A wicked man

"I must be very wicked," Don said with a twinkle in his eye, as he put his empty Coke can on a stump and headed back to his tree-clearing project.

"Why do you say that?" I asked, playing dumb.

"You know what they say....'There's no rest for the wicked.'"

Don hasn't had much time to fish, hunt or even hike this year. Not yet. He's too busy trying to complete his projects before the snow flies.

He's selectively clearing a 200-foot radius around our house, to qualify for the "Defensible Space" rebate offered by the Dept. of Agriculture as part of its rural fire prevention strategy. That must be completed by Dec. 1. He's pushed out hundreds, maybe even thousands, of trees, leaving the nice big ones and a good selection of young ones at least 10 feet apart. Our "yard" and our view expands every day! It looks like a state park. Later this week, a guy with a mega-chipper is coming out to chip everything that Don's laid on the ground.

Don's also completing work on the barn and stalls. He has one stall (of three) left to line with wood, a couple of gates to hang, and a couple automatic waterers to hook up, and that will be done.

Last month he finished building a 12x16 woodshed that looks nice enough to be a guest cabin. And, of course, he had to fill that with firewood which he's cut around the property.

He also had to get his gunshop up and running. It's beautiful, well lit, and very functional...ironically, nicer than the one he had in Yakima for 30 years!

He did take a few days last week to go pheasant hunting in eastern Montana with Dusty Rosenthal, Mike Schell, Bob Graff, and some other friends from Yakima. And he did go fishing for half a day last summer. Deer and elk season starts this weekend, so he has to be "extra wicked" now to get his work done before that!

Ladies' Luncheon, Montana Style

The first Wednesday of each month, about 15 of us women from the Trout Creek area get together for lunch at one of the two local taverns. We alternate between the Wayside and the Naughty Pine Saloon. The hardest beverage ordered is iced tea, and the typical lunch fare runs from chili dogs to taco salads.

My neighbor Kathy Hill, a like-minded conservative woman, invited me to join the group, which has been meeting for several years. "Members" come and go with the seasons, but a core group is always there, since it's an important chance for "female bonding" in an isolated mountain area where the air is always heavy with testosterone.

Most of our lunch bunch ladies are retired, although Maureen, the Trout Creek postmistress, does lock up the post office for 90 minutes so she can join us. Like so many people in this area, most of these women are "from somewhere else" and have lived in the area for only a few years. A disproportionate number are from western Washington. It's easy to understand why they'd escape from the I-5 corridor to a place like this if they're conservatives!

These are educated, savvy, strong, independent women. They cherish the special way of life here, just as much as their husbands do. They pinch pennies. Nobody's ashamed to ask, "What does your hairdresser charge?" or "Where's gas the cheapest today?" They're unpretentious; dressing up for lunch means putting on a new sweatshirt.

Luncheon conversation often revolves around food and recipes...how to cook bear meat, how to field dress an antelope so it doesn't smell up your kitchen later. We also discuss home and garden topics...what to do about all the stinkbugs, and how to get rid of carpenter ants and yellowjackets. And we'll touch on fashion and personal appearance...how Faith found this great Coldwater Creek fleece top at the consignment shop for $7, the practicality of Sharon's great new haircut, or the fact that losing weight causes facial wrinkles so it's better to stay chubby.

Among our group we have women who styled hair for Hollywood celebrities, a woman who lived on a sailboat with her husband for two years, women who work in the local taxidermy shop, and a myriad of other fascinating personal stories. Many of them now share common bonds in quilting and craft work. All of them share something else, however, the first Wednesday of each month. They share the Good Life here.

Another Dream Come True

Ian Tyson is a legend in the music business. He was a rodeo cowboy and logger from B.C., who got famous in the '60s as a Canadian folk singer and songwriter. He paired up with a Toronto singer named Sylvia Fricker, and "Ian and Sylvia" became megastars in Canada and the U.S. The two of them split in the mid-'70s; the folk music era had died. Ian retreated alone to his home territory in the western provinces. He went back to his previous life as a rodeo cowboy and rancher, and began penning cowboy ballads.

I was introduced to Tyson's music in the late '70s during my seven-year stint as an entertainment journalist in Nashville. I interviewed hundreds of country music celebrities--even Roy Rogers--but the elusive Ian Tyson was one I'd never met. He'd attained almost mythical status to me, this rich-toned balladeer who'd chucked the bright lights and fast life to return to what he really loved: working his own ranch on the edge of the mountains in Alberta.

