Coop's Corner: Wednesday around Richland Center

Wednesday, July 8, 2020

Wednesday around Richland Center

Another lovely riding day with some big adventure thrown in, 173 miles, a ride cut short.

A big vine hanging from the massive oak....

Stopped at the site of Seldom Seen Farm, Ben Logan's home place described in one of my favorite books, "The Land Remembers".

Stopped at Glen's place, no one home. He's probably cooler in Texas anyway.

Lunch at the Unique Cafe in Boscobel.

Topped off with.....Merry Berry

One of 3 bucks I saw today, this one just hopping out of the bean field. None of them were running from the cougar I saw.

Yes, a cougar. You don't believe it and neither did I but I saw it, I've eliminated everything else that it could have been. Size too big for a bobcat or lynx, ears not pointed, head proportionately too small. Just clearing a low fence, I had the ability to compare its height to the fence post. There's simply no way that it could have been anything but. I've checked various Wisconsin sightings and see that the DNR is requesting a sighting report, something I plan to do. My helmet cam wasn't on, never would have caught it anyway; my 10 second intervals never seem to catch what they should. I've purposely left my gloves off the last few days, tank bag open half way and the camera right under the open corner so that I can grab the camera with the telephoto lens momentarily after getting stopped. I wasn't even stopped when I rounded the corner.

I know within feet exactly where I was.

Geometry....my affinity for it and enjoyment of it has a lot to do with my early love of mapping. At Ag School, one of my favorite parts was the Surveying unit. Machining and my current job exploit geometry, it's all puzzles and the part of my job I still enjoy.

I see lines, arcs, shapes here and the best part? They have beautiful colors.

Vistas from every ridge...

Not every barn is falling down, those with reasonably fresh roofs will stand a long time while some have been cared for better than others. Just because a barn is falling down (we had one) doesn't mean every building on the place is bad or the place abandoned. More than once these days I've made my assumption only to get closer and see a big swimming pool not far from the old dilapidated building.

My general interest in these old farmsteads is in too many of their recent fall from grace. Long before the buildings crumble, feedlots grow weeds, machine sheds lose their luster....it's obvious that many of these places were going, if not necessarily profitable, enterprises not all that long ago.

I picked this fan up last night so that I'd be able to sleep in the van, never really needed it in there but it's been wonderful on the picnic table. Really impressed with how long my 13000 mAh is keeping it going.

Finally today's big adventure. It let loose just outside of Fennimore which made for a long ride home. It's a good thing I know my way around these parts. Only two downhill starts got me all the way back to the campground; there were some very interesting stops and left turns as I got closer to my end destination but my end destination was made.

I've got some wonderful friends....this story to be continued....

6 comments:

mohessianJuly 9, 2020 at 7:57 AM
Cougar....that was just after you saw the alien, right? You were probably just overheated. You showed a picture of your rear tire. Why? I didn't see a nail.
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RichardMJuly 9, 2020 at 11:47 AM
Ooh, clutch cable. It makes it challenging to ride. Ever since I installed the spare cable (with the end covered up) I’ve not needed them.

How do you find your way with that network of small roads? I’d get lost in a minute without a gps.
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JasonJuly 10, 2020 at 3:29 PM
Coop,
I love that machine-turned countryside! Glad to hear you made it back safe and kept the heat-stroke at bay.
Jason
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Others say....

"it was auspicious to approach any situation from a deferential, inquisitive place. Conceding that there is much to learn is the best blueprint for discovering something new." ----B. Fuller

The Man straightened stiffly above the block of salt fixed to the stake and looked at the young cattle ringed about him. The pasture was holding out well and the stock was looking good. This bunch would be ready to sell in another month, maybe sooner if the market was right.

A stir among the cattle down near the river brought him round to face the swinging bridge he'd built years before. Someone was coming toward him from the bridge. Someone in breeches, but it didn't look like a man, somehow. What was a woman doing in his pasture this time of night?

