Chasing a Dream: A Horseman's Memoir Read online

  SKEETER

  In the spring of ‘68’, on the day Skeeter was born. Dad came to the house and said, “Grant, quick. Come outside. I got a surprise for you!”

  I knew our palomino mare Sugar had been ready to give birth. I ran out to the barn, and there on the ground lay a tiny mule foal, still wet. Unlike the typical sorrel mules Sugar had foaled in the past, this one was a gold color with white mane and tail--a palomino mule. The little mule, his long ears moving checking out the new world, clambered to his feet and staggered on wobbly legs as if drunk.

  “I’ve never seen a mule that color,” I said.

  “The real surprise,” Dad said, “is that he’s yours.”

  “Mine? Really? Just for me?”

  Dad smiled and nodded.

  I grabbed hold of his waist and hugged him.

  Dad stiffened, as he did when anyone hugged him. His voice turned serious and he changed the subject to avoid sentimentality. “You better get your hands on him right away.”

  Sugar had a kind disposition and didn’t get agitated by my touching her baby. While she licked him dry, I petted the little mule’s wet hair. What a special colt, and he was all mine.

  Though my Dad’s training methods were crude, he believed in handling the mules when they were babies to gentle them and gain their trust. I took great pride in owning Skeeter. We spent hours in each other’s company and grew up together. I never broke him to ride, I just started riding him. Because I was too small to climb on him, I would scratch his ears until the pleasure of the scratching would cause him to lower his head. Then, I would quickly swing a leg over his ears, and when he lifted his head I would slide down his neck onto his back as if sliding down a fire pole. I pretty much had to go wherever he went. If I wanted him to stop, I leaned forward and grabbed him around the neck. Soon I had all the mules trained in this way. After school, in my cutoffs and bare feet, I rode the mules without halter or bridle and went wherever they chose to go.

  Unlike other mules that were afraid to leave the herd, Skeeter seemed content to be just with me. As we grew older, Skeeter started to follow my directions. Many times he and I rode out from the house to spend days in the Book Cliffs mountain range. We would ride up the slope until it became too steep, and then I would slide off and lead him. Most mules will balk if they perceive their rider is putting them in danger. Skeeter always followed me without question.

  My job at home was to feed the mules that lived on the steep hillside at the end of our peach orchard. If the mules were over the hill and out of sight, I would imitate their loud, high-pitched bray. Their long ears would hear me far away, and they would come bounding down the hill bucking and kicking up their heels.

  During this time I decided I wanted to build a cabin on Grand Mesa, a flat-topped volcanic mountain that loomed up behind our farm in Palisade. One day I set out riding Skeeter and packing Buttercup and Cocoa, his older sisters. I packed camping supplies, a camp stove, and an axe for the trip to Grand Mesa. No trail existed, so I had to go easy and pick my way up. Steam rose from the sweaty mules and mixed with the smell of juniper berries as we climbed. Several times we found ourselves entangled in brush, and I had to dismount and lead the mules out one at a time. Finally, we broke out into open space on the side of the mountain where I could see Dad’s peach orchards far off in Grand Valley below. By then the mules were foamy with lather and dragging their feet. We were only halfway up.

  I had to stop often to rest the mules. The sun was setting when we finally broke clear onto an old cow trail that weaved up through a grove of aspen trees. The going was easier, but my mules were tired and the light was almost gone. After a few more miles we made it to a place on the side of the mountain that provided us with a small stream and a meadow for grazing. I unloaded the mules, unpacked, and made camp. By the time I got my mules staked out on the grass I was so tired I flopped down onto my sleeping bag and fell sound asleep.

  The yapping of coyotes woke me before daylight. Stars twinkled in the dark. I thought, This is the life, I’m a mountain man! As the sun peeked over the horizon I pulled out the stash of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches I had made for the trip and gobbled two of them. I reloaded the pannier bags, which were difficult for a boy my size to lift onto the mules. I pushed and wrestled with the bags but couldn’t lift them high enough. One at a time, I led Buttercup and Cocoa next to a big log, where they stood without moving while I struggled under the weight of the bags until I could slip the straps over the sawbucks.

