Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Mouthy Monday


I absolutely love reading a story where I can hear the dialect of the storyteller through
the writing.
Flyin'Horse brought us a brand new fresh approach to a good horse story. - Mugs





Have you ever had one of those kinds of colds that make your head feel like
 you’re underwater and you can actually hear the roar of the ocean in 
your ears?  

The kind of cold where you really have to marvel at the amount of pure 
snot that any one human body can produce.  You’re sort of swimming inside
 your own head.  But, and here’s the big thing, have you ever blown
 your nose so hard that something actually spurts out of your eye??
  Believe me it’s as weird as it sounds. It is a pretty complicated duct system up in there though.  It’s like a projectile tear is what it is. 

Anyway that’s the kind of cold I was getting over on the day when 
me and my horse Molly found the dead body. Well a skeleton-y body, 
in a narrow wash in the hills on the east side of the valley where I live.

I say “my” horse Molly because I always do but she really belongs to my 
step-granddaughters who live out of state.  Their dad thought they needed a 
horse to call their own when they come to visit.  That’s sure not very often
 and it turns out they prefer quads to horses anyway.  But that’s a whole 
other story.  Anyway I’m happy to have little Molly here with me and 
I try to take her out for a spin as much as I can even though she’s not my main riding horse.  She’s a barely 14hh Spotted Saddle Horse with two dark 
crackly blue eyes outlined in black eyeliner.  Very dramatic!  She’s built like a 
small tank so I don’t feel too badly asking her to carry my 6’ self and I got
 over feeling foolish on her when I found out what a kick she is to ride.  

When she gaits it’s like riding a wind-up horse and it just makes me laugh.  
Her little head gets to bobbin’ and her fat furry little ears are always perked 
ahead and she’s says ok where are we goin’ now and what are we goin’ to 
do next!  I love that kind of attitude in a trail horse.  So far I haven’t found
 anyplace she won’t go although she will offer an opinion at times.  But I like
 that in a horse too.  Opinions.  Sometimes they’re right.

Anyway  there we were bobbin’ along through this narrow-ish wash with
 out a care in the world heading for home. 
We came around a little bend and bam! Some animal or other had been 
digging at the edge of the wash where it met the bank and spewed out a 
bunch of rocks and dirt into our path.  Pretty big rocks too.

Caught my eye for sure and I’m saying to Molly what on earth could have 
dug all that stuff out into the wash and why?  She wasn’t the least bit 
interested  as she was feeling pretty purposeful about getting home.  Then 
I saw the reason for the digging.  Part of a ribcage was sticking up out of 
the dirt  and some kind of fabric was smushed up around it.  I don’t know 
why I kept going but I did. Maybe because you see bones out there sometimes.  Deer or what have you.  We got about 50’ past and I told Molly sorry girl 
but we gotta go back and check that out again. She did offer a brief opinion
 on that.

The fabric was actually part of a shirt.  Had a tag on it, size L.  There were
 buttons and button holes and a cuff and what looked like a knitted scarf all
 balled up and sticky looking.  I sort of came to and realized there were actual
 flies buzzing around on it and it was February and some kind of god-awful
 smell was making it’s way through my clogged ducts.

The authorities were summoned.   I still  hoped that it was somebody’s big 
family dog that they just happened to dress up in men’s clothing before they 
buried it.  I know,  pretty silly.  But I was worried the cops had come out
 there for nothing. Then I was worried they’d come out there for something. 
Two detectives, a  couple of pokes with a stick and part of the pelvis was 
exposed, a few more pokes and there was the spine.  The remains were 
declared to be human.  Fully intact in a shallow grave as it turns out.

That night at home hubby and I hypothesized  and wondered and speculated. 
We joked; Ribs for dinner tonight, dear?  Yes but perhaps a bit more meat 
on them this time please!  We googled human decomposition rates, we 
googled missing persons, we speculated some more. 

We were dumbfounded. Practically in our backyard!  Well ok, across the 
valley but in a place I ride all winter long!   We had a drink or two to calm 
our nerves and toasted To Herman!  Yep I named him, guess that means he’s 
mine.  

The porkchop on my plate looked disgusting. Later on. Just me. The morbid thoughts, the awfulness of it all.  Does anybody miss him, will anybody 
be sad?  Or worse, what if nobody has missed him, what if nobody is sad?  
Is life really so cheap and meaningless? What were his last minutes like? 
Eeew. 

Why did I find him, is there some cosmic reason that I chose to take 
Miss Molly on a ride on that particular day in that particular wash ?  Or is everything just random like my jaded self tends to think?  I mean come on,
 what’s it really all about Alfie?  The ocean roars, the waves pound.  
I’m swimming inside my head.   I blow my nose hard and something spurts 
out of my eye.  It’s like a projectile tear is what it is.

21 comments:

  1. I heard you telling that story like you were around the campfire with me. ... in a southern drawl.

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  2. I heard Texan drawl...either way, I could hear it, clear as day. Surprisingly complex for as simple as it seems.

    I want to know how it ended.

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  3. Yes, great story but we need to know the ending.

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  4. That sounds like an awful experience. I hope they were identified.

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  5. I want to know if Flyin' Horse has a blog :)

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  6. You know this could stand alone as a short story.

    Love how it starts off with a bad cold, shocks with the mention of the dead body and then veers off to the horse. And then it all comes together at the end. That last sentence is perfect. The tone is lighthearted but there's a horror mystery underneath it all. You're a great storyteller!!

    Brave too - if I'm that sick I usually flake out on riding.

    Someone I used to board with ages ago had found a corpse while out riding her horse. Scary. How long before you could ride back there again? Did they ever find out who the poor guy was? So many morbid questions!

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  7. cdncowgirl-she doesn't...I'm thinking she needs one.

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  8. Heidi - I agree on all counts!

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  9. Thanks for the nice comments! The poor SOB was id'd pretty quickly as he had his driver's license on him! Weird. Turns out he was from Minnesota and I found him all the way in Nevada. Weirder yet. They published his photo in our local paper along with a request for help from the public in solving the case. Seeing his picture was disturbing to say the least. People are saying drug cartels etc. I'm pretty sure my guy Herman (turned out that wasn't really his name, suprise!) wouldn't be mixed up in something like that. I plan to get in touch with the local detective to see what they've found out so I'll keep you posted. Once again thanks for the positive feedback on the story.

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  10. Now, that is a story. And a story teller.

    Pretty impressed with your miss Molly too - the number of horses I've ridden who freak at dead sheep! Or even the smell of dead sheep.

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  11. Great story!

    Pretty ironic that your sense of smell was all but totally blocked on that day. Had your sense of smell been intact you might have attempted to give that entire area a wide birth.

    At least now you know that night rides in that area are probably ill advised! Be careful out there!

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  12. This story is amazing, and the last paragraph ties it up so beautifully!

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  13. I loved this story, and you really do have a talent - Please, blog! :D

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  14. Amazing storyteller...I agree your last paragraph tied the whole story together. Publish it!!

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  15. Concur. PLEASE blog!

    Or tell us where you sell ;-)

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  16. Hey, how are you doing on Mouthy Mondays? I don't want to send any stories in if you've already got quite a few you need to publish.

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  17. This sounds like the opening for another episode of "Criminal Minds"...

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  18. Great story! Definitely start a blog!

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  19. Well, I used to think that a double handful of snot was something to brag about...

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