The Reunion

         

2 Corinthians 5:17 ESV /         

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

    
    
     I got home after a few projects.  
No parties, no big celebrations, just coming home after a season in the Bakken.    I can't describe the feeling I had driving home.   I wasn't coming home to a messy house at least in the cluttery sense or my family relationships.  The kids had been calling and saying, "Dad!  We are coming over."  
So I get to spend quality time with the kids. YAY!!!    I get to see my Bill W. and Dr. Bob friends, and they are ok.    I get to reconnect with my friends at First Lutheran.    Then, I have been making plans with my hunting buddies brad, Ryan and Ralph and a few others, like my brother...  He wants me not to stir the pot with them, especially Bradley who has it coming for getting his name in the paper for doing stupid stuff this summer.
     It's nice getting reacquainted with my home at Penguin Ranch.   I don't like reorganizing my closets, its not easy for me to do.  Its an ADD thing.  I can be putting pants on my shelf and with three pair on the bed, I suddenly realize that I am outside by the well house wiring in the electricity to the well house heater, so I go back in the house and do dishes.  later that day I go upstairs to clean the bathroom, and when I see my pants on the bed,  I say to myself, "Oh yeah,  I need to ...go wash my socks."  Somehow, sometime before bed time, I see that my pants willed themselves to the closet when I was making meals for the kids and doing kitchen duties...  I'm telling you!
     New projects: not at the moment.  But the teen rocket scientists of my residence are building an ice fishing shack out of my camper...  doing a great job too by the way.  My initial doubts have been shattered.  
      Now here is the kicker.  Going back to the Bakken on Thursday.   The puzzled reader would ask, "Why with all this good stuff would he take off and go right away?"   The answer is quite simple.  I leave early Thursday morning on the Empire Builder from Grand Forks to Williston.   There I will reunite with my Williston group of friends and spend a delightful evening with the beautiful Brenda.  Friday afternoon we depart from Williston in her cute little Pontiac to spend an awesome weekend bonding through Christ planning on and deer camp at Penguin Lodge.... planning an awesome life together.   I love her. 

  In one year everything has changed, it hasn't been always easy or fun, or full of laughter, but through the salvation of Jesus Christ it has been worthwhile,  and that has what has made the difference

Camp Life

Romans 12:10 Love one another with brotherly affection. Out do one another in showing honor

      It has been an interesting summer.    Been on two jobs with three companies.  Many of the guys are like me ,  out here on a pipeline, some new faces and some old.  
     I was making dinner last week.  I was enjoying a little bit of peace and quiet.    Then someone came into my hovel.  I was getting a new roommate.    Something seemed familiar with the way he came in and I recognized the voice, but something had changed.  The clean cut Hispanic man was now sporting longer hair wrapped neatly in a pony tail.  I immediately recognized the big smile behind a full beard and moustache.  "Oof Da Tomas," exclaimed the friendly voice.  "You not been eating vegi burritos, have you."  The only voice it could have been poking fun at my tummy was none other than Jose Jimenez.
     We exchanged stories of our families, caught up on our latest adventures in the Bakken oil patch, and sat down and shared a meal.  It was just like working together last winter.  I fixed a little something and he made a little something.
     Lately my weekends consist of getting details worked out with  the impending marriage to the beautiful Brenda.  Jose goes on adventures with his Latino friends.  Its all good. When I return back to the man camp on Sunday nights, Brenda has my cooler loaded full of goodies for the week.  I have found that Rice Crispy bars, chocolate chip cookies, and apple crisp are good barter for a plate of spaghetti, or an occasional burrito.
     Brenda has been introducing me to people in her community and my new friend Eric gave me a shirt from the Williston High School band.   I am scheming on something to show him  that he is a friend.  I like the guy, a rarity out here, a fellow democrat... I hope.  Of course there are others on my backfilling crew.   
     I ran into a fellow that I worked with on my first pipeline job... a sober guy who seen me go back out after 13 years.  It's amazing how things work out.  He's seen me sober again and had almost lost hope figuring I would never come back to sanity.    
    Today I am grateful that I was sane when I met my friend Jose and others that I have met during the last year... they are much easier reunions than those I bump into out here on the line than those that have seen my sick and crazy.   For them, I had nothing real and  to give. And that is what  they remember , and makes it hard for them to accept boundaries.  Boundaries are important in a mancamp in the Bakken.
  
