Chapter 18: Walking
I live outside of St Louis, a little town on the Missouri river, quaint and isolated from the problems of the city. I don’t know anyone here, work in the city and commute every day. It’s hard to meet people in this town. I have often commented to my friends that living in this town is like going to a high school reunion and you didn’t go to that high school. But it is a nice town. I don’t have to lock the doors, no crime, no problems. There is a library and 6 bars within walking distance to my house. Everything I need is just a stroll away.
I like to walk through town and look at the houses. This town was built on the wealth of the river, Steamboats plying the Missouri made this a major trading center. Merchants and river boat captains built fine houses near the river. Now these old houses have been made a historic district, just two blocks from my house. Walking at night you can see into many of the houses, see their antiques, heirlooms, usually all of this is illuminated by the glow of the ever present television.
Sometimes my walk takes me past the parking lot of the bar where my ex wife first cheated on me. I don’t like going past the place, sort of treat it with the same dread as though the murder of a loved one had happened in that spot. I suppose in a way that it did. I always feel my stomach sinking as I approach the spot, I should have no idea what parking spot it was but for some reason, some sixth sense I know. It is across the street from the bar, a little East of the place.
For years I thought that if I was to commit suicide that would be a good place to do it. Just sit down in the gravel and slit my wrists; let my life flow out onto the dirt. It’s a good enough spot to end it all. The bar faces the river, a nice unobstructed final view of all that brown water rolling down to the gulf. When it comes to it any spot is as good as the next, but this spot is where things really ended for me.
I know I shouldn’t blame the guy she cheated on me with. She later told me that she had told him the marriage was over, that she would be filing for divorce soon, that she hated me. How could the guy resist a beautiful woman with a perfect figure? She was always dressed and coifed to perfection, her false breasts a nice complement to the nose surgery. Teeth whitened and straightened, nails manicured, toes painted and polished. I don’t blame the guy, who wouldn’t jump on the chance to sleep with a former model.
I know the night she did this, she later confessed as to when the affair began. Perhaps that would be a nice night to end it all, on one of the anniversaries of the adultery. I remember the night, I was out of town attending a software conference. I didn’t want to go but she pushed me to get ahead, to make more money so that she could have nicer things. Plus there were the bills to pay, plastic surgery doesn’t come cheap and the BMW wasn’t a gift from Germany. So I was off to support my bored wife, doing a job I hated so I could try and make her happy. She didn’t work, always said no one would hire her, that she didn’t want to do the jobs she could get. I can’t remember how many times she told me she wanted a house with a pool, nicer car, better clothes. Writing software was supposed to provide all of this for her. I suppose it can if one was really motivated, I was not.
It would have been nice to give the guy the bill for taking the wife out for a spin. “Here you go dude, your cost of the upkeep for this woman for one night is itemized right here. 65.88 for plastic surgery. 380.19 for BMW payments and insurance. 61.03 for clothing, makeup and sundries. 207.36 for spa and beauty treatments. Just write me a check and enjoy yourself.”
Of course no bill would ever cover the heart ache, pain and desolation an affair can bring to a marriage. That night was the fatal beginning of the end, the butterfly effect that leads to a hurricane. Even years later I don’t have an answer as to why, I know now there is no why, some people have no empathy, no sense of morals, no thoughts but only for themselves.
I walked down there again the day after the St Francis river fiasco. My final resting spot of dirt still sits there, no watery grave for me this time. The St. Francis taught me something, I don’t want to die. I had the chance, right there, right in front of me to let go and sink down and I didn’t. For some reason, some drive, some stupid base instinct I swam.
The sun slowly sinks into the southern shore of the Missouri river. Looking around I can watch people entering the bar. There are the standard types, married couples out for a drink wearing their work clothes, tired of each other and of their lives; guys looking to score, all dressed up in what passes for well to do out here; groups of girls with high heels and too much makeup looking for someone to take them away. It’s early yet and the night crowd is just starting to show up. Later the inhibitions will be broken down by loud music and cocktails. Girls grinding on guys will work themselves into heat. For all I know a few more marriage contracts might be broken in this parking lot tonight.
