Category Archives: Mountain Living

THIS Is 40, or You Are the Wind Beneath my Bat Wings

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There are a lot of things people never tell you about hitting age 40 and beyond.

A blog just isn’t legitimate until there’s a picture of the Ropers in it.

Sure, I knew about the wrinkles and gray hair coming my way. I knew my eyesight would begin to worsen and I’d be shopping for Mrs. Roper-style-hanging-around-my-neck drugstore glasses at some point. And my doctor kept warning me about the “belly roll” that would collect and be hard to get rid of in my 40s. (Can’t they come up with another term for it? Like Lower Abdomen Memory Foam?)

But here’s what they don’t tell you. They don’t tell you that the pimples of your high school years will start coming back and your chin is gonna start to look like your freshman yearbook picture. For no apparent reason. They don’t tell you that your joints will start making sounds reminiscent of old, haunted-house hardwood floors. And it’s scary. Really scary.

This is what came up in an image search on Google for a “complicated outfit.”

They don’t tell you that those ads you used to laugh at that targeted women with a “sudden urge to urinate” might one day not be so funny, especially when you happen to be wearing an awesome, complicated outfit that, well, takes a while to remove.

And yes, they may have told me that my skin would one day fight back from the years of baby-oil tanning, but they sure as hell did not tell me that the fight would include having strange-looking skin tags frozen off my body in a dermatologist office once a year. Seriously, no one EVER mentioned the freezing machine. That thing burns like a mother.

But mostly, they didn’t tell me about bat wings.

Listen, I’ve never been especially proud of my arms, but they weren’t hideous before. A few scars and red scales, but fairly firm, I would say. After all, I can hold my own tossing cattle feed bags and I’m a master snow-shoveler. We’re talking heavy, wet spring mountain snow, too. Not any of this dry powdery two-inch stuff down here in the foothills. (Mountain snob alert.)

These are not my bat wings. Mine are way sexier.

Regardless, something has changed. I now have a layer of bonafide flab hanging down on each arm, flapping in the wind like sheets on a clothes line. And as sexy as that sounds, it’s upsetting.

The first time I noticed them I was putting my hair in a ponytail in front of a mirror and actually looked behind me to see if someone else was possibly standing there with their own bat wings. No such luck.

Of course, my first course of action was to look online to see if I was the only one that this was happening to so early in life. I mean, I thought bat wings were for women in their 60s. Turns out, they indeed start in your 40s, as “middle-aged skin is like cotton with less snap,” causing sagging.

First of all, WebMD, don’t call me middle-aged. And secondly, I want Spandex arms back.

Experts say you can do boot-camp-style tricep exercises to help, but not completely solve the problem. Which does not in any way sound encouraging or appealing. Plus, as Sweet Brown says, ain’t nobody got time for that.

You can also have upper-arm liposuction. But if I’m not going under the knife for the aforementioned lower abdomen memory foam, I’m not risking my life for my breeze-making upper arms.

I tell my son that I love my muffin top (which he so generously pointed out to me after seeing a weight-loss commercial one day. It’s a good thing he’s cute.). I tell him that it’s a souvenir from lots of good food and good times. But these bat wings? I don’t know that they represent anything but old age and the lack of funds and courage to hire Jillian Michaels to yell at me.

By the way (ATTENTION: stop reading here if you are easily offended!) when I googled “bat wings” during my research, I came upon a horrible discovery. Apparently, according to Urban Dictionary, there are other slang definitions for bat wings that have nothing to do with arms. They include but are not limited to:

  •  A woman’s large vaginal skin
  • The spreading and sticking of a man’s testicles to his inner thigh. This usually happens at random in summer and is caused by perspiration and must be physically unstuck.
  • When a female neglects grooming in the pubic region and wears a bikini.
  • One that I just cannot bring myself to type right now.

Nothing like a little Urban Dictionary to make you 1) gag and 2) feel even older than 40. You’re welcome.

And …. now … I don’t feel so bad about my arms for some reason. Maybe I’ll just buy me some Mrs. Roper tunics. You know you want some, too.