    

Open Doors

"For I know the plans I have for your," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."  Jeremiah 29:11 NIV

    Got laid off after a 5 short weeks of work.  Its a long story.  Layoffs seem to put a damper on my plans of prosperity and security, and I must guard my door to let negative thoughts come in.  Sometimes it feels like so many doors are being shut.  Experience shows me that it is quite the contrary.
      I have been thinking about doors lately;  both in a symbolic reference to my life,  and also in a literal sense having installed a couple in my home. There are many doors in my house, but only three of them enter into my home. 
     The first one is screwed shut.  It leads into my basement.  I absolutely hated it as a kid.  It was the one that we carried wood into the house. Its function was simply for work.  And when we opened it.  It meant sweat.  It meant not fun.  It also meant future warmth in the home and a clean aroma of fresh air in the house in the winter months along with aroma of sap  and popple bark.
     The next one leads into my kitchen area from the outside.  I had a pretty nice one there.  But the door jamb was broken.  The latch would lock by itself, and I never had a key.  So people living in my home on occasion would either hope the basement wasn't screwed shut, or a window latch left undone so they could crawl in or stumble down some rickety old stairs into a dark place; and  eventually, through some exerted effort find a way to get in.  I got a new door and frame hung it and finished it off with a modern lock and a handle made of deer antler. 
    The last door goes out onto the new deck. When dad moved in this old rickety house in 1980,  it came complete with an overhanging porch on the west end of the house.  It had an old door. But the only thing missing was the rest of the porch: no floor, no railings..  If a person would open the door and walk out, he would fall about three feet down into a sterile clump of dirt that because of the great overhang never got wet. So nothing ever grew.  But the cats seemed to scratch in it and leave plenty of cat scent.  An occasional dog over the years would dig a hole.  A few weeds would grow on the edge where water dripped off the roof.  When I moved in, I took out the door and covered it with plywood and finished off the inside saying to myself, "Maybe one day if only..."  It seemed like a hopeless pipe dream.  Then one day happened. 
     It started when the weather broke.  I was laid off and had a little time,  so I built a deck under the great over hang. I wanted the house looking better for the new love in my life.  But I finally had the means and that porch had been bugging me since I was a kid.  I wanted this place looking better. I wanted my kids and all who know me that Bunky is back.  I wanted my house to reflect the person I really am.   Its a great pleasure to see the look of approval on Brenda's face when she comes to visit from out west and see things  improving.  After all, this place will soon be hers also.
    Finally after the deck was done, I get laid off again get a little time off and I woke up one day with the determination to get a door in so people can walk right out onto the deck, the deck with an old overhang that had been sitting empty with nothing underneath it for 33 years.
     Here is the thing,  for the last 5 years a small project like this would have been unfathomable.  Overcome with fear, guilt, economic insecurity, resentments, and paralyzed by the depression of alcoholism, the old house with the messed up doors would have remained screwed shut.  The beauty and freedom of a simple home would have remained hidden and just remained barely functional as a sleeping- eating place possibly for another 33 years.  I didn't build it.  I didn't hang the doors.  God did.
    Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.  For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.  Matthew 7:7-8 NIV.  It was only the pain of dealing with a great change of life that brought me to my knees.  It was that pain that lead me to recommit my life to Christ, to examine my life as it was and is,  to live in a solution that gives me the power to solve all my problems.   My heart was hard and cold.  So hard and brittle that it was shattered.  And with a hole in my heart, God's love shined through.  John 3:16  For God so loved the world he gave his only one and only Son.   Now Jesus is the doorway. 
     When it seems like doors are being shut in one's life, God opens so many more. 
"In the New Testament, Jesus tells us to knock at the door, but also warns that the door will someday close and shut out the unprepared.  James warns us that the Judge is at the door.  We do not have forever to decide.  And finally, in Revelations, it is He who knocks at our doors, and waits for us to let Him in.    And the final reference in Revelations is of a "door standing open to heaven"  -- Hope is fulfilled." (Willa: Quotidian Reader).  
    People are much like a house.  We also have our own personal doors to let in and out both good and bad.  We can put up storm doors, or leave them unlocked. We can leave them wide open or put on good locks.  We can put decorations on them, or we can smear  lamb's blood on our door post.  We choose which doors we want to open.  Door A: same old blah blah blah!- restless, irritable, and discontent.  Door B: God's world of love and endless possibilities.
       A big door is opening in my life once again preparing a home and planning a life with Brenda.  She enhances my walk toward Christ and encourages my walk toward the narrow gate.  She consistently reminds me of the bigger picture of life, the unseen one that God has planned for each and everyone of us when we choose to walk that narrow path.  That path isn't always fun,  never is easy, but is always worthwhile.  Thank God for doors... may they continue to open and close. As for me and my house and all who enter in it, we will serve the Lord.
  

