50 miler - Summum Bonum

I looked at Todd laying on the trail, and looked down the trail at the oncoming boys and the thought of the boys watching Todd die made me cringe a bit.
Todd was laying on his side facing away from me. I walked around the other side, nudged Todd and asked him if he was dead. With a groan he said:"No, but pretty close."
I told Todd that I was going to leave him with the boys and run out to get help.
As the boys caught up, I could see that Hayden was fighting off tears seeing his dad on the ground.
I started unpacking Todd's gear from my bag and told the boys that I was running out for help and that they need to take care of Todd.
I handed Alex, Todd's map and had him open it.
I showed the boys where I estimated that we were at and told the young men where I was going, and I showed the boys which direction to hike if they were able to move Todd any further.
With more seriousness than I would liked to have had with the boys I told them that for no reason do they leave the trail. If they were confused at where to go that they just stop and stay on the trail.
I made them go over the plans to make sure that they knew what I wanted. Alex was on top of everything.
I looked the young men in the eyes and asked if they would be able to do it. they all looked back at me an nodded.
Alex looked at me and said:"Dave, we left our purses at home."
The young men all nodded and smiled.
I looked down at Todd and asked if he wanted me to get his cousin with four wheelers or full blown paramedics. Todd looked up and said weakly:" You better get paramedics.
I nodded, gave a few more directions to the young men, snugged up my backpack, and with a couple of skips and a hop, was off on a run to get help.
We had a day and a half left on our trip so I knew that I would have to make good time.
It was late afternoon and being deep into the wilderness, I wondered what type of wildlife I would run into. With the fast pace and me being alone, I hoped that I wouldn't surprise any bears or moose. I thought about making some noise as I ran but just didn't feel like singing or talking. I just felt like Forrest Gump and felt like running. I prayed for a strength and stamina, and felt it. My 45 lb pack didn't feel heavy and my legs felt strong. My lungs felt good and I even felt that If I came across a bear or a moose, that they would have their hands full if they blocked my path. I knew that the Lord loved those boys and he loved Todd, and that he was with us.
I didn't worry about the boys. The look in their eyes gave me confidence and they had proven themselves in they few days before.
I had come the the realization that if the Lord was giving an old fat man like me the strength that I was feeling at the time, that the young men would have three times the advantage that I had.
About a half mile into my run, I came to a large creek crossing. The trail was confusing and took off in about 3 different directions. I pulled out my map and decided on a path that seemed right. It also looked less traveled. I hoped the boys wouldn't get lost from it.
Later, I found out that they got confused there and didn't go any further after that point.
As I continued my great escape from the wilderness, I was still amazed at the beauty of the woods. There was no one there. It was raw and untouched. Even the trail hardly showed any signs of being traveled on.
I started to enjoy the run only to be imposed upon my thoughts of my buddy dieing in front of the young men.
About mid-way out I came across a cow moose. I told the moose to get out of the way and she did.
While running, I payed attention to the trail making sure that an ATV could make it out. I moved a couple of trees that had fallen in the trail so the ATV's could make it up in.
As I exited the wilderness area, I had run out of water, so I stopped at the creek and pumped some more water. I still had a few miles to the trail head, and didn't know if I would have anyone at the trail head or if I would have to run to the main road.
During the last stretch, I heard elk squealing and wanted to stop and look but didn't. I also saw a nice buck.
It was starting to get dark so continued on to the trail head.
As I arrived I noticed two forest service vehicles. Both were locked and thought I might break into them to use their radios, but decided against it as I looked across the valley and saw a parked truck in the distance.
When I got to the truck, there was a group of people camping, I rehearsed what had happened and they showed me where they were getting cell service. They were drunk and I could tell that I had confused them more than they wanted to be.
A gentleman and his teenage son walked me to the spot where they were getting cell service.
I called 911, talked for a minute and lost them. When I called back, they actually dispatched me to a deputy from Buffalo which happened to be Todd's nephew.
After I got off the phone, I realised that I was a little out of it from the run. One gentleman from the camp invited me to sit down with them and have some water. He told his kid to take my pack and carry it for me. His kid threw it on his shoulders only to fall down from the weight. I kind of laughed when his dad grabbed it and grunted "holy shit", under his breath.
I sat with the group of people for about five minutes and decided that I was kind of bored telling stories and listening to drunk logic, so I grabbed my pack and headed over to where I was to meet the paramedics.
While I was waiting it was getting cold so I threw some pants on. I walked around a bit and found another place that could get cell reception.
I called Todd's wife, which wasn't that fun, and I called the Bishop to come out and pick us up. The Bishop, who knows Todd and I well, said:"Dave, I know you and Todd are just up on a hillside laughing and giving me a hard time." I said:"Bishop, a few things I won't joke about, that's cancer, heart attacks, and death." He could tell the seriousness in my voice, got directions to our location and headed up.
About 30 minutes after I had talked to 911, Todd's deputy nephew arrived at the trail head. He was followed shortly by an ambulance and search and rescue.
I waited at the trail head as they went in, and luckily a guy from the forest service was there and he really knew the trail.
I stayed at the trail head with the ambulance driver. He was a nice kid of 20 and we talked about school and life. I broke open some of my food, and I think he ate more than I did the whole trip.
Around 11:00Pm my Bishop showed up. He had been in such a hurry that he had lost his camper shell from his truck. He got out of the truck and realised it.
He was visibly shaken. I updated him on what was going on, and we decided to go and find his topper. We drove down the road about 3 miles and found it. We moved it out of the road and headed back to the ambulance.
By the time we got back, the ambulance driver said that search and rescue had reached Todd and he wasn't dead yet. We were pretty happy.
The ambulance driver asked me for some more trail mix. I was happy to get it.
The Bishop and I climbed into his Dodge Cummins pickup, talked for a minute, I closed my eyes for a second and fell asleep.
After a few minutes I woke to the sound of ATVs It was the group with Todd. We got out of the truck, and watched them pull in. I was surprised that Todd was able to ride on back of the ATV, and it was apparent that Todd had thrown up on the ATV numerous times.
His son Hayden was on the back of another ATV. He jumped off and had a relieved look on his face. He came over and gave me a big hug said a few things gave me a hug again and watched the paramedics go to work on his dad. I talked briefly to Todd and he told me that he still was thinking that he was having a heart attack. They loaded him up and let Hayden ride with him and took off down the rough road to the hospital.
In the mean time, I talked with the search and rescue and they said the other boys would be walking out that night.
I talked the search and rescue guys into going back into the wilderness to get the boys on thier ATV's and they did.
By the time we loaded everyone up it was around 3:30AM.
I had already called Todd's wife and she was waiting for him at the hospital.
The ride home with the boys that night was fun. The boys were all in high spirits and after they had all settled down, the first thing they told the bishop was how they had taken whizzes at 11000 ft.
What a Journey.
The next morning I talked with Todd's wife. There was no heart attack, It was Todd's diabetes, he had gone into a ketoacidosis attack and didn't know it. She said that the doctors told her that if we hadn't gotten him out that night he would have been dead by morning.
Later that day Todd and I talked and he told me how the boys took care of him after I left. He said Jamin and Alex took charge, trekking through the woods dodging wild animals to try and find a high point to get cell service while Hayden and Corbin swatted mosquito's and kept him awake. (Which by the way if he had fallen asleep would have slipped into a coma.) The young men prayed for strength and help and became a team with the single purpose of saving the life of their friend and that indeed is what they did.

Todd was in ICU for three days and was released without any permanent damage.

We went fishing three days after he was released. He said he was feeling about 85%

We fished until 2:30 in the morning. By the time we were done he was back down to 50%.

He has since made a full recovery.

Summum Bonum is a Latin Phrase meaning: Highest or supreme good in which all moral values are included or from which they are derived.

I titled this post Summum Bonum because this little 50 mile journey gave me a chance to see every one of the young men forget themselves and dig deep into the summum bonum of their souls to save the life of someone else. It impressed me more than I can describe.

If that isn't a good high adventure, I guess I don't know what is.

50 miler - Almost the end but not quite.

