So I haven’t posted anything in a while but it seems like
now would be a good time to catch up. Since the last time I have wrote anything
alot of stuff has happened I guess? time has went by and in that time i did
lots of cool stuff, lots of ridiculous things, a few silly ideas have surfaced,
and the list of things to do has only grown.
I am sitting in a library in Kerrville Texas right now.
About an hour NW of San Antonio and next door to Ingram and Hunt it’s a beautiful
new building. (sidenote: supposedly Hunt is where dr. Phil sends all the Hollywood
addicts go to an expensive, middle of nowhere, recovery ranches. this
information courtesy of the extremely elderly volunteer at the thrift shop I
went to today... who also told me the only place i could buy jeans was at
walmart) Anyway I digress. The library is called the Butt-Holdsworth Memorial
Library and that’s a great name. J
I find myself in Ingram Texas at a ranch on Junction Highway
run by a guy name Clint. I met Clint on previous adventure to Texas I took a
few months back that started out as a pedicab ride. Anyway when i met Clint a
few months back I told him how I was living and working in New Orleans but that
what I really wanted to do was explore the Western part of the country and
learn some new skills along the way. By the end of the weekend I had his number
and was told that anytime I wanted to work on his ranch I could feel free to
head on over. I loved the sound of this and ever since I returned from the trip
have had this idea in my head of working on a ranch. Whatever I thought that
might mean i really had not even the slightest clue.
Leaving New Orleans I drove to Dallas where I spent a night
and day checking out what life outside one of the country’s biggest city’s was
like. I stayed with someone I had given a pedicab ride to a few weeks earlier
which was fantastic but the scenery was another. It was not very awesome. Unless you love big
box stores and commercialization on every corner Northern Dallas left a lot to
be aspired for. I don’t think i saw a single individually owned shop or market
or restaurant. I could have been in the wrong place but from what i saw i didnt
like and couldn’t imagine living in. On my first Saturday night outside a major
city in a while I went to see The Avengers and it was everything i wanted from
a movie. action packed, huge explosions, over the top acting, menacing villains,
and overpriced popcorn made it an awesome night. and my first 3-d experience
too.
I kept West on my journey through Texas traveling on lots of
2-4 lane road ways through all kinds of cities. I elected to take these smaller
roads because they did not charge a toll and the scenery was constantly
changing and keeping my eyes bouncing. When i did sneak onto the highway for a
bit i was lucky to have my cowboy hat on my passenger seat. Placed on top of a
large backpack it looks shockingly similar to a human when you accidentally
drive onto the HOV lane...
I arrived to Clint and his wife Amy's ranch around 7 pm,
plenty before sunrise but still late in the day. I had wanted to get to this
place since the moment i heard about it and i don’t think I was trully ready
for it even when i did arrive. Zooming past his house on the first go round i
knew i was passing it as the zebras were grazing in the front and the dogs were
howling by the roadside. I did my u-turn and parked in front of the gate and
began to soak in the place that I had stumbled upon. I could see huge cages all
around, lots of wide open spacing’s and hear all sorts of noises, from dogs to
cats, and donkeys to zebras it seemed like i was in for quite an adventure no
matter how everything turned out.
The first thing Amy said as she saw me waiting by my car was
to question "Where all your hair
went?!" While I had a helmet of Afro on the last time we met i had
drastically cut my hair the day before. Kind of a big decision for me, as my
hair, as you may know, was pretty damn large and certainly gave me alot of
confidence walking around New Orleans. One of my buddies is always chiding me
to "Never cut that shit man, you'll lose all your power!" but I think
I needed to show him (myself) that Id be ok without my afro... It'll grow back…
besides, you try finding a hat that fits ten pounds of afro thunder...
Im digressing like crazy and running out of library time
here!
Anyway, by now I have spent four days on the ranch helping
out the family with whatever they need done (which
to this point has been mostly cutting down trees and turning them into
woodchips for their huge driveway) and whatever i can be of assistance with
or try and learn for the future. The family consists of Clint and Amy and their
15 year old daughter Ashley. Two family/relatives/friends forever named Bill and Clif also live and work
fulltime on the ranch. If I were to put
the characters into more recognizable reality television type stereotypes,
Clint would be the big boss man. If Clint says something, it gets done. If you
think it requires second thought, your a step behind him. He loves to talk and
teach and tell wild stories, of which I couldnt even begin to get into at the
moment. He drives big trucks, loves dangerous animals, and makes ridiculous
things seem completely plausible. Move that mountain to get to get to the
canyon on the other side? Sure! Wrestle that toy from the Lion without taking
your sunglasses off? Go for it! Cut down a forest to pave a road with
woodchips?! Its only small chunk of the 45,000 acres! But this is only a small
batch of his ways. I have only been here for a short amount of time and most of
it is spent with the rest of the crew/family/whatever you might call the unit. Amy is the beautiful wife of the hunter and
does all of the stereotypical things that the housewives might do but takes it
to another level. When someone asks what’s for dinner in texas it doesnt mean
whats in the refrigerator, but more like, how much work should i put into
preparing it. Think along the lines of: Wow, that was grazing in the front yard
a few minutes ago huh? She loves watching crappy television that woman love to
watch but when you can be sentimental over Greys Anatomy and then go slaughter a
pig and feed it to the big cats gain a lot of points in your bad ass standings.
Ashley is their daughter and may be one of the most
intelligent people her age I have ever met. She is able to do any and everything
on the ranch I have seen so far and has the responsibility’s of animals from
donkeys and baby deer (-like species), to chicken and fish, and things in
between like mountain goats or baby lions completely in her care. While I am
learning about incubating eggs and feeding animals from bottles, she utilizes
my extra hands and has more free time to play with the baby mountain lions they
raise from kittens and do other ranch work I couldn’t even remotely wrap my
head around at the moment. The part of the ranch I am working on will be shared
by Ashley and her Mom and used for tourist like income while Clint and the
other guys are off hunting or dealing with the larger part of the ranch during
the off/on seasons.
Bill is a young guy who can best be described as a cowboy. I
couldn’t tell you what that meant a week ago but i certainly could today. Bill
can do everything. He shoots guns, uses his sharp ass knife for anything, doesn’t
need to wear gloves for petty things, catches fish with his bare hands and can
wrestle and catch a deer using a 3 foot rope and his bare hands. And I learned
all that before the sun went down on day one. Bill is also the closest to my
age although i am not sure exactly what that is.
Cliff is the older workhorse. The type that is weathered and
worn and has seen it all but keeps on keeping on. I guess him and Clint were
like brothers growing up and they have just been working together and living
life ever since. I really enjoy the time with Cliff as he always calls me "pilgrim"
and offers to teach me everything he can. My favorite lesson from Cliff is how
to shoot his .22 out back. matt Davidson listen up, Guns are damn cool. You are
right!
This is a short little entry that I will undoubtedly add to
and update. I needed to get to a library and into a city but my slack time off
the ranch has been longer than I would have liked. While I don’t need to go
back for any sort of reason in particular I would rather be outside than in the
library. So that’s what I am going to do. I got this all typed out and it’s a good start
so next time Ill post a ton of pictures and some other cool stuff. Ideally that
will be soon. This weekend I will be going to my first rodeo so the odds of something
interesting happening is pretty great.
Until then!