  We headed for the top. The mules, normally sure-footed in rough country, struggled to climb the cut in the cliff which didn’t allow for a single misstep. If a mule slipped it was a long way down. Buttercup kicked a rock over the edge, and the noise echoed all the way to the bottom. I thought, If something happens to me here, no one will ever find me. I forced myself to look straight ahead. The mules put one foot in front of the other.

  My heart was thumping with fright as we finally crested Grand Mesa. Below stretched the Grand Valley, green with fruit trees lined in rows, and the gleaming Colorado River meandered in s-shaped curves. The thought of how we might get back down worried me, but we would deal with that later. A child wild and free, I rode on across the sagebrush, the mesa open to a cobalt sky, I scanned the area for the perfect cabin site and I turned the mules toward a large grove of pine trees in the distance. I’m going to live here forever! I thought.

  Suddenly a silver pickup truck barreled toward us, a cloud of dust spooling behind it. I thought, How’d that truck get way up here? The truck stopped next to the mules, its wake of dust overtaking us. Both the driver and passenger wore weathered cowboy hats.

  The driver scowled. “What are you doing, kid?” he asked.

  “I’m going to build me a cabin up here. Do you know of a good spot where there’s water?”

  The men looked at each other and then broke out laughing.

  “You can’t build a cabin up here, son. This is private property.”

  I felt like all the air had been knocked out of me. “It is? Well, where can I build a cabin, then?”

  “Not anywhere up here. What’s a kid like you doing up here by yourself, anyway? Where’s your folks?”

  Grant embarks on his first hunting trip with the family mules, Skeeter and Giddyup.

  Grant celebrates his fifth birthday in his cowboy outfit.

  “They’re at home down in Palisade.”

  “You mean you rode by yourself all the way up here from Palisade? How’d you get through the mesa rim?”

  “I just followed an old cow trail.”

  The driver looked surprised and then shook his head. “Well, you sure better get off this mountain before dark.”

  My shoulders slumped and I hung my head. I wanted to be a mountain man. What about my cabin? Dejected, I turned the mules around and headed home, but the whole way down I pondered how and where I might build my cabin in the mountains. I was already planning another trip to the Palisade Reservoir that hung underneath the rim of Grand Mesa. No one will find me there, I thought.

  4

  PALISADE, COLORADO, 1968

  Dad had taken my brother Clay and me to the reservoir to fish the previous summer. We had caught several large brook trout, for which the lake was known. The next pack trip was with Dick, a close friend with whom I had shared my plan. Instead of bushwhacking up, we, as Dad had the summer before, ignored the No Trespassing signs and skirted around locked gates to follow a dirt road up a canyon. We arrived at the reservoir with Grand Mesa looming above.

  We made camp tucked out of sight in a nearby aspen grove, and then, our fishing poles rigged, sneaked through the trees down to the reservoir. Once we saw the place was empty we began hauling in fat brook trout one after another. We grilled the fish on an open fire, and then unrolled our bedrolls on the grass under the stars. Oh, the life of a mountain man! I fell into a deep sleep and dreamed we had found our perfect cabin spot above a trout-filled lake. I would live there forever.


  During the night thunder boomed and lightning lit up the entire sky. We hadn’t thought to bring a tent. The thunder echoed off the cliffs above. The ground seemed to shake. The storm grew louder and stronger. Rain fell and turned into a downpour. The temperature dropped drastically, and our sleeping bags were soaked through. We jumped each time the thunder clapped.

  Scared and hypothermic, we slipped into one bag and pulled the other drenched bag over us. The hours crept by, and we both started shaking uncontrollably. I lay there in shock thinking about how quickly the mountains had turned on us.

  We had never been so glad to see the sun rise up over the rim of the mesa. Right then and there I postponed my dream of a mountain home. I would build it one day for sure, but I would never again venture into the mountains unprepared.

  I know now I was too young to embark on those kinds of adventures. Dad might have stopped me, might have drawn clear boundaries, might have provided some guidance. But he never did. He had simply lectured me and tried to convince me my plans were foolish. It hadn’t worked. I did what I wanted, regardless.