Morning came at around 6:30 AM for me. I woke up to find a real heavy dew had covered the area that we had camped in. There was no rain but there was enough dew to seem like it.
I got up and everyone was still asleep.
Some of the boys wanted me to wake them up to go fishing before we took off on our days journey. After a few nudges I realised that I was on my own and that I'd be fishing on my own.
I grabbed my rod and hiked down to a pool in the creek below the campsite. I made a few casts a got a couple of good hits, only to loose my good lure from a snag.
I decided to walk back to camp.
By that time Todd and his son Hayden were awake and wanted to walk 150 yards to Misty Moon Lake.
Hayden and I walked over, we argued about who was the better fisherman between the the two of us most of the way.
Hayden and I really like to give each other a hard time. I think at one point and time the argument went from fishing skills to 4'6" Hayden was giving me a hard time about my short legs. We got to the lake and I stood about a foot away from Hayden, waiting for him to cast only to cast over the top of his line.
I caught two fish casting over him and he didn't catch any.
On a side note: Hayden reminds me of a young Dave Riddle, Obsessed with hunting and fishing, Gives everyone a hard time, obsessed with knives, Cigarette lighters demand his complete attention, and he loves wrestling. I've told Todd many times that he must have bought Hayden at the same store that my parents bought me.
In the midst of a line tangle Todd showed up and we decided to go to a different spot to fish, we walked over and fished for a while. After a half hour we decided that we should wake the other young men up and get on the trail.
Back in camp we started getting the troops up, wake up was a little slow followed by a few questions about the days journey while eating breakfast.
The ranger showed up and fortunately we hadn't built a fire. We talked for a while and told him that we would be hiking a high pass. He warned us of a possible thunderstorm and suggested that we make the 11000 ft+ pass as soon as possible.
The ranger also talked about having to bury some other campers poop. Todd told the ranger that I had a poop tube (a pvc pipe that you store all of your poop in to pack it out) The green peace ranger looked at me and smile and proudly said "That is awesome that you are that considerate." He then proceeded to tell us of his method of packing out his poop.
After his story, I felt a little guilty (and a little queasy) and told him that I really didn't use a poop tube.
The ranger lost his glow in his eyes, looked down, wished us luck and left.
Even though Todd and I were laughing we felt a little bad so we told the boys that if they took a dump near camp to go throw a rock on it. The boys groaned a little and hid their poop.
After we packed up we filtered some water and headed out.
We had a pretty good climb to make that day and I was glad that we started early.
About a mile into the hike we passed a shallow creek with fish trying to climb higher. I pointed them out to the boys and immediately packs came off and they were trying to catch the fish with their hands.
Hayden caught a small golden trout.

and Alex caught a pretty good golden as well

After messing around with the shallow-water fish we continued the hike. The trail was steep and the boys were getting worked a bit. Alex kept up with me so I pushed a little harder at a quicker pace to see if we could reach his limit.

As we neared 11000 ft. I could feel the elevation and my breathing had stepped up a notch. I felt good and Alex was able to match my pace. Every now and then I would hear Hayden a couple of hundred yards back yell to wait up so Alex and I would stop and let the rest of the guys catch up. Everyone seemed to be doing well. No blisters and pretty good morale.
Todd carried up the rear and seemed to be feeling pretty good. Every few hours I would ask him how his blood sugar was and he seemed to be doing great.
As we climbed higher it was quite a bit cooler, and we found ourselves crossing a few deep snow drifts.

Finally after a few hours of hiking we reached Florence pass. The high point of the trail.

We all stopped and took off our packs for a little break. We were near Florence lake and there was still quite a bit of ice on the lake.

I pulled out my GPS to check the elevation and we were about 40 ft shy of 11000 ft.
Todd suggested that we leave our packs and climb up a saddle to reach the 11,000 ft. Plus, we figured that we might get cell service, to let the boys call home to tell everyone they were all right.
We climbed to the top of the saddle and exceeded 11000 ft by a couple of hundred feet. The view was awesome. We messed around and took some pictures. We had 3 bars on our phones but still couldn't get any calls out or in.

After messing around we hiked back down to our packs.
A couple of boys slid off around some boulders to go to the bathroom, after their return, I asked how it felt to take a whizz at 11000 ft. They laughed,and not to be out done, the rest of the boys decided that they wanted to take a whizz at 11000 ft.
Boys will be boys. I think Todd and I decided to take a whizz while we were there.
While packing up, our favorite Ranger showed up out of nowhere, and we talked for a minute and continued on.
The rest of the trip would be down hill.
After passing Florence lake we stopped and filter some more water. Near the creek was a monument set for A US Bomber that had crashed in 1946. There are still parts scattered across the mountain, hence the name "Bomber Mountain" was born.
After the fill up, we hit the trail again. After a few hundred yards I realised that I didn't get a picture of the monument so I told Todd to lead and I would hike back up to get the picture and catch up.

After I took a few photos I began working my way back down the trail. The group was ahead of me quite a bit so I picked up the pace.
I caught up to the group while they were passing a large snow drift. We took a few pictures and continued down Florence canyon. About 100 yards and the groups stopped. Everyone was feeling fine, and I looked at Todd. He was laying back a bit and looked a little out of breath. I asked him how he was doing, and he told me that he had gotten a little queasy.
I asked him how his blood sugar was, and he said he thought it was pretty good.
We sat there for a minute and then continued on down the canyon.
After getting through the rough part of the canyon, Todd pulled me aside and said that he wasn't feeling good at all, and that he couldn't get his heart rate to fall.
He also informed me of a pain that he was feeling in heart.
We decided to stop and take a break. I told Todd to find a nice spot in the shade and lay down for a minute.
We didn't say anything to the boys about the problem, we thought it would be better to not get them worried.
I had the boys cook a delicious dinner of Top Ramen.
While my water was heating, I walked over to Todd to check his condition, and he said that the pain in his chest was getting worse and his arms were hurting. He sounded worried in his voice and I could see it in his eyes.
I started to get a little worried, because on top of his diabetes, I knew that he had high blood pressure, I knew that his family had a history of heart problems, and I knew that Todd's dad died of a second heart attack at 51.
It didn't help when Todd said: "Dave, I think I might be having a heart attack."
I was a little worried and asked Todd if he needed a blessing. Todd thought that would be a good idea. So I gave Todd a blessing. I won't go into details of my thoughts and feelings during the blessing, this is the world wide web, and I don't know that it's appropriate to get that deep in this kind of situation.
But to say the least, I did have a calm assurance that things would be alright.
After the blessing Todd got up and he walked out into the sun, he said it was a little cold and layed down again.
The boys were beginning to catch on that all was not well in Wyoming.
A couple of boys asked me if Todd was alright I told them that Todd was a little sick, and we just didn't know.
Hayden and Jamin walked over to Todd to talk to him and check him out. While they were talking to him, Todd began to vomit pretty fiercely.
That had me a little worried, because I knew how important it was for Todd to hold down food with his diabetes.
I walked over after Todd was done buying a Buick, and he was looking pretty crappy. I asked him what he wanted to do. He thought we should try to keep going, at least to somewhere that we could get someone to get him out. I walked over and started unloading his backpack and loading his stuff into mine.
We discussed the possibility of his condition being due to elevation sickness. I really wanted to believe that was it even though in the back of my mind I knew that we had just spent the last 4 days above 10000 feet. Perhaps the big climb may have given it too him, or perhaps not.
It was easier to tell the boys that he may have elevation sickness. Especially his son.
I could Hayden was getting a little more concerned as his dad got sicker.
As we continued on Todd was visibly struggling and we were doing a good job not to worry the young men. All but Hayden.
Todd thanked me for carrying his stuff and asked me if it was too much, I joked and told him that he probably wouldn't get it back and not to worry, that I was pretty damn tough.
We tried to lighten things a little by Joking, Todd told Hayden that if he died, to not worry about packing him out in one piece but to quarter him up like an Elk just like he had taught him. That brought a nervous laugh and he decided to keep the joke between he and I.
While we were walking I told Todd to remember that if he killed over it was going to be me that would have to give him mouth to mouth and that I might even use a little tongue out of spite for killing over on the 50 miler. We laughed a little and he said he would do his best not to die.
A serious moment came when we were away from the young men and he got quiet and said, "Dave, I don't know if you can see the fear in my eyes, but this really might be it for me."
Trying to keep it positive, I said: "Well, bro. I don't think its a heart attack because I've never heard of anyone blowing chunks after a heart attack."
Todd, raining on my parade said:"Actually when my dad died of a heart attack, my mom said that he stood up, held his chest, threw up and died."
"Your not making me feel any better." I said.
"If it helps, I'm not feeling any better either." Todd groaned.
We hiked to a river crossing and the boys were out of water so we decided to stop and pump some more water. While we were doing that, Todd began puking again, but a little more violently.
Haden, came up to me fighting away tears and said :"Brother Riddle, if you want to finish the hike with these guys, I'll get my dad out of here."
I told Haden:"Buddy, that's pretty tough of you, but we are in this together, and we will all get your dad out of here."
While pumping water, Todd decided to walk ahead due to his slow pace with Hayden while we pumped water.
While we were pumping the water, I decided to let the other young men know what was going on.
I think that they had noticed that I had gotten into serious Dave mode.
While we were pumping I said:"Young men, I'm sorry to get serious on you but I'm going to need all of you to get serious with me for a second. As you know, Todd is sick. What you don't know is we think he may be having a heart attack. I'm going to need you guys to forget yourselves a little, forget about any little aches and pains or hard hills, and man up. Jamin, I'll need you to follow the rear, and I will need all of you to keep a maximum of 20' spacing at my pace until we catch up to Todd and Hayden. Are you guys good?"
They all looked me in the eyes and said yes. I knew they were up for the challenge.
We finished the the water and continued on.
I kicked in a pretty fast pace, and the boys never let their spacing be more than 20 ft. There was no whining and they really kept a positive attitude.
Shortly after, we caught up to Todd and Hayden. Hayden fell back with the other boys and I carried water for Todd, and we talked a little more.
After about a mile we came to another creek crossing, Todd and I crossed, and continued ahead of the boys while they were putting their dry boots on.
Todd's condition was getting progressively worse and I was a little glad that the boys were behind us.
After a minute, Todd sat down and threw up again. I was getting a little worried about the vomiting, because he wasn't keeping any water down at all.
Todd and I talked about a few options. I told Todd that I could run out and get help pretty fast. We both agree that was our best option.
Todd then layed down on his side. For a second he went still and I wondered if he was dead.

