Chapter 1

Or is it? Or do we just make our own lives a bitch? I did, and it wasn't really a bitch, it just wasn't all I'd hoped for. Thinking of that, why wasn't it? I didn't really have to do anything I didn't want to.

I'm not rich, and in the normal way people understand the phrase, I'm not even comfortable. But in my view I am. I just don't have much money, and I don't even mind that lack. I have enough for most of what I want to buy, or most of what I want anyway.

My parents were well off by the standards of their community, a small East Texas town. My father had a retail department store, and then some. It was by far the biggest business in town and he was one of the big fish in an admittedly small pond.

Life pulled a dirty trick, or some dirty tricks on him at the last though. He let his business get too big for him to handle alone and it became unprofitable. It was large enough, and a regular payout from the large land sale after his father's death was substantial and so the business took a long time to decline.

In other words, things didn't go to shit at once; the money just ran out slowly, not leaving his kids much. It didn't leave them with nothing, but what they got and kept getting wasn't enough to support them in the style they'd become accustomed to.

A weird malfunction of my mother's reproductive system had also wreaked havoc on the family, but in a subtle way. It fucked up our birth order. If you don't believe that birth order has anything to do with the way children grow up and develop, maybe you should only skim over the next few paragraphs. For the rest of you:

My sister was born and a year later a tuber nearly killed my mother, and in the early nineteen forties the damage it did was not to be righted by the doctors of the time. After mother was past the danger of dying, she was informed that she wouldn't be able to have more children.

Time flew since they were no doubt having fun, but eight years later they considered my beginnings a miracle. I have no way of knowing what caused her to think it, but my mother always told me that she carried me for eleven months. I never doubted her, because there was no way to prove it one way or the other, and she had recovered from putative sterility on her own.

Lo and behold she'd made a first class recovery when she did, and popped out a brother for me less than two years later and then another, less than two years after that. I don't know if the repairs broke down after that or if my parents quit fucking or what, but that was it.

So we now effectively have a daughter that is the only child, but with three brothers. We have two firstborn, since my miracle birth was nine years after my sister's and the pregnancy was completely unexpected.

By the time my next brother came along he was toast. He wasn't a miracle, and with the one after him he became an effective middle child. Only my youngest brother escaped for a semi-normal life.

Babies were old hat by the time he got here and wonder of wonders he was essentially healthy. My first brother and I were asthmatics from birth and at the time it was a fairly rare malady, no doubt because the medical progress to keep asthmatics from dying young was recent.

All in all a normal family life was out of the question. I don't know what it did to me, I just know how I seem to have turned out, and at this late date all I can say about it I'll limit to my personal situation.

I'm old, relatively healthy, unemployed by choice and not what most would call particularly honest. If my honesty is merely situational it has a strange way demonstrating that, since I find it nearly impossible to lie for economic gain. Earlier in life I found it nearly impossible to lie for pussy too, and I still think of that as my most distressing failure.

Enough with making you listen to my introspection. With the demise of my father's empire and of my marriage, I ended up with an acre of land, given to me by an uncle who had thousands and who didn't really like me. After his death I figured that he gave me the acre out of guilt from knowing what his will actually said and what he had assured my father it did.

I must say that he pulled one hell of a stunt that he realized he wouldn't have to suffer the fallout from. Even though he felt he'd been stabbed in the back, my father eventually found it funny because my uncle had also done his best legally to cut his wife out of the will too.

There I go drifting back in to fond reminiscence.

I'm still here on my little acre, right on the edge of more than twelve thousand others that are devoted to raising yellow pines for lumber. I have a nice little house, frame construction of the finest, and small. I did say it was little didn't I?

It does have electricity and butane and it uses damned little of either. Did I mention that I managed my father's lumberyard before it became insolvent? My little house, not even as large as a doublewide, used more lumber in its construction than a six-bedroom giant.

The outer stud walls use two by eights and are on eight-inch centers. The rafters and ceiling joist are two by twelve on the same eight-inch centers and no plywood sheeting need apply.

There's two by six center match between me and the cold cruel world, with three hundred pound per square fireproof shingles to turn the weather, and number one seventeen, my favorite pattern, pine siding to dress things up. If you don't understand about the construction details, tough shit.