Unsensible

     Sometimes when Jupiter is in-line with Mars, and when the moon is in the third phase crazy events shape and mold our lives in obscure ways.   I often wonder what puppet master is controlling the Universe to his egotistical delight.  Superstitious as that line of thought is, it is also insensible.  A person of the scientific natue may agree with that statement, but I am not scientific, for science hasn't cured anything with my crazy life, or made anything alright.  So only spiritual reasonings can justify the things that make sense in mhy life today.  For me life changing events are in overdrive, but in my life lately they seem to be on cruise control.

     I made it back out on the line last week.   What a change it has been from the world of my home.  No more sleeping in.  Putting gas in the tank more often.   Dealing with co-workers.  I even get to see my fiancé more often.  Also, I don't get to see the kids as much, and that is a big change, even though we talk as much as they want to, and often.

     Nevertheless, the biggest change that I see is the one of recognition of myself as one of God's children.  I had a hard time describing or putting into words what I was feeling with all this change.  It wasn't a bad thing.   I just felt a need to acknowledge it, to pin it down, to name it, perhaps to own it, or at least apprehend it so that I could comprehend it.
     Then today it happened, or actually it began yesterday.   I was at the Roosevelt Park zoo in Minot with Brenda on Thursday.  what a great place to go and just hang out, and talk about things.   Yes, we have even more to talk about lately.  Yep, that's right... getting hitched. 
     Anyway, two exhibits really caught my attention.   The giraffes and zebras and huge cats were way so cool, but it was the North American animals that  captivated my interests.    First stop was the wolves.   It was neat to see how shy they were, yet in the the presence of full awareness.  they constantly paced the boundaries of their fence, and when seemingly frustrated, they crawled into their den. It wasn't like watching wolves in the wild, and I have been blessed to see them play in the wild and watch them play, and wished I had that wild freedom.
     The second stop that grabbed me were the bears.  Grizzly Bears.  They seemed so much like beggars, and selfish fighting for theirs space.     Just longing to be on the outside.   To me,  they were wild animals and shouldn't be in a cage, yet they were provided for, in good health,  and , yet just not happy.    It  seems that people have the tendency to project their emotions onto animals, and we want to think they were not happy, when as far as a wolf or bear goes, they had all the could need.
     Today out on the line, we were working through some rancher's cow pasture.   Low and behold, fences seemed to keep getting in our way.   We have to open them to get out machines through, and close them right away behind us to make sure the farmer's cow's don't get out through the hole we make.  You would think it wouldn't make a difference when half the calves are running outside the fence anyway it seems.  Some of the critters  spend half their day trying to get back in like this one calf who paced back and forth for three hours trying to get his way back into the fence to be with the others.  
    It is all part of the job and we do it anyway.   Then it dawned on me.  Psalm 23 says, "He leads me to green pastures."   Before  I was like a wild animal,  resenting boundaries and seeing myself as a caged wolf or bear.  One who did not belong with others of domesticated variety.  Now  that I define myself as a child of God, I see myself as more like that stray calf, having tested the realm of the world outside the fence.  I long to get back in with others like me, a member of the human-race, the Beloved.  And it is within these boundaries that one finds true freedom and happiness.  As a wild animal the thought of it all would seem unsensible.
     Today  I got up early, went to work,  paid my bills, drove the speed limit for the most part, helped others around me,  I gave thanks for what I had,  I told the people that mean the most to me that I loved them.     I kept myself clean,  and I am grateful that I  see 44 when I never believed that I would live to see 30.  Thank you God for making me your child, and for the pain and scars of the barbed wire when I slipped back underneath the fence.
    