Walking home I am glad to have the bar at my back. The early night air is moist, the town just settling in to sleep and I have the streets to myself. Several houses have their windows and doors open to the mild night and I can catch the noise of the domestic life inside. Mostly television, occasionally a real human voice, parents yelling for the children, children yelling for their pets. You can tell a lot about people just from walking by their house and observing the yard, house and cars.
I look more carefully at the houses I think are of married couples. The yards are nicer, usually a car and a truck in the drive, windows have curtains instead of blinds. Half of all of these marriages are going to fall apart. Some of them easily, some of them painfully, but half are doomed, this is the way of our land.
Chapter 19: the happy hunting grounds
“Quiet, stay low and always keep something between you and the target” , Walker whispers . “Most animals have screwed up vision and have trouble seeing you if you hold still and have a branch or something obscuring you. Don’t ever move when an animal is looking at you.” He was flat on his stomach, his head up to watch the horses. We were on the edge of a clearing, looking onto a small field nestled in the trees. Six horses were there, eating clover in the warm morning sun. We could smell the horses now, not a bad smell, just different.
He had led us into the wind to find them. The wind, he had told me as we started our hike, does more than carry scent, it can also carry sound. This didn’t make sense to me but it is hard to argue with someone who knows so much more than I. “Walking up on a herd is hard, cause they are always watching but I have shown myself to them several times, been able to touch the horse I am after, so I am not worried,” Walker says as we scoot back from the edge of the clearing. He is carrying a rope, halter and a small sack with a bit of grain in it.
When we started our hike this morning I asked if today was the day to catch the horse. He explained that he had to bring everything with him that he would need when he finally did decide to grab one so as not to show up with anything new to the horse that day. Horses were smarter than most people believed, a new smell or site might be enough to make the horse skittish.
“You can watch from here, but don’t move, make any noise or do anything to startle the horses” Walker said “I’m going to go get close to the one I am after and just spend some time with it.
He waited a moment for me to settle in then made his approach. Walking slowly, only small step every minute or so he came into the horses view. He held the rope in one hand, with a loop dangling and the feed bag in his other hand. He cooed softly as he went gently shaking the feed bag.
The horses noticed him immediately. All of their heads were up and attention focused on him. They had quit feeding and rotated their ears to point in his direction. He quit going forward but continued to coo and shake the feed. A few minutes later the horses begin to lose interest and return to eating. Still cooing he moves forward, again the horses notice him and look, lose interest and return to eating. This goes on for each step, the horses noticing him but not seeming concerned.
Horses don’
t stand still when they graze, but move a step or two after several bites. Watching the horses I notice them shifting, they are mostly moving away from him. One horse is not concerned though and makes no effort to eat farther from Walker.
After what seems like an eternity, but in reality was probably thirty minutes or less, Walker is next to the un afraid horse. He shakes the feed a little louder and the horse raises its head and takes a bite from the bag. It crunches the oats and looks at Walker, then takes another bite from the bag.
Walker gently touches the horse, starting at the shoulder, just smoothing the hair on it. The horse doesn’t shy away, but moves a step closer and eats more. Walker continues to rub the horse, I can see him knocking away horse flies as he runs his hand over the coat. Soon the bag is empty and the horse walks away. No fear in it, no hurry, just looking for its next bite. Walker backs away from the animals, still moving slowly, but not nearly as slow as before.
“That was amazing” I say as he returns to where I am watching them.
“Nothing to it, slowly build their trust, the one I was with is the one I am after. If he wasn’t with the herd he would have been easier. Those other horses are wild and skittish of me. This is about the tenth time I’ve approached the herd and the first time I’ve touched that horse so much, usually I just stand close.”
“When you going to try and ride that horse?”
“Oh not for a while, once I catch it and ride it I can’t let it go. You got to look at it from the slaves perspective. That horse was once a slave, a well fed, well groomed slave but a slave none the less. Now it is free, does it want to go back to its life of servitude or does it want to rough it out in the woods with its friends?”
Walker looks at me as if expecting me to have an answer. “I have no idea.”
“Me neither, that’s why I won’t risk it. I don’t have enough feed to keep him for long, once I grab him I’ve got to get out of here pretty quick. I figure, once I have grabbed him, I can have him reasonably tamed in a month. Just a guess but he has on shoes, that tells me that he was once owned, you don’t shoe a horse if you aren’t going to ride it so I bet he is already broken, he just needs some reminding.”