Pretty (With a Holes in the Top)

Living in the country means you will necessarily be cohabiting with wild critters of all sizes and appetites. Deer—the largest animals sharing our immediate outside space—love to nibble on Desiree’s pretty flowers and newly planted trees. The occasional skunk will sneak into the yard and root out grubs from the earth along the foundation of the house.

Well, a new twist occurred on the rodent end of this spectrum. Turns out, a certain mouse down at the lake likes to eat my pontoon boat. Yesterday, when Desiree and I prepped the boat for a cruise on the lake, we discovered the beginning of a nest atop one of the pontoons. I also discovered the beginning of another nest inside the rolled-up Bimini top. More distressing was the fact that the mouse had gnawed several large holes in the Bimini canvas.

Ungood, that.

After clearing the nests from the boat, we dropped it into the lake and cruised down to Hauser Dam. I’m sharing photographs of the pretty views from Hauser Lake (with holes in the Bimini top included).

View From the Boat

—Mitchell Hegman

Something Laurence J. Peter Said

— “If two wrongs don't make a right, try three.”

— “The man who says he is willing to meet you halfway is usually a poor judge of distance.”

— “Going to church doesn't make you any more a Christian than going to the garage makes you a car.”

Breaking Out

My hoya plant has been in the sunroom for three years now. As mentioned in a previous blog, my hoya originated from a start taken from a plant my grandmother brought into her house in the 1940s.

We can confidently say the hoya has thrived in the sunroom. The planter it’s rooted in has vanished under a thick proliferation of vines and leaves, and vines have also twined up the wall and across the ceiling. The most recent growth surge has sent runners out in an attempt to reach outside through the nearby glass. Some vines are even attempting an escape through the window between the sunroom and what is now my office.

A hoya will go wherever it can and will set roots in other pots if its vines or nodes come into contact with soil. Hoyas thrive by naturally rooting along their stems when they find organic matter or moisture. If a vine extends into a nearby pot and touches the soil—especially at a node (the point where leaves and aerial roots emerge)—it can begin to root there over time.

As a point of fact, my hoya is presently in a planter it stole from a jade plant. For this reason, I’m keeping a close watch on the runners to make sure they don’t plant themselves in a neighbor’s pot of soil.

I’ve posted a photograph of the hoya. Please note, as a reference for size, the Cold Smoke Beer on the brick ledge.

The Sunroom Hoya

—Mitchell Hegman

Webby

It’s getting awfully webby out there.

Desiree and I overnighted at the cabin again, and summer is nearly upon us. As you move through the woods and brush, you constantly feel the whisper of tiny webs brushing your face, lassoing the bare skin of your arms. Sometimes you can spot a gossamer thread stretched long through the air—but more often, not.

This is the work of young spiders—and possibly some variety of caterpillar or wiggly worm on a quest.

I’ll grossly understate things by saying I don’t enjoy walking into spider webs. I think that’s better than admitting to quiet panic. To soften the experience, I try to imagine the webs are spun by worms or caterpillars instead.

As a personal favor, I ask that all you amateur entomologists play along with this idea—even if you know full well no such bugs are afoot this time of year.

Thank you in advance.

—Mitchell Hegman

Seat 11A

 

On most days, sitting in seat 11A on a jetliner doesn’t mean much. It’s a window seat ahead of the port wing, and next to an exit. Two days ago, a British national of Indian origin, named Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, took seat 11A a few minutes before the plane he boarded was scheduled to depart from the city of Ahmedabad, India. All around him, other passengers jostled into place, fought carry-ons into the overhead bins, chatted.

At takeoff, the thrust of the Boeing Dreamliner’s engines pressed him firmly against the seat as the jet streaked down the runway. The plane lifted into the air, climbed. And then something odd happened. Later, Vishwash recounted: “After takeoff, after 5–10 seconds, it seemed like the aircraft was stuck.”

Horror absolute.

The plane rather sank in the air and crashed into buildings in the city below, generating a fury of impossible sounds, infinite and unbinding chaos. Somehow, once all the forward momentum ceased, Vishwash Kumar Ramesh opened his eyes. He was alive, but surrounded by the mangled dead. Beside him, the exit door had cracked open. He untangled himself and squeezed out into the light.

