Shakesthegrounds Rumblings

[Shakesthecoffecan]

It was the coffee and the dance music that got me to Bragg Creek that moring. I am not sure how many kilometers it was, maybe a 45 minute drive and RouxB & Fabienne's direction were perfect. The findingbrokeback bunch was in the parkinglot booting up. With them was an additional memeber, Barry from Ohio, who is also in the Giant catagory.

Our wrangler was named Allen, a friendly retired rancher and former bronc rider in the Rodeo. Just as nice as could be. His son is taking over the business from him next year, and I feel it will be in capable hands. Along with them was Harley, a mountain of a man and two women, one of who is either married or closely connect to Harley and the other a supermodel who was going to help her brother skin long for his new cabin the following day. There were also two dogs that accompanied us, a black one, mostly Lab, and a balck and white sheep dog that never tired and was always happy. "That" I told myself "is what I am coming back as next go round."

Tamarak had hope we could also visit some sights on Canyon Creek, but it proved to be one of those places that even though you could see it from our destination on Moose Mountain, you could not get there from that point. We could return from the trip, truck the horses to another spot and go there, but it would mean a 12 hour day. I began trying to calculate how that would work with my energy level, and it would not.

The day before Fabienne had her run in the a horses hoof and Mouk had her run off a saddle. Allen was keen tknow how they were doing, and I hoped they were well. The only horse incident we had that day involved Allen himself, leading the line, my horse right behind his, almost trying to stick its nose up the otherin's butt, they were crossing a small branch and his horse became spooked and reared, then fell back on him. His bods came running, got the horse up, got him up. He said that he thought he might have broken a bone in his foot, but he was not headed back.

My horse, Doc, was a good mount. He never got excited goin up unless he say a mountain bike coming, we had to keep our eyes out for them. They would stop and let us pass, "how you doin" eh?" a plenty. I felt right at home, like I did this every day inspite of wth my thighs were tellin' me.

The switch backs goin up the mountain conspired with the pine trees to rob me of my Jack Nasty ball cap, which Allen's son returned to me when I reached the top of the hill. I had figgured I might have to let it go so it was nice having it handed back to me. In the high meadows the dragon flies swarmed like a plague, none of them really bothering us. After about three and a half hours we rounded a bend to head up above the tree line and my attention was called to the valley to might right.

There, was the long upward trek of the computor generated sheep, where they ascend an make a hard left, a thousand of them. The angle was slightly different, but recognizable. Onward, up the trail we went to our final destination. There stood a carin of rocks. On flat one painted on it in red: Jack + Ennis. Here, the spot, this the direction, and with Nova's and Barry's help, there the rock that had sat behind Jake Gylenhaal's butt when Heath Ledger came up beside him and squatted down.

"This is a one shot thing we got going on here."

Out in the distance, some 40 km. away, you could make out the skyscrapers of Calgery. I laid there on my right elbow in the Huquerco made my Jake, in his spot. It was a strange feeling. More than seeing the scene, but being in the scene. That vast, lonely mountaintop, the wind blowing, the bear bell bedecked hikers walking by, oblivious to this as the sight where a famous movie had been filmed.

Barry took me over to the other side of the path and showed me where the camera had sat, at a different angle, and captured  Ennis, the fall, Ennis, the sinner on horseback, finally going back to the sheep when he hears the dogs bark. Here I started to learn things, like the trees in the background are the same trees you seen in the frontal shot of the "You know I ain't queer" scene. Where ever they found a place, they shot a scene, if it could work at all. My minds eye searched and imagined the cast and crew, maybe a hundred people, and the sheep,  all in this spot. There are photos the forst service took while they filmed there, you can find them on findingbrokeback.com.

"Over there" Barry told me, and before he could finish it I recognized it, the cliff they are driving the sheet along when they move camps. "It is about a 15 minute hike over there, and it is steep on the other side". My sore legs and feet didn;t want to attempt it, it wouldbe 15 min there and 15 min back, and I still had to eat my lunch of pepperoni, powerbars and apple and water.

Shale rock covered the ground.Thousands of them. I found two irredescent rock twinkleing with shinney points for Judy and Lisa, found two grey shale stones for Paul and Juan. Found an old Black Cherry Soda can from way back in the day, but left it there. The dogs enjoyed my pepperoni scraps, like they needed a reason to be my friend. 

As soon as we started back Doc wanted to trott, I had to continually hold him back. I wanted that ride to be overwith too, but my rump had done took all it was gonna take for one day. It seemed like forever to get back the way we came.

Once stopped for a break Allen told me about wintertime hunting trips he has to camp way back in the wilderness, saying "for tuff guys like you." I turned around and looked all over. ME? thought, I took the compliment and kept my mouth shut.

