Kick your shoes off.  Do not fear.  Bring that bottle over here.  I’ll be your friend tonight.  What story do you have?  We all have one.  Or several.  And isn’t it quiet here by the firelight to just rattle on?  If you can’t share, have you lived?

Oh yes.

The very best living is what no one wants to hear.  It is also the cruelest because they all want to know.  Look out now, because the Saints are coming through.  They’ll tell you how to do it.  Live it.  Feel it.  I’m pretty sure the sky is falling.

The legs are there.  The muscles look almost the same.  The sneakers line up.  You can scoff running, but if it’s your passion there isn’t any getting away.  Some of us were made to move.  All of us were made to move.  Some of us were made to hammer.  I don’t care if “hammer” is a 7:00 mile or a 3:43 mile.  If you love the hammer, you LOVE the hammer.

And the legs look almost the same.  The problem as always, isn’t the legs, it’s the mind.  Memories are free to those that live enough to cherish the details.  Personally, it’s a good thing.  Remember it all.  Because then the eyes can close and repeat.  Repeat.  And hopefully enjoy.

We should remember.  Many things.  Independence day is tomorrow.  Rah Rah.  Remember the ideals that built this country?  Freedom.  The ability to pursue happiness.  Not entitlement.  Not judgement.  The right to bare arms.  Go ahead, wear a tank top or Hell, go shirtless!

Happiness.  Unfortunately, no one is entitled to happiness.  You actually have to work hard at that.  And if this isn’t the land of the Free, then where you gonna go?

No ass in the grass on 6/25- see you NEXT week at Willowglen!

Me and Billy The Kid never got along.  Billy could shoot offenses like a six gun on fire.  He rode lazy in the saddle because he finished his milk with whiskey.  His hair was hacked with a knife and his eyes were always wild.  He loved to brag about how many rules he broke.

This bored me because it was easy for a man to break rules.  First, they didn’t have very many.  Second, they were only judged by men.  Even the hoop skirted women tossed their shoulders back in fake disgust at Billy’s appalling behavior.  Women were judged by men, ladies, and God as translated by his disciples: more men.

On my thirty seventh birthday, I wore a pair of stolen trousers.  I took my braids out and let my hair unravel below my breasts.  No corset, no collar, I stole his shirt.  I stole his hat.  And then I stole his horse.  I slit the saddle off and left it beside him while he slept.  I slugged back three swirls of whiskey and spilt his milk so he would have something to cry about.  I rode off under the strawberry moon.

I love to ride.  It’s freedom from eyes who have opinions.  It’s being alive.  It’s being lost.  Because you can’t really be found or discovered if you aren’t lost.  I grew to love being lost. Stability was mundane.  Expectations clung like thistles to my skirt.  Thistles didn’t cling to trousers and boots did nicely to squish anything rancid underfoot.

I hated the word pardon and Billy never made me say it.  He could never make me do anything.  I could never make him do anything.

I suppose that’s why we always got along.