THE ASHLAND POET

Every year during the week after Christmas my family gets together in Ashland for a few days to celebrate the holidays.  My son and his family come up from South Lake Tahoe, my daughter and her family come down from Portland and their mother comes down from Salem.   One evening this year my son, his wife and grandson Connor were kicking a soccer ball in the park near the center of the city.  I was off to the side watching when a young woman walked by me asking how I was doing?   She may have been 40, well dressed and did not look homeless.   She was carry a bag of poems and asked if I would want to buy one as she was trying to collect enough money to buy a pizza for her boyfriend and her self.  I became a little suspicious, but I asked her to read one.   The poems were written on brown paper that I think was cut from brown paper bags.   She took one of the poems from the bag and recited to me.   As she started it reminded me of my loss of Celia and brought tears to my eyes.  I don't recall all of it, but it started out--searching in solace for what we've all lost.  Not hearing those haunting sounds, not alone in our souls...  I do have the little brown papers of the poems but find it hard to read.   I told her it reminded me of the loss of my wife, she was very sympathetic and gave me a second poem.  I gave her $20 in hopes she would buy the pizza and hopefully not drugs as she walked off.    In some ways she made my day and I hope I contributed to hers'.  

 

MY DOG JACK

It was a late November afternoon in 1989 when I was about ready to leave work at the Cottage Grove Ranger District office and go home to a little house I rented on Lynx Hollow Road north of Cottage Grove.   No sooner than I started packing up my things to head out the door when a woman that worked on the road maintenance crew came up to me asking if I would take a puppy they picked up walking along a forest road where it was beginning to snow.   She knew I had just put my old family dog Corky to sleep because of health issues.   She said she could not take the dog because they already had some dogs.    So I went home with the little black puppy that looked more like a cub bear that I named Jack.

There was a storage room in the back of the house where I left Jack during the day with food, water and a partially opened window as I went off to work.   When I came home at night I let Jack out in the back yard and he had free range in the house at night.   One wall of the storage room had unpacked boxes of items from the house I sold in Gold Beach in 1988.   After a few weeks I noticed Jack was in a corner of the storage room as if something had been bothering him during the day.  One day I saw a wild cat jump in through the opened window and discovered she had a litter of kittens in one of the boxes.   Jack had become accustomed to this wild cat coming and going as she raised her kittens.   Later I discovered the after birth in the box where she had the litter.   The wild cat and her kittens left the house to live in the barn behind the house and roam the nearby fields for rats or other small varmints.   In 1991 I bought a house in south Eugene in order to allow my two children to live with me on a part-time basis while they were in high school and their mother was considering moving out of the area.   Jack was two years old and I constructed a fenced yard with a dog house where he stayed when I was working in Cottage Grove.  Over the next few years Jack went on many hikes, backpacking trips and in the Fall of 1997 went on a  cross country car trip with me to visit a sister living in Indiana.    When Celia and I bought a house in Cottage Grove and got married in 2000 Jack became part of the family.   Jack was susceptible to seizures and in 2005 we had to send him over the Rainbow Bridge due to failing health.  

      

COUNTRY DOCTORS

 When I lived in Orleans in northwestern California from 1971 to 1977 the nearest doctor was 40 miles away in a medical clinic in Hoopa Valley on the Hoopa Indian Reservation.     

This doctor did it all from setting broken bones, stitching up cuts and digging bullets out of people.   If major surgery was required or the birthing of a child we had to drive 85 miles to the hospital in Eureka.  I do not remember any ambulance service.  If there was a medical emergency you were at the mercy of neighbors to provide first aid and get you to Hoopa.  Some vehicle accidents, usually caused by excessive drinking were fatal and it could be days before somebody noticed a vehicle down off the road near the Klamath River below the highway.   Those that survived had to crawl up to the highway in hopes somebody would stop and take them into Hoopa.  