I also have damned few windows and a hell of a lot of insulation. Two by twelve ceiling joist and two by eight stud walls leave a lot of room for insulation. Since I'm a forest products kind of guy, the insulation is the blown in wood fiber type that has been treated to be fire resistant.

The few windows I did allow were all triple pane glazed and there are double-pane glazed storm windows over them, and both my doors, front and back, were bought made into the latest energy efficient door units. The ones with refrigerator type magnetic weather striping that seals itself to the metal skinned door when it closes.

I watched every second of the construction, and the main carpenter, who'd worked for daddy for years, griped the whole time about using silicone gel for caulking and about using it everywhere there was a crack.

With the doors and windows closed, I can't feel a bit of breeze from outside unless the tornado is within a mile of me.

I know it was a little extreme, and I can't remember what got me off into such weirdness, but the first complaint from the carpenter - who shall remain nameless to protect his innocence - about the plans I'd drawn and the specifications I'd written caused me to raise my hackles and it was my way or my way after that. He couldn't even quit.

I could go on and on about rosin coated screw nails and water source heat pumps but I won't. I think I had the most indestructible frame construction structure ever built for a residence and I won't be gainsayed.

At the moment it was all for naught, since I was camping out. More like I was playing survivalist really. I didn't work so I had time on my hands and there was only so much time I could spend admiring my house, since it was already built.

Many times when I went camping I rode my horse and led my pack mule but tonight I was on a solo mission. I had my pack stuffed with essentials and frankly, I'd had hell under the weight all day. I made a note to self in my mind to do more foot powered camping and less horse and mule camping.

What I usually did on my three or four day ankle express expeditions was play beast of burden for a mile or so into the timber, set up a modest camp and then try to wear out my Buckmaster or my Glock, killing everything that wasn't moving.

When I allowed myself the luxury of my horse and mule, I also blistered the pinecones with my Marlin 336c in 35 Remington, my Colt Diamondback in 38 Special or my Thompson Center Contender in 7mm TCU. But I'd been too lazy to reload any ammunition lately, so I was off on foot with my 22 Long Rifle and my Glock. Mostly I'd be giving the Buckmaster a workout because, lets face it, 22 rounds are dirt cheap, more bang for the buck and all that.

Even on twelve thousand acres I had limited locations available for a proper camp, especially when packing my own freight. This was yellow pine timber after all, and pine campfires aren't worth shit, unless you're dying from the cold. I had to hike somewhere that had a few hardwoods around so there'd be enough squaw wood to make a showing at the fire.

I made my destination and set that heavy pack down. I'd used this spot plenty of times before and a few things that make a comfortable camp were already done. I had a circle of stones to build my fire in and last year I'd left a grate for cooking, and of course I had a nice spot roughly leveled to pitch my tent.

Deciding to get set up before sitting down, I pitched said tent. It was sort of like an army two man job; a pup tent most would call it. Next was blowing up my airbed. I know, I know, that really isn't giving myself a chance to enjoy the full benefits of camping, such as waking up sore from sleeping on the hard ground.

I'll have you know that I tried one of each type of airbed in any Wal-Mart within a hundred miles of home. This one fit perfectly in my pup tent and when inflated it fit snugly against all the tent's inner walls. Not only was it comfortable, it kept me from having to carry extra blankets to sleep on.

Yes, Virginia, it's true. I know you've all heard that when you're sleeping on the ground you should put more blankets below you than over you, to keep the cold cold ground from freezing your ass during the night. Well all the ugly rumors are true, but if you use an airbed you don't have to bother about such. Besides, I didn't like waking up with sore spots.

I gathered some squaw wood and started a fire then, but not for warmth. Autumn in East Texas is not cold weather time, in fact it was barely cool enough to keep me from working up a sweat hiking out. I wanted the fire to warm supper.

After it was down to good coals, I put my grate across the strategically placed rocks, put my camping saucepan on the grate and poured in a can of Ranch Style Beans and a can of Wolf Brand Chili. As it was warming I put my small skillet beside it and scrambled three eggs.

It's a pain in the ass to carry eggs while hiking. You have to buy a special hard plastic egg crate or you'll end up with a mess in your pack. I had one of the crates though, and I guess I packed eggs just for my masochistic pleasure. After all, there's always the chance you'll stumble and fall and break the eggs anyway.