  I don’t hold it against him. His father had died when he was a baby, and he had been raised fatherless with no example to follow. He tried. I loved Dad but didn’t respect him because he didn’t know how to say “No.” Mother was the disciplinarian, but only after we pushed her to her limit. Her limit left lots of room for us to find trouble.

  Dad worked at the power plant and raised peaches and mules on the side. Though I, an eleven-year-old, had almost no experience training horses or mules, he made me break all of them. “What do I do?” I’d ask.

  Dad would say, “Just show ’em who is boss, and don’t give ’em a choice.”

  I had no idea what that meant, but I had him as an example. If they made one wrong move he would kick them in the belly. He’d hold tight to the lead rope while I climbed up like a monkey and sat perched in the saddle. Even from there I could see the whites in their wide eyes, could feel the fear wound up in them like a rubber band ready to spin loose at any second.

  To this day I vividly remember their fear. Of course it made me feel even more insecure, and we fed each other’s worries. The colts would often bolt, running and weaving through our peach trees and raking me off on the limbs. I’d get slapped to the ground, and the air knocked out of me. Dad would yell at me to get back on and show them who’s boss. I got good at ducking and dodging branches and hanging off the side of the saddle like an Indian shielding himself during battle.

  Dad was always coming up with some new training technique or tool such as a mechanical hackamore, a sort of noseband made out of wire cable. He called it an “Easy Stop.” When the rider pulled back on the reins, the cable would inflict pain until the mule stopped, but the contraption peeled the hide off their chins. Even though I knew nothing, I knew the mules were my friends. Hurting them seemed wrong. The entire process left me feeling nauseated.

  Dad’s philosophy with mules carried over into our family. He was a wiry man standing five feet, two inches tall; he had weathered the depression as the youngest of five siblings. His mother had had to scratch out a living for her children on a small Kansas dirt farm after her husband died of influenza. Dad told us about the days when the only thing his family had to eat was a jackrabbit. To earn money his mother farmed out her boys to work on neighboring farms. Whenever we complained about anything, Dad would remind us that he had to get up at four a.m., milk sixteen cows, and then walk to school. After school he repeated the process in reverse.

  Dad lost one of his eyes in an accident on a battleship while serving in the navy during World War II. Two weeks later, while he was recuperating shoreside, his ship, the U.S.S. Hull, sank in a terrible storm at sea. There were seventy-two survivors, and two hundred two dead or missing. Like so many WWII veterans, Dad never uttered a word about the war.

  His suffering leached out nevertheless. He had no idea how to give or receive physical affection. He would stiffen and sometimes recoil when hugged. He was very critical of my mother, Jeanne, and all four of us kids. My oldest siblings, Clay and Kathy, caught the worst of his criticism. Dad was particularly hard on Clay. “You’re such a pig,” he’d say. “I don’t know what’s wrong with you.” “You’ll never amount to anything.” “You’re a lazy slob.”

  I don’t recall him ever giving Clay or Kathy a reward or positive reinforcement. We never once heard him say “I love you” or “I’m proud of you.” His love was given or withheld based on his perception of our performance, so we grew up doing everything we could to earn praise or a kind word from him. He never abused any of us physically, but he wielded his mouth as a weapon. The old saying, “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me,” is a lie. Dad’s words wounded all of us. In me, those wounds would fester for years.

  Clay lived up to Dad’s expectations. His bedroom looked like a pig pen. Stuff was strewn everywhere, and it reeked. Kathy dealt with the situation in a different way by trying to avoid Dad, and she morphed into a rebellious teenager. She left home right after high school, and married a man my parents didn’t approve of.

  Five years my senior, Clay picked on me like older brothers do. One of his favorite methods was to sit on my chest, pinning my arms to the floor while drooling spit onto my face. I would scream for help, and when Mom had had enough she would grab a leather belt out of the linen closet and come swinging indiscriminately. We both got the same licking. Finally we learned that if we hid the belt Mom would have to grab whatever tool was available, usually a yardstick or a flyswatter, neither of which caused much pain. Regardless, we’d scream and flail like she was killing us, and then later fall over laughing about it. Then I’d go off and do whatever I wanted.

