In March of 06 my paramour Pam, and I, quit work and began a rambling shuffle of job-searching (for her) and camping journey (for us).
A medium-good memory from that spring: We were sitting in camp chairs, near the shore of Utah's Sevier River, just after waking (not much energy yet). The fire was beginning to make warm water for our coffee. We were facing each other. Pam's back was to a scrub-bush and tree covered slope. Movement caught my eye. I looked up. A red tailed hawk shot down over-through the brush and trees in a spitting-arc, toward us.
It opened its wings WIDE in a braking motion. As it's talons slowly (not slowly at all, this whole thing lasted three-four seconds) reached out from it's body to begin to land on the top of Pam's head....I began to react. (Oh, how—now—I wish I'd the temerity to remain motionless.) An intake of breath preceded my facial muscles beginning to squinch (the expression which usually precludes the word 'eww'). My shoulders began to hunch a little and I started to raise my hand (I think, maybe, I was going to point...?) The hawk's eye-line shifted up from the top of Pam's head (isn't it shit-cream crazy how the incredible eyeball-brain-combo works? This movement of Mister Hawk's head lasted...well...maybe four-tenths of a second, and registered in my head as what it really was: the hawk's recognition of a mistake it was in the extremely rapid process of making.)
It then saw me...moving. It's force-trajectory had brought it three feet from Pam. So close, the talons were no longer visible—blocked from my view by Pam's wonderfully pillow-tousled hair. Pam's sleep-addled brain correctly interpreted my movements as the beginning of a reaction to something I was seeing—and she started to turn. The hawk's head snapped to the side, and (...exit stage left...) with a burst of wind from it's four-foot wingspan it darted away, out of sight. My sight. Pam never saw a feather. The only proof she had/has, that I didn't make it all up, was/is: she heard the pop-burst of wind, which caused her to duck.
Every time I retell the story she says, "You would have loved it if that hawk actually landed on me." I can only reply, "True. It is, currently, only a medium-good story. For it to have become a great campfire story, the hawk and you would both have had to lose your collective shit."
Fall of 06 we began an almost 12,000 mile looping-trek across the US; Arizona to Virgina, up to Maine, further up through Canada, and down through Glacier National Park, Yellowstone, and the Grand Tetons, back to Arizona. This was also a combined job-hunt/once-in-a-lifetime chance to see-the-sights. No job landed. Many sights seen.
One (of many) notable moments occurred after many weeks in a cramped car, guest rooms, cheap hotels, and camps: We stopped for the night at Lake Saranac in upstate New York and rented a cottage for one evening (a splurge). Our hopes were on easing the tensions of our proximity-overload. We basked in front of a roaring fireplace; soaked in a highly-effective hot tub; ate in a kitchen where Pam made one of our favorite meals; and....received some cat love. We were missing ours. A cabin cat showed up, came in, and snuggled. To top off the night—we took a canoe out and paddled into the moonlight with the shore lights gleaming off the water.
(to be continued?)
A medium-good memory from that spring: We were sitting in camp chairs, near the shore of Utah's Sevier River, just after waking (not much energy yet). The fire was beginning to make warm water for our coffee. We were facing each other. Pam's back was to a scrub-bush and tree covered slope. Movement caught my eye. I looked up. A red tailed hawk shot down over-through the brush and trees in a spitting-arc, toward us.
It then saw me...moving. It's force-trajectory had brought it three feet from Pam. So close, the talons were no longer visible—blocked from my view by Pam's wonderfully pillow-tousled hair. Pam's sleep-addled brain correctly interpreted my movements as the beginning of a reaction to something I was seeing—and she started to turn. The hawk's head snapped to the side, and (...exit stage left...) with a burst of wind from it's four-foot wingspan it darted away, out of sight. My sight. Pam never saw a feather. The only proof she had/has, that I didn't make it all up, was/is: she heard the pop-burst of wind, which caused her to duck.
Every time I retell the story she says, "You would have loved it if that hawk actually landed on me." I can only reply, "True. It is, currently, only a medium-good story. For it to have become a great campfire story, the hawk and you would both have had to lose your collective shit."
Fall of 06 we began an almost 12,000 mile looping-trek across the US; Arizona to Virgina, up to Maine, further up through Canada, and down through Glacier National Park, Yellowstone, and the Grand Tetons, back to Arizona. This was also a combined job-hunt/once-in-a-lifetime chance to see-the-sights. No job landed. Many sights seen.
One (of many) notable moments occurred after many weeks in a cramped car, guest rooms, cheap hotels, and camps: We stopped for the night at Lake Saranac in upstate New York and rented a cottage for one evening (a splurge). Our hopes were on easing the tensions of our proximity-overload. We basked in front of a roaring fireplace; soaked in a highly-effective hot tub; ate in a kitchen where Pam made one of our favorite meals; and....received some cat love. We were missing ours. A cabin cat showed up, came in, and snuggled. To top off the night—we took a canoe out and paddled into the moonlight with the shore lights gleaming off the water.(to be continued?)
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