Dust On My Boots Part 6
Dust On My Boots, Part 6: They were here, and it could mean no good
by Nazel Pickens
I was awoken early this cold Winter mornin’ by the buzz of chainsaws in the woods.
Now, to be clear, despite the obvious fact that they are brutally violent and gnarly machines that tear through just’bout anything with an unforgiving and indiscriminate determination like nothin’ else, I use’um, and I am no moralist in their regard, or really any other for that matter. I don’t like’um, chainsaws and morals. I prefer more intimate interaction, less mediated, and definitely less stinky, loud, and obnoxious. They are dangerous as hell too. On more than one occasion I’ve come too damn close to losin’ a limb, some toes, or worse. Still got a few scars to remind me of those close-calls. And this don’t even take into account the fallin’ of timber tonnage and all the physics, tensions, surprises, and danger in all that. No, I’ll take a sharp handsaw and an axe any day. But sometimes, unfortunately, circumstances lean towards the chainsaw and everything bound up in it.
So as the yellowish-blue first light was pokin’ its way through cedars, firs, maples, ash, madrones, oaks, and mist, I was rudely and abruptly pulled out of a dream concerning a large fox (or it could have been a small coyote), a sitar, and a refrigerator, and back into the waking life by a revving saw in the near distance, then another, and one more. And then, finally causing me to jump outta bed, a much bigger machine moaning its clanking horror. The Earth Wreckers. They were here, and it could mean no good.
Generally, I’m a mind-my-own-business-stay-outta-yer-shit-n-you-don’t be-diggin’round-in-mine-kinda-guy…. to a point. I think other people’s freedom is their deal, not anything to really concern myself with outside general abstractions. You might call me a libertine. But humans are also purty fuckin’ stupid and short-sighted much of the time. I would never treat the earth and most of its creatures the way some despicable shits do, to that insane level, with that malice and arrogance. It makes me sad, which makes me mad. It still astounds me, after all the endless demonstrations I’ve witnessed in my time here, how utterly blubber-headed, lumpish, myopic, and cockeyed most people can be.
I will add, if it is a family, tribe, or lil’ ganga folks tryin’ to take care of themselves and their own, I giv’um an even extra wide berth. Better they’re tryin’ to live as independently as they can figure out how to than bein’ part of the slavish herd, suckin’ on the system’s teats like damn grown babies with severely atrophied senses and abilities. I give those who try the room to thrive and make mistakes without spittin’ much of a peep ‘bout it. If they dig or cut too hard, if they shit in their water, if they stir up rattlesnake pits and bear dens, well, they’re hurtin’ themselves the most in the long run. No need for me to stick my nose in. But when ya got these fuckers in tall buildings wearin’ suits and ties makin’ decisions to destroy life for their own fat-bellied-bottom-line, well, we got a problem mister. And when its in my backyard, by that I mean our watershed, our mountain, our mucky and delicious web of livin’ dank goo, well, then the problem grows exponentially; I might need to kick up some dust.
Hell yeah I’m a NIMBY-fuck! If we don’t take care of our home first, our own backyard, then how in the hell can we even think of makin’ any sorta snot-nosed suggestions to anyone else out there. My mama always said, “Lil’ Naz, if ya keep yer house clean, ya don’t gotta worry ‘bout runnin’ off any rats.” And while she was wrong about a hellava lot, she hit it on the head there.
Well, with that, I tied up my boots, covered myself in camo, filled a thermos with coffee, stuffed some deer jerky in my pockets, and went out to go do some recon.
Now, I’ve got trails up and down this side of the mountain, all along the creek, and halfway up the other side too. They’re mostly deer paths that have gotten more worn down by my clumsy booted feet. I regularly wander for hours, often in a sort of primal meditative trot, other times in slow and perceptive detail-oriented assessments. For this mission, I took a slightly round-about way towards the devastating cacophony of destruction as stealthily as I could. It didn’t take long to get on’um. They were close. Right up in our shit. When I could see them clearly, I set my bottom down in the duff, blended in with the huckleberry, and poured myself some jo.
