville I’ve been focused. Mostly Vegetarian or seafood. Biscuits, seabass, smoked salmon, soups, some curries, sourdough pizza and various breads, beans and gourds.  

We find ourselves down now to the last couple of weeks before the election. A choice between ignorance and informed. Intelligent or Dumb. Accomplished or inept. Measured or petulant. Petty & vindictive or compassionate. Inclusive or divided. Thoughtful or whimsical. A leader to be proud of or a proudly failed leader. Choose your words. Choose your side. Let’s see where it goes.

We went to Hinton’s little Railroad Days festival for a couple of hours last Friday. We go to these small town events a few times a year. They are essentially identical except for the town. The same folk musicians playing classical guitar. Same food trucks. Same arts and crafts folks and same merchies selling the same shit. Seriously identical except a few miles down the road. But what the hell. It’s community. 

Next day we went to TOOTs (Taste of our Towns) and met some groovy folks. We wound up drinking on the patio of The French Goat with Ray and Randelle — also recent re-lo’s to the area. Good folks and a nice afternoon.

I love having a dog. But like kids, they require some accommodations in schedules at times. We had Marti with us but it was not ideal at TOOTs. Too many people in too small a space to suit her and lots of other dogs. So once we got settled in at French Goat it was fine. We mostly try to have Marti with us of course but once in a while we leave her at home if it’s just a few hours, or with the dog sitter if it’s a trip she can’t go on. She’s growing up to be a fine dog. A bit aloof at times but she’s an Amish rescue and who knows what horrors she experienced on those dark Amish farms. 

I’ve starting laying up wood for the winter. Lots of time with the saw and axe and hatchet and hard labor. But it’s fine. It’s right. Dues must be paid.

Kenny came by the other day. We are discussing my first major project since finishing the homestead here. I want to take out the wood burner and build a proper fireplace on that same wall. It will create more space and I just love a big traditional rock fireplace with a mantle. So we are aiming for that sometime next summer. Will have to save my pennies.

Next weekend the boys are here for a motorcycle weekend. Krystal’s boyfriend, Nathan, who is also my UPS driver, is a rider. I invited him to join us but when I told him we would be wearing ‘Bikers for Harris’ shirts, he quickly declined. Understood sir.

We fully expect to get our asses kicked at some point next weekend when we stop in some local bar for a break. But sometimes you gotta get an ass-kicking for an important point I guess. Won’t be my first or last. 

Whiskey goes down
Like cold, spring water
Over rocks, at the close of the day
When you’re flying like Eagles
Down American highways
You lose a lot of friends along the way
But we just keep on moving
And rolling along
Can’t look back
We might turn to stone
But we we’d have taken much better care of ourselves
If we would have known we was gonna live this long

Wilie Nelson

I’m down to just a few of the excellent Cubans I got from Joel in Namibia. That brilliant young man, an MYO alum, got out of Namibia and into Cuba where he went to medical school and became a doctor. He also has a great connection for cigars so I brought a box home with me. 

The last weekend of the month Brittany and I are headed to Toronto to see Springsteen. Probably my last concert with the boss. Seems we are both getting on. Somewhere around my 15th concert, in 4 different countries, but spread over 40 years, it’s not a particularly dense concert schedule. 

I told Brittany that I hope her sister would make sure to expose young Eze to Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard. Brittany said that responsibility would probably fall on me — so I’ve now got that burden on my back. But it must be done.

One of the problems with having such a ridiculously contented life is that it takes away those sad and lonely moments where reflection and booze and bad choices conjure up the kinds of memories that fall on a different part of life’s sin wave. I’ve put in a lot of hard hours in small dives, sitting at the bar listening to hangdog country songs or swapping sad stories with some pitiful ole bastard feeling sorry for himself. But the pain’s real if you think it is.

There’s a whole subculture existing between my current plane and those less fortunate and I try never to forget that. I’d help them if I could but mostly we can’t. I know this because I’ve tried. We’re all on our own journey and need the experiences we’ve chosen for ourselves in this life. Occasionally our trajectories may intersect but mostly these days they don’t. We tend stay within our own socio-economic cages in this stratified society — for better or for worse.

I’ve never heard of a great writer honing his craft in the throes of a wonderful life. I should have made more of an effort in my formative and hungry years. There’s gold in them sad stories being told at dive bars all over the country.

All things being equal, I suppose I’d choose the positive side of the wave, but there’s real humanity in the other side as well. And knowing and learning. Guess we need the context to understand both. Bukowski knew what he was talking about. And Maugham and lots of other philosophers. ‘It’s easy to be a holy man on a mountain‘ (Maugham)

The cigar is done and the fire is dying out. Brittany is inside dishing up ice cream so will head in to sit with her and Marti and enjoy this moment.

Humbly Submitted
Robert Myres – Flanker, Portneuf Valley Rugby Football Club (ret.)