Whiskey, Stars, and a Hawk's Last Stand
Part 2 of a Pronghorn Saga
It was the craziest thing. A Redtail Hawk standing on the dashed, white center line of I-90 facing upstream into bumper-to-bumper, 85mph, traffic on the rolling plains of eastern South Dakota. I held my breath from the left lane as we approached and whizzed past, afraid to look in my rear-view mirror. It was supernatural, the way it proudly stood there, defiantly facing certain death. It conjured a mental image of a mid-19th century Native American Chief with a full headdress, defiantly standing chest out in the face of a U.S. Calvary soldier pointing a Sharps carbine at him.
When we finally made it to pronghorn country, the three of us met up at a historic saloon that dated back to the 1800’s on the Bozeman Trail. It had old west charm, complete with the original bar and bullet holes still visible in the walls from gunfights fought between cowboys, outlaws, and adventurers.
An old cowboy was playing a parlor-style acoustic guitar in the back corner underneath a dusty pronghorn shoulder mount. I couldn’t make out the make of the guitar from where we sat near the bar, but it sounded like an old Washburn. We ordered country fried steak and a couple rounds of cheap whiskey to celebrate Tom’s birthday. I’m not much of a drinker and puked it up later that night as silently as I could so as to not wake up Jason and Tom in our cheap, two bed motel room.
We camped on the river for the next week, or so. Sleeping in till around 8am, black coffee, breakfast. Watching the herd of sheep or the herd of cattle come down to the river each morning to drink. Every now and then a small group of pronghorn would join them. Some days we’d drive around to find pronghorn to stalk, some days we’d split up and hike out from camp. The cattle were never quite sure of what to think of us and would tip toe into camp every few days and gawk at our setup. The sheep kept their distance.
Nights were spent telling stories of the day’s stalks, talking about philosophy, astronomy, politics, dreams. At some point each of us would climb to the top of a nearby hill to get barely enough service to send a text message to the other side of the country. Having fun, didn’t get one yet. Everyone is safe. I love you, will check back in tomorrow.
We ate and drank and sang and played the guitar in the dark then retreated to our beds each night. I slept in the bed of my truck with the tonneau cover rolled up just enough so I could lie there in my down sleeping bag and stare into millions of cowboy stars until I fell asleep.
Most nights I thought about pronghorn, affirming to myself it was so hard I had nothing to lose by being more aggressive each day. Who cares how the story ends?
Some nights my thoughts would wander to my Dad who passed away earlier that year and how in those last days I must have told him I loved him every ten minutes. Partly because I didn’t have the words, partly because hearing him say it back made everything feel like it was going to be ok. I thought about my dad a lot on that trip while staring out into the endless sage and blue skies. I was still in a place where I wasn’t sure if his energy could hear my thoughts or if I had to say them out loud. The western meadowlarks and sage thrashers didn’t look at me funny as I seemingly talked to myself so it was ok.
A shooting star glides overhead, I roll over in my sleeping bag and my thoughts return to the hawk on the interstate. In a parallel universe I stopped and saved it. In another, the hawk sticks it’s wings out and slides backwards, it’s talons grinding and digging into the asphalt, as it stops the lead car in the right and left lane, causing a massive pileup behind them. On this night, the only thing that consoles me to sleep is the realization of how sudden whatever the outcome was here in this universe.
To be continued…