The Gypsy Carpenters

Sandhill Crane on its nest

Last night we played music at Pine Creek with Rachel, Dennis, Rich, Kyle, and Zondra until 11:00. Home around midnight. That was after a strenuous hike up to Daley Lake. This morning the alarm went off at 5:30 AM to go birding. My first ever trip to look for and identify birds. This trip was free with USFS wildlife experts and some other great naturalists. The pros were helpful and instructive and enthusiastic. Our friend Rachel (same one who was out late the night before) lead the trip, drove us, shared food and clothes. There were about 15 people in total and I think I was the least experienced. we went on a 50 mile route outside of Big Timber that covered a variety of habitat. We saw prairie potholes, riparian area and short grass prairie. In just 5 hours I, me, myself had laid eyes on over 50 species of birds. Favorites were the Blue-winged Teal, the Black Necked Stilt and the nesting Sandhill Crane. I saw a pair of Robins doing the deed, too.

We also saw some big birds of prey: Golden and Bald Eagles, Turkey Vultures, and a Great Horned Owl on its nest with its chick. But I am too tired to say more.

Black Necked Stilt

Western Kingbird

Snipe

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Wild lands as refuge

I was just reading a piece on the theme of open space providing emotional refuge to humans. Not a new topic I realize but these last two weeks in the greater Yellowstone area have made this concept a visceral reality for me. Feeling wretched over the situation with my mom where there is no right or wrong, no obvious choices, no solace and no end in sight I was wondering why? why? why? What’s the point of all this? Am I doing what I should be doing? Is this what fate has in store for me? Wrestling with existential ideas is not uplifting for me. I was mired in the futility of all this and terrorized by the idea that I might be heading down the same path as my mother. Little things like trouble learning new tunes and misunderstanding with Burt all get magnified by the specter of “is it happening?’ So we arrived in a new but familiar place for new but familiar work for a long time trusted client and I was wondering how much it would take for me to make the choice to live or die. Not that I was planning anything. I was thinking about how would I know when it was time to plan something. I’d rather go soon and happy than late and lost.

Enter Yellowstone. I feel as if every walk and every drive has saved my life. My heart rate is down. My mind is steady. This morning the dogs and I headed overland to Daley’s lake. It’s a cross country route with only game trails and sage and rocks. From on top you can see what I posted below. I arrived to the plateau after 30 minutes of huffing and puffing to find absolute solitude. Satisfying and soothing solitude. Alone. Alive. Verga was moving in from the south. Wind whipped my wispy hair. I was happy to be alive and just walking in the wilds. Everyday down here reinforces that this is just what I need right now.

We all need places to find comfort.

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This place is addictive

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There’s a hole in the ground…

Gene and Burt marveling at the actual dirt in the hole

To build a house first you must dig a hole. The hole has to be bigger than the house. This morning we staked out the house corners and used a laser level to see how deep Gene needed to dig on each side. His hole will be four feet wider than the house to allow room for the concrete forms to be installed. This home will have a daylight basement since it is situated on a nice hillside. Burt and I guessed at the slope and we were both off by large margins. He thought 6 feet and I thought four. It was a little over eight. Perfect for a daylight basement. Eight feet deep at the uphill side and just a bit for the footers and frost wall at the other end.

Gene should have the hole dug by tomorrow. We’ll be in Helena for teeth cleaning, taxes and client consultation. Thursday the foundation guy comes and forms the footings. Best guess is the basement walls will be poured Monday. We’ll wait for them to cure and have the plumbing lines installed. Next is back filling to the basement walls and then we start framing. Our best guess is framing in two weeks.

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Happy Birthday, Burt!

There's gonna be somma this....

I am one lucky girl to be spending my life wandering the world with this man. I skunked him at cribbage on his birthday and he didn’t care. He feeds me. He drives me. He plays music with me. He loves me. And I love him. We’ll have dinner tonight at Chico Hot Springs and toast our fun life and our job here starting on time.

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Ground Breaking Today:

You can see the shiny culverts and the yellow loader.

