Sun and mist in the Ochocos.
Clan Cornelius saw off 2020 in our usual style — a feast of crab and our own company. There were fireworks in the neighborhood and not too far off somebody dumped a mag, perhaps symbolically slaying the foul-breathed dragon that the past year turned out to be.
We finished strong, with a road trip out to The Painted Hills, which is part of the extensive John Day Fossil Beds National Monument. Lying about two hours of highway time to the east of us, over the Ochoco Mountains, this is a part of Oregon we have not explored adequately.
There was a dense, icy inversion layer over everything east of eh Cascades. We broke out of it summiting the Ochocos. I love that country….
We were back down in it at The Painted Hills. Temps in the 20s and a chill in the bones, but that’s no impediment.
The colors are a strange phenomenon. It’s not sedimentation — it’s climatological.
I found the interpretive sign about John Day slightly annoying…
Apparently the Department of the Interior can’t bring itself to say who robbed Day and Crooks. If you guessed “Indians” you would be correct. But such things must apparently be elided in the current climate. Which is just silly.
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Our acute discomfort in confronting the realities of our history has been in high relief over the past couple of years. Perhaps it’s a function of time and distance.
On the road, we listened to Neil Oliver’s Love Letter to the British Isles Podcast. The current episodes are concerned with the arrival of the Northmen, the march of The Great Heathen Army and the Saxon stand in Wessex under the leadership of Alfred the Great — the stuff of Bernard Cornwell’s The Last Kingdom. Migration, raid, displacement, assimilation… these are age-old phenomena. We can look upon the massive dislocations of 1,000 years ago with some level of dispassionate interest — but events of a couple hundred years ago are maybe too close. I guess some of us are afraid that they reflect negatively on our own moral character.
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I’m fixing to adjourn to the Frontier Partisan Studios (aka the attic) to record a supplemental episode wrapping up the ride with Kit Carson. I’ve already dug into the research for the next series on the Highland Scots. Talk about dislocation and displacement…
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I don’t really do New Year’s resolutions. My efforts will continue to be bent toward using my time as wisely and effectively as possible, doing generative work in my patch of woods, mountains and desert and avoiding as much as possible getting caught up in petty bullshit and the Daily Outrage. There are many trails yet to walk, many books to read, songs to sing and stories to tell.
I appreciate all of you who share the trails and campfires with me. And, as Slaid Cleaves would have it, I wish you one good year…
Matthew says
I guess you can’t admit anymore that the Indians are less than perfect. It is annoying. Of course, I also encountered people who want to hold on to the old triumphalist narrative and that is also annoying.
I was once at a graveyard in a ghost town here in Colorado where one of the graves was a trader who had defrauded the Indians and had been murdered in turn. That was more accurate to history than either the triumphalist narrative or the politically correct one.
JimC says
It’s even lamer than that. The native peoples of the Rockies, Plains and Great Basin had no compunction about stealing from a couple of trappers — they were fair game from the natives’ cultural perspective. In trying to “protect” their reputation, Interior is imposing culturally-derived morality that had no bearing on their actions. It’s actually a kind of insulting paternalism.
J.F. Bell says
A week or so back I told you I’d be sending you some reading. I’ve located the book, and should have it in the mail early next week.
It’s one of those that defy easy definition. The Comanche and the pioneer culture of North Texas feature in heavily and the author, to his credit, allows that the latter were no angels – which he tempers with the stories of some who’d dealt with the former firsthand.
It has the benefit of being written before political correctness was much apparent.
Suffice it to say there were no angels on the field in those days.
JimC says
OK… I’m intrigued. Thank you.
lane batot says
Now, you don’t KNOW it was injuns done it–it could’ve been Aliens!(ahem!) But seriously–I have been neglecting my Frontier Partisans abominably, I’m afraid–just not much time for computer stuff lately–except just most peripherally–(which CAN be a good thing, of course!), and I needs to be catchin’ up! I especially need to watch that “Last Of The Mohicans” documentary and chime in with the perspective of the (uninterviewed) “grayteest oov awl zee eenveezable coureur de bois”!
JimC says
Yes, you must.
Norman Andrews says
Happy new year to all you folks.
Norm.
JimC says
And to you Norm. Always good to hear from you.
Paul McNamee says
Happy New Year!
Sure hoping we can ramp up to something positive, ‘normal,’ and forward-looking by the time summer rolls around.
Cheers!
JimC says
Thanks Paul.
Thom Eley says
Jim, the Painted Hills are fantastic. I was talking (Jim Misko) and I mentioned that we were going to Sisters. He said that we must go to the Painted Hills, which we did and enjoyed much. Turns out Jim Misko was born and grew up in Mitchell. We visited Mitchell and ate at a great cafe. Jim said the cafe has been there for time immemorial.