- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:Rock Springs, Wyoming

Golden, Canada.

It's morning and I'm sitting on Main Street in front of a café next to a man- forty years my senior.

He’s cradling a porcelain cup of black coffee and a Marlboro. I have an iced americano with light cream, to go.

He starts with "Beautiful day, nice look'n truck over there in that handicapped spot".

I agree, "Yup, nice day. Sure like those side runners."

Idle talk. This is what I miss most about the north. He worked for the railroad, his youngest lives in Europe, works for a ‘fancy- pants’ investment firm, and I’m wandering the north wishing that I could stay.

Silence. The comfortable kind, relaxed.

He takes a drag off his cigarette and as he exhales he says "When you wake up dreading going to work three days in a row, that's when you quit." His eyes are still admiring the truck.

"And how is it that you know this?" I ask

"Because that's what I did." Long pause. "They all said ‘what about your pension? Can't walk away from that, it ain't sencicle.’ But I did. Best thing I ever did for myself".

"Then what?" I ask.

"I built all this". He waves his hand from left to right up and down Main Street. "Doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see what needs to get done." Another pause, another drag off the Marborlo "Just got’a learn to think for yourself, that's all."

The High Country Ranch

The last time that Chris and I were at the High Country Ranch in Wyoming was last year for a funeral. Although it was somber time, it was one most beautiful places that I can remember being.

Last week the family gathered once again at the ranch to celebrate life and the amazing gift of family. I am lucky to, and am grateful for belonging to not just one loving family, but two.

I joke that I married Chris for his family, some days for his brother, and some days for his father, many days for his mother. Right now I have an overwhelming feeling that I married Chris for the whole lot of them.

There were lots of laughs during our stay, lots of fun, not enough sleep and more love than I've been part in a long while.

I have stories about cowboys, of history and relationships. But you'll have to wait for for them because I'm still savoring them for myself, pulling every speckle of warmth from their memory to hold close, to use as fuel as I settle back into the land of the rooted.

Oh Canada

Such a strange place..and so similar to Minnesota.

On to the next

Three down, how many to go? Doesn't matter for now because the next stop is Golden, Canada for the Canadian Nationals.

This is a place where the people talk like me, move slow like me, step aside and say 'Good Morning'..and mean it.

There's a spring fed pond just my size, a rope swing, and from what I've heard, the worst mosquito season in years- from the perspective of the human- and the best- from the perspective of the mosquito.

I'm ready. Wish us luck at the boarder.



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:Chelan Washington pwc 2010