Alas, no bread with my supper. If I'd been riding, I'd have brought my Dutch oven and a few of those biscuits tubes from the dairy case, you know - the ones you hit against something and they pop open - but I wasn't riding so I hadn't brought the biscuit makings. It wasn't the actual biscuits that killed the deal; a Dutch oven is heavy, and I was walking, remember?

The sun was heading down by the time I'd eaten and cleaned up, so I unrolled my sleeping bag and got out of my clothes. Don't worry, I wasn't about to ruin my high dollar double size arctic sleeping bag. If you eat beans practically every day, like I do, they don't make you fart much at all, and I'm not silly enough to sleep without wearing my boxer briefs, just in case.

The arctic bag was overkill and I usually went to sleep with the top off to the side, pulling it over me in the night if I got cold. The Internet had informed me that mid fifties was the coldest I could possibly expect and that high fifties or low sixties were more likely. Chances were that I'd never even notice.

When I woke for a second, probably after midnight, and pulled the bag's top over me I didn't even think about it. It did occur to me that it sure seemed like it was colder than I'd been led to believe it would be. It didn't really disturb my sleep though.

My watch told me it was five fifteen AM when I finally woke to get up. I didn't do it right away though, the sun wouldn't be up for an hour or more and dammit, no matter what the Internet thought, it was cold.

It had seemed silly when I packed my Carhardts, a Pendelton shirt, and brought along a down jacket, but they were light, mostly, and I had. As I lay in my sleeping bag, I was glad I had and was also dreading having to get out and to my pack to find them after I dressed. I knew they were down at the bottom in the probably won't need this trip part of my pack, with my wool socks.

When the sun was up, I dressed for my trip to my pack and then got up and out. What the fuck, it was snowing and my first footprint showed me that there were already about two inches on the ground. I grabbed my pack, carried it in the tent and then sat down.

This was impossible. In this part of Texas it snowed in February, about two or three inches usually, every third or forth year. It did not snow in late October, any inches, ever. How could the Internet have been so wrong? Had nuclear winter come up overnight, without the bombs? But there was snow out there and it was cold and I had to deal with the facts on the ground.

My pack had to be unpacked, completely, to get at my warmer clothes. After only a few seconds consideration I striped back down to my briefs and put on my Browning knit long-underwear and worked my way out.

I didn't just put on my warmest clothes, I put on all my clothes, even changing to my insulated boots, they were half a size larger, so I could wear my cotton and wool socks at the same time. The only thing I didn't put on was my two-piece rain suit.

Back outside, I looked around and forgot completely about the snow. These were not the same woods I'd gone to bed in.

"How could you tell?" you might ask, "Trees are trees."

Trees might be trees to you, but these were not the trees that I had gone to bed among, one time professional lumberman that I was I could tell the difference. I'd camped in a scattering of maybe twenty to twenty-five oaks and probably five or six hickories. None of them more than twenty-four inches in diameter. From where I stood now I could easily see at least a hundred oaks and probably fifty hickories. They were so numerous that I could barely see any of the ubiquitous southern yellow pines that made up the majority of the timber in East Texas.

That was only the first clue. These oaks and hickories were all at least three feet in diameter and some even larger. The squaw wood I'd had to scrounge for last night was now apparent everywhere, not even covered by the, impossible to be falling snow, yet.

And the pines. Even from this distance, the pines I could see were giants, some of them looked to be probably five feet in diameter. There hadn't been any pines like that in Texas, anywhere, for a hundred years.

Something was dreadfully wrong and I didn't even feel a deep burning pain in my side. The only preparation for something like this that I'd ever had in my life was the old TV series "The Twilight Zone."

What do you do when you wake up and face a situation that is completely impossible? I didn't need to shit and I didn't want to go blind. I built my fire again to cook breakfast.

I wasn't worried about my beans or chili but I did fear for my eggs. I guess it hadn't been cold enough long enough to freeze them, but that wouldn't last. I scrambled six this morning and mixed them into the can of beans and the can of chili I warmed up, cursing bitterly now over the lack of biscuits.

