Walsenburg Waltz - Page 5

Pouring Concrete Walls

Friday afternoon work crew – Randall, Norm and Fred – watch the sun go down behind East Spanish Peak, no cement truck in sight. A race to the bottom of a Jack Daniels fifth is interrupted by the rumble of the mixer at 4pm, hours after everyone has given up on it. Oh shit! What are we going to do now? When the truck reaches our site, the tipsy crew goes to work. Fresh cement is delivered one wheelbarrow at a time. Try not to spill; this stuff is really heavy.

one, two, three
one, two, three
Maria del oro Fred does his part
stay close to the heart

The Great Escape (almost)

The Kawasaki 175 (Estrella model) is a sporty, temperamental motorcycle for riding the Story Creek back roads and making quick trips to town. One day, Fred takes it out for a spin. Wearing sunglasses plus a helmet with a smoky visor, he keeps fiddling to kick this sucker into third gear. As luck would have it, he notches third as he comes over a rise, revving up to 30 mph about the time he sees, about 40 feet away, a three-strand barbed wire gate closing the road. Steve McQueen in The Great Escape would have leaped gracefully over this barrier. Instead, Fred goes for Plan B: dropping the bike, sliding wheels-first into the obstacle to save himself from painful lacerations. Almost. His right hand on the handlebar finds some nasty barbed wire that slices a two-inch gash in his middle-finger knuckle. Resourceful to a fault, Fred wraps his wound in a bandana, opens the gate, picks up the Kawasaki and drives 10 more miles into town, seeking ER medical relief. The nurse checks him in and parks him on a cot to wait for the doc when two cops bring in his new roommate, a psychobilly traumatized with a PCP psychosis, restrained by the sheriffs and howling to beat the band. Fun is where you find it – that’s Fred’s for the day. The docs stitch him up, he rides back to Story Creek and, to this day, keeps his middle-finger scar as a reminder.