All of the other passengers and crew on the flight, including his brother, who had been sitting in a different row, had perished—241 of them. And somehow Vishwash found himself alive and staggering down a street surrounded by shocked and unfamiliar faces.

By what providence, by what flip of luck, had seat 11A saved him?

Dreamliner Seating

Vishwash Kumar Ramesh

—Mitchell Hegman

Living in a Simulation

I stubbed my toe on the way to the kitchen. It hurt like the dickens and actually caused me to hop around in a circle like a one-legged bunny rabbit. For some reason, this ridiculous scene forced me to question reality. What if my toe and I are not part of base reality? What if everything—the chair I bumped into, New York City, my sweet wife, love, and every tragic war suffered by humanity—is just part of an elaborate simulation?

There’s a theory for that. Simulation theory. It suggests that if technology progresses far enough, someone—somewhere—might simulate an entire world, down to the smallest mote of dust looping the lemon tree in my sunroom. If they can run one world, they can run millions. Which makes the odds lean toward this not being base reality, but a copy. A high-resolution echo.

Even physicists admit the code might be showing its skirt on occasion. The universe acts digital in strange places—quantum particles that flip when measured, light that obeys a universal speed limit, space that’s not quite continuous. It behaves more like a program than a place.

Still, I carry on when my toe stops hurting. I kiss my wife when she draws near enough to me. Whether this world is real or rendered matters not. This is the only world I know.

Painting With Light

—Mitchell Hegman

My Go-To Shirt

My go-to shirt is about ready to give up the ghost. It’s literally falling apart and now riddled with small holes.

It’s a long-sleeve flannel number, my go-to. I’ve had the shirt for something near twenty years. The shirt fits me well and feels like a part of me when I slip it on. I like to wear it when I feel a chill after first rolling out of bed in the mornings. I like to slip it on when I’m rolling out the door in cool weather.

This is a shirt that likes to go to work. To chop wood. To dig in the dirt. It likes to play.

When not wearing it, I hang the shirt on a rack in the laundry room for ready access.

This shirt, as I mentioned, is in tough shape. The cuffs are fraying apart. The small holes are growing into big ones. Honestly, an argument to throw the shirt out could have been launched five years ago. But I’m hanging on. So is the shirt.

As long as the sleeves remain attached, we are good to go.

My Go-To Shirt

Frayed Cuff

—Mitchell Hegman

Clearing the Way

In addition to being prepared for any kind of weather conditions when driving mountain roads in Montana, you need to be prepared to suddenly find the route impassable because a tree has dropped across the road. To that end, I carry a couple of handsaws in my truck at all times. Often, I also have my chainsaw bouncing around in the box of the truck.

Yesterday, after rounding a corner on a road traversing the mountains outside of Lincoln, Desiree and I encountered an aspen tree slashed across the roadway, making it entirely impassable. Not a sapling, either. This one was nearly sixteen inches thick at the base. Luckily, I had the chainsaw.

I fired it up and chunked the lower section into pieces we could roll aside. Desiree and I worked together, clearing just enough space for the truck. At one point, the chainsaw bar got pinched between two trunk sections, and I had to dig out the handsaw to free it. Fifteen minutes later, I squeezed through the narrow path we’d made—back on the road, the way open behind us.

The Aspen Tree Across the Road

Me Sawing Through a Section of Truck

Driving Through the Narrow Section of Cleared Road

—Mitchell Hegman 

Something Zig Ziglar Said

—"There are no traffic jams on the extra mile.”

—"Your attitude, not your aptitude, will determine your altitude.”

—"A goal properly set is halfway reached.”

In Celebration

Nothing says “celebration” in Filipino culture more than lechon. For the uninitiated, lechon is a whole pig spit-roasted over charcoal and flavored with oil and spices. It's the dish of choice for any special occasion.

To mark the twofold festivities of Desiree’s (also Anna and Ida’s) birthday and our third wedding anniversary, we roasted a 47-pound pig down at the lake. Desiree and I started prepping the lechon at 4:00 in the morning and finally pulled it from the coals at 1:00 in the afternoon.

We had a grand time from beginning to end.

The Entire Gathering

All Three Birthday Girls

Lodi and the Lechon (Cooking)

Desiree with the Lechon (Read to Share)

—Mitchell Hegman

Bunchgrass Baseball

Today, I’m sharing a photograph of four Filipino boys playing baseball on the bunchgrass prairie in front of my house. I’m not sure about the rules of their four-man game, but it lasted into twilight—the lovely end to another fine June day on the edge of the Rocky Mountains in Montana.

