It's What Works For Me, And I Suppose That's What Works For Her

I got a degree in forest management and a job with the forest service in Idaho. Five years went by, I lived a rather solitary life, things were just like I wanted them to be. I was never a people person. I didn't have newspapers or a telephone. I got up, did my rounds, did my job, fixed my meals and went to sleep, a job well done.

Then this woman came to see me. She said she was writing a book about solitary jobs. She had already interviewed a guy who lived and took care of a lighthouse on the Oregon coast, a man who counted animals in the wild. And now she wanted to know about the forest service. She started with what are you scared off the most about being out here by yourself? I said, Fire. That's it? Yes.

Well that didn't sit well with her, she wanted to write a chapter for her book and one word answers wasn't going to make for a long chapter. I told her that she had her thing, and I had my thing, but talking about it wasn't my thing. So thanks for stopping by, but she interrupted my day. If she felt insulted, accept my apology, but I had work to do and talking to a woman writer wasn't part of it. Get going, leave, let me do my job.

She got in her truck and looking over her shoulder she asked, 'don't you ever get horny". I said sometimes. 'What do you do?' Well I go find me a sheep, I told her. Of course that was joke, but she wrote it down. So when she sent her draft for review she had a whole chapter, all made up, about a sheepherder. A solitary and lonely job, but when the nights got cold, the sheepherder found him a ewe and settled down for the night.

Just kidding. All right, I let her interview me. But she didn't leave with out leaving a little bit of her ass behind. She got mad about it, said that's not what she had come to do. Well, I said, not a very smart woman coming out to interview men who have solitary jobs. Out there where it's lonely she was mighty good looking and I did what I had to do.

Things got complicated after that. She kept coming out to see me, and bringing home cooked cookies and things. She told me that she wasn't of the mind to ignore what happened. As far as she was concerned I had proposed to her and she had accepted, so when was she going to see the ring? I asked her why she wanted to marry a man who was perfectly happy living away from civilization? She said this and that, and then she asked if I wanted her to leave? I said no, I kind of got used to having her, but did she have to talk so much.

I guess you got used to her climbing in bed with ne, because I kept her around. Once she started having kids he decided that she would live in town, where she could see to it that the kids went to school. And I stayed with my job up high in the mountain, going to town once a month whether I needed to or not. That's what works best for me. And worked well enough for her.