Day 8

June 4^th, 2011. Tedious work today…I basically just cut down mini willow trees that are sprouting up all around Lee's new how site. After that I dug out a bunch of big rocks around it where he wants to plant grass. My back was killing me, I spent all day hunched over. Bah so glad its over. But I get tomorrow off! After I got done working I went down to the bunkhouse and just passed out in the chair for about 2 hours. Lee came in and said, "You look disappointed". I told him, "No I'm just beat man". I literally work as hard as I can every day and just get burned out. Lee went on to tell me how good of a job I did, and that he was very pleased with my work. We BBQ'd up a couple steaks he said he was saving, so I had a really good dinner too. This morning I woke up and saw a bald eagle, red fox, moose, horse, and elk all outside my window. It is really neat to know that there's still a place like this. The work might be back breaking and bone chilling at times, but you get to experience stuff up here that seems to be no big deal from an outsiders standpoint. But when you see all this wildlife you start to think differently about other stuff. And being that Lee owns so much land we don’t throw out as much in the garbage as I've normally done in my life. Anything that is biodegradable can be recycled on the spot. The guys Lee has helping him with the masonry work on his new house told me about the last WWOOFer to come up here. I guess he just left about a month ago, Lee never told me. I can see how people can have a hard time getting along with Lee, but he's just a hard ass. When you're on his ranch you do things his way, but he and his ways are respectable. It just takes some understanding. His land is so big that I've never really got to see his other 20 horses, but today they all surprised me at the same time and said Hi! Lol, I went over and fed them some grass and petted them. I wish I could get closer to the elk, but they only let me get about 50 feet then they just bolt away like I was a mountain lion. I've only been here a week and it seems like much longer. I don’t mean that in a bad way, there's just so much I've learned and done. I'll admit that when I got here I thought it would be about 10% as difficult as it really is. But still I have to say that I'm happy to be here. Everything just seems so real here, its hard to explain how clear your mind gets when your this far away from home. It's like boot camp lol, or detention in high school. I'm here for a while, it's hard as hell, but I'm learning and I know much good will come from it. I keep thinking back to when I'd complain about work being too hard, or not being able to handle a simple task, and think, "wow really". Like I said, it has only been a week, but I can tell you its been the hardest working week of my life. When you get things done around here you get to see progress. The more work you do, the more you accomplish. And when I walk around the ranch and see improvements that I made it makes me feel good. Its not like workings in a warehouse where you load up 20,000 pounds of product in a truck and it drives away. This all stays here, I see it all grow and become something better. …. I thought horses liked apples??? I tried to give Clearwater (The white horse) an apple today and he didn’t want it…oh well, maybe he wants an orange lol. I did a load of laundry yesterday and accidentally dropped half a roll of toilet paper in their…all my clothes are covered in TP shreds!!! Good thing I'm not going out anywhere for the next couple months haha. Ahhh what to type what to type….I feel bad, today I had to knock down a swallow nest. Those little birds nest EVERYWHERE up here…But Lee doesn't want them nesting on the bunkhouse. Within about 3 or 4 hours of knocking it down they had already built about half of it back up though. They all work as a team, there's a gang of about 50 of them that just fly together. They make their nests out of mud, they look like little baskets up on beams or wherever they can stack it. Tiny little birds though, only .5 ounces, and they aren't dumb. They too have fun flying like the ravens do, I see them chase each other around all day. It's getting late, and its my only night to stay up late, think I'm gonna watch Fight Club then go to bed. Good Night from Delta Junction!