Yesterday Ian Tyson ate lunch in the "Monti's Room" with Don and me. He was in Thompson to do a benefit concert for the high school. He and his two backup guys were returning from the Pendleton Roundup, and they were headed back to Alberta. I made arrangements to interview him for a speculative piece for a magazine. He agreed, so I picked him up yesterday morning and brought him to Shorthorse for lunch and a chat.

For reasons so deep and complex that I can't express them to many, this was bigger than Roy Rogers for me. Ian Tyson. Eating beef barley soup and sourdough bread with Don and me. Later we strolled out to look at the horses, and then went back inside for an informal visit. This is the type of interview I'd learned to do, and done so many times, under the tutelage of my old Music City News editor, Lee Rector. Lee's in Reno now. He wanted like everything to come up to meet Ian himself, but was tied up. He said he'd be here with us in spirit, and I know he was. Lee's a songwriter too. We spent many a long night in his Nashville kitchen, along with a myriad of drop-in talented musicians and songwriters (they were just "neighbors" then), picking and singing Tyson songs and swilling down beer and cheap wine. "Four Strong Winds," "Summer Wages," "Someday Soon" were always on the nightly playlist.

Aside from the fact that he's still alive, time hasn't otherwise been kind to Tyson's looks or his voice. He'll be 75 next week. He looks like a bony, gnarled up old bareback rider (which he is) who's tipped a few too many bottles of whiskey out behind the chutes. His voice is all but gone. That part made me want to cry at his concert last night. It was painful listening to him. But, as Lee reminded me in an email this morning, we'll always have Tyson's strong, clear baritone voice in our audio files.

Ian played my guitar yesterday in our living room. It's a Martin D-28 that I bought new in Nashville in 1980. I bought it because I could afford it at the time, and because it was a connection with Ian Tyson's acoustic music. A couple days ago when I was tuning it in prep for this interview, I broke a string. It's hard to find a good guitar string in Sanders County, Montana, on a Saturday afternoon. But I got a light-gauge string from our friend Dave Oliver who left it on his kitchen table for me to pick up Sunday morning, since he and wife Deb were going to Missoula that day. It was a totally inappropriate string for my guitar, but it was better than nothing. I offered a lame apology to Ian when he strummed it.

When I brought him back to his motel room after lunch, he told me to wait a minute. He dashed into his room, came back out, and handed me a set of professional quality D'Addario wound steel guitar strings.

How ironic that I had to come this far in my life, to this little place called Thompson Falls, to realize a huge dream. Shorthorse itself is a dream come true...and now this. I-God, Woodrow!!

Our Team's Open House

We wanted everyone who'd worked on our house to be able to come and see the finished product, to show their family what they'd done, and to admire their contribution to the project. So we invited them all to an Open House just for them on Sunday, Sept. 7.

It was a gathering of not just contractors and crew, but of friends. Everyone here knows each other. And now they know us.

There were about 30 people here over the course of the beautiful fall afternoon. We all ate well, drank copious amounts of beer and lemonade, and laughed at reminscences of the very lengthy project that was the building of our home.

I'd wanted to get pictures of all of them, but was too busy tending bar to break away for photo ops. The only picture we got was at the end of the day, when Charlotte Beaudry (another former Yakimanian) snapped the photo above of Don and me at our front door. The sign was made by our old friend and former Yakima neighbor Mike Tully. He and his wife Theresa now live in Kansas. Their gift arrived just a couple days before our Open House, so the timing was perfect. We are very grateful for this wonderful surprise!

The National Bison Range

Less than 60 miles from our house is the National Bison Range. It is administered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as part of the National Wildlife Refuge System. It was established in 1908 and is one of the oldest Wildlife Refuges in the nation.

On this 18,500-acre piece of wild land are about 400 bison, 200 species of birds, plus whitetail, mule deer, elk, bears, coyotes, pronghorns, and bighorn sheep. It's not like a drive-through zoo. You really have to look for these critters. But if you're patient, you'll go home with an eyeful.

We've made two trips there this summer--the first time with our old Yakima neighbors, Tom and Celine Bates. The second time was 10 days ago with Rollie Taylor and John Jay, who were making their second trip to Shorthorse this year. (The first time was the July 4 weekend.)