Bunchgrass Baseball

—Mitchell Hegman

Seven Questions

1. Is a hard reboot your first choice for solving connectivity problems?
2. Do you presently have any keys hidden under a rug?
3. What single name would you give yourself if you were on the verge of becoming famous?
4. When shopping, do you ever decide you don’t want an item and place it with the nearest display rather than return it to its original spot?
5. When was the last time you had a drink of milk?
6. Have you ever suspected that your toaster is purposely rigged to burn your toast every third or fourth time?
7. Have you ever literally swept something under the rug?

Yogurt Someone Dropped in With Frozen Chicken

—Mitchell Hegman

A Band-Aid and a Wedding Ring

There’s a story about George Carlin that sticks with me—not one of his cutting monologues or blistering observations about society, but something quieter.

Sometime after the death of his wife, Brenda, Carlin was cast in a film to play a priest. The role called for him to appear as a man of the cloth—celibate, ringless. But Carlin, reeling from the recent loss of his wife, couldn’t bring himself to remove his wedding ring. Brenda had been his partner for over thirty years, through the ups and downs of fame, addiction, reinvention, and radical honesty. Taking off that ring, even for a part, felt wrong to him.

Eventually, Carlin struck on a compromise: he would cover the ring with a Band-Aid.

This was a practical solution for a movie camera, but also a private form of resistance. He wasn’t hiding the ring from the audience so much as he was sheltering it—shielding the part of himself that still held on, still mourned, still honored the love of his life.

George Carlin was the guy who tore down sacred cows, challenged institutions, and never missed a chance to call out nonsense. But that Band-Aid tells another story—a private and deeply human one.

—Mitchell Hegman

A Sure Sign the Relationship Is Over

You can be fairly certain your relationship is over when the couples counselor you are seeing suggests you start throwing knives at each other.

—Mitchell Hegman

Anniversary

I’ll fix you a sweet drink, my rare orchid, and you can tell me how the blossoms on our new tree have turned to apples. We’re not tearing through the house today, but we’re steady in our best light. Together, we’ll let the day settle, brushing aside sour news as it comes.

Remember that study claiming true love only lasts six months to two years? We can smile at that. They certainly missed the mark. Just look at us—tomorrow we step quietly into our fourth year.

—Mitchell Hegman

The Most Common Thing

As a kid, the most common thing for me was asking my mother, “How come?” or “Why is that?”

During my days on construction sites, I constantly quipped, “More work, less talk.”

At this point, the most common thing I find myself saying is this: “Desiree, I screwed this up. Can you fix it?”

—Mitchell Hegman

The Unstackables

You’ve likely heard of the “untouchables.” There are two meanings, actually. One refers to a marginalized caste in Indian society. The other to incorruptible Prohibition-era U.S. lawmen.

In my firewood stockpile, I have something I call the “unstackables.” These are chunks of split wood too wonky to fit into my neat rows of firewood.

I’m a bit persnickety about my stacks, and the unstackables—thanks to bulging knots or twisted grain—are irregular in shape and don’t fit in. They make the stack tippy and loose.

As fuel, though, they’re just fine.

My solution is to toss them into a loose pile on top of a box I built for firewood storage.

It ain’t pretty, as they say in slack quarters, but it burns well.

An Orderly Stack of Firewood

The Unstackables

All Put Together

—Mitchell Hegman

A Whatizit

I don’t know my weasels. I mean, I don’t know a mink from a least weasel or a ferret from an ermine. If you exclude black-footed ferrets (which are extinct from my region of Montana) and exclude badgers and wolverines (because they have obvious features), there are seven weasel-type critters that scamper the wilds surrounding my cabin.

One of these little scurrying whatizits tripped my game camera late in the night and provided me with a fuzzy, ill-lighted photograph capture. Given the location of the animal relative to the camera, I would guess it to be somewhere north or south of two feet in length, including the tail.

So, I’m thinking—suppose I left a can of Cold Smoke beer out there so I could both attract these critters and have an accurate reference for size…

If you look closely at the center of the photograph I’ve posted, you can see the whatizit in question.