[Shakesthecoffecan]

Our Wranglers:

[Kelda]

Tru, I love love love these stories - keep em coming! And I would be very happy to have a regualr Travels with truman story to read!

[Shakesthecoffecan]

Tru, I love love love these stories - keep em coming! And I would be very happy to have a regualr Travels with truman story to read!

Well I'll see what I can do about that!

[Shakesthecoffecan]

Meryl told us we had to be up and away from there by 7 am.

It was Friday, and the heard of cats was moving south. This would require removal of smashed bugs and dirt from the windshields of vehicles. Packing and claiming and carrying away of food stuffs. Lee had taken off that morning, headed back to Colorado, thinking about her departure I played Emmy Lou in my head singing "can't remember if we said goodbye". We had our directions and took off according to our readiness. I saw the pimpwagon headed out and fell in behind. Judy and Mouk behind me in a PT Cruiser.

The TransCanada Highway was the same as when I had been the day before, the exit toward Bragg Creek the same. RouxB and myself hunted for the gas door release leaver only to find you need to give it a little push. We got turned around a couple of times before reaching Longview, but nothing catastrophic. I could tell when the call came in to RouxB's phone, she passed me on a mission. I held on and followed.

Out, down below in a valley I saw the vehicles I recognized, turned off on a dirt road, there at the intersection a studly cowboy in a white hat was waving us in that direction, was he our guide for something, no wait a minute, that's Eric! Come to join us at last.

Those of you who have never met Eric in person, you should. There are few people I have ever met more comfortable in their own skin, more properly filled with their own being than this man. He is gregarious and charming, infectiously happy and outgoing. I hope his folk are proud of him.

Up the hill we went, and parking on the side of the road we congregated, I looked back where we came from, and in a fit of deja vu recognized where I had been.

I had waited a couple of months to see Brokeback Mountain. I had first heard about it on NPR when it was at the Toronto film festival and told myself I would need to remember that name so I could rent it later, it sounded like a great movie. Then the buzz followed, the sound clips on NPR, the trailer on TV and that music, that beautiful music from Shawshank Redemption, I knew then no matter what I had to see that movie as soon as I possibly could, which was at an art house theater, a one hundred mile round trip. My partner had to ask me if he could go with me because I was so single minded in my mission. The sense of pride and apprehension that came over me when I saw that marquee say "Brokeback Mountain" was just the beginning of a long sorting out of things. It was about the third showing, the largest theater full of people. The lights went down, Focus features and River Road Entertainment showed off their logos and then the title came up, came up against the very rolling hills I was looking at now and I though: "I cant believe I am finally going to see it". Now, all these months later, there before me, was a car headed south on a road toward Signal, a town that never existed.

Kat's husband, hell he has a handle now: U/C Flyer, had his portable DVD player going, playing the scene, and we, once we got quiet, listed to it, soaked it in, and then was shocked back to reality by a passing train, in the movie that is. Judy, in a foreshadowing of her role to come in my story, gave me a big hug as the tears filled my eyes.

From there, we made our way south still, saying a prayer to whoever/whatever listens to prayers in that part of the world that Judy, low on gas, would have the Hanukkah Miracle performed in her gas tank. It worked, Many kilometers later we pulled into a little town where a woman was pumping gas at the pumps. I had not encountered such since approximately the 27th of August, 2004 in Taylor, Nebraska. This place was much the same, a crossroads in the middle of nowhere. I talked with Fabienne about how it was starting to look like those towns and we wondered what it must be like to live there.

Inside, the woman pumping gas told Judy how her brother had met Heath Ledger during the filming. Had his picture made with him. She was just smiling and happy about it and I thought that was so cool. If they had filmed it where I live, no one would admit being associated with it. I heard the train passing nearby, a sound so familiar. We were close I remember thinking.

Down the road we saw huge windmills. The kind used to make electricity. And then a sharp left off the main road into the little town of Cowley. When I turned onto that street, it was like I was coming home after a round the world trip by Yaris. 

We pulled off on the vacant side of the road, the side with the train tracks. Across the way the red church steeple behind a stack of fence posts, where Aguirre's trailer once sat. Where Jack had pulled his truck up was a store selling jerky of all kinds, with a plywood cut out of a male figure shooting an Elk. A woman sat on the bench there, taking it all in. What must she think? Oh Gawd, more of them, because of that movie, bunch of homos and hangers on come to disrupt their general peacefulness. Two young boys on a riding lawn mower went down the street at top speed pulling a third on a skate board, eager for attention. There was safety in numbers, until the towns folk poured out of wherever they were hiding.