On our most recent trip with Rollie and John, we saw quite a few bison...but the highlight was FIVE six-point bull elk! Four of them were in a draw at the bottom of a mountain we drove up. The fifth was on the bank of a stream not too far off the road. Needless to say, he was breathtaking!

We also saw lots of the other big critters too, including two bears running through the huckleberry bushes high on a hillside.

We highly recommend a drive through the National Bison Range for anyone who gets close to it. The drive takes about two hours (or more if you want to hike and glass) along a mostly one-way road about 22 miles long.

Photo: Don with Rollie and John, glassing bull elk atop Red Sleep Mountain on the National Bison Range.

The Shorthorse Deer

Okay, we've named them, but we refuse to feed them. The deer here at Shorthorse can stay as long as they want. They'll be safe here, as long as nature provides their food.

It's fun watching them grow, mature, and become braver around us. Early on, we started identifying their different personalities. "Sweetie" is the confident doe who's not bothered at all by our presence. "Honey" is a bit more flighty. Then there's "Notch," who was a runt last winter. She got her name because of a huge notch in her left ear. We worry about her because she's had a bad case of mange or something all summer...but now she's getting some real size, and it looks like she'll have a decent winter coat after all.

There are boys too, of course. There's "Tasty" (so named by Don), and "Tasty Two." One's a four-point and one's a three-point. "Little Tasty" is a spike.

We all peacefully coexist. Lizzie leaves them complete alone, thanks to her shock collar training last winter. We talk to to them, but never try to get close or lure them to us. When Don is clearing brush or cutting wood, they're usually very close so they can snatch up the lichen from the tree limbs. They think it's candy.

The other night I took Lizzie for a walk around the perimeter of our property. During the mile-long loop, I counted 17 deer making their way up onto our land.

Pictured above are Tasty and Tasty Two, outside our front and kitchen windows.

Purple Finger Disease

Last weekend was the Huckleberry Festival in our little town of Trout Creek. The annual event brings in lots of outsiders, along with locals. They served 2,500 huckleberry pancake breakfasts at the fire hall over the weekend. Other activities included a parade, "Miss Huckleberry" contest, auction, and many craftsmen selling their hand-made wares throughout the festival park.

Oh yes...there was a huckleberry dessert contest...in which I won SECOND PLACE! I made some huckleberry coconut bars I modified from a recipe on a Western Family oatmeal box!

My dog Lizzie and I also hosted an agility demo on the festival grounds. It was a popular event, and we generated a lot of local interest in the sport of agility. Lizzie even got her picture in the weekly newspaper for her efforts!

Obviously huckleberry season is in full swing, so Don and I set out today to find some for ourselves. We did. It's a secret location, of course. And there are lots more out there that we didn't get picked in the short time we were up there on top of the world, just over the Idaho state line.

This was my first venture at huckleberry picking, and I must say it was surprisingly enjoyable. We now have 10 whole cups of berries vacuum-sealed in our freezer (from two hours of picking!). And I now know why Robin Simmons' pies are so expensive when they're auctioned off at the Yakima animal banquets!!

Here's the finished product

At long last, the house is stained and all doors are painted. We still need Gene Carner to finish the stonework around the steps, and for our concrete man to seal the stamped concrete porch and deck. And that's about it!

A Fourth to Remember

On July 3, our good friends Rollie Taylor and John Jay pulled in for a weekend visit.

We celebrated the Fourth of July by driving to Sex Peak Lookout, in the Kootenai National Forest, about 20 miles from where we live. This lookout was established in the 1920s. It's no longer staffed, but the Forest Service makes it available for single-night rentals to whomever wants to go there. Because of the name, it's a popular getaway for outdoorsy couples celebrating anniversaries and such, but it's also used by families and elk chasers. If you like real solitude, this rocky eagle's nest is a cozy escape.

We spent about an hour climbing on the rocks, exploring the interior, and wondering what it would be like to be up there in that wood and glass shack during a violent thunderstorm. The consensus was that it would be fantastic!

On the way back down the mountain we made several stops to watch wildlife. We saw a mama bear and a watermelon-sized cub. Mama went up a tree and we watched her wait patiently for us to leave. Finally she fell asleep up there, undoubtedly muttering something like, "Damn tourists!" under her breath. We had the binoculars with us so we got a close-up look at her sleepy eyes.

