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| The sky was really strange the other night—the clouds almost looked oily and had a sheen to them that the photos dont capture. (And no, I wasnt wearing a tinfoil hat.) |
Well, I made it back to the desert near Moab, Utah, where Im now camped in my gypsy cargo trailer. I made a few modifications to make it more liveable—changed the bed from a double into a single, which freed up an aisle that makes it easier to get around the bed, plus adds room for dog beds and a shelf, which the cats promptly took over.
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I also splurged and bought a nice thick featherbed and memory-foam pad, both which help my gimpy back, as well as a down comforter on top of the featherbed, but it all now makes it necessary for me to climb into bed using a small step-stool (a la the Princess and the Pea), kind of like getting on a tall horse—and thus the need for more floor space for dog beds, as Cassies now the only one who can jump up there (Weezee and Moki are too fat but are slimming down rapidly lest Cassie get the better of them on this one). (The previous sentence proves that your English teacher was wrong about run-on sentences being impossible to process—well, maybe, anyway.)
Besides, with a twin bed, theres now not much room up there, especially when the cats decide the bed looks even comfier than the shelves, which they usually do around 3 a.m. Its kind of like I imagine what living with flying monkeys would be like, and of course the cats are getting fatter and fatter without much exercise, as jumping down off shelves doesnt burn many calories, since gravity does most of the work. They do go outside a lot in their cat tent, but they mostly just lay around watching the bluejays eat the nuts I throw out for their entertainment.
The days are awesome—in the 60s—but the nights are getting chilly, down in the mid-30s, so Im using my little Blackcat propane heater. I was starting to get a bit depressed from the long nights, but I bought a set of LED rope lights and strung them around the ceiling, and now things seem better. Amazing how we humans have evolved to be such daylight creatures.
Along those lines, theres not a soul within miles, and Moab is pretty quiet, which makes this the nicest time of the entire year, given the great weather. But when I go out at night, everything seems kind of primal, and even though I really want to stay out and star gaze, as the night sky here is stupendous, I feel a sense of uncertainty.
I wont let the dogs out after dark as the coyotes have been making quite a ruckus around camp since I got here (theyre yipping as I write this). One even knocked on the door last night and asked for scraps. I gave it some cat food.
In any case, theres sure not much that can beat living out here, cats, dogs, coyotes, and all.
And all those stories of long lost lives
Written on paper-thin sand
Holy flashflood has stolen
Into Mesozoic land.(From my book, Uranium Daughter)
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| Some photos of my LED lights—this is what you do on long nights indoors while the coyotes call... |
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