Montana, Part Two; or, how I became relaxed and happy in just seven days.

(Please read part one, which is a couple posts down, if you haven't yet)

The secret, I have discovered, to relaxation and happiness can actually be accomplished at any time -- I just need to turn my cell phone off, hide my computer from myself, and get out into the natural world. However, being able to spend a week in Montana, away from work, obligations, and society in general, made the process much easier. It was impossible for me to fret about my silly life dramas when I was sleeping in a little cabin in the mountains, eating wonderful home cooked food (to the point of gluttony!) at every meal, meeting like-minded individuals, enjoying (as I like to call it) grassroots entertainment (ie, no TV or movies), and riding on horseback nearly every day through the wilderness -- with absolutely no access to a Verizon signal or a T-Mobile HotSpot. (Though I heard if you stood on this one rock by the edge of the ranch. . .)

I wrote in a previous post about getting to the Lazy K Bar ranch. Now on to Day Two! I began the day with french toast and poached eggs, and slung on my boots and my silly gardening hat (which kind of looks like a cowboy hat, but not as cool). We took a half day ride down into the valley, with Kelly and Karen as our wranglers. Now, I had taken a full summer of riding lessons in 2001, but all the knowledge I had gained during those months apparently had taken leave of my brain. The only thing I could recall was that I needed to keep my heels down, and something about leaning forward as you go up a steep path, and backward as you descend. My horse, Lobo (who perhaps was misnamed), didn't really respond to my gentle kicking and coaxing "Come on Lobo! Let's go!" Lobo was pretty set in his ways: he liked to eat. It took me a whole week to become assertive with Lobo and get his head out of the delicious grasses along the trails. Since I needed a lot more riding instruction than simple assertiveness training that day, Kelly suggested we spend that afternoon in the arena, so I wouldn't go flying off the saddle during a trot.





Kelly was a great teacher (during the year, she works in a North Dakota school district), and had me work with her horse, Glory Be, from scratch. Standing in the middle of the arena, I learned how to catch the horse's attention and keep it, sending her around the ring by keeping myself in her line of vision. (I wasn't really good at it, but it was extremely interesting). I practiced walking, jogging, trotting, and loping (at the end of the lesson in the arena, Kelly came with me into the meadow to practice full-on loping). Kelly is the daughter of Carol Van Cleve Kirby, who is one of the owners of the ranch.

Carol and Kelly:



Lobo was much harder to work with than Glory Be; but I was determined to get him to trot when I wanted him to. I think the funniest-slash-hardest thing about Lobo was right when I'd get on him in the morning -- he wouldn't move out of the way to make room for the other horses. Nope. He'd go when he was ready, which was usually when the other horses started to walk in line up the path. I'd sit there, coaxing, kicking, laughing embarassedly, trying to get him to move just a few feet. Ah Lobo, when I return to Montana next year, you'd better believe I'm gonna be able to make you move! Seriously though, I loved Lobo. He was a sweet (yet stubborn, kind of like me) horse who had been rescued from a rodeo (I think?) and thus was a pacer, which meant that he liked to do a pace instead of a lope. (I did get him to lope by the end of the week, though!) His nose was so soft, and he was a beautiful, shimmery chestnut color with a black mane. I hope he liked me too.

Dinner on day two was roast beef, potatoes, salad, and chocolate cake. Dinner is served family style in the lodge, and thankfully all my fellow ranch visitors were truly friendly and welcoming when I would join them to eat. Besides Denis and Dahlia, there were two lovely sisters from Maine:



And here's Denis with Leon and David, two Tennesseans with the greatest accents ever:



There was also a family from New Jersey (the Moles), a bunch of other Tennesseans who were traveling with Leon and David, a wonderful family from Atlanta (the Yates), a mother/daughter/friend trio from Michigan -- all at the ranch to do some serious riding and relaxing. Many had been to the Lazy K before -- the Yates' dad had come with his family as did Mr. Mole.

Day Three: An All Day Ride To Twin Lakes!! Riding all day up a mountain is hard work, and when I returned, I was pretty darn sore. I don't think I'd ever used my whole body that actively, even while rock climbing or weightlifting. Even my green chile omelet and homemade toast didn't prepare me for the muscle-usage onslaught. But SO WORTH IT!!



Here's one of my better photos:



And, first in a series of horse portraits, may I present: LOBO.



When we returned to the ranch, it was dinner time; I sat with the Kirbys and the sisters from Maine and had multiple servings of chicken casserole, tomato salad, bisuits, and green beans. And as the Klepacs said in their comment on the last post, I gave a little post dinner flute recital for the guests, which was a lot of fun, and I thought to myself, I wonder if these mountains have heard Bach before? I know, it's very hippy, but I truly love playing in the midst of open nature (I have an excellent picture of myself in the African bush playing something, probably Mozart, who knows). It's as if you're playing for the sky. (I'm really not furthering a portrait of myself as a tough, yet classy, chick who could kick your butt, am I? Oh well.)

I sat up with the Klepacs and Carol and John Kirby until about 9pm, and as I returned to my cabin, it was still light. I read a book on my porch with a bottle of Blue Moon.

Day 4 Began With French Toast And Two Over Hard Eggs.

I went on a morning ride with Denis and Dahlia, led by Lena, and we practiced trotting and loping in some meadows (this is when I got Lobo to fall into a lope).

Me, Denis and Dahlia:



Then, we went to the brood mare pasture. I don't even know how to begin describing this experience -- I don't think I fully comprehended how awesome it was until after it was over. A two hour car ride away, this is where the mares have their foals. I saw colts that were only a couple of weeks old. We would sit or kneel and they would meander up to us, sniffing, exploring, curious.