To be continued.

50 miler continued

Before bed, we looked at the sky and considering the fact that we were on the west side of the Big horn mountains, we knew that it wouldn't rain.
I covered my pack just in case.
As the young men tucked themselves under their new shelter, I yelled over to them to not go getting themselves into trouble that night. I think that only one was still awake to even laugh at my bad Joke.
At around 1:30AM the lightning picked up and was followed by rain. I yelled to Todd to see if he wanted to cover his pack. He just mumbled something and went back to sleep.
Morning came, and I found myself awake around 6:00 AM. I couldn't sleep because I was a little worried about the days journey up the hill. We had planned on hiking up some crazy terrain to go fishing, but I thought that Alex would be the only young man that would be able to make it.
The lake was beautiful that morning and I decided to skip fishing and take some time consulting with the big man. Everyone was asleep and would be until after 8:00AM.
I picked up my map and hiked up a rocky hill side to do a little praying and a little thinking.
I thought about the whole trip and wondered if I was a fool to take a bunch of young men deep into the wilderness. From the previous days hiking, I really wondered if they could make it. I knew Alex would make it, I hoped Hayden could make it, If Jamin wasn't so sick, I knew he could make it, and I really wondered if Corbin could make it. I never worried about Todd. He seemed to be keeping his diabetes in check and was feeling pretty good.
That morning my prayer on that rock consisted of some thanks, some questions, and some pleadings for a little strength and morale for the boys. I came off the rock with some answers and a little peace of mind.
As Todd woke up we discussed plans and decided to take a little break that day and to skip hiking the crazy trail to catch some golden trout. Instead we would spend until noon fishing Lake Solitude.
As the boys woke up we all decided to walk down to the lake to do a little fishing. Quite a few fish were caught. Mostly Splake, Lake Trout, and Brook Trout. We decided to keep a number of them and cook them up.
Back in camp, Todd convinced me that we needed a fire to cook the fish on. We had little stoves, but a fire just made it nicer. Unfortunately, in the cloud peak Wilderness Area, fires are prohibited above 9200 ft. We were at about 9250. We built a fire anyways.
Todd and I are good examples.
For breakfast that morning we had oatmeal and fish. I think by the time we were done we all felt pretty good and morale was lifted.
We talked to the young men and told them that we wanted to get on the trail a little early so we could beat the hill and get it out of our way.
As we were packing our bags a Ranger showed up. Our fire was out but very noticeable. I became his buddy quick. We talked for about 15 minutes until he looked over at the fire. He asked if that was our fire. All of my young men looked at me to see if I would lie. I aknowleged that it was our fire. The ranger got serious and asked if he could talk to me off to the side.
To save typing time, I will say that I got out of the ticket. Unfortunately about an hour later the Ranger had talked himself into coming back to give us the 275.00 ticket. The second time he was bound and determined to give it. I pulled him aside and got a little serious. Todd joined in and between my salesmanship and Todd's mind games we got out of our ticket a second time. We made the deal with the ranger to never speak of the situation. We looked at him and said what situation?
After the ranger left we pulled the young men aside and told them that we didn't want them telling anyone about the ranger. That was part of our deal with the ranger.
Alex told the story in sacrament meeting the next Sunday so the secret was out. That is the only reason I wrote it today.

The fish and oatmeal breakfast must have done something because the young men were tougher. Perhaps the previous day's hike had toughened them up.
Earlier that morning Corbin and I had a nice talk about mental toughness, and I think he got it.
I don't think Corbin had spent a lot of time in the wilderness and I don't think he has ever had a dad around to teach him to be a man.
Needless to say Corbin and I didn't need to have any "man up" talks for the rest of the trip.
As we hiked that day he kept up and didn't complain once.
If it is possible for a boy to mentally become a man in one short day, Corbin pulled it off.
Just to put things in perspective, I have written a lot about dealing with Corbin, for a clearer picture, realise that when school starts at the end of August, Corbin will be starting the 8th grade. Show me a pre 8th grader man enough to take on a 50 mile hike with 3 large Rambo Survival knives, a tackle box, 15 lb steel toe boots, and a 40 lb pack with little camping or hiking experience. The only other young-young man was Hayden, Todd's son, who Todd took care of during the Hike. Jamin was about 1 week off of turning 18, and Alex (who is probably the best natural athelete at anything, that I've ever known) is 15 with summers and summers of camping and hiking experience.
I don't want to paint a picture of any of the young men being sissy boys because when taken in perspective every one of them are pretty darn tough.
Another example of thier toughness (off the subject) instead of church basketball the young men wanted to do church boxing. I won't get into that too far, I'll just say it was a blood bath in the church gymnasium, and I may go to hell for it. Needless to say, I did take some pretty damn tough young men on a 50 miler.

Later that day, we arrived at our base camp near Misty Moon Lake. The camp site overlooked Lake Helen.

We set up camp, ate, packed small packs of water and fishing gear and hiked to a few nearby lakes. That evening as it got dark we absolutely slaughtered the fish. Cast after cast we caught them. All Splake. It was awesome.
We retired to bed that night happy to be alive, and happy to be together. The young men enjoyed each others company, and I didn't hear a swear word from any of them the whole trip. I think that I'm the only one who swore the whole trip. Nothing serious just a couple of damns, a few Hells, a puss, and I think shit might have slipped out once while talking to Todd.
Not too bad if you ask me.
That night as we settled in for the night,we were happy. Jamin gave a little spiritual thought, we prayed together and started to settle in.
Corbin was the first to lay down and get inside the shelter that the young men had made. While we were rummaging around Corbin sat up and said: "Sick! Who Farted?". We looked down and reminded Corbin that he was the only one in his shelter, and that he was the inadvertant culprit. We all laughed and went to bed.
Todd and I B.S.ed a little and the young men told stories to each other, quoted television shows, and solved the worlds problems. little did we know what the next day would bring. If we would have known, I don't think that we would have slept as well as we did.


To be continued..

50 miler

A few months ago, my friend Todd and I decided that we would try to talk the young men into going on a 50 miler for their high adventure. We thought it would be a difficult task because previous high adventures usually involved water skiing or more recreational activities.
We sat the young men down, and introduced to them what we wanted to do. We made it sound exciting, and between Todd's mind games (he's a shrink) and my salesmanship, we helped the young men feel good about a 50 miler for their high adventure.
Planning started early for Todd and I. We were pretty excited to buy new toys and figure out routes to the best fishing spots. Todd is an outdoors man like myself, and it seemed like we spent an hour every other night planning and talking about cool stuff we had bought. By the time the trip came around we were prepared, perhaps overly prepared. Between the two of us, we had both spent enough money to feed a small country for at least a year.
I think our wives and kids were a little tired of our excitement. I'd call his house and as his son would hand him the phone I'd hear in the background "Dad, it's your boyfriend." He'd call my house and when I'd get off the phone my wife would ask what my gay lover wanted. Luckily, we were both comfortable enough in our masculinity and our strict belief in heterosexuality to not take any of the persecution to heart. Needless to say, Todd and I became pretty good friends through the whole deal.
Finally the day came that we were to leave for the Big Horns. Two nights before the trip we traveled to each of the young men's homes to check packs, weigh them and make suggestions. We had punch lists, and the boys seemed prepared for the most part. Early on Todd and I made it a goal to get in shape for the adventure. I wanted to be in good enough shape that I wouldn't have to worry about having to get packed out. Todd had the same goal. I kicked off about 20 lbs for the trip. Todd is a Type 1 diabetic, so he remained skinny but got in pretty good shape.
At 5:00 PM we loaded the Bishops truck with packs, said a prayer and headed off for the Big Horn Wilderness.
On the way, I looked back at the boys and said a few things like; "I hope you boys left your purses at home." and "Enjoy being boys because in four days you will be men." We all laughed and had a good time on the way up. As we passed our pick up point, I told the boys to pay close attention to how far away we actually would be traveling the drop off point to the pick up point. 50 miles is a long way to hike with a 45 lb back pack on your back. We planned on hiking between 13 to 15 miles per day.
Around 6:45 PM we arrived at our drop off point. The West Tensleep trail head. We unloaded our stuff, sprayed down with bug repellant, took some pictures, and headed off for a place to camp for the night.
We hiked in about 1.5 miles before finding a nice camping spot for the night.
The sky was clear and the only shelter that the boy had for the hike was a tarp each and some parachute cord. We wanted them to work a little on their survival skills.
As we settled in to camp, we suggested to the boys that they build shelters in case it rained. They all declined and said that they would just wrap themselves in the tarps like "burritos". Besides, it wasn't going to rain anyways.
So we took a few pictures, and wrestled around a bit.