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Putting Up the Tree — and Missing My Mammaw and Granny Like Crazy

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Well, first I’ll get the mountain-snob snarkiness out of the way: It’s just plain weird to me to put up a Christmas tree in Colorado when there is no snow on the ground, no howling wind outside your door, no traipsing through knee-deep drifts to find the perfect tree, no fire burning in the wood stove. You get the picture. That was always our life when we lived at the top of a mountain. And I loved everything about it.

Down here in the foothills, we put up our tree today, and it was 60 degrees and not a flurry in sight. I wore shorts. We got our tree from a commercial seller.  It was too warm for a fire in the fireplace. Blah, blah.

But there are a few things that didn’t change. First, we made kettle corn to munch on while we decorated our tree (Grand Fir, $34.99. Ooops, snark returns.) We played Christmas music (on Pandora instead of CDs – hey, you can’t stop progress). And we pulled out all the same ornaments we use every year.

And that’s when I always start to miss my grandmothers, both of whom have passed away, so bad it’s a downright physical thing.

My grandmothers (Mammaw on my mother’s side, and Granny on my dad’s) could not have been more different, but I have such great memories of time spent with them both at the holidays.

I’m lucky that we lived fairly close to both of my grandmothers, and that both liked us girls to help them decorate for the holidays after Thanksgiving.

With Mammaw, it was fragile glass ornaments and shiny, gold-beaded balls she’d made herself. It was a pristine white angel with real feathers as wings as the topper. Some years, it was a full, lush tree flocked with fake white snow. It was white lights and a silver-trimmed tree skirt, probably bought from a department store. It was Eddie Arnold on the stereo. It was quiet and beautiful.

When my grandfather passed away (Mammaw left us years earlier), my mom shared some of Mammaw’s ornaments with me, and I cherish them. There are a couple of delicate antique ornaments in gold and red and silver, and two of her ornaments she decorated herself with old jewelry and tiny sequins and pins. They are as classy and lovely as she was. And they make me miss her so much. Our conversations. Our games of cards. Her Thanksgiving turkey and dressing. Her walking around with that kitchen towel on her shoulder as she cooked holiday meals. Her long, lean, soft hands that, as she got older and sick, she’d ask me to hold.

And then there are the items I have from Granny that take me back to the holidays at her house. She was a ranch woman, but she also loved to crochet. Those rough, calloused hands were like magic when it came to yarn. I have crocheted icicles and snowflakes she made – their hangers are old bread ties in green and red and blue. I specifically bought big, round, frosted bulbs this year to put on our tree, based solely on the fact that she had some similar on her tree every year. (They were from the 1960s, I swear, and we often worried that they’d get so hot, they’d catch the tree on fire.)

This is what a mesquite tree looks like, for you non-South Texans.

And her tree! Oh, I loved Granny’s approach to her tree. It was usually just a cedar tree we’d cut from the pasture, lopsided and wispy and perfect. She didn’t have a tree stand; we’d just plop the tree trunk in a bucket and fill it with rocks to hold `er steady. Ornaments were mostly handmade by either her or us kids. We always added store-bought tinsel of some kind, and red-and-white candy canes. Lots of multi-colored, twinkling lights were a must, too. She’d hang mistletoe up (real mistletoe, people!). Plus she had some plastic pine garland we’d hang over the entrance to the living room, from the dining room. With fake red berries. There’d be nails up there from the year before to tuck the garland behind, or we’d just use scotch tape.

After we decorated our tree today, we made cookies as a family, and I found my Granny’s old recipe for Cherry Cream Delight, which is basically just Cool Whip, a can of cherry pie filling, cream cheese, and graham crackers. Man, I loved that stuff. And I think I’ll be making it this year.

It’s nice to have my grandmothers’ things around me during the holidays, since I can’t have them here with me anymore. But what I wouldn’t give to, just one more time, hear Granny say, “No need to rush off now,” late on Christmas Eve, or to hear Mammaw shooing us out of her kitchen on Christmas Day.

Miss you both.

What do love most about your grandmothers and the holidays? I’d love to hear about others’ memories, too.