After I'd eaten and cleaned up I packed my things, having already decided to cut this excursion short. My survivalist fantasy was shot to shit since it had become too damned near real for my taste. I packed up all my things, even taking the grate, the round point shovel and the yard broom that were here when I arrived. Backyard wanderer that I'd become, I had the same sort of permanent equipment scattered around at five or six little campsites. I took these back with me this time though, just in case. I didn't know what was happening, but I was worried.

I was going back home and I intended to give the Internet a piece of my mind for this travesty of weather forecasting, but all during the packing I wondered if my home would be where I'd left it.

It wasn't. My home wasn't there, my small barn wasn't there, the fence that kept my horse and mule penned up wasn't there and neither were my horse and mule. My garage with my 1976 Chevy half-ton four-wheel drive pickup was absent and so was the workshop and the little shed that I built specifically as a smithy so I could shoe my own horse and mule. Of course I'd only done it three times myself, but still, it was mine.

My DirectTV/DirectPC satellite dish wasn't there, and neither was my five hundred gallon butane tank nor my deep, tube, water well. Nothing was there, except more of the impossibly huge trees, all of them pine in this particular area.

Even though the woods around were changed, I knew I was at the right place. There'd been a small cave type opening in a nearby hillside and it was still there. Too damned bad it wasn't big enough to stay in.

I was worried now. Of course I would set off for the nearest little town, but with nothing at all, except for the hole in the hill, looking familiar - what was the chance the town would be there?

It wasn't really a town anyway. Just a crossroads gas station and store that didn't even sell gas anymore, and was only open sporadically to sell the few grocery items it kept now.

My first destination was my uncle's house, the uncle that didn't care much for me. Of course he was long dead, but the house his wife had nagged him into building when he was old enough to know better, Sunning Hill she'd named it, it was still there. Or it had been two days ago.

Probably a mile and a half later I saw that while the hill was still there, though not like it had looked the last time I'd seen it, Sunning Hill - the house - was not around. I walked to the top of it and the T&P Lake that had been behind it wasn't there either.

The T&P Lake had been made by damming a good stream that was still there. It had been made as a Mill Pond for the big sawmill my grandfather and his brother had built in the late eighteen hundreds. The lake was gone.

Luckily for me, when I'd taken up camping as a job I'd learned how to really use a compass. It was a Boy Scout model, in fact, and I knew how to find where the small town was. It was a damned good thing too, because along with everything else that wasn't here, Farm Road 248 wasn't here either.

I knew the town was about three miles from Sunning Hill, "as the crow flies" like they always say. I wasn't riding on crows but I knew I could go basically straight over the countryside. Especially with the lake absent. The railroad tracks were also absent, but they'd run pretty much straight to the town and railroads usually took the path of least resistance when they could.

As I'd expected the little town was nowhere to be seen. My next trick was eight miles nearly due north, my original hometown. I didn't really expect it to be there either, but it had been older than this tiny town and maybe that made a difference.

At any rate, I was walked out for the day. I found a few hardwoods, gathered some wood and built a fire. When I discovered that my eggs hadn't frozen after all, I declined chili tonight and had a can of beans and scrambled the rest of my eggs, mixing them together.

After I'd eaten I put up my tent, pumped up my airbed and got in. I brought everything into the tent except for the yard broom, the shovel and the grate. I even brought my axe and hatchet in, but I was so tired by that time that I may not have had a good reason to.

Breakfast was chili the next morning. I didn't even put it in my saucepan to heat it up. I opened the can, and after the fire was down to coals, I set the can near it. It was warm when I spooned it out and I didn't have to bother with cleaning anything up.

By now I was tired of lugging the shovel, rake and fire grate with me, but I wasn't about to leave them anywhere. If I never found anything like a town or other people they would come in handy. The weight wasn't really a problem either, since my pack's contents had been diminishing by a couple of cans of chili and beans a day, and the eggs were all inside me now. They'd probably be back outside me in a few hours.

If I didn't find my way out of this to somewhere, I'd be out of chili and beans in two more days and I'd have nothing left to eat except a few granola bars.

Packing things up, I headed north; while I walked I tried to think of what I'd eat when the chili and beans were gone. Meat looked like it would be easy to come by. I'd seen plenty of deer and a lot more squirrels. I hadn't even had to look for them. They seemed to be almost everywhere and they weren't as shy of me as they should have been. They weren't coming up and begging for treats or anything, but if I didn't try to get close they didn't panic.