He bent over the salt again; maybe if he paid her no heed she'd go on past and let him mind his own business. He heard her footsteps come nearer and stop. "Good evening," she said.

Her voice was smooth with book learning but friendlier than most, and somehow almost shy. When he made no answer she went on, "I've been sitting on your swinging bridge....I thought I'd like to say thank-you...." Her voice stumbled a little, then she tried once more.

"You are Mr. ____". His name sounded strange in her voice, but she went on to tell her own.

"That's what they've called me the last sixty-eight years," he said, looking past her face to the hills fast darkening under a single star. "I reckon the woods are free for those that like to walk there."

The unfamiliar voice laughed a little. "That's what Emerson said: the grove belongs to the man who walks in it with an open heart....On that basis I guess I've owned part of your woods for a good many years.....". She made a final effort. "I've always wanted to thank you....."

Something deeply hidden stirred in him. "There's a stump up there, in the notch of the woods", he said slowly, "that before the timber grew so tall you could stand on it and see all over this country."

He kept still a minute, remembering, then, "I used to stand up there an' look at things, an' wonder how they come to be like they was, an' how the hills was created, an' all the things in Nature.... I told my wife I guessed all the religion I ever had I got standin' on that old stump, a-wonderin'..." He turned his face away from her.

She helped him out. "I know about that, a little. This afternoon I saw......." Her account of a thing she had really taken time to look at eased him, and he answered with telling of the badger den at the foot of the swinging bridge.

When she had gone, he turned to watch her. After a moment she stood clear and unmoving against the sky. You could hear the sounds of the river where she stood. She was one that could stand still long enough, he thought, really to hear what a body was saying, or a river.

Then she walked down the farther side of the slope and was gone. ------Margaret Snyder from A Chosen Valley

Fall was the end of harvest, end of the growing season, a burst of color and sun-warmth before killing frost turned the land gray and cold. Fall was a moody time, full of both life and death, a time when we were reminded of the power outside of us, reminded that the seasons happen to us. We do not invite the change to come.-------Ben Logan, from The Land Remembers

When you get those rare moments of clarity, those flashes when the universe makes sense, you try desperately to hold onto them. They are the lifeboats for the darker times, when the vastness of it all, the incomprehensible nature of life is completely elusive. So the question becomes or should have been all along, what would you do if you knew you only had one day, or one week, or one month to live. What lifeboat would you grab onto? What secret would you tell? What band would you see? What person would you declare your love to? What wish would you fulfill? What exotic locale would you fly to for coffee? What book would you write? ------- Ben Tyler

We were also cautioned about journeying far from home. As an example of the dangers, the town had a badly crippled lady named Lucy, who as a girl had traveled to New York City. As she traveled along a sidewalk, sightseeing, she was struck by the outstretched hand of a suicide who had leapt from high above. Her spine had been shattered and for the rest of her life, she was to walk bent forward at the waist, tapping the sidewalk with two black canes. Whenever the subject of travel to a big city was raised, someone would say, "Just remember what happened to Miss Tripp." ---- Ted Kooser, from Local Wonders

"Steamboats are like wedding cakes without the complications...." ----Mark Twain

"It's not about having lots of money, it's about having lots of options......." -----Chris Rock

As the very proud father of three former ponytail wearers, hopefully I can get away with this....."For the past few years it's been fashionable for young women to wear ball caps and to snap the strap on the back under their ponytails. I like the looks of that, their shiny ponytails jauntily swinging, but it's hard not to think of the rear ends of horses. There's a piece of harness called the crupper that goes just under a horse's tail to keep its nose down. If the horse lifts its head to look for a way out of whatever predicament it's in, the crupper tightens and hurts the horse. But it's foolish for parents to think that a ball cap might keep a young woman from running away. Anybody can see they're made for running." ------Ted Kooser, Local Wonders

"I tell the guy's girlfriend that the only difference between the book's main character Phaedrus and myself is that I am neither brilliant, tortured or insane, she looks at my bike and there is an uncomfortable silence." --------ahendepe (a.k.a. Vermin)