Mystery Capture

—Mitchell Hegman

Black Lung

The Dead South—a four-piece band from Regina, Saskatchewan—blends bluegrass, folk, and rock to produce acoustic music with a little dirt under its nails and mischief in its grin. The banjo player outright rocks on some songs. When I listen to them, I’m compelled to snap my fingers or stomp my feet.

I’m not the only one who’s noticed The Dead South. Their breakout hit, "In Hell, I'll Be in Good Company," has racked up hundreds of millions of views, and the group has become something of a movement.

Posted here is a song titled "Black Lung."

—Mitchell Hegman

Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJhklT4ST9M

Close to the Nest

I have new neighbors. Actually, they’re more like tenants. I’m talking about two pairs of birds with active nests in my yard. I have a set of robins in a nest in the Mayday tree and a brace of bluebirds nesting in a box on a post not far away. I saw the bluebirds setting up house several weeks ago and had mentioned to Desiree that robins were hanging around pretty steadily. “They have a nest somewhere close,” I suggested.

I discovered the robins’ nest in the Mayday just yesterday.

Both couples are incredibly tolerant of my presence near their nests. I appreciate that. At the same time, I’ve given the bluebirds space and will now do the same for the robins as much as possible.

I’ve now witnessed both sets of birds bringing in food—bugs, more accurately—to the nest to feed their little ones. Robins and bluebirds tend to be exemplary, extremely attentive parents. I know how demanding this can be. As a boy, I raised a robin until it fledged. I found the small, nearly naked bird on the street with no nest in sight, carried it home cupped in my hands, and then spent the next few weeks tending it.

I’ll never forget the day I allowed the bird to go free. It was the first time I understood that sadness can wed joy and become a single thing.

Bluebird Box

Robin’s Nest

—Mitchell Hegman

My Present Composition

I’m 10 percent warm and squishy,

10 percent wondering where I left my phone,

5 percent feeling like I’ve still got it,

25 percent happily retired,

10 percent trying to remember that one person’s name,

5 percent out back, chopping firewood,

15 percent in need of a haircut,

5 percent keeping track of the nearest bathroom,

5 percent measuring life by the standard of a Cold Smoke beer,

and 10 percent watching the clouds roll by.

—Mitchell Hegman

Cold Smoke: Another View

Desiree and I had dinner last night at a bar and grill just a short walk from the Finlen Hotel. The establishment was housed in a wonderfully preserved old structure overlooking “the Flats” and the noteworthy Highland Mountains. As luck would have it, the bar featured Cold Smoke on tap.

In my world, you always order a freshly poured Cold Smoke when given the opportunity.

This wasn’t a moment for comparing sizes, measuring snowfall, or rating life’s strange events. This was a Cold Smoke meant simply to pair with a good meal and the most beautiful woman in the world.

Cheers to that.

A Fresh Cold Smoke

—Mitchell Hegman

The Finlen Hotel

Desiree and I are spending a couple of nights at the Finlen Hotel in Uptown Butte, America. I’m here for two days of teaching. Uptown Butte is, in my estimation, one of the best places in the world. The area is rich with history, and the locals are friendly. I also love seeing the snow-capped chevron peaks of the Highland Mountains across the way.

The Finlen, a product of the 1920s, is lovely on the inside. Our room is in the adjacent motel, which is well-maintained and pleasantly clean.

At the height of the mining boom last century, Butte thrummed with life, its streets alive with the clatter of streetcars and the steady churn of industry. Smoke curled into the sky from smelters and stacks, casting a haze over a city swollen with immigrants who had come from every corner of the globe to dig copper from the earth. Saloons spilled light and laughter into the night, boarding houses overflowed, and the town pulsed with the fierce, gritty optimism of a place where fortunes were being wrestled from the rocks beneath their feet.

We strolled around the block, admiring some of the old buildings shortly after arriving, and even spent a few minutes browsing an antique shop that was stacked from wall to wall and floor to ceiling with glassware, clothing, toys, and anything else you might imagine.

Here, even the passing cars are friendly. On our stroll back to the Finlen, a carload of teenagers waved and said hello from a passing car.

Put all of this together, and you get Montana at its very best.

