Mist and Fire

These elemental: mist and fire.  Next are my mountains.

Yesterday, that girl and I drove overtop the Continental Divide and then unwound in elevation until we reached the cabin.  The forest surrounding the cabin stood perfectly still; the pine and fir trees layered like carvings of jade and ghosted through by mist.

As the sun drew the mist skyward, that girl and I gathered deadfall from along the roadway in and brought forth an open fire.

If the sky is my garden, tending a fire in the mountains is my feast.  There are few things I enjoy more.  That girl feels the same.

We spent most of the day at the fire, urging flames upright in the cool air, and then drove home by way of several gravel roads.  We even stopped to look aground Marysville, the half-ghost town where my family first scratched into this Montana earth during the gold rush of the 1860s.

--Mitchell Hegman

The Brain Trust

Apparently, it is a myth that the average human uses only ten percent of their brain.  Recent studies show that a normal person uses virtually every nook and cranny of their brain.  As Barry Gordon, a neurologist at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, notes: “the brain represents three percent of the body’s weight and uses twenty percent of the body’s energy.”   

Obviously, there are notable exceptions to using the entire brain.  You’ve heard that story about the would-be robber, mystified that his pistol did not fire when he pulled the trigger to shoot his victim.  In an attempt to understand why the pistol didn’t work, the would-be robber pointed the pistol at himself so he could peer down the barrel.  He pulled the trigger again.

The pistol fired.

Also consider how, in 1975, an entire generation of deep thinkers (include me here) went out and purchased pet rocks and bell-bottom jeans.  Where were our brains that day? 

Closer to home, I am guessing that half of my relatives operate on about a third of their brain.  And that’s after my great-grandmother on my mother’s side gave us a considerable boost in brain power.  Before that, we were out there trying to stop freight trains and mine shaft cave-ins with our bare hands.  We did not have pistols.

I got to thinking.

What if our brains are simply miniature versions of our physical self?  What if what you see on the outside is what exists on the inside?

That doesn’t bode well for me.  Maybe I am using all of my brain, but here is what my brain looks like:

My brain is short in stature and utterly incapable of a decent jump shot.  My brain’s right foot hurts.  Recently, a great deal of hair-thinning has taken place.  My brain squints when it tries to see in the distance.  A fair amount of energy is wasted because my brain is clumsy and drops stuff.  Mine is not a handsome brain.  My brain has a belly.  It has a lot of scars and wrinkles.

Did I mention that my brain’s ears stick out?

--Mitchell Hegman

Kevin Makes a Confession

The other day, a bunch of us were sitting around talking about canning homemade salsa and shooting deer, the way people do.  Naturally the subject switched to Miley Cyrus.  About then, Kevin slugs down some beer and announces: “I have a confession.”

We all turned and stared at Kevin.  This could be big, right?

“Yeah,” I probed, “what is it?”

Keven says, “I’d like to wrestle Miley’s tongue.”

Normally, some of would have gasped.  But most of the some of us had been drinking for a while and were just busy trying to sit there.  So the room got silent for a bit.

Kevin downed another gulp of beer and said:  “Only thing is…I’m afraid she could lick my ass.”

--Mitchell Hegman 

Thinking of You

Inside you is a bulldozer.

One by one shacks are brought down,

huffing like rabid dogs eating black dirt and bones

For years you have been convinced life is a locked cage,

love must be suffered.

Remember,

you were invented in a glaring hospital room

when a blurry nurse gave sterile blankets a sharp slap.

Out you came, gasping, hale, making a fist.

And off you ran, through the twisted spokes of a bicycle wheel,

atop broken canning jars, between crumpled cars,

kicking at burning oil cans and two bad marriages.

The destruction complete.

--Mitchell Hegman

If the Electrical Code Governed Cat Juggling

Article 300, Cat Juggling

300.10 Juggling Cats     It shall be permitted to juggle cats under the conditions expressed in 300.10 (A) through (E).

(A) Fluffy cats shall not be permitted for cat juggling

(B) The cats shall be permitted to be declawed.

(C) Using the tails of the cats as a handle shall not be permitted.

(D) No more than four cats shall be juggled simultaneously.

(E) Where two or more cats are juggled simultaneously, the sum of the weight of the individual cats shall not exceed 50 pounds.