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What I’m Thankful for Right Now, in This Moment

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New and old friends and family who support my writing. A six-year-old who can already cook up a mean batch of fried catfish. Sonic ice and Dr Pepper. A husband who buys me Sonic ice because he knows it makes me happy. Two furry babies who make me smile, no matter how very bad they can be. My publisher, 30 Day Books (Laura Pepper Wu and Brandon Wu) — it’s so darn awesome to know that there are good, kind people all over the world, and that I have these folks on my side. Jeremy Kron for his wonderful work on my novels’ cover and interior design. My new job with Truven Health Analytics. I’m loving the work so much. Knowing that I’ll get to see my family and taste my mama’s cooking in just a couple of weeks. My Kindle Fire. Brilliant writing by people who inspire me. The herd of deer hanging out on our road this evening. The Rocky Mountains. Fresh mountain air. Memory foam. This laptop. Friends I know will be there for me if I need them. Texas Hill Country pecans, found at a Target in Colorado, believe it or not. Cool cotton pillowcases. Good wine. Stand-up comedians. A mother- and father-in-law who adore my son and treat us all with overwhelming generosity. The good health of myself, my family and my friends. The music of Lyle Lovett. Sara Lee pies because I don’t have time to make my own. Readers out there in the universe who are reading my novels and taking the time to let me know that my words touched them somehow. Every single person who has written a review of either of my novels. My eyesight. A soft, warm blanket on a chilly night. Stars. Avocados. Dark chocolate. Ariat boots. Vacuum cleaners. Wild Orange essential oil. A massage therapist as a spouse. And the sound of my angel-son saying, “I love you, mama,” as he drifts off to sleep.

What are you thankful for right now, in this moment? (Don’t think about it deeply, just spit out what comes to mind. It’s nice sometimes to just Let. It. Out.) PS: Vacuum is a weird word, isn’t it?

 

 

 

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Our Dogs Are Going to Get Us Kicked out of the Neighborhood

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Observation #2 of living like normal people: People down here are way more up into my business.

Let me explain.

Hoodlum One: Trouble. Offense: Eating stuffed animals that are not his.

We have two golden retriever mixes, Trouble and Sky. And I will admit it to the world: They are hoodlums! They believe it is their job to destroy socks, pillows, t-shirts, towels, and the occasional pine tree. They also believe they must protect us from the very dangerous white-tail deer that lurk around this new house. And they are fully committed to their jobs.

That means they bark when there are deer around. And unlike at 10,500 ft., where the deer are still very much wild and don’t stick around if a dog barks at them, the deer down here look at our dogs, like, “Yeah. Whatever. Bark at me all you want. I can’t hear you. You’re invisible to me. And this tall grass is really good, by the way. You should try it.”

This infuriates the hoodlums. First, they don’t like grass anyway unless they are sick. And second, the message they send back to the deer is this: “Fine. I will bark my head off and foam at the mouth like I have rabies if you continue to just stand there.”

Further complicating things (for me), is that, unlike in the mountains, the houses here are right on top of one another (literally, since we live on a hill.)

So, it was only a matter of time before a neighbor decided he must talk to us about our barking dogs, on behalf of another neighbor. (So he says. I can’t hear you ….)

Hoodlum Two: Sky. Offense: Never sharing chewbones and being quite vocal about it.

This neighbor also told us he has observed our dogs and he does not believe that we walk them enough. And that he feels sorry for the dogs when they bark like that. Ummmm. We do walk our dogs, and we play with them for at least two hours a day in the backyard, and they are actually treated pretty much like humans …. which is better than this dude treats his girlfriend, from what we’ve heard of their conversations. (Maybe they’re not getting in enough walks together.)

So there you go. When you decide to leave the mountains and live like normal people, it seems you have to actually DEAL with people. And that’s just not something I’m good at.

P.S. Observation #1 – it’s damn hot down here. I have Al the Swamp Cooler blowing on me and the hoodlums right now, in fact. Yes, the hoodlums are so mistreated, lounging on my bed, chewing on massive chewbones with cool air blowing in their faces. But hey, at least they’re not annoying nosy neighbors.

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Saying Goodbye to My Dream, or the One-Year Experiment with Normal Living

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Dear cabin, I’ll miss you.

It’s difficult for me to even type these words, but here it goes: This is the last week of life at 10,500 feet above sea level for me. [insert sobbing noises]

At least for a year.