I quietly watched them for about twenty minutes or so. They were cutting some smaller trees, clearing a path for the big machine to force a road up through all of this living reality. Like their ain’t enough roads out there to bring people back and forth from emptiness to more emptiness. But this road was far worse. In their world, I could really care less what stupid activities they do to fill their pathetic lives. Here though, they just came to take, to plunder, to destroy, to slaughter. This road was a brutal slice for their vampiric games. They were here to suck life from this place in a deplorably pathological attempt to fill their void, with absolutely no concern for the affect on everything that is already living here.
At some point the saws shut off and it seemed as if they were taking a break from the carnage. One of the guys who was previously hackin’ away at trees took off his work gloves, threw down his helmet and googles, unzipped his pants, pulled out his lil’ pecker, and started to piss on a luscious patch of moss, lichen, and ferns that were living next to a small trickle of seasonal run-off.
“God damn mutherfuckin’ douche” the guy with his mini-member between his thumb and forefinger scruffed off to the another long-bearded buffed-up lug who was dressed in the same clunky lumberin’ outfit.
“Are you still bitchin’ ‘bout Barney?” the other replied as he stuffed some chew into his lower lip. “He’s just ploppin’ down on us what landed on his head.”
“But he don’t have to be such a dick about it though,” the first guy, who was now dribblin’ down the front of his chaps, protested with a pathetic whimper.
“Look, he just wants to get this done so he can get the suits off his back and maybe you should just suck it up a little and quit yer whining. We’re makin’ some good dough and besides yer weekend barbeque gig ain’t gonna pay for that truck of yours…. and who the hell told ya to have another pasty runt?”
“Now, dontcha….. ”
But we never got to hear his response, ‘cause before he could get it out of his mouth, from the right side of my periphery came an enormous golden brown cat. It seems that it had been doing its own recon, but with more of a plan of action than I had. I’ve spotted cougars a few times in these parts, but never any this big and certainly none this motivated to have human contact. Within seconds the neck of the logger had been sliced completely open. Blood shot in all directions. To be somewhat detached and descriptive, it was a purty pulsating splatter of maroon that reminded me of the moment a piñata explodes over excited children, but that’s just me. No scream came out of the man’s mouth because there was no throat left to speak of, or with.
It took all of my strength to stay completely still and quiet.
The other dude looked on in complete terror, and after his co-worker fell limp to the ground like a deflated blow-up doll, he hollered some indecipherable words followed by a screeching noise and ran down the hillside to the trucks parked below. It was only after he tore off down the mountain at around ninety miles an hour that the guy on a big machine and another man with a chainsaw in hand noticed all the commotion.
The cat then let out a roar that seemed to shake reality down to its core, blood and flesh dripping from its mouth.
The two guys saw the cat and ran to the truck that remained. At first I thought they were gonna take off too, but then I saw the one from the machine pull out a pistol from the truck. He pointed it at the cat.
Instinctively, I immediately jumped up from my silence, “NO! GODDAMMIT! NO!”
He still took a shot, but I suppose I interrupted his concerted effort to be an even bigger dick than he already was and the bullet hit a tree a few feet from the cat. The feline gave one quick glare at the shooter, then took off into the brush. Luckily, only I had spotted the two cubs already hiding there. They quickly went off deeper in, following their mama. They were gone.
“What the hell! Who the fuck are you!” the guy with the gun screamed. He then pointed his weapon at me. “Is that yer cat?” he added.
I waited a second to let that brilliance glimmer like a frozen turd.
“How fuckin’ stupid are you people?” I responded, shaking my head. I calmly started walking towards him, gently waving my hands downward in hopes he would lower his barrel.
“No, you hold on!” he yelled.
“OK… ok. So first, no, that is not my cat ya ding-dong, she’s her own cat, never met her before in my life, I swear. Second, I don’t think another dead guy up here’s gonna help anything or anyone. And third, don’t point that thing at me, I live here.”
They looked at me kinda confused, but it could have just been their resting stupid faces.
“Right down there,” pointing down the hill a bit and off to the east, “That’s my home. In fact, this is too for all meaningful purposes. And ‘fore this gets any messier, maybe y’all better just cool the fuck down.”
