Today’s trivia involves the three things that every town in Wyoming has in common.
1. A taxidermy shop (more heads on your wall = way more manly and respected/envied by your peers)
2. More antelope/mule deer than people (they completely overrun all the best bars)
3. A liquor store and/or bar (which are overrun by mule deer and antelope)
On a slightly more serious note, it froze last night- October 5th, 2008.
A chill begins to set in over the wandering hills of Wyoming, nipping at the noses of each respective sage bush and cottontail rabbit. My watch battery died and I haven’t found the time (I know…a bad Megan joke) to replace it. Without time attached to my body during every second of my being like it has been all summer, time has seemed to slow to a crawl, a slow pitter-patter, like the plod of a fat prairie cow looking for the nearest source of water. Winter is whispering in the Wyoming wind as fat Canadian geese fly overhead and quaking aspen trees leaves begin to turn the slightest shade of yellow. I have found myself shopping in the figurative aisles (as in on the internet) of fleece-lined work pants and moisture-wicking polyester shirts to fight off the bitter cold that I hear is the cowboy winter.
Another kind of chill has just set in—the chill of yet again, saying goodbye to dear friends made within the confines of the government compound—the barracks—and I grit my teeth and prepare to wade through the weather until October with the remaining 4 seasonal employees. I am the last in the women’s housing as of yesterday, and so I’m regressing to my ways at the beginning of the summer and avoiding my house (although then it was because it was too full!). Since I was, yet again, the last roommate in the house I’ve found myself with more random odds and ends of food than I know what to do with, including but not limited to, four bottles of vegetable oil, two boxes of stale triscuts, as well as 3 squash and a dozen fresh tomatoes (won’t complain!).
And what better to bite back the chill but a wooly hat and a warm chocolate cake? I have a morbid curiosity as to whether or not I can survive the winter in Wyoming, and the fighter in me wants to wait it out and take it blow by blow. I have work until December and I have applied for a 6-month internship to tide me over til next summer when I can work my range tech position again (I should find out whether I’ve secured that in a week or so). So even though I’m working, it doesn’t feel like I have any long term plans except, enjoying life, burning gas, paying student loans, and fighting the man. This somewhat transient career choice also makes me feel less like I’m in the real world and more like the school year, a pleasant transition if I do say so myself.
It’s hunting season here in Wyoming, and the BLM office has been reduced to about half at any given day during the week as people who have been saving up their leave time all year to get out in the field. My boss, included.
“What do you have planned for me Mike?” I ask, thinking the reply will result in some sort of to-do list.
“Just keep busy Megan, I trust you,” comes Mike’s reply.
And this is the laid-back mentality of my government job.
And with the nothing-to-do blues, I took the day off and purchased some quality reading: “Homebrewing for Dummies.” I’ll be sure to let you all know when I get all the gear for it and start putting out some product. It looks to be a minor/Major-for-Megan-living-in-Rawlins investment, but an important one I’m sure.
For all those so fortunate as to be in limbo for the time being, count your blessings. There will ALWAYS be work. We will work for the rest of our lives, in fact. I began to notice this very recently, and that is the second reason I took the day off.
Being back and forth to Colorado all summer, and conversing with Alice last weekend and fellow gov employee, Tony, I have definitely decided that Colorado is pretentious and somehow a little fake. I felt it most in places like Boulder and Ft. Collins, and may have not notice it at all if I didn’t have Wyoming to contrast it with. Actually, some cowboys recycle too, though you would never guess it. I’m still in a mixed phase about all of this, but Wyoming has definitely grown on me. Another little contrast btw Wyoming in Boulder. When I went hiking with Alice, Ari, and Sophie in Boulder, we were constantly sidestepping for the 100+ people we saw on our way up. Hiking in Wyoming with my roomie Van, we saw a man on a bike and a deer. That was all.
With another bone-chilling rush of Wyoming wind, the leaves have begun to shed their greens and are donning yellows and reds with the rush of an old woman, donning her coat to keep out the cold. Everything seems the same and yet so different that I guess I don’t know how to describe it. I guess I just find it more important to tell the story.
What’s yours?
Warm and squishy downy coat hugs from Wyoming,
Meg