Todd had a nice one man tent to sleep in and I had a Bivy sack. A bivy sack is a waterproof sack that fits over a mummy bag that is waterproof. You can zip it up over your face if it is raining hard and is quite handy. My bivy wrapped around a new Marmot 800 fill sleeping bag that I purchased with Zach's college money.
After messing around we all went to bed. About 15 minutes into the night lightning started to pick up. I looked over at one of the boys (Corbin) who had his bag exposed, and told him that he needed to wrap up better than that. He fiddled with his tarp and the rain came and man did it come.
About 2 minutes into the hard rain I hear Corbin: "BROTHER RIDDLE, I'M WET AND I'M FREEZING!"
By this time I'm tight in my bivy sack, I hear Todd laughing, and I automatically start laughing.
I yelled through the rain to Corbin:" Buddy, you are just going to have to man up! If Todd or I have to get out we will get wet and then we'll all get wet!" I look over at Todd in his tent and we start laughing again.
Corbin:"BUT MY HANDS ARE FREEZING AND I'M REALLY WET!
Me:"CORBIN, I PROMISE I WONT LET YOU DIE, YOU HAVE JUST GOT TO BE A MAN! YOUR BODY CAN TAKE A LOT MORE THAN THIS, TRY TO KEEP COVERED THE BEST YOU CAN, AND WE'LL FIX IT WHEN THE RAIN LETS UP!"
Corbin:"OK,"
The rain fell hard for about two hours before letting up. After it let up two of the four boys were soaked. Corbin and Jamin.
Todd and I decided to put his son Hayden in his one man tent with him, and Corbin in Hayden's bag. I thanked Hayden for taking one for the team.
Jamin on the other hand said he would man up and sleep in a wet bag. His bag was soaked to the bone. He grabbed Corbin's bag and teased Corbin because it was hardly wet.
I worried a little about Jamin, because we were at 9400 feet and it was still pretty cold.
Finally we settled in and went to sleep. Every hour or so I would check on Jamin. The rain came pretty consistent through the night, and around 4:00 AM I hear Jamin:"Brother Riddle, what time is it? I'm frozen!" I look over and Jamin is standing there with his shirt off, shivering with rain dripping off of him.
I thought to myself: "Dang, I hope we don't give him pneumonia." I climbed out of bed and got into my dry back pack, grabbed a thermal blanket, my waterproof jacket and a beanie. I fixed Jamin up and he went back to bed.
Around 6:30 AM, I got up and Jamin was just shivering and not saying much. I heated some water and made a big batch of Oatmeal for Jamin. He ate about half of it and began blowing chunks.
I felt pretty bad, and the boys were up to watch the show.
After eating everyone spread their bags and wet gear on some rocks to dry in the sun. I watched Jamin, and he seem to be feeling better and was joking around.

Around 11:30 AM we had our gear dry and packed up. We pumped some water out of a spring and headed out. I told the boys that we would have to hit it pretty hard to get 15 miles in before night fall.
And hit it hard was just what we did. I stayed out in front while Todd brought up the rear.
We stopped for a few breaks and took a few pictures the country was beautiful. A couple of times we stopped because Corbin's knee was bothering him. Todd and I discussed the situation and really wondered if it was really the knee or if it was just a matter of needing to toughen up. We were pushing a pretty hard pace.


At one point and time Corbin fell down holding his knee. I told Todd and the Others to go ahead. I looked down at Corbin and asked him how his feet were. I was a little worried because he was hiking in a pair of 15lb Steel toe work boots from Wall-Mart.
He told me that he thought he may have a couple of blisters.
Luckily, I had packed a pair of my running shoes. Even more luckily Corbin was a size 11 like me. I gave him my running shoes, and we tied his boots on to his bag. After another mile Corbin layed down on a rock whining a little and holding his knee.
I was a little suspicious because I didn't see a limp at all.
I walked back to Corbin and started loading some things from his bag into mine. I took his 15 lb boots, his gas for his stove and a few other things. I told Corbin that he was just going to have to man up and there was no other choice but to finish the hike. I said the only way out of there was by helicopter, and I knew that neither he or I could afford a helicopter. He looked up at me hopefully and said:"I have medicaid."
I shook my head and mumbled under my breath that medicaid didn't cover being a puss. "What brother Riddle?" "Nothing." I said. We talked it out for a minute and I talked to him about manning up. I told him that he had two choices, man up or die. I told him that I wouldn't let him take the second choice.
We moved on.
As we passed the 10 mile mark, the boys were getting visibly fatigued. Most of the hike had been up hill as we climbed from 9000ft to over 10000 feet.



As we continued our hike we reached a high point and then the hike took us back down to lower elevations. There weren't many places on the hike that we would backtrack except for a stretch of about 5 miles. That worried me a little because that stretch was covered that first day. It was all down hill. In fact very steep down hill. That wouldn't have bothered me except I knew that we would have to climb out of there the next day.
Every 15 minutes the boys would yell to either me or Todd. "How much farther?" Todd's answer was always the same "thirty minutes!" My answer was always the same " Just over this hill!" By the time we arrived at camp the boys were exhausted, all but Alex. Todd and I weren't tired, but were a little worried because moral was a little low.
Jamin was still sick, so he just layed down in the grass. I looked over at Corbin and he had layed down, said something like: "I just want to go home" and passed out.
Alex and Hayden began working on a shelter. I noticed that Corbin had lost his tarp on the way, So I asked the boys to just build a shelter that they all could share. The boys griped a little about the other sleeping beauties but submitted and built a shelter for all of them.





That evening the boys were able to fish. Catching Splake, Lake Trout, and Brook Trout, did wonders for morale.
Corbin and I had another talk about being a man.
We ate dinner and went to bed.
That was the last day that I heard a complaint from any of the boys.
From here on out, I will refer to them as men.

To be continued....

Five things my Mother never taught me.

My last post addressed "Mom Blogs" and my mother's comment nearly turned my "Man Blog" into a "Mom Blog". So I would like to take a moment to write about my own Mother.
In fact I would like to write about Five things my Mother never taught me.

1. My Mother never taught me to backbite.

All of my life watching my mother interact with other people I cannot ever recall hearing my Mother say anything bad about a person behind their back.

2. My Mother never taught me to steal.

When I was a very little boy, I worked a few funny jobs for my mom and collected every bit of loose change that I could find so that I could buy a Stomper. I don't know if anyone remembers stompers but it was a little truck a bit larger than a matchbox car that took a AA battery. The stomper had a switch to turn it on and it would slowly creep across the floor. The stomper's headlights would light up and the stomper usually came with two sets of tires, foam and hard rubber. If I remember right, the stomper usually cost around a dollar twenty.


After scrimping and saving for a period of time the day finally came that I had saved enough change to buy the stomper, I placed the change in a small plastic sandwich bag and asked my mother if we could go to town to buy a stomper. My mother told me that later that day she was going grocery shopping and that we could go then.
I remember waiting and pacing for what seemed like forever until my mother, with a smile said; "Bubba, (that's what my mom calls me)are you ready to go?"
Before she could get an answer I had my bag full of change and was climbing in to our old Ford Torino.
My mother stepped into the car and we took off to the store. Our first stop was Lin's Thriftway. My mother had some grocery shopping to do so I followed her with my change bag in hand as she loaded the cart.
In my stomper excitement I took a little detour and walked passed a shelf with whole peanuts that you could buy by the pound. I loved peanuts and didn't think much about it and decided that I would like to eat one, so I reached up and grabbed a peanut.
As I walked back to my mom, I cracked open one half of the shell and ate one of the delicious peanuts. It was wonderful. When I arrived at my mothers shopping cart, she looked down and said:"Bubba, what is that?" "A peanut," I said. "Bubba, where did you get that? I pointed to the large stash of peanuts. "Did you pay for it?" My mother asked. "No", I said.
"When you take something without paying for it, that is stealing," My mother said. I knew what stealing was, but it was just a single peanut. "But mom, it was just one peanut," I said. "It's still stealing, so you will have to pay for the peanut that you ate." My mother said in a kind voice.
So my mother walked with me to the checkout line peanut shell in hand. She lifted me up to talk to the cashier.
"Tell her what happened David." My mother said.
"I stole a peanut over there and would like to pay for it." I sadly said.
The cashier looked at us kind of funny as I handed her the empty peanut shell, she pushed a couple of buttons on the cash register and said, that will be seven cents.
I slowly reached in to my plastic bag and handed her a nickel and two pennies.
The cashier took it and put the change in the register. I looked down at my bag of money and new I didn't have enough for the stomper.
I told my mom of my concerns hoping she would give me 7 cents. She just smiled, gave me a hug and told me I would just have to save more money.
I felt pretty bad that day but that lesson stuck with me deep for a long time, at least until I was a teenager.
One day as teenagers my older brother and I went shopping with our mom.
We were in high school and a little rowdy to say the least. While shopping with our mother something caught our eye, it was a the dry ice cooler. My brother and I loved dry ice. Not only because it was neat, but because you could make bombs and get into a lot of trouble with it.
As my brother and I walked closer to the dry ice cooler, temptation got the better of us. We walked over to the cooler and opened the door. Steam lifted off the white gold as it beckoned to us to take it. Off to the side were a couple of chips of Dry ice a little smaller than a golf ball. My brother and I couldn't take the temptation so we each reached into the cooler and each took a chip of ice. We shut the cooler about the time my mother was getting the groceries rung up.
We played around with the ice, putting it in our mouths and rolling it on our tongues, pretending we were blowing smoke from a big cigar, burning each other, and just having a good time.
As my Mom walked out of the store we followed her and the bag boy to the car, all the while playing with our new toys of frozen gas.
While the bagger was setting the groceries into the trunk of the car he looked at my mom and said (and I swear these are the exact words): "I don't want to be a narc, but your boys took that dry ice without paying for it."
My mother looked at him and thanked him. She shut the trunk of the car and marched her two teenage boys to the cashier. Almost automatically my older brother looked at the cashier and said: "We took some dry ice without paying for it and would like to pay for it." I followed up with a quiet "yeah."
The cashier looked at us funny as we placed our small dry ice chips on the scale. The total bill was 17 cents. My older brother was kind enough to pay my part of the bill.
I don't remember what was said on the way back to the car, I don't think there were any Ill feelings, and my mom may have possibly called us little shits. But that was that.
We new our mother loved us and expected more from us.
My mother never taught me to steal.