Finlen Hotel  

Desiree in the Lobby

Desiree With a Highland Mountain Backdrop

Browsing Antiques

—Mitchell Hegman

On the Other Side

In my early twenties, I went through a stage where I read nothing and wrote nothing but contemporary poetry. This condition is more widely known as depression. I managed to work through this episode without becoming a tortured poet myself. Having no talent for writing poetry turned out to be my blessing.

Sylvia Plath, someone with absolute talent, once wrote: "I talk to God but the sky is empty. And when I look for the arrow that struck me, I can’t find it. But I can find the wound."

Long ago, my wound healed.

—Mitchell Hegman

Cabin Junk Drawer

Some twenty years ago, I bought a rolling kitchen island to use in the cabin—just until we got around to installing proper cabinets. Tomorrow, we’re finally ordering those cabinets and cupboards. Here’s the interesting thing: even that temporary rolling island proved enough to establish a junk drawer.

Early this morning, after coaxing a fire to life in the woodstove, I took stock of the cabin’s junk drawer. Here’s what I found:

• One big box of wooden matches
• Two small boxes of wooden matches
• Two partially used matchbooks
• One 60-watt incandescent lightbulb
• Six long lighters for starting the woodstove
• Three type C batteries
• Five packets of green tea
• One key ring with no keys
• One miniature screwdriver

It’s an interesting little collection. The lighters and matches are essential. The batteries and incandescent bulb, once useful, have mostly slow-marched into obsolescence. The tea doesn’t really belong, and yet somehow, everything else does.

I’ve posted a photo of the island, along with one of the miniature screwdriver posed beside a Cold Smoke beer—so you can properly judge its size.

Kitchen Island

Screwdriver 

—Mitchell Hegman

Grand Prismatic Spring

Desiree and I drove home by way of a loop through Yellowstone National Park after my teaching engagement there.

A great choice, that. We managed, among other things, to walk the boardwalk that loops through the steaming features at Grand Prismatic Spring.

Grand Prismatic Spring looks like something spilled from another world—with bold hues painted in unnatural patterns and steam sweeping back and forth above the water. That water, impossibly clear and hot enough to boil an egg, pulses with color: deep blue at the center, then rings of green, yellow, orange, and rust—each band the result of heat-loving bacteria doing what they’ve done for millennia. It’s the largest hot spring in the United States, but it’s the colors that are most impressive.

I’m posting photographs taken along the boardwalk at Grand Prismatic Spring.

Grand Prismatic

Patterns on the Flats

A Smaller Hot Pot along the Walk

Desiree on the Boardwalk

—Mitchell Hegman

A Toilet Paper Array

Toilet paper is serious business. More to the point, running out can have serious consequences. One of the bathrooms at the facility where I conducted classes in Yellowstone National Park features something designed to alleviate that risk: a toilet paper array.

Not a dispenser.

A full-on array.

This is all about never turning aside and getting the job done. This is the Great Wall, not a fence. This is an entire industry mobilized. This is bold and unwavering. An arsenal.

A Toilet Paper Array 

—Mitchell Hegman

Emigrant Peak

Emigrant Peak is a striking mountain located in Montana’s Paradise Valley, just east of the town of Emigrant and north of Yellowstone National Park. Part of the Absaroka Range, the peak surges abruptly to an elevation of 10,926 feet. Its summit towers more than 6,000 feet above the Yellowstone River, which winds through the valley floor below.

Yesterday, on a drive through Paradise Valley on the way to a teaching engagement with the Yellowstone Park electricians, Desiree and I stopped to admire Emigrant Peak from a fishing access along the Yellowstone River.

Emigrant Peak

Desiree Along the River 

—Mitchell Hegman

Butterfly Central

 My chokecherry bushes are just now entertaining full bloom. All manner of bees, flies, wasps, butterflies, and no-name whizbots have swarmed the shroud of fragrant flowers. One butterfly—the Juniper Hairstreak—is especially drawn to the flowers.

The Juniper Hairstreak is a small, brilliantly colored butterfly found in scattered populations across Montana, primarily in the drier, open habitats of the state's valleys and foothills. Montana marks the northern edge of its range, and sightings are typically limited to areas where Rocky Mountain juniper is well established. The larvae are host-specific, feeding exclusively on juniper foliage, while adults are often seen nectaring on a variety of spring wildflowers. With a wingspan of just about 1 inch, they are comparable in size to a Cheerio or a shirt button, and their quick, darting flight makes them easy to miss.