When we lived in Gold Beach on the south coast of Oregon, there was one doctor for the town of about 1500 people.   He worked out of the hospital doing everything from emergencies to clinical work.   To see the doctor you just went to the hospital emergency room and waited your turn.   When I developed an  infection on the side of my waist that prevented me from keeping my pants up it was time to wait my turn in the emergency room.    Once I was called into the exam room the doctor had me lay down on a table where he proceeded to cut open the infection in order to drain it.   Afterwards he told the nurse to pour peroxide on it and bandage it up.   I was sent home with a prescription for antibiotics and instructions to soak in the bathtub daily with Epson salts.  During the cutting procedure I was not given any local anesthesia.  There was a water pipe on the wall adjacent to the table that I hung onto thinking I might break it while dealing with any pain.   It all reminded me of the wild west.  

THE OLD MAN AND HIS DOG

Recently I went to the Oregon coast to visit my daughter and her family near Waldport where they had rented a beach house.    One morning we went to Seal Rock beach at low tide to explore all the tide pools and the creatures that live there.   There is a moderately steep trail from the parking lot going down hill to the beach.   Once we made it down to the beach I looked back up the trail to see an older man with his small dog on a leash coming down behind us.   I would guess he was around 80 years of age and very attached to his dog as he waved at me.   I waved back as we went down to the exposed rocks covered with muscles and all types of barnacles.   I noticed the old man walking on the upper beach playing with his dog now off the leash running around freely.    About an half hour later he made his way slowly back up the trial with his dog and disappeared into the forest leading to the parking lot.   I wondered if he was traveling in a motorhome, or lived nearby and if he had any family?     Sadly I suspect that dog was his family.   

14 HOUR DAYS

 This song brings back memories of farm life back in the 1960's operating some of those old combines in northern California harvesting barley, rice, safflower and milo corn.   Then in my later years working on a grass seed farm near Harrisburg, Oregon operating modern combines in the 1990's.  The one thing that never changed was the long days, many were 14 hour days.   

CATASTROPHIC FIRE DAMAGE

 Recently I took a road trip with my daughter and her family down to visit my son in  Meyers, California.  We took the Susanville/Reno route by way of highways 89 to 44 and 395 to highway 50 in Carson City.    It must have been 6 or 7 years ago since we traveled this route and since then there has been many catastrophic wild fires.   All the way starting at Hat Creek along Highway 89 down the eastside of the Sierra Nevada Mountains along Highway 395 to Reno much of the forests have been burned.   There are areas of green timber that were not burned or completely destroyed.   Much of this was burned by the Dixie Fire in 2021, including half of the Lassen National Park and destroyed the town of Greenville.   

While we traveled around South Lake Tahoe and Meyers during our visit we could see the burned forests along the south rim of the Tahoe Basin that was part of the Caldor Fire in 2021.    Presently this area is being logged to prevent a future fire of the standing dead and down trees, in addition to the hazard trees on the slopes above Highway 50 leading to Sacramento.   Most of these logs are being hauled and decked in Carson City waiting for processing in a future mill to be constructed in Gardnerville, Nevada.  

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WILDFIRES ON REBURNED AREAS

 Do you ever wonder if there is anything left out there to burn after all the fires over the last decade(s)?   

A few weeks ago I drove up to Oakridge to inquire about camping at Waldo Lake.   I was informed by the Forest Service that Waldo Lake was closed to the public due to the Cedar Creek Fire as it was spreading around the north end of the lake.   Knowing this area north of the lake burned 10 years ago, I asked what the fuel load was on the old burned over area.    Looking at a map on the wall at the Middle Fork Ranger Station I was told that the regrowth of under brush and old burned trees had fallen to the ground adding to the fuel load creating another catastrophic fire that eventually burned into the many campgrounds on the east side of the lake.    I'm not sure what the answer is on how to manage these burned over areas.   It might depend on site specific conditions, such as protection of communities, recreation facilities, road systems and other improvements.  My son informs me the Forest Service is removing many of the dead trees from the Caldor Fire that burned into the forests near South Lake Tahoe as a prevention measure to future fires in an urban area.    Highway 50 leading up to South Lake Tahoe from Sacramento is having all burned trees that are a hazard removed by Caltrans.    This is also true along I-5 going through the mountains of northern California from recent fires.    Locally we can see it up the North Umpqua Highway.