300.12 Cat Juggling Not Permitted    Cat Juggling shall not be permitted in classified locations such as operating rooms, anesthetizing locations, fuel dispensing areas, and spray booths.

300.15 Cat Jugglers    Only qualified persons shall juggle cats.

--Mitchell Hegman

A Fish Out of Water

Yesterday, after exhausting myself working through some thorny National Electrical Code training material, I talked that girl into going for an afternoon drive.  We drove around the backside of Canyon Ferry Reservoir and stopped to explore the shoreline at a couple places near Goose Bay.

Canyon Ferry is, essentially, the Missouri River having been shoulder-blocked and knocked back on its ass by a giant concrete dam.  The reservoir waters rise with the glut of spring runoff from the snowfilled mountains and recede during the sunwashed summers.

That girl and I walked down through a jumble of antediluvian stones left exposed by summer’s receding water.  Later, we walked across a wide expanse of fine sand, leaving a footprint at every step.  The day remained perfectly calm under an enormous blue sky.  Every so often, fish broke the surface of the lake, doing whatever fish things a fish must do.

Other than some geese and the fish, we had the entire lake to ourselves.

Stunning.

Posted today are some photographs I captured along the way.  Though the dead carp is a little morbid, I thought it worth a picture.

--Mitchell Hegman

Then Came the Thought

This morning, after creating first coffee and telling my 40 pounds of housecat they were lovely monsters, I stepped outside and slipped into my hot tub.  Above me, a wide arch of clouds obscured the banner of stars.

I closed my eyes.

There, inside my eyes, I saw a single point of light.  Bright and flickering.

Something new, that!  What light there?

I opened my eyes again, cleared them by looking out onto the darkened lake below.

I closed my eyes and the light appeared once more.  Starlike, but still lambent.  The light danced alone as I watched on the inside.

Only then came the thought.  What if this is the final light?  What if this is the light that comes to gather?  What if this is the light to which I must flee when my days here are done?  Why here with me today?

--Mitchell Hegman

Six More Questions

—Do you think a lie based on omission is less malicious than a lie based on fabrication?

—Have you ever purposely driven a short distance down a one-way street?  Should that be a punishable offense?

—Do the voices in your head have British accents?

—If you found a wad of dollar bills on the floor of a large retail store, which of the following would you do?

            1. Take the money

            2. Ignore the money

            3. Whistle sharply

            4. Take the money to lost and found

—What color do you consider a “nonstarter?”

—Which do you prefer, sunrise or sunset?

--Mitchell Hegman

Do Your Cats Listen to Metallica?

Apparently, Tom Cruise has sent Dakota Fanning a birthday gift—usually a pair of shoes—every year since she was 11 years old.  She is now 22 years old.  The actors worked together back in 2005, filming the movie War of the Worlds.

Interesting, but not what this blog is about.

The birthday shoes story is what I was digging into when I chanced upon something about a guy who has produced an album of music for cats.

I gave up on Tom Cruise right there.

This is also where Metallica arrives.  Seems David Teie (name unpronounceable in East Helena, Montana), first got the idea for making cat music while performing a concert with the rock band Metallica.  David is a cellist with America’s National Symphony Orchestra.

This is not an indictment against the music favored by Metallica.  Far from it.  Dave Teie (name still unpronounceable) felt a strong emotional sense to the music—something very close to nature—but on a human scale.  He started to think about music produced for humans.  He asked himself “Why doesn’t a song last for a tenth of a second, for ten thousand years?”  The answer: Because we base our music on human rhythms.

David Teie (sigh) decided he would try to make music not for humans.  He first wrote music for capuchin monkeys.  They liked it.  Cats were his next choice.  Maybe, because he knows that people goofy enough to live with cats are goofy enough to buy music for them.

The “cat” music is layered with sounds that recreates purring, but also has a layer of base clef that registers too low for cats but is pleasurable to humans.  Initial responses from cats have been favorable.  Many cats nuzzle next to the speakers while the music plays, some curl near the speakers and begin purring.

I am thinking about exposing my 40 pounds of housecat to the cat music album.  If that goes well, maybe my 40 pounds of housecat and I can try to catch Metallica someplace.

