Peace in a Small Town, Day 7, last day

Day 7-last day

I wish I could report this morning the Bad Boys were found eating some more of Mrs. Johnson’s award winning roses, but I can’t. I think they have moved on to the next cycle of deer life; having wives, kids, finding a place to stay in the woods, staying out of the cross hairs of anything with the word Remington on it. The town, early this morning, is bustling with people loading up their Range Rovers and moving on to the next town or state.

So, how does a Grand Lady clean herself up when she is overrun with people and vehicles so thick they are lined up in both directions as far out of town as one can see, double parked, overflowing her trash cans, and generally taking up too much room on the sidewalks? How? She rains on them; rains on them a lot. I mean a lot of rain, hard, pelting, sideways, in a confined space, on all of them, soaking them and making them cold.

They were running to their cars, under over-hangs, getting back on their motorcycles and Caravans and pulling their soaking wet Maltese’s in to the cars with them. There, they stayed for hours. A large supply of them gave up and left even before the fireworks.

Maggie’s Kitchen closed early yesterday. They sold out of the smoked brisket and pork shoulder along with their burgers. The boss went home to take a nap and a shower.

The fireworks in this town are probably one of the best in the country. The town fathers had shortened the show due to budget. This town lives on tourism and we all know that is down. They have to cut their school budget this year by 10% which is now into staff. When you only have 200 students in a K-12 program, that can be a whole grade level. It was obvious the show was cut back. They had large times between rockets, trying to stretch the show to match the music they synced it to via the school’s KURA radio station. Still, it was incredible. The echoes off the mountains could be felt as well as heard.

I guess that’s just part of the cycle of life; like the Bad Boys. We want that memory, that time when all things seemed right with the world; that perfect moment when we cut out a place in our brain just for that image. Then, we spend the rest of our life trying to find it again.

We never do.

This town is terrible, please don’t come. Stay away. Those pleas are from someone who has done just that, cut out a corner of the memory bank and tried to capture and keep that image as a real event. It isn’t. It was once, but now its gone. I need to let my grip go.

Time to make new images and memories. There are more to come, more Bad Boys, more Mrs. Johnson’s roses, more Bries, more walking in a small town eating some ice cream while sitting on a bench, watching the Meadow Gold truck make its delivery and counting that as the high point of my day. You just got to look. Some new images will be from here, but I have to allow the old ones to go or I will be sorely disappointed-every time.

Maybe, if we are lucky, the Bad Boys will have kids. They will teach them the ways of the world in downtown Ouray. They will show them how and when and what to do.

And the rest of us, while we sip our coffee on our breathless walk up a street at 7700 feet, will smile at the sight of the new kids on the block and store that image for a day when we need to remember; a time and a place.