I got a basket full of lemons and they all taste the same
A window and a pigeon with a broken wing
You can spend your whole life working for something
Just to have it taken away
If you are looking for our secret spot, drive west from Denver. Once you arrive in Glenwood Springs you know you are getting close. The air smells cleaner, cellular phone signals begin to flutter, and the liquor goes up in price by 50%. Keep driving.
Carbondale comes into view, a small little town on a fork in the road. Stay left and you’re off to Aspen. Hang right and the secluded beauty of the mountains, the forest, and rushing rivers greet you as a friend who welcomes you back to remember the moment you shared with her once before.
Now turn off your cell phone. Stop checking if you have a signal. I assure you it’s not going to work. It’s baffling how addicted we’ve become to technology. ‘No Signal’ might as well mean ‘no idea what to do now.’ Calm down. It’s going to be o.k.
Leave the highway. Make a time to find your way. Watch the dust settle back to the earth behind you. By now, the anticipation should be absolutely bursting inside your veins. Remember the river which separates peace from chaos? It’s approaching. You are going to cross it soon. Just one more turn and you’ll see her. You can already hear the rapids echoing though the canyon, a voice from heaven reminding you to take a deep breath, relax, and cherish each moment as it slowly passes into the embrace of memory.
I have basket full of lemons; thank god someone had enough foresight to bring vodka. Matthew, Joshua, Jesse, Jason and I spent four days in perfect peace. Just like last year, we crossed a small mountain creek and in an instant an enormous gulf emerged between us and the rest of the world. We were alone, free to think and dream and reflect. Or: time on our hands, whiskey in our blood, strategies for the next horseshoe game consuming our thoughts, and plenty of arguments about why Jesse and I have enlightened progressive political views and the rest of the rotten bastards we camp with will just never get it.
But alas, this is the camping trip which reminds Cletus why he never wants to work on a dude ranch. I might cook his breakfast, but he still has to saddle my horse and listen to me snivel about how my ass hurts. My biggest problem is that horses don’t much like me. Horses make me anxious. They are big, moody animals.
There’s a fundamental problem with being anxious around a horse. I believe we are all control freaks at heart. But when I sit on a horse, I don’t feel like I am in control and I start to feel nervous, especially when I kick bruises into its ribs and it still won’t go where I tell it. My suspicion is that when the rider gets nervous, the horse (at least the good for nothing ass-clown my “friends” make me ride), starts to get twitchy. I know, I know…horses can be controlled by people-just beat the shit out of them and they’ll get the point. Or, as my good buddy Cletus admonishes me, “Wrangle that horse, cowboy!” But I ain’t no cowboy and I like my worldview just the way it is. I’m no closer to a cowboy than I am a mermaid.
There ain’t no reason things are this way, and there are no explanations why I should be friends with people so different than me. Republicans! Readers of this space know it well - I don’t have many friends and I don’t care to. But could it be that the crazy idiots I sit around a campfire with really aren’t that different than me? We have common hopes, common passion for a better world, and a shared enjoyment of discussions which border on argumentative. As I reflect on our differences (I like showers, they like backstroking through a muddy river), I begin to wonder if maybe we are much the same. Horses make me nervous but I do my best to look brave and ride them anyway. Jack Daniels makes Cletus and Josh nervous but they do their best to look brave and ride it anyway.
I am being intentionally short on the details. And yet, not much happened. That’s the beauty of the trip. We literally get together, sit around a fire, and tell Matthew why cows are bad for the environment. (read the article for yourself: it takes 8kg of grain to produce 1kg of beef). Of course, there’s a few more things which happened, but the river keeps our secrets. I’m already thinking of next year. Josh, it’s your turn to bring the lemons.