To listen to the cat music, try this:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FV8qERXJgHY

--Mitchell Hegman

Sources: news.sky.com, time.com

The Hunter and the Hunted

I woke earlier than normal this morning—long before 5:00.  After starting some coffee and feeding my 40 pounds of housecat, I stepped outside and slipped into my hot tub.  Several miles away, within the nighttime doublings of the Big Belt Mountains, a pack of coyotes erupted into howls.

I don’t know why coyotes cry.

Have they a lost love.  Are they hungry?  Is there sickness among them?  Celebrating a successful hunt?

My grandfather loathed coyotes and would shoot them on site, if he could.  He, my grandfather, was raised in the Canadian wilderness not long after men first began to settle there.  He was a hunter.  Coyotes were seen as competition.  I know coyotes are the bane of ranchers.  They, the leading predator when it comes to the loss of lambs and calves.

Me?  I am mostly ambivalent about coyotes.  I suppose there is a time and place for them.  Same as a flower.  Same as a weed.

The coyotes eventually fell silent.  Soon after, a pair of headlights migrated up from a lakeside home across the way.  I watched the headlights thread up through the trees and open spaces, climbing the hills holding the lake in place.  The headlights crested the hills and drained out of view on the far side.

Likely a hunter heading out for this, the first day of big game season.

Today will be a good day to be the hunter.

Not so much the hunted.

--Mitchell Hegman

Thursday, 11:15, October 2016

Arrives, each fall, one flawless minute.  For one minute, roadway traffic falls silent, all vehicles having receded to nameless and distant roads.  Clouds stop pushing clouds.  Neighborhood dogs crinkle down into the orange and yellow clusters of fallen leaves.  The last visible airliner dissolves into its own contrail.  Birds settle into the nearest trees.

If you are lucky, you will be near water when this flawless minute arrives.  Yesterday morning, at 11:15, I happened to be driving near Lake Helena when the whole valley calmed around me.  I pulled my truck off the road, jumped out, and stood overlooking the perfectly reflective waters.  Not so much as an insect rippled the lake.  The sky and the water were almost indistinguishable in color.

Luckily, I managed to capture a couple of images with my smarter-than-me-phone just before a fly lifted at my feet and spurred everything back into motion.

--Mitchell Hegman

Salma Hayek and John Wayne at a Campfire

Salma Hayek and John Wayne rode horseback most of the day to cross a wide, grassy valley.  They made camp when they struck a shallow river strung between thick cottonwood trees.

Salma Hayek gathered firewood while John Wayne brought forth a campfire.

As a dull orange sun sliced against a nearby cluster of hills, the pair of riders sat on logs near the fire.  They ate jerky and drank red wine from a bottle John Wayne had carried in his saddle bag.  “I find it odd,” John Wayne suggested, cautiously appraising Salma Hayek’s deep eyes, “that we are here together after the long ride.”

“Why do your say that? Salma Hayek asked.

John Wayne poked a stick into the fire, formulating his response.  “Well, normally when Mitch Hegman writes two famous people into a story, both of them have—what’s the term—“

“Croaked?” Salma Hayek suggested.

“No.”

“Expired?”

“No.”

“Handed in their dinner pail?”

“No.”

“Become a landowner?”

“No.”

“Died?”

“That’s it!” John Wayne said.  “Normally these stories only have dead people as characters in them.  Why do you suppose we are here?  I guess what I mean is…why are you here?”

Salma Hayek did not answer.  Her hair glowed red-brunette in the last light of the day.  Her dusky eyes drawing in and holding the entire surround.  Only then did she realize that maybe she was there only because Mitch Hegman was a little creepy.  And this—this was just a cheap way for him to post another photograph of her.

--Mitchell Hegman

Now That I’m Here

Getting here was a bit untidy.  Cars in the ditch.  Some relationships like bags with holes in the bottom.  More than a few questionable pets.  The unpredictable ebb and flow of money.  Now that I’m here, I have distilled all my desires down to two items.  One: I want to make it easy for those who still love me to love me.  Two: I want to make sure the town drunk is not me.

--Mitchell Hegman

631 = Panic

Apparently, the number 631 equals panic.  Total panic.

Bear with me as I try to explain.  This will require just a bit of math, but I’ll run the calculator to take the sting out of that.

We need to begin with 20 pounds of housecat: Carmel.  Carmel has been with me for something like 5 years and 3 months.  If we convert those years into months, we find a total of 63 months.