We also saw several flocks of wild turkeys and about 40 deer here and there, including young ones still in spots.

The wildflowers were in full bloom too.

Oh yes, and we saw eagles.

We met only two other vehicles on the whole trip up and down the mountain. Both of them were pickups full of firewood.

That night, back at Shorthorse, we walked down our road to a good vantage point for the neighborhood fireworks display. We have several well healed neighbors who each put on extraordinary ($$$$$) shows along the shore of the river. Rollie commented it was the best fireworks display he'd ever seen....even better than at the fairgrounds in Yakima.

We capped it all off with some homemade strawberry shortcake and called it a night...and a fantastic Fourth of July. What a country we live in!

Hay in the barn!

Our barn now has Montana hay in it, fresh from the field.

Finding small bales of horse hay is no easy task here. The growing season is short, so there's only one cutting. No one (hardly) irrigates, so there's not much alfalfa. And everyone around here is into the big, round bales, which we can't handle without special equipment.

Oh, how I appreciate that wonderful alfalfa/grass mixed hay we got from Mike Drury down on Rutherford Road in Yakima last year for $100 a ton!! Around here, the equivalent would have to come from south of Missoula, and it would run about $180+ a ton, IF we could even get it.

We were fortunate enough to hook up with someone who buys hay from a guy just four miles down the road. He introduced us to the farmer, and we were able to get three tons last week. It's brome hay (low protein, good for our older horses) in nice little 70-pound bales. We picked it up right out of the field. $85 a ton. We still need to find about 3 more tons but think we have that lined up too. However, if Mike Drury wants to haul a load up here on his way to a hunting or fishing trip, I wouldn't turn it down!

Waking from a Noisy Dream

Anyone who's built a special home (or had a home built) has his own stories and memories, chock full of highs and lows. It definitely is one of those "life experiences" that challenges everything you've got..physically, emotionally and financially.

We'd heard it many times from friends who'd been there: "If your marriage can survive home-building, then it can survive anything." For Don and me, it was never hard on our relationship, although it was difficult on us individually...which certainly affected our moods from time to time.

I can't speak for him or know his feelings, but I can tell you what the completion of our house was like for me: waking up from a noisy, tumultuous, confusing, fragmented dream.

Those types of dreams are pretty common for me...they seem to run in my family, since my sister has vivid, detailed, crazy dreams too. There's always a lot going on, plenty of background noise, many voices, colors, etc., and I'm just sort of "there" in the middle of this kaleidescope. It's usually a relief to awaken, gradually, to a quiet bedroom and the comfort and stillness of consciousness in my own bed. Within minutes of waking, the memories of those noisy dreams have completely faded.

That's what it's like to be in this house now, enveloped in the present and totally content with it. The last four years have been so confusing, so busy, so goal-oriented, so NOISY...selling businesses, selling our Yakima house, packing, unpacking, trying to get a house built over the phone, thousands of miles of driving back and forth, making arrangements, saying goodbye to friends, fighting depression and thinking the house would never be completed, readjusting EVERYTHING....

and then I awaken in this quiet, beautiful room with cedar ceiling and cedar walls. There's a mountain right outside my window. There's no alarm clock. There's only peace. And I'm so "into the present" that there's no room for the stressful memories of the last four years, and they just fade away like last night's dreams.

This is what it's like for me to be here now. We are here. We've reached the destination. It is "The Precious Present."

Bear in Sunglasses

Her name is Bosca. (At the Mannings, every critter has a name.) It would have been Bosco (a good generic bear name), but she's a female.

She's a good guard, a good landmark, and she doesn't eat much.

Come Sign the Guest Book

Milestones:
1. The grass we planted two weeks ago is coming up.
2. The dirt pile that was in front of the house is gone.
3. Don has removed about 500 trees (no kidding) to create our "defensible space."
4. The lights are on in the barn.
5. Don's lost 25 pounds without even trying (and I found some of it).

We thought we'd have an "open house" in June, but too much remains to be done. The porch and deck need sealing, there's a bit more rockwork to do on the windowsills, Don's library furniture isn't ready yet, and the exterior still needs to be stained. Maybe in the fall??? By then we should also have our horseshoe pit and fire ring in the back yard.