Fire has always been part of the ecosystem and may become more frequent on burned over areas with time, especially with a warming climate.    Will these burned over areas ever recover to what they once were? 

DOG DAYS OF SUMMER

So far this summer we have been spared any smoke, fire threats and record temperatures compared to the last few summers, but anything could still happen over the next two months before the Fall rains arrive.  108 is the highest temperature I have recorded here this summer.  Not as bad as 115 near the end of June last summer.   Last major rainfall was June 13th with 0.65 of inch at my place and only a few drops since then.  August is not my favorite month with hot afternoons preventing me from doing any outdoor work.  The sound of crickets at night is encouraging, a sign of change.   Fall can't get here fast enough for me.  

THE JET BOAT EXPERIENCE

 This story was told to me by a contract timber faller by the name of Lester (Les) Olson.   Les had been a contract faller for South Coast Lumber Company (SCL) out of Brookings that purchased many timber sales on the Gold Beach Ranger District.    Les and his crew had been responsible for cutting many of the clearcut units on the District over many years from the 1970's through the 80's that had been sold to SCL.

As a timber sale contract administrator on the District from 1979-88, I got to know Les and his crew.  While inspecting his operation for required fire equipment and falling practices Les told me about his recent jet boat trip up the Rogue River with his elderly parents.   He said his dad had a hard time of hearing and spoke loudly, especially in the jet boat with the roar of the engine.    There were very few visible clear cut units from the river, except in certain side drainages where you could look up and see a distant unit ranging in size from 20 to 40 acres.    The jet boats could carry up 20 to 30 people, mostly tourists that had very little knowledge of clearcutting on National Forests at the time.    In one of these side drainages Lester's dad yelled out, "Les did you cut that unit!?" pointing up the hill.    Les looked at his dad in shock placing his index finger over his mouth in hopes his dad would be quiet as many of the people on the boat turned to look at Les in disbelief.    Les said his dad got the message after that, seeing all the heads turning.  

FLOATING THE ROGUE RIVER

Allen Wilson was a neighbor and friend when we lived on Hunter Creek outside of Gold Beach in the 1980's.   He had been a river guide on the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon and few other rivers, including the Rogue River.   To float the Wild and Scenic section of the Rogue River requires a permit between May and October, and sometimes you need to apply a year in advance for the time period you want.   The permit covers a certain number of people in the group and I don't remember the limit.    Allen had a permit for a summer float trip and asked me if I would be interested in going since he had a vacancy in their permit.   The reason for the permit was to insure each party of a place to camp, since there is only so many sand bars available in the wild and scenic portion to spend the night, plus try to make it a wilderness experience without bumper to bumper traffic going down the river.   The permit required all trash and human waste to be removed.  Allen had a bucket that we used to deposit our daily waste into after placing it in plastic bags.   To go up behind a rock to do our business we could see toilet paper and more behind every big rock.   During the high water in the winter all this got flushed down river.  No wonder it was common to get giardia from the Gold Beach water source.   

To start the trip we had to drive over Bear Camp Road toward Grants Pass and check in at the BLM Visitor Center at Rand to be issued a permit to be displayed on the raft.   It was a 3 or 4 day trip down to Foster Bar where we ended our trip.   Allen knew the rough rapids and where we had to pull the raft from the river and portage around, such as Black Bar falls.   On our second or third day we reached the Rogue River Ranch, a national historic site at Marial administered by BLM.   We spent a few hours looking at the ranch and the old house, used as a museum as  I recall.   There is a BLM road coming into the ranch from the north.  Beyond Marial we entered the Siskiyou National Forest where the old Mule Creek Guard Station was utilized by the trail crew that maintained the Rogue River trail.  The last dangerous rapid is at Blossom Bar.   Allen was experienced at getting a raft over this rapid, but many others have tried this, some have failed and some drowned.   This is the upper limit where jet boats coming up river from Gold Beach can go.   Many of these jet boats bring people up to the lodge at Paradise Bar, just below Blossom Bar.   In many ways this is where the wilderness experience ends.  

