Drive - A Memoir 102nd Installment
we
told and retold the story, and ever since then, the little house has
been known as the ‘haunted shack.’
Chapter
28
Last
year on a cold wintry day we drove up to Taylor’s place, a 22,000
acre operation between Hamer and St. Anthony, an area almost entirely
flat with short grass and brush. Deer wintered here which made it
perfect for a close-to-home short hunt. We saw Taylor driving around
his home place and stopped to talk. “Which way do we go if we want
to hunt toward the sand dunes?” Max, a guy we knew, asked Taylor.
Max, an old man to us at 17, had asked us to take him up to Taylor’s
for the first time.
“Well,
as I remember, take this dirt road in and take the first left then
the next two right splits in the road and you’ll be close.”
Taylor said.
“Remember?”
I chided. “You grew up here and should know every inch of this
ranch.”
“Every
inch? Don’t you mean every square mile?” There are thirty-five
square miles to this place!” he seemed a teeny bit miffed. “See
that 55 gallon drum in the back of this pickup?” We nodded. “I
keep that full of gas so if by chance I get lost on my own place, I
can drive, refuel and drive until I find my way out!” With that he
revved his motor, waved and drove off.
We
drove in, but not as far as we would have liked. The sky was looking
more ominous and seemed to be a mile lower. Tiny white crystals
formed in our hair. The cold was coming and the humidity was high.
Two inches of snow covered the ground, and the grass and brush were
white with frost. We let out Max; he was planning to walk to his
right, knowing that we were told to turn to the right up ahead. When
we came to the Y in the road, I got out and was going to walk out a
quarter mile and wait for Max to show up. Russ was going to drive on
about a half mile and wait there. At least that was the plan we made.
I
hadn’t noticed, and the others probably didn’t either, but the
cloud bank had thickened and lowered to the ground. I walked a while
and about a half hour later I felt like I was in a bottle of milk. I
could see my feet, a little bit of color against the pure white
ground. As I raised my eyes, it was like I was white-blind causing me
to quickly look at my hand and down my body again to check if
something had happened to my vision. My nerves started to jangle with
a little fear. I looked around peering level, turning in a circle,
looking up and down and then putting my hand in front of my face to
test my vision.
500 more words tomorrow
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