Rabbits and Foxes

 Jax and I are grid searching the area south of the Wind Caves. We've made occasional forays out there but never anything organized to try and find everything. I usually work until noon, feed the day critters, birds, squirrels, and chipmunks and then Jax and I spend the next four to five hours hiking and it's dark by then. Just a couple hours in to exploring all the tracks we had seen were rabbits and foxes and nothing else. Going to sit out there some evening with night vision and watch the the night of life and death.

The most recognizable part of the Rabbits and Foxes area is what we've always called Four Fingers and a Thumb but apparently has a real name called Solstice Tower. Jax walks with his nose to the ground each day as he collects data and I with my eyes scanning for tracks or anything unusual or moving.

Each day when we leave to go hiking I'm sore. It's difficult to put the boots on and I feel the pain in the thighs as I lift my legs to tie the laces of my boots on the benches. Sometimes, maybe every other day, something really hurts on the hike, top of my foot one day, tie the boots tighter, pull the strings real tight. A leg cramp, walk it out. A little pop in the knee, walk a little different to take the pressure off. Usually they go away in a day or two and something new comes up. Falling apart and healing at the same time. These are all little wounds. Just don't want the big one or permanent one.

I was in the military for eight years as a stockade guard and occasionally escorting prisoners to Leavenworth. It was spin off of Military Police. There were four of us that road dirt bikes together. Terreault, Tornbloom, Thomas, and me. Steve Thomas had a shoulder that would come out of the socket. Sometimes other guards would shake his hand, yank on his arm, and he'd fall down on the pavement or office floor with his arm flopping all around. It was pretty painful and hard to watch until it went back in the socket. We all rode with gear, helmets, gloves, long sleeve shirt, long pants, and boots. Steve rode with a helmet, t-shirt, shorts, and sandals. It was the mountains of Colorado and things could and did go wrong. Best to be careful.

One day we're riding a narrow little trail and we come to a steep part. I shoot up and just barely make it over the top, Terreault is right behind me and he barely makes it then Tornbloom. When Steve gets to the top, there's no more room. He falls backwards down the hill and his 400 Suzuki lands on top of him. It's already 100 degrees out and add another 100 or so to his exhaust pipe and muffler which land on his unprotected thighs and pin him to the side of the hill. He reaches out with his hands to push it off him and grabs the tailpipe and muffler. He screams in pain as he burns his hands and it falls back on his knees re-pinning him to the side of the hill. I can smell flesh burning. We want to get to him and help but it's like watching a train wreck as one car piles into another, and another.....

Steve finally gets out from under the Suzuki. His thighs are burned, his knees, his hands, he's a mess. He takes off his helmet. Grabs it by the strap and starts swinging it around and says "Damn Colorado, damn mountains" Then he throws his helmet down the side of the mountain. When he does his arm comes out of the socket. Somebody had cut some wood and made a little pile. Four logs on the bottom, three next layer up, then two and then one on top. Steve in a great deal of pain stumbles backwards and falls over the pile of wood into a whole bunch of cactus. His arm is flopping all over the place picking up 10 or 15 needles each time it hits cactus. We get to him to try and help him but his arm is an out of control weapon flopping in every direction with hundreds of cactus needles sticking out and picking up more with every slap of the ground. When his arm finally goes back in the socket all three of us spend the next hour or so with needle nose pliers pulling cactus out of Steve's arm.

In all this hiking if some injury does happen and goes bad permanently I hope it ain't that one.