   

A BAD DAY ON THE FARM

These pictures taken in 2011 on a small farm near Dillard where the Umpqua Bio Fuel  group processed grease collected from restaurants into bio diesel.    The processing facility was made up of old water heater tanks, and all kinds of plumbing powered by propane.  Lucky we did not blow the place up and nothing was on firm ground in the winter as you can see.  

EASTERN OREGON

Eastern Oregon has always intrigued me with its vast open country, insolated mountain ranges, high desert, small communities and less people.    I think back on all the places I was fortunate to see in my travels through eastern Oregon, including the Steens Mountains, Alvord Desert, the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, Lake Owyhee, the Mahogany Mountains, backpacking in the Strawberry and Eagle Cap Wilderness areas, just to name a few.   Celia and I looked at houses in Joseph, but after giving it serious thought decided not to thinking our children would never come visit us.   We even considered buying 40 acres of high desert land for sale outside of Dayville.   Not sure how that would have turned out, probably best we landed where we did.    

This picture is looking south across the John Day Valley toward the Strawberry Mountains.   

Wandering Aimlessly

 You ever have the desire to take off with no final destination in mind?    Sometime in the late 1980's when my marriage was on the rocks and feeling depressed with a sense of loss I took off with my backpacking gear and some trail food in the car.    My general destination was the eastside of the Mt. Jefferson Wilderness thinking it was a good place to get away from civilization.   I left Eugene on a Friday evening after work and drove over Santiam Pass then turned north on a forest road leading to the Cabot Lake Trial head on the eastern edge of the Mt. Jefferson Wilderness Area.    It was about a 3 hour drive from Eugene.  It was the early Fall and no rain was in the forecast, so it was a good time to get away from it all before the wet weather set in.    There were only 3 or 4 cars parked at the trail head parking lot.   I loaded up my back and took off with no destination in mind.   It got dark on me about an hour into the hike, so I just got out my sleeping bag and slept on the trail.   Early the next morning I made my way to Cabot Lake and noticed some people on the other side of the lake.    After the lake I made my way toward Mt. Jefferson and ended up on a rim overlooking the Warm Springs Indian Reservation above the tree line.   It was a desolate area where a man could wander and never be found again.   That night I don't remember where I camped, could have been back by the lake on my return hike back to the parking lot, just don't remember.  Don't even remember my drive back to Eugene or wherever I was living at the time, maybe Cottage Grove.   Emotionally I may have never left the wilderness.  

Sure wish I could wander off these days, but the best I can do is wander aimlessly around the grocery store once a week.  

GRANDPA'S TRACTOR

The other day I stopped by the John Deere tractor store to buy some oil and a filter for my tractor, better known as Grandpa's tractor.    There are so many interesting items to look at in the store and outside too.  Tractors of all sizes, utility vehicles, riding lawn mowers, all kinds of implements and attachments for tractors.   I felt like a kid in a toy store, it reminded me of  Zumwalt's Equipment store in the small farming town of Willows, where I grew up in northern California.   Whenever I had any extra money earned from seasonal farm jobs I would spend it on hand tools purchased from Zumwalt's.   Many of those tools from 60 to 65 years ago I still have and use.    When the grandkids were here last summer we all had a good time on the tractor, not sure who had more fun, the grandkids or grandpa.  

BEARS

 This is about my close encounter with bears while working for the Forest Service.   It does include the encounter with  the unknown creature, which was probably a bear, that ran me out of the East Fork of Bluff Creek in my story titled--IN SEARCH OF BIG FOOT.   

The quickest way back to the truck was to go straight up through an old clear cut unit from the bottom of the East Fork of Blue Creek after a day of locating proposed clear-cut boundaries on the Orleans Ranger District.     It was the spring of 1972 as I made my way up to the old hand fire line running along the bottom of the unit.   Then I noticed the fresh carcass of a cub bear.    In the world of bears it is common for the big male bears to attack and eat young cub bears.   Not really sure why, but might have something to do with the cub not being their offspring or downright hungry after hibernation.   As I started the steep climb from the bottom of the unit I saw a large black figure walking on the road about thousand feet above.    It was a large black bear looking down into the unit and sniffing the air.   Bears have bad eye sight, but can smell and hear things from a far distance depending on the wind.   It must have heard me as it was straining to see what was making noise down slope.    I stayed put for a while sitting behind as large stump waiting for the bear to leave as they can be aggressive if disturbed.    Finally I made it to the road on top of the unit.    As I walked along the road back to the Forest Service truck at the end of the road I saw large bear droppings going in my direction.    Luckily I made it back to the truck with no problems.