That’s right. We are conducting a grand experiment that involves moving from our beautiful log cabin at the top of a mountain, along the Continental Divide, to a larger home at a much lower altitude.

In other words, we’re trading crazy for how regular people must live. And I’m not sure I can survive it.

I’ve done a whole lot of writing and relaxing on this deck in the summer.

Why the move? A lot of reasons, I guess. My husband has given me 10+ years of living in a raw, often brutal climate. That’s pretty darn good considering I gave him three months when we first moved up here. He was a suburban boy who’d never used a chainsaw back then, a guy who practically lived in movie theaters. Now, thanks mostly to Netflix and heavy drinking (kidding), he’s adapted quite well. But he’s tired of the drive, which can be about as dangerous as it gets in the winter, i.e., nine months out of the year. He’s tired of the snow. (When Denver gets a foot of snow, we get three.) He’s tired of the hardships of mountain living, which can range from temperatures that hit 50 below for days on end, 90 mile-an-hour winds and mountain lions on the prowl for snacks like our son and dogs, to days without power and weeks without water. And I’ll admit these things wear on me, too, some days.

So the answer: We’re testing the lower-altitude waters by renting a home in the foothills west of Denver. At a whopping 6,500 feet. That’s 4,000 feet and two ecosystems lower than where we live now.

At the new place, we’ll have things we’ve learned to live without for over a decade. (A decade!) Things like a garage. Trash pickup. Newspaper delivery. The opportunity to grow things in the spring and fall. The ability to take a walk in the winter without putting on professional snow gear. The capacity to not have a week’s worth of blizzard supplies in your car at all times just in case you careen off the side of a mountain on your morning commute. It’ll be a whole new world for us.

So what’s not to like about the move? Why am I so grumpy I had to warn my family to stay away from me while we packed boxes this past weekend?

My neighborhood.

Because this was my dream. When I moved to Colorado, I knew I wanted to experience true mountain living, with all of its ups and downs. I didn’t want comfort; I wanted adventure. I wanted an authentic log cabin. I wanted to heat with wood that I cut with my own hands. I wanted to write in total peace and quiet, and thrive under the watchful eye of a golden eagle and the supervision of tall pine trees and groves of golden aspens.

Besides, I like the challenges this life presents to me. I like that I can’t get complacent here; Nature keeps me on my toes. I like that the air up here feels unlike any other air I’ve ever breathed. I like that the blue sky here is so crisp and so exquisite that it can make you literally gasp from the pureness of it all. I like that on a clear night, the dark sky is like a field of a million diamonds above me, stars so close you think you could really touch them if you tried. I like that I can walk to our meadow and see wildlife every time, because bears, deer, moose, elk, coyotes and foxes are our closest (and best) neighbors. I like that I can trout-fish in our creek or mountain lakes with my son all summer long and never have the same experience twice. I like that I don’t have to drive to get to hiking trails; amazing ones are outside my door. I like that I can snow-shoe or cross-country ski on my lunch hour when I work from home in the winter. I like that the summer wildflowers can be so breathtakingly beautiful that there really are no words to describe them.

Mostly, I think, I like that not just anyone can make it up here. I like that it makes me different. And frankly, I like what it says about me: I’m strong. I’m resourceful. I’m fearless.

I’m basically bad-ass.

And yet. Did I mention there was a garage at the new place?

So, I have promised to give this a chance. I will embrace my 2.5 bathrooms and the fact that I can now recycle at the end of my driveway. And I’ll try really hard not to get progressively meaner when fall and winter settle in, and I’m living in complete and utter comfort, with not a carnivore predator or a four-foot blizzard in sight.

I’ll also try to remember this quote from Winston Churchill: “We shape our dwellings, and then our dwellings shape us.”

After all, the mountain has shaped me in so many ways. But there are things the new place can teach me, too.

Right?

At least this way I’ll be closer to Texas Roadhouse and a good liquor store.

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The Things That Can’t Be Replaced

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My son and I were staining our deck rails yesterday afternoon, commenting on the fact that it had reached 83 degrees on the top of our mountain—one of the hottest days we’ve ever experienced in my nearly 11 years up here.