Next, to get where I am going, we need to determine the total number of weeks.  Punching numbers into my calculator, we end up with 252 weeks.  Carmel has been with me for 252 weeks.

This is where the math—at least the concept—is going to get a bit tricky.  We are going to use ½ a trash bag in our next calculation.  See, I estimate that I used 2½ trash bags every week.  Some weeks I use a couple.  Some weeks I use more.

Now, back to our weeks.  If we multiply 2.5 times 252 weeks, we end up with 630.  Apparently, a magic number.  That is, by my estimation, the number of new trash bags I have unfurled and stuffed into my trash can in the 252 weeks Carmel has been with me.

Yesterday, while standing in the kitchen, I tried to stuff trash bag number 631 into my trash can as my 20 pounds of housecat sat watching from the nearby den.

Somewhere, about halfway through my stuffing process, Carmel decided I was doing something terrifying.  I was evil incarnate!  He exploded up into the air.  Upon landing, the cat leapt away and bounded off down the hall and vanished into the spare bedroom.

I write this as a cautionary tale.  Those of you with housecats may want to start counting trash bags.

Be prepared when you reach number 631.

--Mitchell Hegman

City, Stone, Moon

The young woman fled through city night to reach the ocean.

Down,

down at the water she pitched stones at a dull reflection

of the quarter moon.

She’d always wished for two moons:

One full while the other is sliced.

A car-strung highway hissed on the clifftop above,

headlights projecting writhing ghosts into a low bank of clouds.

She thought.

For every first dance, a last.

For each certainty, something not.

With one final chuck, she broke the moon in two. 

--Mitchell Hegman

Never Step on the Foul Line

Ken Griffey, Jr. once sold a brand new car he’d purchased because, after driving it a few times, he didn’t believe the car had any hits in it.  Baseball players tend to be suspicious like that.

More than a few baseball players engage in certain rituals before batting or playing a game.  Pitcher Turk Wendell brushed his teeth in-between each inning.  He never stepped on the field before stuffing four pieces of black licorice in his mouth.  Jack Glasscock, a Cleveland Blues player in the late 1800s, always swept up a few pebbles from his position at shortstop and stuffed them in his pocket.  Every time Kevin Rhomberg got tagged-out while running the bases, he made a point to immediately turn around and touch the player responsible for tagging him.    

Wade Boggs played under a litany of specific numbers and exacting times.  When playing night games, Boggs always took his batting practice at exactly 5:17.  During warm-up, he took 150 grounders, no more, no less.  Every time he stepped up to the batter’s box, he scratched the Hebrew “chai” symbol (meaning life) into the dirt with his bat.

The foul line is a big deal.

A great number of players will never step on the foul line as they take the playing field.  Turk Wendell took that to the extreme.  He leaped over both the line and the dirt path on either side.  Then we have a few contrarians: players who purposefully stomp on the foul line each time they walk on or off the playing field.

The list of superstitions and rituals is huge:  Don’t talk to the starting pitcher on game day.  Always eat the same breakfast on days when games are scheduled.  Wear your hat inside-out if you go into a batting slump.  Adjust your batting glove exactly so before each swing.

I got to thinking about all of this after watching the Cleveland Indians playing their last two games.  We need to watch.  That girl is from the Cleveland area.

“There are a lot of beards out there on the playing field,” I remarked as we watched the first game of the playoffs.

“Maybe a lot of played afraid to shave right now,” she said.  “Shaving might be bad luck.”

I nodded.  That seems downright rational when you start digging in.

--Mitchell Hegman

Flying In, Flying Home

Flying into Helena, Montana, is different.  Yes, I am aware that flying into any new town is different.  You are not likely to mistake San Francisco for, say, Fargo, North Dakota, as you swoop in.

But I’m not talking about outside the airplane.  The difference is inside the plane.

That girl and I both noticed this.  Me, last week as I flew home from Ohio.  She, just this week as she flew in.  I have actually noticed this before and was surprised when that girl mentioned something while we sat eating lunch at the Mediterranean Grill yesterday.  “My plane was filled with happy people,” she said.  “Two toddlers were running up and down the aisle before we took off and everyone was talking with them, asking them questions.”