3. My mother never taught me to overlook those have been overlooked.
I have never seen a kinder person to the elderly than my mother. Throughout my life I have watched my mother spend countless hours listening, talking to, and helping the elderly.
Rarely an evening went by at our house that my mother didn't get a phone call from an elderly lady that just needed someone to talk to. She always listened and always genuinely cared about what they had to say. I don't think that we ever had a Thanksgiving or a Christmas dinner that my Mother didn't invite an old widow that lived down the street to eat with us.
I have never seen my Mother belittle anyone no matter who they were, and it's impossible to not feel like a million bucks when you are around her.

4. My Mother never taught me to throw my hands in the air and give up.
When I was younger, the trucking company that my dad worked for went out of business. So my dad did everything he could to provide for us. That meant a lot of hours during the day doing odd jobs and driving a mail route through the evening and all night.
With my Dad gone it left raising four fighting boys to my mother for the majority of the time. Many, Many times my brothers and I would really get out of hand only to find my mother patching things up and really trying her best to help us all be happy. Every night and every morning my Mother made sure that we all as a family took time to pray together. Looking back, I know those times had to be extremely difficult for her but she was always strong and I never saw throw her hands up in the air and give up, when I believe most people would have.

5. My mother never taught me what it was like to not be loved.

In my whole life, there has never been a time that I have wondered if my mother loved me. Growing up and especially in my high school years I was kind of a rascal. I did a lot of things that at the time I didn't think warranted love from anyone. But no matter what I did, no matter what the circumstance, I always knew that my mother loved me.

I just hope that no matter what, my Mother knows that I will always love her.

David Riddle Blog

So, I have been thinking a little about this whole blog thing. It's kind of an interesting phenomenon.
I like to click on links from friends and family's blogs and even read blogs of people that I don't even know.
I think the majority of the blogs are "Mom Blogs" which usually consists of the family name with a picture of the family in the title while a mom tells heartwarming adventures that she has had with her family that day or week.
I think the Mom blogs are nice, and It seems like Moms have nearly taken over blog space. It's kind of a nice way for families to keep other family members in touch with each other.
The only problem I have with "Mom Blogs" are the comment sections. Rarely do I read a Mom blog with a rude or smart @$$ comment. For the most part, "Mom blog" comments are almost too sweet. I know women are meaner than that, so why not write what they really feel. Instead of, Oh how sweet is that or that is the cutest thing, why not say what you really feel like. Why not write the comment you made out loud as you looked at and read the blog. If you said, "Oh how darling!" Please write it, but if you said "Oh gag me!" write that. If the kid isn't cute write it, they need to know. Throw something out like: "yeah, your kid is cute if you are into giant foreheads" Ya know something like that. There is no need for other bloggers to be under a distorted perception of reality. They would be better off knowing the truth.
If I go to the doctor and have cancer, I want to know if I have cancer, I don't want him to smile, give me a hug, and tell me that I'm pretty. I want to know what I have so I can fix it.
I think I have a pretty good idea of what is going on inside the mind of the Mom bloggers and I guarantee that 90% of the comments are a little off of what they really feel.
This is the Internet. When you put something on a blog, anyone in the world can read about your personal life. I think when someone creates a public blog, they should welcome public comments even if they cause hurt feelings.
There you are telling the world how your kid is the cutest and best kid in the world. You better expect to be compared to the whole world, and sooner or later someone with a cuter and smarter kid is going to come across your blog, look at your kid and say: damn, that's an ugly kid, and possibly post it. Ive done that before to random strangers, and I don't do it anonymously, not to be mean but because I think they need to know.
I think it is funny when I see a "comment deleted" in someones comments, I try to imagine what was written because I know somewhere deep there was something that would have been much more entertaining than "Oh how cute, that was to die for!" Somebody had the cajones to say something and I just wish that I would have read it before it got deleted. Maybe I would have agreed and maybe I would have disagreed.
I have never deleted a comment from my blog. I do not think that I ever will.
If I was that worried what other people said I would privatize my blog. If you are worried about what someone says or thinks privatize yourself, because weather you know it or not your site probably gets hit 25-80 times per day, not just by strangers but by people that know you that are just bored and wanted to see what you were up to. Most people don't comment because they think that you might think they are weird for just randomly checking you out. Hell, I randomly Google people all the time, some people I like, some people I don't like, and some people just to find out if they are in prison or not. It's pretty entertaining and I'd be willing to bet that we all have at one point and time been on someones blog that we wouldn't want them to know that we were there.
When I surf blog world I usually just surf the friends links of friends links of friends links because I don't dare push the "Next Blog Button" in fear of what I might come across.
When I first started blogging, I got a phone call from my little brother, he said that he pushed the next blog button and got some kind of porn blog. This is how the phone call went:
Dave: Hello?
Gregg: (in a disgusted voice) Dave, (pause, pause,pause) What the hell?
Dave: What?
Gregg:Bro. I pushed the "next blog" button on your blog and it took me to a porn site!
Dave: (Laughing.) You did?
Gregg: Yeah, What the hell? (Now stuttering mad.) Really bad stuff. What the hell?
Dave: I'm sorry bro. I have pushed the next button once and got something bad too, I just don't push the next button any more.
Gregg: What the hell? Why are you linked to a porn site?
Dave: Gregg, I'm not linked to a porn site, it's just random, and I think that since they started letting videos get posted a bunch of sickos came out of the wood works. I was going to put a warning on my blog but I figured everybody would start pushing next just to see if it was true.
Gregg: Oh, that stuff made me feel bad.
Dave: Sorry bro. don't push the next blog button any more.
Gregg: I won't.
So needless to say I try to avoid surfing blog world by pressing the next blog link.
You may have your friends or friends friends come up to you and ask who is dave riddle? He left a crazy comment on my blog.
Yes, I leave random crazy comments on peoples blogs. Even people I don't know, and yes sometimes I say something rude if I think they need it. Nothing too rude, I may tell them their kid looks like he has an Afro with a chinstrap but only if he or she does.
I think that most people are sensitive when someone talks behind their backs. If they hear about it happening, it usually is accompanied by hurt feelings. It shouldn't be. Everybody talks behind everybodys back, and for the most part it isn't out of malice it's just conversation.
If you are honest in your blog comments, it will come as no surprise to someone who hears you said it to someone else and you won't make them feel as bad.
I'm not proposing that every one tap into their inner mean self. I'm just proposing that everyone make their posts a little more real. Then I would really enjoy blog space.

The rest of the rest of the story postponed

So, I guess I'm going to step away from the Rest of the story until I finish the rest of the story. I think the rest of the story takes me too long, and my blog has gotten too spotty because of it. It's easy for me to take five minutes to throw out little funny stories, but when I get into "The rest of the story" I have to write it and then have my Lawyer look at it and approve it before I post it. So I have decided to finish it and then post it all at once.
Sorry but I guess me keeping you hanging isn't new. Not that I will be keeping more than about 2 people hanging.