That’s when we heard the sirens—three different ones by our count. My five-year-old is one of the smartest kids in the world (I’m sure of it), and he looked at me and said, “Wildfire, Mom.”

Weekend photo of the High Park Fire in northern Colorado

We both had tuned into the news earlier and knew of other fires burning in Colorado. The record heat and low humidity were not doing firefighters any favors. So we knew the conditions were bad all around us. But even though I could’ve really used a triple shot of vodka right then to calm my worry, I reassured my son that everything was fine, and we went back to painting.

Then our neighbor came over … said there actually was a fire, just a few miles down the mountain. The road was closed and volunteers were preparing to go door to door to evacuate folks, if things took a turn. We weren’t in immediate danger, but we should be ready to leave.

Now, we live in the middle of a national forest and near many backcountry recreation areas, where campers and tourists and off-roaders congregate, and where a campfire or cigarette butt could get out of hand at any time—fire ban or not. So we are generally prepared with important documents in one place, ready to grab if needed. So that was the easy part.

I asked my son to pack his 10 favorite toys—mostly just to keep him busy while I decided what else needed to go with us, if the need arose. I thought of all those people in northern Colorado who have lost their homes recently to the High Park Fire, the second largest in the state’s history (still burning and only 45 percent contained). More than 200 homes have been lost so far. I thought of all those folks in Texas last year who suffered when the flurry of wildfires hit in early September. I wondered if they’d had any warning … if they’d had the luxury of the time we had this afternoon to think clearly about what could and couldn’t be replaced. I hoped that they did.

We’d had another wildfire scare in 2002, before our son was born. We’d gotten the “prepare to evacuate” notice. We sprayed our roof down with water. I remember thinking back then that packing a few things wasn’t all that difficult. My husband and I were at a point in our lives when we didn’t have tons of “stuff.” We lived simply in our mountain log cabin. Other than a few family heirlooms and our wedding album, most of what we had could be easily replaced. Basically, I needed my laptop, with all of my current writing files; a pair of jeans and boots; a couple of t-shirts; and my dogs. That was it.

My boys reading on Christmas Eve ... and the kind of photo that it would hurt to lose.

This time, it was completely different. There were the photos and scrapbooks and videos, of course. But also the monster truck and fireman and school bus and tractor drawings. The watercolor paintings, and preschool and kindergarten crafts, and “I love you, Mom” notes. The few baby items I’d saved, like his first cowboy boots, his first Texas A&M t-shirt, the clothes we brought him home from the hospital in, his baby blanket, his first Miami Dolphins’ jersey (my husband’s a huge fan, bless his heart). A favorite rattle. All the portraits on the walls from the baby years to the toddler years to preschool and then kindergarten. There were notes and letters from my son’s birthparents. There was every pine cone and rock he has ever collected on a hike, that he gave to me for “safekeeping.” And my journals of his first years, and my first years of being a mom and trying to balance career and baby and life. His favorite books that we’ve read together a million times … the first ones he could read to us by himself.

The thought of losing any of these things made me ache so deeply that I can’t even begin to explain it. I suppose this is just one more way that being a parent changes everything. Damn kids. They really do worm their way into our very being, don’t they?

The day ended just fine, by the way. The fire was brought under control quickly (thank you, firefighters!!) and we were never asked to leave. But it is going to be a long summer, so I went ahead and packed up as much I could in a few boxes, just in case.

Hank is pretty much a celebrity in our house.

As for the Stinkbug, here’s what was in his box: one big red bouncy ball that cost 75 cents from Walmart, all of his Hank the Cowdog books, four monster trucks, five Hot Wheels cars, a glow-in-the-dark football, his new guitar, two die-cast jet planes, two stuffed animals, a box of colored pencils, a Slinky that no longer slinks, and his Johnny Cash and Jack Johnson CDs.

I love that kid.

And you know, I suppose that when it comes down to it, if all my husband and son and I really had left was each other, we’d still be living pretty high on the hog.

(Note to the Fire Gods … please don’t test this theory. Please? I really really like my comfy bed and my new coffeemaker and my collection of boots and that one really cool necklace I have made of recycled watch parts, and the Adirondack chair my dad built me and that one pair of jeans that fits just right after 100 washings and and and …)

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