This little one was so my favorite:



Here he is with his mom, nursing:



The Mole kids (keep in mind the Mole actually has an accent on it and is pronounced "Molay" - I just realized that without the accent it looked kind of funny) and another little one:



How amazing is this???



Regal, noble creatures:



And, topping it off, a beautiful vista on the way to the pasture:



We also stopped for some KICKIN' milkshakes and burgers at a little place on the side of the road. By the way, this is Molly:



Molly is one smart little Montana cookie who knows how to work the crowd. She actually took some of the photos that appear later in this entry; I tried to take a picture of her with the colts, but all parties were too elusive. That would have definitely been a prize-winning cute photo. I did, however, get this shot:



That's getting printed out.

After a couple hours with the horses, we left to go back to the ranch, eat AMAZING RANCH STEAK and have a square dance!! And here, I must say, I realized that all my ballroom dancing knowledge had departed with the horseback riding know-how. I hope they had a nice honeymoon somewhere and had some dancing bareback babies or something. Because I got nothin' from them. I look graceful here dancing with wrangler Chris, but it's a big lie:



Much better dancers, Tack and Carol, demonstrating a polka:



Next time, I shall burn up the dance floor. Next time.

Sunday morning is a horse vacation day at the Lazy K, so Day 5 started with a campfire breakfast cooked by Kelly and Chris! Truly truly yummy. I had four eggs. I also was pretty tired from the revelry of the day previous, as you can see in this photo taken by Molly:



Here's Molly's Dad, a true cowboy:



I was reading some Camus as I ate my breakfast, and Molly wanted some attention, so I had her read it out loud. I helped with the longer words, like "Nietzsche". It was a little surreal to hear a five year old reading Camus' analysis of the purpose of life.

Anyway, then I relaxed. I slept for a couple hours, read the entire "Kite Runner" (good book, by the way), sat in the hot tub, and practiced. The only bummer was that I slept through a fried chicken lunch. Arghhh! Good thing I had stuffed myself at breakfast. Dinner was a buffet of ham, turkey, chick pea/bean salad, raw veggies, and chocolate cake. I made a marvelous discovery that if you mix the cream with the milk (all ranch produced), the milk becomes even more awesome.

"Dear readers, we produced that delicious cream!"



After dinner, there was a talent show at the lodge! I'm seriously into this grassroots entertainment thing. It was great. I got excellent videos of Tack and Dahlia singing, and staff and guests all put on a great show. I played for everyone, but then felt like I was cheating, so I sang something I wrote for voice and guitar. After the show, Carol played the piano and Dahlia, Dorothy (of the Atlanta Yates), Mary (the cook) and I all sang country western hits! In harmony! Good thing I could sight read, because I had never heard of most of the songs.

The fireplace at the lodge:



The pool table (that's Tyler and Eric, two staff members):



Day 6:
Breakfast: two over hard eggs, french toast, peach juice. I went on a short all day ride to the reservoir, but my group got a little lost, so we had lunch in a grove of pine trees, which was quite lovely. Some of the horses wandered away while we ate, led by -- who else -- Lobo, probably in search of ever-more-tasty grasses. I took a number of horse portraits at lunch. Ladies and gentlemen, may I introduce:

The Lovely NOUGAT



The Charming JUNE BUG:



The Dapper FRITZ:



I tried to capture some of the spectacular views of the meadows and mountains on the ride back to the ranch, but my camera did not do the land justice. Perhaps it's better that the memory is firmly implanted in my mind, so I won't end up using a photo as a crutch. Here's Lena, leading us back home:



And here's me and Lobo, crossing the creek! Thanks to Denis for taking this photo.



When we returned, I had a couple beers with the Klepacs on their porch, and we chatted with some new arrivals at the ranch. It was hard to believe that familiar faces had departed -- and I, too, would be leaving the following day. I tried not to think about it. At dinner, I sat with the Klepacs and the Yates and had stuffed chiles, green beans and salad, and entertained Quill Yates (such a Faulkner name!!) with tales of Jeri, the crazy cat woman of Waban (and my absentee landlord). I sat on the porch following dinner and wrote about my time at the ranch, which was almost up.

Departing from tradition on Day 7, I had eggs, bacon and the homemade toast. One more ride to go, and it was to the falls, led by Carol and Kelly. Words and pictures can't describe how pretty the waterfall and the area surrounding it was, but I'll try.

Here are the falls. Apparently kayaks try to go down this. I'd like to see that.



Looking down, over the edge:



See the rainbow in the mist?



Ridiculously happy:



Ridiculously sad. I was trying to take in the scenery for posterity when Rick, one of the recently arrived guests, said, "You need to have a picture of you looking wistful." So he took this.



On the ride back down, I cried. Truly, I did. Carol, riding behind me, said, "Whenever you're feeling stressed out, just picture the ranch and this land, and go there in your head," and tears welled up as I thought of how wonderful the week had been, how relaxed I was, and how I needed more of all this in my life. And it frustrates me that I can put you all inside my head to experience what I did. Any sort of media, I've realized, can't capture true experience. Pictures, video, whatever -- none of them work. It's all about touching the trees and the animals and breathing the air and talking to the people.

And so, after I ate lunch and sat in the hot tub, I packed, practiced, and got into the truck with John. I said a quick goodbye to Denis and Dahlia because I thought I might cry again. We set out on the long road to Bozeman:





We made a quick stop in Livingston to check out the model railroad, which was very detailed, extensive, and cool, and John introduced me to a fantastic songrwriter named John Prine. And then. . . on the airplane, another crazy flight path back through Salt Lake and Cincinnati, Logan, Blue-Green-Red Lines, Magazine Street, Upton. . . number 10. . . I love Cambridge but I can't wait to go back to Montana. I can't wait to start traveling again in the fall. Our world is very big and I can't just read about it in books.