The Rest of the Story Ch.5

After the old man had finished telling his story, I looked over at him and could see in his eyes a bit of relief. I asked him if anyone else knew about the grave sites and what had happened. He told me that I was the only person in the world that new about any of this. He said that he tried to tell his late wife when he was younger, but the deeper he got into the story he could see that his wife was really getting worried, so he told her he was just telling a story, and left it at that.
It was getting later in the evening and the air was cooling a little. The cool breeze felt good after such an intense hour of stories.
I had a million questions running through my mind but for some reason didn't ask any of them. I just stood there with the old man looking at a small pile of brown sandstone rocks. Part of me wondered if there really was a body under the rocks, but given the circumstances I was pretty sure there was.
After a minute of silence the old man looked up at me and asked me what I was going to do about what I had heard. I paused for a minute and asked him what he meant. He said, "Well, are you going to turn me in?"
I hadn't really thought about it, but it dawned on me that this man was making a confession to a murder. Or was it a murder? Was I under the obligation as a responsible citizen to turn the old man in?
I paused for a few seconds and looked at the old man and asked him what he thought I should do.
He kind of smiled and said,"Why don't you keep it under your hat until I die. I've only got a couple of years left in me and would rather not spend them in court or in jail."
I looked at the old feeble man and in my mind decided that I would keep the story under my hat for the time being.
I told the man that he didn't have to loose any sleep over this and I would keep quiet. The old man smile and said; "Good. Lets get back to your truck, I have got more to show you.
As we walked back to my pickup truck about mid-way I let the old man take my arm because he was visibly struggling with the walk. I joked with him about him hanging in there because I didn't want to have to dig a third grave. He stopped and looked at me and got a serious look in his eye and said: "You mean a fourth grave?" In my mind I thought, Oh crap, this guy has killed more people. The old man then smiled and said "I had you going there." I saw that he was joking and felt relieved that there were no more graves.
After about five minutes of walking, we arrived at my truck and I helped the old man into it. I shut his door and walked around and climbed into my side. It was warm in the truck and the old man struggled with the window as he manually rolled it down. I did the same.
"Where to boss?" I said.
The old man smiled and with a little more life in his tone said: "To the good stuff!" and pointed to the area where I had seen the black circle in the side of the hill as I stood positioned on the stone with the crazy markings.
"Can you get us close in this truck?" the old man said. I looked at the old man and nodded. "I can get you anywhere in Big Red." I told him, referring to my old Red Chevy 4x4.
The old man reached behind him and struggled with the seat belt until he got it around him. I left mine off.
As I started driving the old man broke off into another story.
"After I buried that guy I was so sick that I just wanted to lay down, right in the rocks and die. I was partially covered in blood and dust and even a little vomit. I felt not only dirty on the outside but dirty on the inside. I decided to try to get home and cleaned up before my family came out looking for me. So I headed back. It was the most miserable walk I had ever taken. It was after noon and the son was high and hot. Flies started buzzing around me and I was smelling pretty bad. As I passed the creek I stopped and jumped into the deepest whole I could find. I even left my boots on because they needed cleaning. I scrubbed everything in that creek. I hadn't realised how much blood I had on me until I noticed that the water was visibly holding a red tint. I pulled my pants off and scrubbed until I couldn't see anymore blood.
After I finally got to where I felt clean I climbed out of the creek and walked the remaining quarter mile back home only to walk in sopping wet to Sunday dinner.
Every one was sitting at the table My Mom, Dad, and little sisters. My dad was the first to ask me where I had been. I just stood there and didn't say anything. I knew that I wouldn't be able to talk without crying. I looked at my Mother and little sisters and the innocence in their eyes and that made me want to cry even more. So I just stood there. I wanted so bad to just say everything to tell them what happened. I wanted my parents to give me hug and tell me it would be alright. I would feel better if I just let it out.
Just as I was about to say something my Father stood up and said "Boy, don't think that because you wanted to fake sick and to stay home and go swimming that you can sit down and eat Sunday dinner with us. You go get some dry clothes on and go out and start cleaning the corrals."
Without saying anything I went to my room, changed my clothes and went out to clean the corrals.
I was glad to not have to sit down and try to keep my composure. I was especially glad that I could get into some dry clothes and have a little time to think.
As I shoveled manure I decided that no matter what I could tell no one. I knew that if I really wanted to keep a secret I could trust no one with it. So I locked it up.
That night as finished up the corrals my dad came out to inspect the job. He told me to go in and get a bite to eat and go to bed."
After the old man finished telling the story, I watched him as he stared out the window. I could tell that he was reliving the old days over in his mind so I didn't say anything. I just kept driving to the hill side.

The rest of the story Ch. 4

As our eyes met, I could tell that our meeting was as big of a surprise to the killer as it was to me. Silence fell over the both of us as neither of us knew what to say or do. The killer was the first to break the silence. He looked at me and asked me what I was doing there. I didn't say anything as I tried to slowly slide my new gun behind my back hoping he wouldn't recognise it. As I slid my gun behind my back I almost automatically cocked the hammer. I remembered being impressed at how smooth the action felt. I watched the eyes of the killer as he looked at the gun that I was trying to hide.
"Wher'd you get that gun boy!" the killer yelled to me. His voice was raspy and deep. I didn't say anything. I didn't know what to do. I couldn't run, I couldn't say anything. As the killer took a step towards me I felt a familiar warm sensation running down the side of my leg. That warm sensation brought back the vision of the man shooting the other man in the back and then in the side of the head and I realised that I was next. Almost instinctively I raised the gun towards the man as he took another step closer. I still couldn't say anything. The man took another step and I pulled the trigger. Click, Nothing. I realised that I had hit the empty part of the cylinder. I cocked the hammer again. I noticed that the man didn't even flinch during the first trigger pull. By the time I had the gun aimed at his head again he was 5 feet away from me. Click. I pulled the trigger again and still nothing. As I lowered the gun a little to cock the hammer again I noticed the man was right on me and before I knew it I had the cocked pistol pressed against the mans lips. Without thinking I pulled the trigger for the third time. This time there was no click just a, "pathump." The mans body went limp but the forward momentum of the man knocked me down as his body landed on my legs. I looked down at the man as I cocked the pistol again a realised that I wouldn't need another round. There was a hole in the back of the mans head about the size of a silver dollar. There were bits of bone, skull, brains, hair, and what looked like pieces of his teeth inside his oozing head. I scrambled trying to free my legs to stand up. As I kicked myself free, one of my cowboy boots slid off and stayed stuck under the man.
I stood up marvelling at the scene. It all seemed like a dream as I looked around. I looked at the dead man and the blood that was collecting on the ground where his head lay. I looked at my pants. Not only were my pants wet from pissing myself but my whole right thigh was covered with blood. I stood there with one boot on and the other with just a sock on. It didn't take me long to turn my head and begin puking. As I puked reality hit and it hit hard, and I began crying. I stood up and took another look at the scene. I had killed a man. What did that mean? I didn't know what to do. I couldn't tell anyone. It was self defense wasn't it? Wouldn't he have killed me if I hadn't killed him? What would my mom say? What would my dad do? What did God think?
I had all kinds of questions running through my mind but the fact of the matter was that I skipped church to steel a gun and ended up killing an un-armed man. A man that I had I had watched kill another man and didn't say anything about. There wasn't anyone in the world who would believe my story. I picked up a rock and began digging a new hole.
I dug the hole about 15 ft away from the man so I wouldn't have to look at him. A couple of times I looked up to make sure he wasn't going to stand up and come after me. He wasn't going anywhere.
After nearly two hours of digging I had a hole about 6 foot long by three feet wide by 3 feet deep. The hole was pretty impressive and my hands were paying for it. I had some pretty serious blisters forming on the palms of both hands. I stood up and noticed that my pants had dried and the dry blood made the pant leg stiff as I walked with it. I walked over to the man and grabbed him by the boots and began to try and drag him. It felt like dragging a dead deer but heavier. I tried not to look at the back of his head but he laid face down and it was impossible not to. About midway into the drag I stopped to take a breath and noticed a leather wallet hanging partially out of his back pocket. I reached down and pulled it out. The wallet felt heavy and I told myself no matter how much money was in it I wouldn't take it. I couldn't.
As I opened the wallet my heart sunk as I saw a small round circle with some engravings and a star in the middle. My breathing became fast and uncontrollable. A lawman? I had killed a lawman? I looked around to see if anyone saw what I had seen and quickly threw the wallet into the hole. I noticed that my boot was still laying on the ground where the man had laid so I grabbed it and put it back on. A sick feeling came to me as I slid the boot on. The boot was still warm and I knew what had kept it warm. I walked back over and grabbed the man again by the boots and drug his body into the hole. I pushed his arms and legs into the hole and began kicking the dirt onto the man just as I had seen the man in the hole do it a few days before that. After a second I stopped grabbed my new gun and threw it on top of the body and continued kicking the dirt in.
After about a foot of cover with the dirt. I piled large stones on top of the dirt and the man until the hole was filled, kicked more dirt on top of the rocks and then grabbed more rocks to stack on top.
When I was finished I grabbed a couple of dead sticks from a nearby juniper tree and threw them on top of the grave to make it not look so obvious. I then kicked dirt over the top of the puddle of blood to cover it up."

