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You ain't goin' nowhere

 
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BoyNhisDog
The dangerous place where the winds meet




Joined: 05 Jan 2003
Posts: 1375
Location: Tucson

PostPosted: 3/5/2007, 3:23 pm    Post subject: You ain't goin' nowhere Reply to topic Reply with quote

Though I have done nothing of note in recent times, I have come across something I found interesting. I will tell it as I heard it, adding nothing but leaving out several specifics that might not be wisely related here on a public forum. I only wish I could follow where she walked. The following is mostly what I do know.

After days of being tailed by well-equipped and funded law officers, she finally broke a law. This set a string of events into motion that would never have happened if some bored bureaucrat chained to a desk, whose life was frustrating and whose dog didn’t even like him, had not set his sights on her. She thought it was some kind of random thing but couldn’t say for sure. It could be related to things she knows. All she knew for sure is that she had the feeling of being watched. She began to notice how they ran parallels on her, after seeing the same people in different places. Patterns emerged. Now they had found reason to strike.

She had her pack on with her usual gear and was off to seek a hike. The landscape did not look compelling to the casual observer but she knew there were jewels waiting so in her haste to be out into it, she made a fatal error, she J-walked. Out of the government van sprang the black clad operators with full assault gear and automatic weapons. The order was shouted to lock and load. Out of primal instinct, she bolted. The initial chase was frightening she admitted. They looked magnificent and unnerving, every bit capable of the hollow eyed killers that they tried so hard to portray. Funny thing though, after a good five minutes they starting huffing and puffing, all red in the face and sort of ran out of steam. She could hold a hard pace for many hours so with an exhilarated grin, she knew she would be gone until an obstacle beyond her initial belief loomed right in her face, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe. There on its tracks was a train between her and the wild lands of freedom and flight. That train was flying. The vultures circled and would come in with a pincher movement, catching her in a deadly crossfire. She feigned right and sprinted left as an opening so sweet arose. She dove through it, a sweet passage under the tracks and flew on towards the mesas of salvation.



It took time for them to regroup but they were not dawdlers and were trained as a tight team, a team of winners. Once more, they were on her trail and very close when the second impassable obstacle stood in the way. I-40 was wall-to-wall traffic at freeway speeds and continuing would be certain death by being squished. The dark horde laughed at how easy and quick this had turned out to be. They caught a second wind, and now they would come down on her like a pack of song dogs onto a cornered rabbit. She was about to be torn apart limb from limb. She decided that she would go down on the run and not as a deer in the headlights so off she flew zigging and zagging. She leaped a small wall of levied rocks and there it was, an opening that she did not think twice over, a wash that ran under the thundering roadways. She fell down the bank, rolling and thunking to a stop at the bottom in a shallow water that ran sandstone red. This is where one must be very careful as one can sink to the thighs if a false step is placed wrongly. She took more time than seemed necessary but made it across and started up through the steep thicket on the far bank as the wolf pack ran right into the middle of the stream and did sink in the muck.



As they struggled, She kept an even and fast pace toward the far mesas. If she could make it to them, she would disappear as those who lived there a thousand years ago did in their own flights. That was the key to surviving this wicked chase. Now the troops had gotten through the muck and had some adrenaline pumping. They split up and sent one bunch straight at her while the others went north in a flanking maneuver. She finally made the foot of the first mesa and flew up the face as the pursuers bogged down once more, the adrenaline now gone from their veins and leaving them with nothing. She went along the top, staying low in the cedar and natural blinds. After a ways she went over the side down into a maze of canyons and stopped for a drink and a breath near a flow of ancient erosion. She raised her cup with a good drink of water mixed with a packet of Emergen-C Super Energy Booster containing 32 active mineral complexes and its electrolyte-enhanced formula to give her the continuing strength it would take to evade and escape the J-walking charges and whatever else they had on their minds.



