Sheep on a Hillside

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The following story is from 2016 when I first moved to Colorado. The blog post is part of the RV Chronicles book, which will be released slowly on a subscription-only basis. Please let me know what you think. :)

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I pulled up the long driveway at the campground, tires crunching the gravel as I rounded the corner to the row of cabins. Seleh's cabin was first, then mine, then the empty one, and then the one set back in the woods a little bit.

Selah stood outside her cabin working on a canvas, paintbrush in hand.

I took a quick look at the painting—it looked like a bunch of bubbles—as I put the Jeep in park. I’d just returned from the laundromat and started unloading the clothes basket from the back when I heard a muffled call. I poked my head from the Jeep. “What?”

“Did you talk to Greg yet?” Selah called over her shoulder.

“Talk to him about what?”

“No,” she said flatly, turning to look at me. “Did you talk with Greg yet?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

She turned around and went back to her painting.

Ugh! Was I missing some context here?

Stepping from the Jeep, I paused to feel the warm afternoon sun and inhaled the deep scent of dust and pine. Turning back to the Jeep, I unloaded the clothes before going to the passenger side for Roxie, my dear sweet poor older dog, Roxie. Her grey hair felt thick in my hands as I went to lift her from the Jeep and put her to the ground. Her little legs had started having trouble a few years ago. But now she had even more difficulty because she’d put on weight while staying with my ex. My goal was to get her moving and keep her moving.

I chuckled as I thought about the lamentation of my early 20s. What should I do? Should I get a husband or a dog to be a travel companion. I chose the husband, and now I chose the dog. The marriage, however, produced two absolutely wonderful daughters who were now young adults. They flew from the nest after turning 18. Why couldn’t mama bird fly from the nest, too?

Shaking my head to clear my thoughts, I stepped toward Selah’s.

“What do you mean did I talk to Greg?” I blurted out when I was within 20 feet from where she stood washing her brush.

“Nothing. You’ll see,” she said mysteriously. “Do you like my painting? Know what it is?”

I looked at all the black circles on the canvas.

“They’re sheep,” she replied to her own question. “See? I’m adding eyes here.” She stepped over with a new paintbrush and a pallet. Dipping the paintbrush into the paint, she withdrew it quickly and filled in a few circles. “See? I’m going to do eyes peaking out of all the fluff. I might even add cotton balls.”

“What’s it for?” I wanted to know, trying to picture the cotton balls on the canvas.

“It’s for a Sunday school project. Jesus is the shepherd, and we are the sheep.”

At that moment, a large red truck rumbled up the driveway, rolling past where we stood at the canvas.

“Have you met Dexter?” Selah asked.

I shook my head no.

"Oh, I'm sure you'll have a chance toert him," she smiled and returned to her art.

Seleh, enjoying the sun and a watermelon on another afternoon outside her cabin.

For the rest of the afternoon I rearranged all my stuff.

Again.

And again.

No matter what I tried, I couldn’t get it to fit. The chi in the small cabin…the energy and flow…felt off. I had the table by the one big window in the cabin, the bed in the corner, the dresser and nightstand on the wall perpendicular to the bed. The radiator I placed near the door.

Ugh! I’d already moved out the extra furniture, and now I was down to only the favorite pieces I’d brought out from Missouri, but even those were too much for such a small place.

A sharp knock sounded at my door, and I moved the radiator and some suitcases so I could open it.

Selah stood there smiling, saying she had arranged a small get together at the campfire by Dexter’s cabin.

“When?” I asked, looking at Selah and then up at the sky, which had quickly clouded over since this afternoon.

“Around six,” she said, spinning on her heel and heading back to her cabin next door.

I made progress on the cabin and, by 5:30, had determined it was time to start getting ready. I didn’t really want to meet people today. I wasn’t in a jovial mood. Despite all that work on the cabin, I’d come to the realization that I’d be spending a cold snowy winter in a cramped cabin. What the heck was I doing?

Maybe I could get a storage unit, I thought as I propped up a mirror and tried getting ready in the dim light.