The rest of the Story Ch. 3

As we sat there looking at the pile of rocks, the warm evening breeze seemed to stop for a moment of weird calmness. I looked up at the side of the hill and towards the rocks where the old man had said he hid. He couldn't have been more than a hundred feet away when he witnessed the shooting. I also couldn't help but wonder if there was an old skeleton under the rocks. I asked the old man if he thought anyone had ever dug up the body. The old man slowly raised his head from gazing down at the rocks and looked into my eyes and said: "Yes, I did about a week later." I looked at the old man with a little wonder and he continued on. "When I got home the day of the killing, I was so shaken, I couldn't talk to no one. I went out behind the house and hid in the cottonwood trees behind the creek. I was sick. Visions of that guy getting shot ran through my head over and over. I sat there behind the tree just pukin' every time I saw that guy shaking and moaning. I can still remember every second of that day perfectly. In between pukin' and crying I sat leaning against a tree wondering if I should tell my mother, or the sheriff, or anyone. I weighed out the situation, and it made sense in my mind not to tell no one. So there I sat, alone with my secret. A secret that would haunt me for the rest of my life. I felt horrible, I was tired and sick to my stomach. My jeans had dried but the insides of my legs had been rubbed raw from running with em wet. I ran the scene over in my mind again. I could see the killer's face perfectly. The look in his eyes, his mustache, his brown hair, and the gun. That damn gun."
I asked the old man about the gun, and the old man broke off into another story. "When I watched that guy being buried, the other guy threw the pistol that he killed him with on top of him. I watched him do that, and hell, I was still a boy, it was the 1930's and we didn't have no money, and it was a gun. I had kind of an internal battle over that gun. On one hand I was afraid to go back there because of what happened. I didn't know if I would come across the killer or a ghost or what. On the other hand there was a perfectly good pistol sitting under about a foot of dirt. I battled over a number of things. So, after battling things out for a week I figured I might dig it up and keep it for myself. I knew the gun was down by the guys feet and I could dig that thing up and not have to see his face or the blood and I'd have a pistol. Being a dumb kid, and after it worked on me for a week, I decided to sneak back for the gun. I didn't realise at the time that sneaking back for the gun would be the biggest mistake of my life."
The old man just sat there staring blankly, and as he finished his last sentence I almost thought he was going to cry. I didn't say anything because I wanted the old man to take a breath. I've never been good with dealing with emotion in other men so I thought I would let him catch his composure. After about a minute of silence the old man looked up at me. He kind of had a look in his eyes, that made me feel like he was struggling with what to do next.
"Follow me", he said hesitantly, and I did. The old man began walking around the side of the hill. I walked close behind him to catch him if he fell. He walked slow, and by his breathing I could tell that it was taking all that he had to walk. As we walked around a juniper tree, his coat caught onto a branch. He struggled with it a little, said a swear word under his breath and kept walking. The pace was slow and I wondered how far he wanted to go. After about 220 yards the old man stopped and scanned the area directly in front of him and locked on to another small pile of rocks. He didn't say anything, he just walked straight towards the pile.
As we stood looking over the pile of rocks, the old man broke into another story. "I went back for that gun on a Sunday morning. My Dad and Mom and Sisters all went into town to church. I pretended to be sick. I didn't feel like I was lying because I was sick but just mind sick. A part of me wanted to get that gun and another part of me wanted to really see if that grave was there and if all of that was real and not a dream. As soon as my family pulled out of the house I threw some clothes on and started for the hills. I ran fast. As I approached the hills, I took the route that I normally took. It not only allowed me to sneak up there without being noticed but it gave me a pretty good view of anything around me. When I arrived to the grave site, I was taken back a bit. Everything came back to me and I got scared again. I wanted to turn around and go back to my house. I wanted to tell my mom what had happened. I wanted to have her hug me and tell me that it was all going to be ok. She would understand. My fantasy came crashing down as I realised that my Dad wouldn't understand. We were on the outs and I was already feeling that my Dad didn't want me around because of something else. I brushed it all away and went for what I had come for. I went to where I figured his legs were and grabbed a flat rock that was sitting there and started digging. After a few seconds I looked at the rock and saw a small dark stain on it where my hands were and realised that I was digging with the same rock that the killer dug the hole with. I dropped the rock and wiped my hands in the rocky sand hoping it would free me from any contamination. The sick feeling came back. I kicked the bloody rock about 20 feet from the site and grabbed another, and continued. After about 2 minutes of digging I hit something. It was rubbery and made a dull thud as I hit it. As I exposed more with the rock I realised it was the leather of the dead mans boot, and inside that boot was a foot. The foot of the guy that I watched get shot. I was sick inside, and it really scared me. It scared me almost enought to leave, but I decided to go for it. After locating the boot it only took me a couple of minutes to uncover the end of the gun. I pulled the gun free from the dirt, stood up and quickly kicked dirt back over the body. I stacked the rocks back on top of the body and ran around the side of the hill. I couldn't bear to be around the grave any longer. After I felt like I was safe, I hid in a little bunch of trees, sat down on a rock and looked at my treasure. It was a .32 caliber revolver and except for some sand in the cylinder, was in pretty good condition. I opened the action and there were four un-fired bullets and two fired. I knew where the two had went. The scene flashed in my mind once again for the 107th time that day. I pulled the cartridges out and began to shake and wipe clean the pistol. I buried the two empty cartriges. I blew air into the barrel to blow any sand out. After I was satisfied that the gun was clean enough to shoot, I placed the four live rounds back into the cylinder and closed it. I turned the cylinder and was a little surprised at how smooth it turned. The new gun almost made me forget for a second the horrible things that had happened.
I decided that I had better get home before my parents did. So I stood up and began walking. I decided to take a different route back home so I wouldn't have to walk past the grave. About 100 yards into my treck home, I heard a stick break to my right. I turned my head slowly to inspect the noise, only to find myself staring about 15 feet into the dark evil eyes of the man who had been haunting my thoughts and dreams for the past week.

The rest of the story Ch.2

As I stood on the stone and gazed into the hill, the hot breeze blew into my face. Not only did the breeze make me blink to get the moisture back into my contact lenses, but it brought with it an erie feeling. I kind of felt like I may be doing something wrong, or I was in danger or something. I brushed the feeling away. I thought to myself; what could possibly happen? This is an old man, I don't think that he could physically do anything. Even if this guy had a weapon, he probably would have a hard time hurting me. He was strange, really strange. What I was gazing at was equally strange in magnitude. The hill side was covered with Rocks of all sizes. Shale mostly, littered with Juniper trees, Brush and a little grass. But there it was, in the rock, and in between a couple of juniper trees was a perfect three quarter circle without a bottom. The circle was formed in what looked like black rock. From far away the circle looked to be a very thin line but very distinct. If I moved even an inch to the left or to the right I couldn't see it, but if I stood in the correct position on the stone it was as clear as day. The old man nudged me on the elbow, "can you see it, can you see it"? I told him I could, and said: "What is th...". "Quiet" he said, "you'll know soon enough. The old man turned around and walked back to my truck. I followed him to his door and helped him back into the truck. As I walked around to my side of the truck I looked at the old man and he had his eyes fixed on something else. I climbed into the truck and started it. "Where to next boss?" I asked. (I call people boss a lot because I think sometimes it makes people feel good, and lets face it, I knew who was in charge.) I started to ask him about the black circle again when he cut me off, and pointed to a hill in the distance. "Drive to the base of that hill" he said. I drove and he talked. He told me that he was going to show me two grave sites. One of the grave sites was of a man whom was shot in a gun fight, and the other was a grave site of a man that he killed. My gut instantly twisted in a knot. I looked at the old guy and didn't have to say anything, he knew that I needed more details. As we approached the hill I looked at the old man, and a sad look came over his face. He said in a low quite voice, "I swore that I would never come back here, and 75 years later here I am. Stop the truck". I stopped the truck and the old man groaned as he opened his door to climb out. I opened my door and followed. The old man started walking towards a small pile of rocks. The pile wasn't uniform, and I was a little surprised that I never noticed it before.

The old man pointed at the rocks and said: "When, I was a boy sneaking around up here, I used to just watch what was going on. I was sneaky, and I was quiet. I knew that if I ever got caught sneaking around the characters up here would probably kill me. So I learned to be sneaky just out of survival. I knew the dangers but I just couldn't stay away. I was curious. I guess you could say that I was as sneaky as an old Indian. One day I hid in between a couple of rocks up on that hill and watched two fellers. They were arguing about something, and the one feller said he was done and turned his back to walk away. As he was walking away, the other feller reached into a bag he was carrying, and pulled out a gun and shot the other guy in the back. The guy fell immediately, started shaking and moaning bleeding all over, then the guy shot him a second time in the side of his head. I pissed my pants. I really pissed down the side of my leg. I thought about running but I was frozen. I couldn't breath and I couldn't move. I sat up on that hill and watched for two hours as the other guy took a flat rock, dug a shallow grave and buried the other guy. I remember smelling the piss in my pants hoping and praying that the guy wouldn't smell it. The guy stacked those rocks on the grave, and left. When I saw he was gone, I ran as fast as I could those five miles back to the house. I couldn't tell no one. I just couldn't tell no one."