A plane filled with people flying to Helena, Montana, is abuzz with conversation.  A palpable cheer fills the cabin.  People are friendly and courteous.

Helena is a small town.  Hell, Montana is one sprawling small town.  If you are from Montana, that last statement makes sense.  I can say that I know someone in almost every town in the state—at least somebody that came from there.  And, consider, only five flights a day land in Helena.  There is not a lot of hurry.

On the plane, this translates into people seeming to have a vested interest in everybody else.  Pretty soon, people are asking strangers questions: What’s taking you to Helena?  Flying home?  Where are you from?  Who do you know?  Do you know so and so?  What is your favorite lake or river?  Have you tried a burger up at York?  Are you a hunter?

I wrote last week about a deep conversation I had on my flight into Helena.  I have had many of those on flights home.  Meaningful conversations.  Pleasant conversations.  Flights into Helena are different.

We are all flying home.

--Mitchell Hegman

A Political Ad against Me

Mitch Hegman says he wants to be your dog catcher.  He says he wants to help dogs.  But he doesn’t even own a dog.  He and his out-of-touch friends own fluffy cats that poop in boxes.  And the truth is, Mitch Hegman couldn’t catch a cold if he ran naked though a snowstorm with his mouth open.

People who know Mitch Hegman, know he is a naked man under all of his clothes…so naked, it might be a good idea to keep your eyes closed most of the time.

And his friends aren’t all that friendly.  They kick dogs.

Mitch Hegman isn’t the right man for catching dogs.  That’s why we keep saying Mitch Hegman.  We want to annoy you so you equate being annoyed with Mitch Hegman

Mitch Hegman: he doesn’t eat mayonnaise and he probably has cooties.  Now, he wants to be mean to your dog.

--Mitchell Hegman

Old Age

—Harlan David Sanders (Colonel Sanders) did not found Kentucky Fried Chicken until the age of 62.  Before that, Sanders had operated a service station, was a farmer, piloted a steamboat, and was an insurance agent.

—At the age of 70, Ben Franklin penned his name to the Declaration of Independence.

—Garndma Moses did not pick up a paintbrush until the age of 75.  In 2006, (long after her death) her painting “Sugaring Off” sold for $1.2 million.

—Nelson Mandela, after spending 27 years imprisoned in a South African jail for leading an armed resistance group against the government called “Spear of the Nation,” was released from a South African Jail.  While imprisoned, Mandela earned a bachelor of law degree from the University of London.  Four years after his release, at the age of 75, Mandela was elected president of South Africa.

—In April of this year, at the age of 70 to 72 (a birth certificate is not available) an Indian woman named Daljinder Kaur gave birth to a healthy baby boy.  Daljinder underwent treatment at a fertility center for two years before the successful pregnancy.  She and her husband have been married for 46 years. 

—Yuichiro Miura, a Japanese mountaineer, reached the summit of Mount Everest at the age of 80.

--Mitchell Hegman

Sources: HowStuffWorks,History.com, express.co.uk, CBS News, Yahoo.com

Photo: CBS News/Geddy Images

My Confession

I must make a confession.

It’s about a mule deer doe I have named Dot.  I call her Dot because she has a conspicuous white spot on her forehead.

Dot emerges almost daily from the heavy sage and bull pine below my house.  She is quite friendly and allowed me to approach her early on.

Here is my confession: I have been doing bad things with the deer.

Stop.

Those of you who immediately went sexual are either from East Helena, Montana, or you need to spend a bit more time watching the Disney Channel.

I’m not talking about sex.

I have been feeding the deer.  I know all the reasons that feeding deer is bad.  It removes their natural fear of humans, skews their lifestyle in unnatural ways, and so forth.

Thing is, Dot started this.  One of the first times I saw her, she came right up and sniffed at me as I sat in my hot tub.  She regularly approaches the house, even if I am standing on the deck.

As far as the feeding goes, I throw apple cores, broccoli ends, carrot ends, and that kind of thing out back so she can have them.  And then, of course, there is an assortment of fruit and vegetables Kevin and I have scattered around the place when we shoot the potato gun.

I have not seen Dot for a couple days.  She comes and goes on her own schedule.  Hunting season is just around the corner as I write this.  Honestly, I hope she sticks around here for the whole of the season—stalked by nothing more than my incompetent 40 pounds of housecat.