My next encounter with bears was in Alaska when I volunteered for a work detail on the Tongass National Forest in September of 1993.    Four of us were assigned to the Forest Service work center at the Rowan Bay logging camp that was operated by the Alaskan Pulp Corporation on Kuiu Island.    The black bear population was greater than the human population on this island and they were everywhere as the Salmon were going up all the streams to spawn.    Working in the woods locating clear-cut unit boundaries and spur roads, we were required to carry canisters of pepper spray to deter any attack from the bears.    The bears were so intent on catching salmon they could care less on what we humans were doing.   Driving back to camp at the end of the day we had to stop at times to allow bears to cross the road as they were chasing salmon up the many streams.    There was even a sign that said ‘Bear Crossing’ just before getting to the camp.  The camp was comprised of single wide trailers for living quarters.   Garbage containers had to be kept within the enclosed front porches to keep the bears from getting in it.   Garbage was collected and incinerated here, no open dump for bears to feast in.   They roamed the small streets of the camp with a population of about 100 people as if they owned the place.    There were penalties for leaving garbage out in the open or goodies in the vehicles.    In many ways the bears ruled this place. 

 

Biochar

 Between storms this last week did my third batch this winter made from 2 to 4 inch material and wet, 22 inches of rain here since 10/1/2020.  Used some cardboard boxes to get it started.    Crush it by putting it in empty 40 lbs bird seed bags and drive over it.   Between me and the neighbor it goes into our compost. 

Prelude to Spring

 The first sign of Spring is the arrival of seed catalogs in the mail and all the bags of soil amendments piled in the parking lot of the local Bi-Mart in Sutherlin.    This last Sunday our neighbor, Jim brought us a couple of bags of greens from his greenhouse.  I have been providing him with biochar to incorporate into their compost and from that he makes a potting soil that beats anything I can buy or put together.   Something he learned from his grandmother in his younger days.   My gardening abilities are limited by a shortage of water in the summer and an increase of critters eating everything I plant, except potatoes.   Last summer my motion camera detected mice climbing the bean supports and eating all the foliage, plus everything else, including what was started in our greenhouse.   Even our three cats can't keep up with the varmints.   Anybody know of a poison that will not be harmful to our cats?  

What would we do during these uncertain times without planning for our gardens this coming spring? 

Living on Hunter Creek

This story has been in the works for awhile.    Looking back I can see some humor, but at the time it was anything but humorous, more stress than anything.    

Took a look on Google Earth to see what the place looks like today.  All the outbuildings are gone, including the big Willow tree that was out front.   It is just a memory now of long-long ago.

                                              1981-1988

 

There were chickens, a goat, a black sheep, a dog, a cat, two young children, my wife and I all on two acres with a big garden and creek frontage.    It was the first home we purchased when conventional home loans had interest rates peaking at 18%.    We bought the place with seller’s financing at 10% and a balloon payment due at the end of ten years.    We had no idea how we would come up with the balloon payment and at the time didn’t give it much thought.  We were so excited to have a place of our own after living in a government house for two years where gardening or any kind of alterations to the landscaping was not permitted, because the Gold Beach Ranger Station is on the National Register of Historical Places, since it was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in 1937.     

It was a three bedroom house with a fireplace where we had a woodstove insert installed.   There was a variety of  outbuildings consisting of a small three-sided barn, a pump house, a chicken coup, a greenhouse attached to a building that had been added on to the back of the house with a garage attached to that and a woodshed attached to the garage.   I’m sure none of it was constructed in accordance to the local building codes, which was typical of many country places in Oregon at the time.    There were neighbors to the east and west of us, but only a forested hill across the county road to the north of the property and Hunter Creek boarding the south end.   We were two miles south of Gold Beach outside the city limits, but the city did provide water to the homes in the area.  There was a small community of homes scattered along Hunter Creek, including a small store, tavern, lumber yard with a hardware store on the old highway off Highway 101, just a mile south of Gold Beach.