Today is the first official day of construction and actual get dirty work for Burt. Gene Lembke showed up this morning with his old yellow loader ready to move some dirt and install culverts. The driveway ties into a State road and the connection needs a culvert and has to be 64′ wide. I do not know why. Maybe someday we’ll have a Starbucks drive-thru here. Regardless of the extreme width the connection needed improvement so Gene could get his excavator in to dig for the foundation. So today the boys are out there moving dirt and a lot of boulders and taking grades and setting the culvert. I am not working but I have not been a slacker.

Before Gene got here Burt decided he was going to wash all the windows and screens in the Nash. It was a chore long overdue but brought to a crisis by the dust disaster of Nebraska. The only thing stopping him is that he can’t get the screens out. He is a bit of a Bam Bam and Burt is known to suddenly break things that require some well placed finagling. So Burt had to get me to sign up for the job of removing screens before he could do the windows. Just as I got the last screen out (and it is a delicate yet formidable job) Gene pulled up to get to work. Guess who washed all the screens and windows while Burt wandered off to make money? I did. Burt came back and sheepishly mentioned how he hadn’t planned for me to do the job and I told him I had noticed that I was doing the job he had signed up for but not to worry about it. Tomorrow is Burt’s birthday I decided it was a fine birthday present.

The view from up on top

After that was all done, and my what a nice view we have here, I took the dogs for a walk. I plan to take regular photos of the job from the cliffs up above the house. It’s about an hour and a half walk round trip to get up on top even with the building site. Since today was the first day I thought I better get a picture. I had no other work to do. Elvis and Olive joined me. This particular walk is about a half mile down the highway until you reach state lands. At this point you can cross a decrepit barbed wire fence and then meander up and around some lava cliffs. The cliffs are like ridges of rock corduroy. You climb up and down always making it a bit higher until you are on top. I’ve learned the hard way to keep the dogs leashed through all the little valleys between the ridges. Deer like to bed down in the snug clefts and Olive has chased a surprised herd out of view. Of course we didn’t see one deer while I had the dogs on leashes.

Once on top of the plateau I let the dogs off and hoped for the best. The road is far away and the game are less easily surprised. Today I went straight to the spot over looking the site and took a few photos. Burt reported that he could see me but I did not see him. That job done I wandered around and looked at wildflowers and found a shed deer antler. I gave Burt a due back time so he could come looking if I managed to get hurt (not very far fetched when climbing steep terrain with two mangy mutts on leashes) so I headed back after a little bit. I noticed a bunch of tree swallows catching bugs right where the trail drops off the first cliff so I sat down to try and get a picture. These small violet blue birds fly like jedis and I failed to get one decent shot. Olive took the time to dig a hole under me and bury my camera case and Elvis’ leash. I found the case but did not see the leash. We got up and I kept Elvis off leash since I didn’t want 65 pounds of dog dictating the pace of our decent. I could manage Olive. Halfway down I realized I didn’t have Elvis’ leash. I climbed back up and looked where we were sitting and couldn’t see anything. Argh. I walked back to the first rock we sat on and didn’t find it. I started to worry about the half mile of highway with no leash. How would I gt Elvis to heel the entire way? Then I thought, “Maybe Olive buried it.” We headed back to our spot and this time I noticed a tiny bit of the webbing sticking up from a pile of loose dirt. The leash was buried almost entirely. Nice work Olive. If that doesn’t tell me what you’re thinking nothing will. Well tough luck and tough love you’re going to wear a leash. I made it back just before Burt worried. He did wonder what was taking so long but decided I was watching birds and looking at flowers and he was mostly right.

Clean window and screen at the head of our bed.

Wild Flowers

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Pine Creek Cafe

Bluegrass jam on Thursdays (we don't play bluegrass but they let us in anyway.)

Last week we jumped into the Thursday night bluegrass jam hosted by our friends Pete and Rachel and has a fine old time. Dennis, another regular and also long time music friend, was there to. And it just so happened that our long lost buddy Zondra was home from working in Antarctica and she backed us up on the bass. The 6 of us had a ball getting reacquainted and plan to do it again this week. Swing on in at 7:30 if you’re in the mood. I can’t promise we won’t mangle the bluegrass but it will be fun. How can you go wrong in a joint that looks like this?