I am fond of her.

--Mitchell Hegman

The Sky Is My Garden, Part II

The sky is my garden, growing first light and last,

growing gods and beasts point by point at night.

Brought me sweetwater rain, this sky,

knit trees into mountains and prairie grass across the American West.

A man is free that drives a long road vanishing into chevron mountains

or rises as a fine thread into itinerant clouds.

I need antelope at scurry over open plains,

creeks both seen and heard, a sky that is blue, absolute.

Give me room to run.

I remember what Richard Hugo said

while studying a map of the Isle of Skye:

“We’ll be confined and free.  The roads end fast.”

 And Edwin Markham:

“The color of the ground was in him, the red earth:

The smack and tang of elemental things.”

Give me a road across the red earth that is without end.

Let me touch the very sky that delivered both river and trout.

--Mitchell Hegman

Meanwhile, Out In Montana

Growing giant pumpkins is a real thing in Ohio.  Just about every town with a “ville” or “burg” at the end of the name has a giant pumpkin growing contest in the fall.  Okay, the contest is actually a weigh-in.  A growing contest would require you to stand in a field all summer watching vines creep around the place.

Really, that’s not too exciting.

While I was back in Ohio just last week, I caught a news story about such a contest in Huntsburg, Ohio.  A guy named Jerry Rose won.  His pumpkin weighed 1,284 pounds.  As you can see in the photograph below, giant pumpkins are a bit freakish.  They look like something from a Star Wars movie.  Jabba the Hutt, maybe.  And that’s Jerry standing alongside his winning pumpkin.

In truth, a great deal of science and whole season of effort is involved in growing a giant pumpkin.  Sex is involved.  The seeds (mother) and the pollinator (father) are often brought together with great purpose.  The parents of these monsters have names such as “1730 Werner” and “1524 Fulk.”  Not sexy, but good genes.

Growing a monster requires dedication.  Weeds must be pulled from the growing plot.  The vine growing the behemoth must be pruned to eliminate competition from any other fruit.  Fertilizer must be applied.  Up to 100 gallons of water a day may need to be applied to the growing plot.  Rose said that, for a time, his winning pumpkin was putting on 40 pounds of weight every day.

Impressive, to be sure. 

Well, we grow stuff here in Montana, as well.  My friend Kevin has a garden.  Yesterday, I went down to his place to grab a few carrots and a kohlrabi.  This year, Kevin and Cooper, his grandson, tried their hand at growing watermelons.  Posted is a photograph of the single watermelon Kevin managed to bring forth.  As you can see, Kevin is beaming with pride…or, maybe the beer is good.

--Mitchell Hegman

Pumkin Photo: Thomas Ondrey

Those Years Gone

Introduction:

I suffered through depression for the better part of a decade in a much earlier life.  I allowed a dark part of my mind to have control back then.  I tell people that I read and wrote myself out of my depression.  This is true.  The poem I am sharing today was written during that time.  I was twenty-something and visiting friends in Harlowton, Montana—friends I met while attending Montana State University.

I wrote the poem after several of us—both men and women—drove to an open prairie lake in the middle of an empty September night.  Drunk and disoriented, we all removed our clothes and swam together under an open sky.

The poem is entirely about me.

I have rewritten this dozens upon dozens of times.  I posted an earlier version of this poem on February 6, 2010.  Though I might change a word or two, or alter a line, the “gut” feeling of this has never changed.  I suspect I will never be done with this.

Those Years Gone

Beyond Harlowton, on flat prairie flecked with sage and ryegrass,

the nightsky became so heavy with stars it sagged and touched the horizons.

We shivered, stripping off our clothes,

waves licking battered stones at our feet,

on the shore of a lake I remember only as deep, cool, and naked as ourselves.

Wind carried wheatsmell down from Canada.

Stickwilllows rattled in the dry arroyos.

We dove, swam.

Your last girlfriend had married some cityboy.

I watched you tread black water,

looking up,

wondering how that sky to pregnant with stars could lack, so utterly,

warmth.

And how that wind followed us back to the car.

We were wet, transparent, without hope.

Back at the lake, I heard waves piling against clay banks.

A distant coyote howled out in a language only the endangered understand.

You understood.

--Mitchell Hegman