Then a bullet punched through the top inch of her titanium cup spraying fluid all over her and kicked up dirt in the erosion behind. It appeared that the flankers had made position. They had situated a sniper above her position and about 600 yards to the north. It did not appear that they were looking to hand out a ticket for the offence but lucky for her the guy needed some shooting lessons. She immediately dropped down further into the drainage and kept going past hoodoos and through deep cut canyons, a terrain that the pursuers were unfamiliar with, but where she felt at home.


The supplemented water felt good and she was able to make some miles now, all the while an old Dylan song done so well by the Byrds cycling through her head, pacing her onwards, carrying her over the horizon. She never saw the pursuers again. They had come to their limit and had used their bag of tricks. They would go back through the muck the same way they came. With their muddy clothes, wet and scuffed boots which shined mere hours ago and red dirt smeared on their faces they would stand tall before the man as he chewed them out for letting a lone hiking, J-walker get away. She vowed that nobody would ever catch her, not in this life again. She would live to see another day and to admire another sunset on this one. Now she walks in peace among the features of the earth with the blue skies vaulting above. There are questions in everything and answers enough for now.



The night was coming on fast and it would be time soon to dig in and spend a few hours eating and sleeping until the next dawn. She took out two tools, one to hone a gleaming edge and the other to help make fire to boil water for a comforting drink and a hot meal. They are talismans and a comfort, the Viking whetstone and its colors of the end of the day, the Finnish puukko blade and its stacked birch bark handle warm to the touch, its design one thousand years old. These were the tools that were used to survive a harsh landscape on another continent by those who went before her. They were passed down to her from her grandfather and embody the spirit of her people. The orange lichen of these far rocks went perfectly in the falling light with this pair of things that are more than mere tools. The Scandinavians, who some used to call Vikings knew this. They are a comfort in the dark passages.



The old Byrds song kept cycling as she lay back on her pack and considered the day;

I don't care
How many letters they sent
Morning came and morning went
Pick up your money
And pack up your tent
You ain't goin' nowhere………….

We'll climb that hill no matter how steep
When we get up to it
Whoo-ee! Ride me high
Tomorrow's the day
My bride's gonna come
Oh, oh, are we gonna fly
Down in the easy chair!

--Bob Dylan, “You ain't goin' nowhere”




The events related here were found in the weathered pages of a small notebook that I found wrapped in zip locked plastic somewhere on the Colorado Plateau. I have transcribed the passages above from that little book. Many questions remain as to the severity of the chase but the answers are not forthcoming and might be very dangerous to try to uncover. There is nothing to explain where she is now or why the pages were abandoned in the alcove of sandstone with the accompanying photos.
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RedRoxx44
Queen of the Walkabout




Joined: 15 Jan 2004
Posts: 1167

PostPosted: 3/5/2007, 3:30 pm    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

Cool story, lots of canyons to get lost in that area. You'd have to know them well to catch your prey. She kept a cool head and did what she needed to do. If it were not for worrying my family I would love to disappear in that country for months on end.
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CatValet
Got Gear?




Joined: 04 Jan 2003
Posts: 735
Location: Scottsdale

PostPosted: 3/5/2007, 4:02 pm    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

Quote:

If it were not for worrying my family I would love to disappear in that country for months


I can see the book now, "ReddRoxx44, a Vagabond for Beauty" !

Just y'all be back for next year's get together!

Everett Reuss has missed the last four, so now GTG has suspended his site privileges. Rolling Eyes
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Matt Hoffman





Joined: 18 Feb 2004
Posts: 701
Location: Grantham, NH

PostPosted: 3/5/2007, 5:40 pm    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

That was an awesome story! Now I wish I didn't have to work tomorrow!
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PageRob





Joined: 03 Mar 2005
Posts: 859
Location: Page, Az.

PostPosted: 3/5/2007, 6:13 pm    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

RedRoxx44 wrote:
If it were not for worrying my family I would love to disappear in that country for months on end.

Amen.