The underside of the hindwings is striking, featuring an iridescent green. Adults are most active from late spring into early summer, typically in one generation per year in Montana's climate. My chokecherry bushes are serving as butterfly central for the local population of Hairstreaks. Standing before one of the bushes, you are likely to see a dozen or more of these animated paint chips at once. I have posted two photographs I managed.

A Collection of Juniper Hairstreak Butterflies

Hairstreak Details 

—Mitchell Hegman

Connecting the Dots

It’s true that the top of my head is getting pretty bald, but I’m still capable of proving I’m not a robot when my online interactions require it. So, I’ve got that much going for me.

—Mitchell Hegman

A Weirdly Sobering Thought

I’m not opposed to going along with a bad idea, so long as the food is decent and I’ve got either a wee dram of single-malt Scotch or a sip of Cold Smoke beer in hand.

—Mitchell Hegman

Small Beauties

I don’t always have a Cold Smoke beer when I really need one. It’s a bummer, but I manage to carry on. Yesterday turned out to be one of those days when chance caught me beerless—just when I really needed one for use as my standard scale for size.

On a quick turnaround trip to the cabin, I chanced onto a patch of mixed flowers, including shootingstar and fairy slippers (one of our rare orchids). These two specimens are among the smallest of the mountain wildflowers. At the same time, they are among the most striking to behold. Shootingstar flowers blaze with color, and fairy slippers dazzle with delicate particulars. Both of these natives keep a low profile in growth, and the flowers are something near the size of a dime.

I apologize for not having a can of Cold Smoke to place alongside the flowers so you might get an accurate read on size.

Fairy Slippers

Shootingstar

—Mitchell Hegman

False Snow

Our Mayday tree is nearing the end of a prolific bloom. As a kind of grand finale, the flowers shed their white petals all at once. A slight breeze may release thousands of them, sending them swirling down to settle on the concrete apron below. Before long, the fallen petals look like skiffs of false snow swept into place.

Mayday trees, native to northern Europe and northern Asia, are the first of my flowering trees or shrubs to bloom in spring. Interestingly, just as the Mayday begins to brush off its blossoms, the nearby chokecherry—first cousin to the Mayday, but native to Montana—is only now beginning to unfurl its fragrant flowers.

—Mitchell Hegman

List of Ideas for Leading a More Interesting Life

Following is a list of ideas you might put into practice if you wish to lead a more interesting life:

• Practice whistling on a regular basis.
• Use body paint to draw smiles on your bruises.
• Challenge yourself by squeezing the word “fandango” into at least one conversation every day.
• Give yourself a single name—something along the lines of “Sting” or “Prince”—but choose the name from the Periodic Table of Elements. Maybe “Boron” or “Radon.”
• Volunteer for clinical tests involving substances with psychedelic properties.
• Accurately balance your checking account.
• Whack weeds while naked.
• Read a classic Russian novel while juggling.

—Mitchell Hegman

A Swing

The Hegman lakefront has been without a swing set—or even a single swing—for more than 60 years. Obviously, this is a problem. After all, my neighbors, the St. Clairs, have a swing dangling from one of their golden willows. Thankfully, Desiree both recognized and remedied the situation during a break in the last several days of rain.

Posted is a photograph of the newly installed (and tested) Hegman swing.

The Hegman Swing

—Mitchell Hegman

Dust Cattle

Our cabin sits just shy of 10 miles from the edge of Montana’s Bob Marshall Wilderness Complex—the second-largest wilderness area in the contiguous U.S. and home to a robust population of grizzly bears.

We’re talking wild country here.

But the area around our cabin is wild in a more impractical way. Not grizzly bear wild—we’re talking dust cattle.

Dust cattle are like dust bunnies on steroids. With the rugged and untamed surroundings—the campfires, the thick forest, the creek flouncing through, and the mud from recent rains—it’s easy to track all kinds of whatnot into the cabin. After a weekend of work in and around the place, Desiree swept the floor before we packed up and wound our way down the mountain roads to our wide valley home. The result of her efforts: a healthy collection of dust cattle.

I’m sharing a photo of the dust cattle beside a Cold Smoke beer, for scale and accuracy.

Dust Cattle and a Cold Smoke Beer 

—Mitchell Hegman