What to wear? What to wear? What to wear?

I still had many of my hippie chicka outfits and decided on a mostly-purple tie-dyed skirt. I’d have to wear a jacket, too. The chill from the north wind suggested winter would soon be here.

He squatted beside the fire, poking at it and talking to Selah. The low murmur of their voices sounded like a secret gurgling spring. From the way he squatted beside the fire, I could see that he was tall and lanky. As I drew nearer, carrying the pot of chili I'd made earlier, he looked up at me, firelight glinting off his black hair, dark eyes looking from me to the pot. “Need help with that?”

“Nah, I got it,” I said, setting it on the picnic bench and quickly eyeballing the food and seeing Selah brought the tortillas she had promised.

“I got the chips,” she said brightly. “There’s also some hummus there.”

“Thanks,” I said, turning toward the fire. “You must be Dexter?”

“Dex,” he said, standing up and walking over to the table. “What did you bring? I’m starving. Haven’t eaten anything all day.”

He wore a fleece jacket, green army pants, and hiking boots. His lithe body moved quickly as he scooped up some tortillas and threw a couple ladles of chili on top.

“So where are you from?” Dex asked me while using a tortilla to scoop chili into his mouth.

“Ah…I’ve moved a lot,” I started. “When people ask me this question, I never know if they want to know where I was born because I lived all over—Ohio, Minnesota, South Carolina, Indiana, Missouri, California—”

“Was your dad in the military?” he asked.

“No, my mom and dad bought and sold homes. They were flipping houses before it became popular. We were living in them during the construction process.”

“Where’s your family now?” he asked, hungrily shoving another chili-laden tortilla into his mouth.

“My mom passed this summer, and my dad lives in Baltimore.”

“Really?” he asked, perking up and wiping his bearded mouth with a napkin. “My dad lives just north of Baltimore!”

“Actually, my dad does, too,” I corrected myself. “He lives in Joppa.”

“That’s where my dad lives!” he exclaimed, visibly excited. “He lives on Ridge Road.”

“No way!” I said loudly. “That’s where my dad lives.”

Dex looked over at Selah. “What are the chances? Both of our fathers live on the same street, and here we meet on the side of a mountain in Colorado! This must mean something.”

Selah looked from Dex to me and back to Dex. She stood up. “I think you both are crazy,” she said, making her way back to the food table. “Hey, this chili is really good.”

After that night, Dex and I found excuses to talk to each other. I’d ask a question about his work on the truck. He’d ask if I needed anything at the store. I’d ask about the mountain. He’d ask if I wanted to go for a walk. We stayed in each other’s orbit, not wanting to draw away to go do whatever it was we were supposed to be doing.

One afternoon, he came down to see if I needed help winterizing the cabin.

“Winterize the cabin? What do you mean?” I asked standing in the doorway and looking down the steps, my hands on the rough adobe walls.

“It’s gonna get cold up here on this mountain. Every year we winterize the cabins for whoever stays in them.”

This gave me something to think about. I’d already been thinking about building a little loft in the cabin to make some space. As it was, I’d brought too much furniture from St. Louis. If I could build a small loft out of 4x4s, 2x4s, and plywood, I could give up the storage place in Rifle that was costing me $60 a month. I had to think smart, and building a loft would cost less than the price of storage for the winter.

The next day when I saw Dex tinkering on his truck, I went over.

“Hey, what are you talking about with winterization? Like…what should I do?”

He looked across from the engine at me, the smudge of oil on his cheek almost blending in with his perpetual 5 o’clock stubble. “I’ll come over later and take a look. I gotta get this done because I gotta take my son to band practice.”

“Oh…right! Sorry,” I said, backing away and not wanting to interrupt any time he might have with his son.

“I’ll come over later,” he promised.

On the way back to my cabin, I felt someone watching me and looked up. Seleh stood in her porch with a Cheshire-grin on her face.

I waved as I drew closer.

“He’s good looking, isn’t he?” she asked.