P.S. I dig the tale, and the photos add a nice dimension too.
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Sande J
Calamity J




Joined: 06 Jan 2003
Posts: 725
Location: Mesa, AZ

PostPosted: 3/6/2007, 6:18 am    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

Ok Nice!
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azhiker96





Joined: 05 Jan 2003
Posts: 1419

PostPosted: 3/6/2007, 7:50 am    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

Great story and great song. I have it on their "Sweetheart of the Rodeo" album. Perfect song to be stuck in my head for awhile.
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kurthzone
Thread Killer




Joined: 31 Dec 2002
Posts: 1097
Location: Peoria, Arizona

PostPosted: 3/6/2007, 3:27 pm    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

Quite the enigma Glen. Very nice photos that survived in the cache. The Birds did another Dylan song that is nice, "My Back Pages"


Crimson flames tied through my ears
Rollin' high and mighty traps
Pounced with fire on flaming roads
Using ideas as my maps
"We'll meet on edges, soon," said I
Proud 'neath heated brow.
Ah, but I was so much older then,
I'm younger than that now.

Half-wracked prejudice leaped forth
"Rip down all hate," I screamed
Lies that life is black and white
Spoke from my skull. I dreamed
Romantic facts of musketeers
Foundationed deep, somehow.
Ah, but I was so much older then,
I'm younger than that now.

Girls' faces formed the forward path
From phony jealousy
To memorizing politics
Of ancient history
Flung down by corpse evangelists
Unthought of, though, somehow.
Ah, but I was so much older then,
I'm younger than that now.

A self-ordained professor's tongue
Too serious to fool
Spouted out that liberty
Is just equality in school
"Equality," I spoke the word
As if a wedding vow.
Ah, but I was so much older then,
I'm younger than that now.

In a soldier's stance, I aimed my hand
At the mongrel dogs who teach
Fearing not that I'd become my enemy
In the instant that I preach
My pathway led by confusion boats
Mutiny from stern to bow.
Ah, but I was so much older then,
I'm younger than that now.

Yes, my guard stood hard when abstract threats
Too noble to neglect
Deceived me into thinking
I had something to protect
Good and bad, I define these terms
Quite clear, no doubt, somehow.
Ah, but I was so much older then,
I'm younger than that now.
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Arizonaheat
Got Supes Juice?




Joined: 04 Jan 2003
Posts: 1741
Location: Mesa, AZ

PostPosted: 3/6/2007, 4:58 pm    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

Very nice.

You better watch out though, the law may find you on here like they found the guys that biked the Canyon.
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BoyNhisDog
The dangerous place where the winds meet




Joined: 05 Jan 2003
Posts: 1375
Location: Tucson

PostPosted: 3/6/2007, 6:22 pm    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

Arizonaheat wrote:

You better watch out though, the law may find you on here like they found the guys that biked the Canyon.


Shhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!! LOL Lots of people laying low right now is my guess. I will never give up her secrets. ROFLMAO angel

I think that incident with the overzealous pursuers of those kids may have been on my mind. “Crime” and “Punishment” are strange things sometimes. Glad you saw the parallel.


That is a great and classic song Kurt and one that could be a good rhythm to put some miles under you with. I like that album George. Ok

I thought you might follow this Sandy. Agree

I want to go find her too Matt. I know she is still out there and like Letty and Rob, I could easily loose myself in the landscapes up there if it were not for………well, you know, those things.

Randy, the spirit of Everett is here with some of us so check with the boss and see if he will cut him a break. For sure, Everett knows more than we do and if we can listen well enough, there may be, how did someone say once, epiphanies.
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Cholla





Joined: 26 Oct 2005
Posts: 379

PostPosted: 3/6/2007, 8:05 pm    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

An interesting read. I find our need for constant communication fascinating. Instant text messaging, etc. Less than 30 years ago it was not unusual to get into a new city in a new country and pick up your mail at your name, "poste restante" city , country. You mailed your slide film home to be developed months later and woud go through your journal to match up time and location. Now we want it all now and everyone freaks if you are out of reach for more than a few days.
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PageRob





Joined: 03 Mar 2005
Posts: 859
Location: Page, Az.

PostPosted: 3/6/2007, 9:01 pm    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote

Cholla wrote:
everyone freaks if you are out of reach for more than a few days.

Isn't that the truth. Rolling Eyes
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