       

The Call

     I got a call from Jose Jimenez on Saturday.  "Hola, Tomas.  I goin' back to workm but its not a good deal."  He explained how we wouldn't be staying in a mancamp this season, but a hotel...
     Not a good deal?  I guess I could think of so many people that have not had a good deal.  I myself have been down that road of not thinking I was having a good deal at the moment: fend for my own meals, more miles to drive.  About that time I begin to think exactly how spoiled rotten I am and have been over the last few months and truly blessed.  I think of all the people who have lived out West and not had such a good deal.
     On Saturday I visitied Fort Buford and Fort Union near Williston, North Dakota.  I attended these sites of historic profoundness in awe and wonder with my beautiful companion Brenda.  She being more familiar with the area acted as my guide.  At Ft. Union an old fashioned Rendezvouz was happening.  Furs, old tools and dress, harsh living quarters, with a hint of Bourgoise presence and human refinedness made me reflect on this idea of human dignity in in the harshest primitive conditions in a time period when nothing was certain.  I particulary let my ear wander to the sound of a a drum and a Lakota story-teller.  The man spoke and sang in a small crowded room in the corner of the fort opposite the Bourgoise house.  How fitting and contrasting the two ideas of richness.  Yet I felt at ease in either setting.
     After some time at Ft. Union, we moved down the road to Ft. Buford.     More military than fur-trade historics, it hit me and I felt the presence of something much greater than the happenings of the Bakken.  I imagined what it would have been like to be doing about my business one day when over the hill came a band of 168 Lakota people, warriors and families, hen hearing an order to disarm them and take their horses. 
     I imagined Sitting Bull the leader of these people handing his 5 year old son his rifle and explaining to the commander and the press that the buffalo were gone, the nomadic way of life was gone and it was the responsibility of people like the commander to teach this boy something, to educate him because as far as sitting Bull was concerned, he only knew one way to educate a child and from that day forward, it would be pointless to try and teach him the ways of survival in the new way.   He only knew his way.  On Saturday, June 15, 2013  I walked where Sitting Bull walked,  and I sat in the room where he surrendered his rifle.   I looked out the same window where Crows Foot gave the commander his father's rifle.
     The Bakken, invaders, manifest destiny, imminent domain, mineral rights, land owner rights,  expansion,  progress, technology.... Change!
     I wonder in great awesome thought, what has really changed over the last 130 years.  Men all the time wonder what it is that they should educate their children in.  It beguiles me to think of what an education is today and what it should be, what kind of society we are building for our children?   Should it be the path of secular humanism, college, new age scientific dynamics? What path should I point them down. God knows how often I have stood where where the two roads diverge.  Then as I reflect on the changes in my life it hits me so simple so precise.  What if we just teach our children  to walk, to walk where Jesus walks.
     "I'll see you out there on the line my friend Jose, if not this one maybe the next one."