My wife’s first priority was to have a goat for milk.   This was a learning experience for us both, especially when goats are herd animals and do not care to be left alone.   The first night the young goat considered us part of the herd and would whine if left alone.  This troubled my wife and the goat was brought into our bedroom for the night.   It did not work out and I don’t remember much after that episode.   One of those things that has been blacked out of my aging memory.   Eventually we got a black sheep my wife wanted for the wool to supply her with material for weaving.   The goat and sheep stayed in the back pasture with the small three-side barn for shelter from the rain.   The company of the sheep seem to satisfy the goat.  

In order to have a goat that produces milk it must be bred once a year and have an offspring.   This became a yearly event.  We had to load the goat into the bed of the pickup and drive her up a dirt road in the hills east of Gold Beach.   It was always at night as the four of us sat in the front of our 1975 Ford pickup and made our way up a muddy road to an isolated goat farm where an old lady would charge us $20 for having our goat mate with her Billy goat.    All I can recall is driving up to a rustic looking shack with a light coming from a door window and a wooden fence and barn with a variety of goats enclosed within it all.    The old lady would bring her Billy goat out to the truck where we had unloaded our goat and the procedure happened quickly since the Billy goat was more than ready.   It had to have been a learning experience for our two young children.   After a few months and the birth of the new goat the milking procedure started twice a day.   The baby goat would be sold a few months later.    This process continued for the next four years.   

Over the course of the first year we suffered some setbacks.   First the well went dry.   It came down to either drilling a new well or tap into the city water line that was out under the county road 100+ feet in front of the house.   We decided on the city water source knowing there would be a guarantee of water.  This cost us $1000 to have a meter installed off the road.  Getting the water piped to the house with all the required values was our responsibility and subject to inspection.   I did all this work myself and it even past inspection.

During the first winter Hunter Creek flooded the back 40 or the one acre where the pasture, barn and chicken coup were located.   Early in the morning I had to rescue the goat that was in the barn up to its belly in water.   We kept the goat and the sheep in the room attached to the back of the house until the water receded.  The chicken’s survived by staying in the rafters of the coup.    With the wet pasture during the winter the goat developed hoof rot, which required constant care by trimming and applying a disinfectant.    It also became necessary to supplement feed the goat and sheep with alfalfa hay during the wet season.   This required a yearly trip to a feed store in Langlois, 40 miles north of Gold Beach for all the hay bales we could load on the pickup.    We stored the hay in the back room behind the house.   This room also was where we milked the goat during the wet season on a milking stand.    There may have been a half of a gallon produced every day.     

There were the never ending projects to do.   I remodeled a couple of the rooms of the house.  There was an old fuse box in the utility room that kept blowing fuses on a couple of circuits that were overloaded.   We hired an electrical contractor to install a breaker box and rewire the place to code.  The house was on two septic systems, one for brown water and one for gray water and both were in need of overhaul.    There was a large Willow tree in the front yard where the drain field was located and the Willow tree roots had invaded the one and only leech line.   Cutting and hauling firewood from the forest involved many weekends.    In addition to everything else I constructed a split rail cedar fence along the property boundary on the eastside.   After some weekends I looked forward to going to work on Monday.  

It was an ideal place for children to grow up with the best swimming hole in the neighborhood during the summer, a forest to build a fort across the county road and a garden to pick veggies from.    There were summer days when many of the nearby young children would spend more time at our place than at their own homes.   At times we had to feed some of them and drive them back to their homes where their parents didn’t even know they had been gone for the day, or didn’t care. 

When the new McKay’s market opened in Gold Beach we entered a drawing for a freezer full of food.   We were shocked when we found out we had won it.    Most the food included was frozen meals, ice cream and some meat.  