I just kind of stood there looking at the old man. A sick feeling came to me as I imagined the situation happening, and for the first time that evening, I just didn't dare say anything.


To be continued.

The rest of the story.

About 9 months ago, I wrote about an old man that showed up to my house. The old man was in his 90's and said that he lived on the ranch (that I now live on) when he was a boy. I took him for a ride through the 8000 Acre ranch, and I wrote about him showing me where a man was buried from a gun fight, where people panned successfully for gold, where bandits hung out, and a hidden mine. I left the story alone because, I felt that the claims needed further investigation. I mean the guy was 90 years old and he was telling me things that happened when he was 15. I left a lot out because there was something that seemed to validate the things that he told me. If the things that he told me were true, I could never tell anyone, at least until I secured a few things. I have secured a few things so, Here is the rest of the story.
When the old gentleman stopped by my house that evening, there was something strange about him, and he said something that really caught my attention. He told me in a low voice that there were secrets on the ranch, secrets that he had, and secrets that he felt he should divulge before he died. I didn't know what to think, so I offered to listen and take him for a tour of the ranch.
As we hopped into my pickup, the old man was visibly excited, and he had a look on his face that I can't really describe. It was a smile that carried, a little worry, and a little peace. It was strange. It kind of made me wonder what I was getting into. As we drove back into the hills he told me a story. He said that when he was a boy, about 14 years of age, he did a lot of messing around back in the hills. His parents didn't like him out there because it was rumored, that quite often under the cover of the thick Cedar trees and in the rough country there were bandits and shady characters that hung out there. He said that his father rarely ventured out there, only to gather stray cattle. He said that his father would tell a story of stumbling onto 3 men gathered around a wooden box, whom, after he surprised, all quickly raised guns at him. He said the story naturally awakened his young curiosity so he started snooping around. He said that in his snooping he found that back behind "the divide" there was an unusual amount of activity. So he snooped. He told me that he was going to show me a few things, a few things indeed...
As we drove into the hills, I looked over at my new friend and noticed that he was shaking. I started to ask if he was OK, when he cut me off and pointed across a flat and to five large rocks. I had never noticed it before but they were placed with one rock exactly to the north. Another to the south and another to the east, another to the west with one flat stone in the middle. Sort of a compass. The high grass almost hid everything. He told me to drive up to the rocks. I did, and we stopped and got out of the truck. The old man hobbled to the the flat stone in the center and stood on top of it. I looked down at the flat stone and there were two grooves that had been cut into the rock. The old man carefully aligned his feet with a groove that was facing about 10 degrees north of the east stone, and began to look into the rocky hills. As he did this I noticed a grin on his face. He stepped off the rock and with his crooked finger pointed to the stone. He looked at me with a grin and told me to stand on the center stone lining my right big toe and heel with the first groove. I stepped onto the rock and aligned myself. I jokingly asked if he would like me to dance. He didn't laugh and boldly said: "look straight forward!" As I stood there looking I kind of felt silly. Who was this guy? Thoughts began to race through my mind only to be cut off by what I saw. What was that?

To be continued...

Sucking up

Sucking up, Brown nosing, Butt kissing, it has many names and many different forms. It can be noticed and go unnoticed. It can be effective and it can be ineffective. It can draw ridicule and it can draw praise and I would like to write about it a little. As of recent, I have thought about sucking up and how I feel about it. Some forms of sucking up I hate with a passion and some forms I enjoy. But for the most part I hate sucking up. Every day that I age I hate it more and more. I don't hate getting sucked up to, I hate sucking up. I have to confess, I probably suck up more than the average man. I hate doing it but I believe it is one of those necessary evils.

The Riddle dictionary defines sucking up as: To be overly nice to a person or persons to enable a smooth accomplishment of a goal.

I would like share with you five key points to my theory of sucking up.

1. Sucking up is not effective until you realise that your end purpose is to no longer have to suck up to ANYONE.


I think that we all want to get to point in life where we don't have to suck up to anyone. Take for instance a president of the United States. He spends his whole life sucking up to everyone to get to where they are until they reach the goal of a second term. After that, the gloves are off and they finally do what they want. It has to feel good.

I love to talk to old men that have retired. They say it like it is and don't sugar coat things they don't suck up because they don't have to. Spending time with an old man is a good way to get a good honest self evaluation. My Grandpa for example, he was kind of rough character, and he didn't suck up to anyone. If he thought you were a sicko he told you. If he liked you he told you, If he thought you looked bad he told you, If he felt like having you pull his finger he would ask you. A person always knew how he felt about them because he had no reason to sugar coat. What was a person going to do if they did have their feelings hurt, take away his beer? Heck no, he'd just rack that person over the head with his cane, and he would enjoy that more than much more his beer.
That is the end goal in life. To not have to suck up to anyone.


2. Good friendships do not require sucking up.


If you are with a good friend, they truly like you for who you are. You can tell them the truth, you can be yourself, you can tell them anything and it doesn't change the way they feel about you. This does not rule out courtesy and being nice. With good friends you are courteous and nice because you love them and enjoy being courteous and nice to them. With a good friend you never feel like you are being "fake" nice, and if you give them a little crap, they laugh it off.

If you find yourself in the company of a person, and find yourself not having to suck up. You can be assured that that person is a good friend.


3. Sometimes it is OK to abruptly end the sucking up for a moment of truth.


In a fight the person who throws the first punch is generally the person charged with the crime or takes the blame. Moments of truth are the same way. Though it can be very advantageous to throw the first punch, you have to be darn sure you are going to get away with it. Otherwise, if you don't want a lawsuit, it's a good idea to wait until the first punch is thrown, then and only then comeback with with hell fire. The same concept applies when dropping the sucking up wall for a moment of truth. About 6 months ago while working on a project, I rejected a contractors work because it didn't meet a specification that I had told him over and over that he needed to meet. Through the whole job he sucked up to me and I sucked up to him. We both had a job to accomplish, so it worked for us to be overly nice to one another. Until that day of rejection. He lost it, screaming, ranting, raving calling me names. It was his moment of truth. Bad timing though because he still needed me to sign off for payment of $500,000 dollars worth of work. After he was done, I left the site calmly, and expected him to show up to my office with an apology. (500G's will always bring an apology) Sure enough the next morning he showed up to my office with an apology. He had his hat in hand taking back every thing that was said. He even thanked me for not loosing my temper. I then knew it was the proper time to throw my punch. I told him that I would never loose my temper on a job, I pointed at the picture of my wife and kid on the desk and told him that feeding them was more important. I then said in a low quiet, serious voice, looking him in the eyes, "just so you know, if you would have talked to me like that out on the ranch, I would have knocked every one of your fricken teeth out". He looked at me with a little shock. I accepted his apology, and invited him out to dinner on the Ranch. He declined saying," hell no, I'm not going out to your ranch." It was perfect timing to a moment of truth. I felt better, and there was no consequence.


4. Men can and will always be better and more effective suck ups.


Throughout time, as men were the hunters and gatherers, they learned to adapt. They learned to put food on the table by any means possible, that included sucking up. Women on the other hand stayed at home nurturing, taking care of the home and raising children. The women were the true masters of their domains. There was no need for sucking up. If the children got out of hand, they busted their chops and went on with it. When the man got home, she cooked a fine meal of woolly mammoth and they enjoyed it together. They put the kids to bed blew out the candles and laid down by the fire. This is a time at night where a man began to truly refine his sucking up skills. I attribute this time of the evening to the development of truly effective sucking up skills. I wont go into any more details, but needless to say, there isn't a woman alive that has ever felt out of necessity the need to give a back or a foot rub the way a man has.
I don't know if you have ever worked around women, but women (collectively, not individually) don't work well together.

Take for example an elementary school with predominantly women employees. It's a fricken war zone. Both my mother, wife are teachers, I know for a fact that that the mental trauma some women inflict on other women makes an elementary school faculty room environment comparable to Omaha beach during D-day. Throw a female principal into the mix and you have Hiroshima all over again. This is all a result of the fact that women do not, nor will they ever understand the true principles of sucking up it's just not in their nature.


5. Sucking up is an essential key to success.


If a person wants to be truly successful in life it is imperative that a person learns to suck up effectively.

In college, I took a class with a guy he was about 10 years older than I was. I wont name his name, but he absolutely refused to suck up. We actually had a number of discussions on sucking up. He argued that a man should never have to suck up. I can tell you so far, the up to date results of this man's not sucking up. He never finished college, never got married and still lives with his mom and dad. So much for not sucking up.

Sucking up has many names and there are many ways to suck up. Some good, some bad, most of the time you don't even know you are doing it.

I would submit that, If you are able to make the argument that you are and have been successful without sucking up ,more than likely you fall into one of two categories:1. You are a very attractive woman, 2. You inherited your success.

My question is: Is success truly success without having to suck up a little?