Of Beavers and Wolves

     In 1996, -97, and -98  I was living an outdoors-man's dream.  A typical day I would wake up at the crack of dawn, and journey out to tend my muskrat and beaver sets.  I would come home at dark and spend hours in a fur skinning shed.   Once a week or sometimes more depending on my catch I would visit the fur man and get a nice check.   I loved the smell of the swamp, the trees, the exhaust from a warm vehicle.  I was subsidized by an unemployment check.  My bills were paid, and I felt I had a purpose in life- to catch and kill and skin and stretch as much fur as a human could.  By most trappers accounts, I was considered good.  I took over 3500 muskrats and nearly a 600 beaver in those years. Foxes, coyotes, badgers, fishers, bobcats, and I even had a wolf in a trap one time, but got it loosed.  I struggled over the idea of trying to smuggle the hide into Canada.  But I turned him loose.
      I remember picking up one of my children just born from the hospital in a pickup loaded with beavers in the round and some put up and hauling them and my family to the fur man Ordean Sunrud in Fosston, MN.  My boys tasted a freshly cooked beaver there, and it was good.
     Life moved on for me, I had a couple of career changes, markets dropped and I sold my traps and some supplies to another guy who wanted to make a go at it.  I was raising turkeys.  One night something got into my turkey shed and killed about 600 birds outright, while the rest piled up in the four corners of the shed.  Tracks left in the mud led certain evidence plus the fact in my alfalfa field I had seen a pair of wolves earlier that summer.  I was angry, financially devastated.  I became consumed with the spirit of vengeance and within a couple days I had settled the score. I encouraged others to do the same , and got on the anti wolf bandwagon.
     A couple years later after moving on from ranching and settling in to another chapter of my life, I was driving around one day.  In a distant meadow I saw two wolves playing around a bale.  My instinct was to grab the gun, but instead I grabbed the binoculars... it changed my heart and my life.
     I saw that the pair were actually hunting mice.  In the grass I could see smaller wolves, pups.  The pair was teaching them how to hunt and feed.  The pups would play and wrestle around. It reminded me of my boys.  When the wrestling got a little rough, the mom would intervene and they would snap back and pay attention again.  They were just doing what wolves do.  They were being a family not much different than mine.
     They were just being the way God created them.  They play and sleep together, hunt together, they encourage each other to grow and become stronger.  They keep each other in line so that their family can function together as a unit.
     Same with the beaver, building a home together, gathering food.   So it is then I realized that as we are brother and sisters in Christ, so too are we brothers and sisters to the furry four legs in Creation.     I will not take any of my fur legged brothers or sisters nor teach the ways of it no more...forever.  This does not mean that I will not hunt or trap again. It means doing only these things for me to provide a meal, or clothe myself.  After all, who can turn down a plate of well prepared venison.
     Who am I to judge one of God's families.  It was on that day, and although possibly distorted at the time, I began my journey back on the Red Road.  A road that has led me back to God's family,  their have been struggles and victories.  We are more alike than different.
     Of wolves and beavers,  I hold nothing against the man who takes the fur as a part of his journey of existence on his life.  I hold nothing against the farmer protecting his crops and livestock.  But I hold in the least regard for men who were takers as I once was "sportsmen" satisfying an ego, .  Using greed as their creed and giving nothing back.  I hold even less regard for a government or bureau profiting from the control of these creatures.        
     Worse are those who wantonly waste the creatures of Creation in the name of satisfying a void in their heart with  the excitement of hearing the crack of a firearm and the satisfaction of an aimed shot.  It matters not what others do though.  And if because of my beliefs the retelling of these exploits brings joy to their hearts to see mine sad;  then... Amen.    I know that it is what they have to do as part of their journey to find their own center.   I will pray to live in the spirit of forgiveness so that I may forgive.
Mitakuye Oyasin
           

The Human Story

My favorite stories are aliens from outer space.

Extraterrestrials have their place,
And I have met a few.
But you don't have to leave this planet
To tell a good story.

I would say
You
Are fearless.

Imagination...
The most powerful force ever
Made available
To human

Kind.