Visitors have come in a steady and very welcome procession since early March...Maurice Alpert, Barb Madsen, Jim Stump, Larry Demoss, Judy Otteson, Celine Bates, Dominic Viega. My friends Charlie Reddick and Laurie Mosher will be here later this week, followed by Gene Carner, Rollie Taylor, John Jay, and all of the rest of you. If you're reading this, you're invited. It's just as much fun to be able to share this incredible place with you as it is to live here ourselves.

Don hopes to have his gunsmithing capabilities up and running in a week or so, as soon as he gets his machines wired up. I'm teaching free dog classes in town once a week and already have about 10 students.

We work/play outside all day...pruning, hiking, riding, spraying for knapweed, mowing, planting deer-proof (i.e., silk) flowers, dog agility training, road grading, and more hiking. We go to bed tired. It's wonderful. Gas prices don't even seem to affect us that much, because we never want to leave here.

The river is very high and muddy, due to spring runoff and lots of rain. It'll be a while before the fishermen get out on it. Don is shopping on the internet for fishing stuff, so he'll be ready when the river is.

Even without fishing, there's plenty of fun around here....like endless hiking just out the back door, and shooting to your heart's content. So don't wait for clear water; come over and see us now....and later too!

April 21 Weather Report

Everyone says this is absolutely crazy weather this year. It's snowed almost every day for the past three weeks, with the exception of April 12-13 when it was around 78 degrees.

One good thing about the snow....the harder it falls, the more certain that the sun will break through blue sky about five minutes later.

We have green grass here and there...and ice in the horses' stock tank every morning!

Great Mini-Lodge of the Northwest

Don and I found a coffee-table book at Costco about 8 years ago: "Great Lodges of the West." All our lives we've both had a fascination with places like Old Faithful Inn at Yellowstone, or Paradise Inn at Mt. Rainier. The massive logs, the old timbers, towering ceilings, the stonework and elegant but rustic 1940s style grandeur.

So we've tried to incorporate that feel in a mini-version at Shorthorse. For a couple of rank amateurs, it seems to have turned out pretty well!

The Master Bedroom

Our bedroom is the warmest room in the house. It's a comforting room with cedar walls and ceiling, and a couple big windows, plus a glass door that opens out onto a small balcony. There are no dressers or closets; we have a walk-in dressing room adjacent to the master bath.

We have a small gas stove/fireplace near the foot of the bed. It adds a little extra heat to the room very quickly, which is nice on those cold evenings (or mornings).

The outdoor pictures above are the views from the little balcony. Notice the deer in one of them. They live here.

A Well Deserved Nap

Here's Don, learning how to relax in the new house. Retirement is rough!

My Hideaway

Our old furniture from Yakima is up here in my room, where I'm blogging this. The dogs like to hang out here with me. It's a cozy multi-purpose room....office, exercise room, lounge, music room.

Don's room (his office) is downstairs and is the one room that's not done yet. Tom Wagler is making a desk and some bookcases for him.

Before and After

No more need to pretend or to be impatient for completion. It's happened. This is our foyer...in August '07 and March '08.

The Kitchen

I grew up in northern Minnesota, in summer cabins that were lined in knotty pine. It's one of the warmest, friendliest, most comforting looks I know of. So I wanted that in my own new kitchen.

The walls are still light, but I'm looking forward to the day they mellow into that honey-gold hue.

Tom Wagler did all the cabinetry. He and his family are part of a large Mennonite population here, and they are impeccable craftsmen. Tom delivered the cabinets one late afternoon in December, and piled them in the kitchen for installation the next day. We went in to look at them after he'd left, and noticed a simple, philosophical Bible verse written prominently on the bottom side of a drawer that was sitting on end so we could clearly see it. A nice personal touch.

Our countertops are Cambria (brand) quartz. The stainless steel sink has two bowls--the big one is about 10 inches deep and big enough to accommodate a cookie sheet. The other one is small.

All our appliances came from Lowes. I'm having fun with the double wall oven, both of which have convection features. I'm finding that convection cooking really is faster and better than traditional baking.

The cooktop is a smooth ceramic electric, on the island. I wanted it that way so I could stand there and cook, while looking at Don who'd typically be sitting at the eating nook. Much nicer than having my back turned to him, particularly if we're trying to converse.

A downdraft on the island pops up when you push a button.

The floor is a rustic-looking, reddish-brown ceramic tile with dark gray grout.