  Because I didn’t want to be treated like Clay and Kathy, I worked hard to win Dad’s approval and avoid his harsh words. I kept my bedroom immaculate and constantly cleaned up around the farm hoping to elicit a word of praise. I lived my entire boyhood hoping for one thing more than any other. I wanted to hear Dad tell me I was a good boy.

  By the age of thirteen I was becoming even more disengaged from home, and did a lot of things on my own. I still longed to be a mountain man, to live a life of adventure, so I decided to earn my own money by trapping coyotes and bobcats.

  5

  PALISADE, COLORADO, 1973

  Movies like Jeremiah Johnson and books about mountain men Jedediah Smith, Jim Bridger, and Hugh Glass had a big influence on me. I started running my own trap line. One winter day while checking my traps I rode Skeeter and packed Giddyup and Moose, Dad’s favorite and most reliable animals. We followed a narrow deer trail that led up a steep canyon I had ridden a week earlier. This time, however, it was covered with snow. On a rockslide where the trail narrowed, Skeeter refused to go any farther. He planted his feet and ignored my coaxing. I thought if I could get Moose across, then Skeeter and Giddyup, not wanting to be left behind, would follow.

  I dismounted and tried to lead Moose, but he hesitated at the same spot. After some time he trusted my judgment and tentatively tiptoed onto the snow-covered trail. I didn’t know the snow concealed a layer of ice. Moose’s feet flew out from underneath him. I held firm to the lead rope but it burned through my hands as he went over the edge, his legs splayed and belly and chin scraping against the snow and rocks as he tobogganed down the hill. His gaze shot right though me as if he were saying, “I tried to tell you it wasn’t safe.”

  Moose slid out of sight, and then a thud sounded far below. Oh my God! I thought, I just killed my dad’s favorite mule.

  I tied Skeeter and Giddyup to the nearest tree and then scrambled and slid down to the edge of the precipice. Peeking over the edge I expected to see a dead mule, but there he stood at the bottom eating grass as if he had walked there on purpose. I scrambled down and examined him carefully, but other than some cuts and scrapes nothing was wrong with him. A wave of relief washed over me.

  Moose had survived, but I had to find a different way ou
t of that canyon. The only possible route seemed to be up, so with my legs still trembling I held the lead rope and led Moose up the narrow passage on an old game trail. I kept repeating, “I’m sorry, Moose. I was wrong not to trust you. You knew all along, didn’t you? From now on I’ll try to listen. I promise.”

  We managed the steep incline and got back to Giddyup and Skeeter, who stood quietly tied to their tree. This time I scouted a safer route on foot and got us all safely to the top where I was able to check my trapline. It was empty. By then the ice had melted and the trail was safe for us to go back down. So much for emulating Jeremiah Johnson. I felt foolish.

  During my high school years I continued to take Skeeter deer hunting and camping on Grand Mesa, killing deer and packing them on his back. He was helping me to become a bit of a mountain man.

  Grant, always enjoying a good laugh, clowns around on the ever-patient Giddyup at Buckskin Crossing.

  I wasn’t much for school, and my grades in high school were mediocre, but I loved sports, especially wrestling and football. Even though I put a sixteen-pound shotput in my pants, before weigh in, I came in at a hundred sixty-five pounds, the smallest player on the team. I played linebacker and running back, and by my senior year became team captain.

  Wrestling was my favorite sport. I worked hard to receive recognition from our coach, Mr. Woodburn. Coach Woodburn praised me at every opportunity, and I thrived under his guidance.

  During my sophomore season, I had trained hard and adhered to a strict diet, but then I began drinking, partying, and running around with some of my wilder friends. Mom and Dad didn’t seem to notice until one day out of the blue they made an announcement: “Grant, you either stop drinking or you can’t live in this house anymore.” Because I was unaccustomed to my parents setting boundaries and was used to making my own decisions, their ultimatum caught me off-guard, and the drinking and partying were so much fun. Without thinking I replied that I’d be moving out. This was not the answer they had anticipated.