They looked at each other and then at the pile of shredded meat that was their fellow worker, maybe even friend. He dropped the gun, ran both hands through his hair, and sat down on the ground. The other guy just starred frozen-like at the mutilated body.
There was silence for a few long seconds. Some stellar jays started up a conversation in the trees as a squirrel ran by. Then, like an ancient call to prayer, I could faintly hear some vultures in the distance.
“I don’t know what to tell y’all. Sucks for him. I guess humans just can’t figure out their place in anything. Always stumblin’ around like big ol’ baffoons thinkin’ they know all ‘bout ev’rythang and that its all here for their petty grabbin’. Sometimes those ungraceful and indiscriminate bipedal steps touch ground in the most unfortunate of places. Usually ev’rythang else takes the beatin’, but sometimes, once in awhile…. (smirk) ….. anyway, I gotta go home and chop some firewood.”
Yeah, an ol’ axe in my hand. That would be a poetic (and useful) way to finish off this strange Winter morning. Then some bacon and eggs and a nap, maybe curled up with one of my delightfully frisky feline friends. So, without any resistance or debate, I shuffled on home singin’ this lil’ol’ song that I penned a long time ago, when I had almost no grey hairs on my chin:
Sometimes I think its all way too much
Up against the ropes with barely a touch
Nothin’ works out, ya know the story an’ such
Shiftin’ gears, but I ain’t got no clutch
Well, life is just a piece of meat
Hangin’ on by the skin of my teeth
With a knack for trouble I’ve been endowed
Ya tell me yer thoughts, but baby much too loud
All yer little white lies add up to one gray cloud
And every day just feels like part of a crowd
Life is just a piece of meat
Hangin’ on by the skin of my teeth
I always seem to have a half empty cup
Try to swallow it down, but I throw it back up
Gonna write down my feelings and seal it on up
You can open it when yer ready to grow up
It’ll say: “Life is just a piece of meat
Hangin’ on by the skin of my teeth”
I’m gonna go back ‘fore I was born
Try it again when I wake up in the morn’
Change my name, different faces can be worn
Maybe Dylan’s right, its all hopeless and forlorn
And life is just a piece of meat
Hangin’ on by the skin of my teeth
When all is said and done, I’m just one man
Movin’ through this mess, doin’ the best I can
No matter what they tell ya, there ain’t no plan
Ya better have some fun ‘fore ya wind up in the pan
‘Cause life is just a piece of meat
Hangin’ on by the skin of my teeth
Yeah, life is just a piece of meat
And I’m hangin’ on by the skin of my teeth
(D - A - (x4) / G A D (x2))
—————
Nazel Pickens, a cosmic-anarchist-cowboy with backwoods, home-spun, divergent, deviant, rebellious, sorrowful, cynical, silly, and celestial commentary on the world at large and his forever cluttered and dusty lil' place in it. Ol’ Nazel doesn’t have a cellphone (they’re gonna pry his rotary landline outta his cold dead hand) or internet connection, but he sure does have opinions about this psychotically alienated technophilic postmodern mess of a world and of his perpetual pursuit of authentic anarchic freedom, and loves to pound them out on his typewriter, some of which is available as the somewhat regularly reoccurring column “Dust On My Boots” from The Rogue Writers Guild’s online magazine (www.roguewritersguild.com). From essays to poems to rants to short stories to songs, Mr. Pickens emotes with words in the dust, and lets the wind take it all away. He sometimes joins forces with another voice in his head, Invecchiare Selvatico, who writes from a more sophisticated, sometimes more analytical, voice. They teamed up to put out a book, Black Blossoms At The End Of The World, available from underworldamusements.com.
Messages to be passed on to Nazel (and requests for a free catalog of his own distro) can be sent to PO BOX 316 Williams, OR 97544 or nazelpickens@gmail.com. Nazel also puts out music with his (now defunct, but hopefully someday reconstituted and resurrected) cosmic-outlaw-country band, which can be heard at: distilledspiritrebellion.bandcamp.com