When our children entered school my wife went to work as a teacher’s aide for a handicap class at the Ophir School 12 miles north of Gold Beach.   She also took extension classes at night in Gold Beach from Southwestern Community College in Coos Bay.    Going back to school and getting a degree in education was something she always wanted to do.    In the summer of 1986 she enrolled at the University of Oregon in Eugene and she and the children moved into university housing that September.    Every other weekend I would make the four hour trip to visit them.    With the family gone I thought I would have more free time to tackle all those uncompleted projects on the place.   During the summer months I rented out the bedrooms for two seasonal Forest Service employees to stay, since rental housing was scarce in the community.     There was a young man and woman that became tenants.  The woman did her fair share of housekeeping and cooking.  The young man did very little and always wanted to go to the tavern after work and drink beer.    This caused friction between the two and heated discussions on who should being doing what.   On weekends the young woman had her boyfriend from Corvallis come visit her.  

In the spring of 1988 I transferred to Cottage Grove to be closer to family.   The Hunter Creek house was put up for sale with a real estate broker and a young couple rented it while it was on the market.    About two months later it sold for the same price we bought it for in 1981, which was a financial loss considering all the improvements.    The goat and sheep ended up being moved to farms near Eugene where my wife wanted them to reside.   The poor chickens became a meal for some critters, except for the rooster that escaped to the rafters.   I don’t know where he ended up in the end.   The dog came with me and I don’t remember much about the cat that may have strayed off or died before the last year on the place.    Best of all we did not have to worry about coming up with a balloon payment after 10 years and my weekends were much less stressful.

The Christmas party at the Gold Beach Ranger Station 1981

 It was the Friday before the Christmas week and most employees were taking the next week or two off to be with family and friends.  That morning Earl, our supervisor with his office upstairs, told the three of us sale administrators in the downstairs office to come to his office at 4 pm, which was a half hour before quitting time.    At the end of the day we ventured up stairs where Earl proceeded to pull a bottle of Jack Daniel's from a deck drawer and we all had a drink or two from paper cups.   It didn't take long to get into the holiday spirit with that stuff.   At quitting time the rumor was that the party would continue in the upstairs office over the fire warehouse near the back of the compound.   At the time my wife, two young children and I lived in a government house on the station, so driving home was not a problem.  As we walked from our office building back to the warehouse we were feeling no pain and the festivities were well under way.   It was turning dark as some of our wives showed up to persuade some of us it was time to come home.   It was good my wife came to get me as I don't think I could have found my way in the dark.  It was the last Christmas party of this magnitude I remember on a ranger station.   Every Christmas party after that was family oriented minus the alcohol.  

Holiday Cheer at the Cottage Grove Post Office

 When I first moved to Cottage Grove in 1988 to work for the Forest Service, I rented a P.O. Box.  The Post Office was located up town at the corner of 5th Street and Washington Avenue, if I remember correctly.  The only available parking was on the streets.  It was a week or so before Christmas.   After work every day I would drive up town to pick up my mail before driving north of town where I rented a small house on Lynx Hollow Road.   This day there was a package slip in my box, so I got in line at the front deck to receive the package.   There may have been 3 or 4 people ahead of me.   I noticed only two people working, one at the front counter and a man in the back sorting mail.  There were packages of all sizes scattered down the aisles and piled on selves, it did not look very organized.   One of the men ahead of me in the line handed his package slip to the clerk.   The clerk spent a good part of 5 minutes walking through the aisles looking for the package with no success in finding it.  By this time there were a line of people going out the door onto the sidewalk.   The clerk returned to the counter and asked the man if he would come back later.  The man waiting for his package was stunned, including those of us standing nearby.    By the time I got to the counter the clerk did find my package.  He seemed  to be spaced out, maybe overworked or had been smoking something besides tobacco, who knows?   The other man in the back continued sorting mail in slow motion as if he was the only person there.   Wonder where the Postmaster was?   As I made my way out the door people were starting to lose the holiday spirit and the streets were filled with cars trying to find a place to park.  

Today there is a new Post Office in Cottage Grove, and it even has a parking lot.

Happy Holidays!

Mike

PS-- there will be more short holiday stories as they come to mind, some of these have been told before.