Oregondoggie was there, in his aquablue Escort stationwagon, the same one he had driven last year from Oregon to Wyoming when we all got together in the town of Buffalo. He who had whined he would be unable to make the trip was suddenly coming in the last remaining days. He who had put my prayer from the casher out on the clothes line of the world had been to the Mint Bar, had pictures of the pool table and a tale of seeing the unknown man. Ten years older, and not alone. Let us hope it is so, I have no reason to doubt such a gentle soul.

I walked over to the store and checked out the parking lot. I was there with Phil and Paul and Kat when the stores' proprietor came out with something green and nylon in her hand. She asked if we were there because of Brokeback and we told her we were. She said she thought we would like to see this: it was the back off of Ang Lee's directors chair, he had given it to her himself. She was proud to be showing it off. Phil produced a microphone and began talking to her about the shoot there, and she invited us into her store. "We have the best jerky in the world" she told us.

Inside there was a poster of  the movie, and a younger girl at the counter made us feel welcome. She retrieved the chair back so Pete and Oregon could have their picture made with it. I told her her as I paid for me buffalo jerky that in many ways we felt trepidation going to these places and she looked puzzled and asked why. I said it was because of the gay thing. She said "That's not what that movie was about". She went on to say that people there saw the story for what it was, about love and struggle and loss. I exhaled, a little bit.

Down the street the alley where Ennis feels his guts being pulled out, just before the parking area for the rescue squad where Jack's truck was parked, I had always thought it was still in front of Aguirre's trailer. My own attempts to recreate the sound effects was still too familiar too me and I exited the little space as the kids were coming up the street again on the lawnmower. Unable to come to a complete stop they ran into the corner of building, giddy with excitement. I heard differing stories of what their take on Brokeback was.

Armed with some dry red meet in my stomach I staved off hunger for Ft. McLeod, about 40 km. away. My rear view mirror speaking more to the dirtiness of my car than anything I was leaving behind.

Ft. McLeod was a bigger place for sure. There we had a number of scenes from Riverton, the divorce court, the bus station cafe, the bar where Cassie just finished her shift and of course, the apartment over the laundry. Little places we had to seek out as 3/4 of them were concealed behind their veneer of real life.

The Java Shop building dates to 1912 or so, one half diner, one half Greyhound station. They are REAL proud of their roll in Brokeback. They have posters on the wall, they have a TV playing a continuous loop of Cassie and Carl entering, her confronting Ennis, the arrival of the returned past card and that chilly, gut wrenching phone conversation with Lureen. They keep a steady order of apple pie, and you can reserve table 25 if you call ahead, sit where Heath ledger sat, with you back to the TV while Jack is beaten to death. I am glad they included that sobering part.

Our waitress was a nice enough woman who gave us menus and then told us what our choices were. I got a big old red meat hamburger and a split a plate of fries with Oregon that nigh one of us could finish. They are looking for help BTW, Mouk.

Kat and Flyer, with the assistance of Kirk and Eric, worked on their own going project of recreating the scenes in the locations the originals were films. Kirk, I don't know if he was just pretending to eat that pie of if he actually was putting it in his mouth, sat at 25 while Eric escorted Kat in. There were towns people in half the place and I was giddy with excitement that they had enough nerve to do this in broad daylight, that it was okay to do. I was not prepared for what I saw. Kat is a natural. She was in character and she was Cassie. Not the first crack, she went Thur those lines like a pro. I was so impressed.

Out on the street, in true feline form, we ended splitting up into two groups, one headed for the court house another for the bar. I followed the latter, as far as the door. The smell of stale beer and old tobacco smoke hit me before I entered, and a life time of self preservation kicked in again. Shakestheground learned early on he don't go in places that smell like that. They are inhabited by dangerous people. Others in the group went in, had a beer, but like Eric said in one of his posts in the pictures thread, you can only expect so much from people drinking at 2 pm. Next door was a theater, they had a world premier of a play that night and offered walking tours of the film sights in the town. It was here that the local premiere of the movie had taken place, with the whole town turning out. Ang Lee himself had attended.

Down the street a left hand turn at the gift shop and there at the end of the block was the apartment. The stairs, the landing, the enclosure, the parking lot across the street. It seemed smaller than what I had imagined. A poster hung on the wall, replacing an earlier movie poster that had become faded. It heralded the site as the location of filming for three days in June of 2004. Jake's last name was mispelt, and we were invited to take all the pictures we wanted, but to please leave the tenants alone. I gave Judy a kiss in the stairwell, she let me be Ennis.

(The findingbrokeback bunch has actually been in the apartment, it is rumored that Tamarack can tell you the distance between the medicine cabinet and the door jam.)

The court room was not a big deal I thought. Juan and myself climbed those stairs having somehow lost the rest of them and checked it out. A sign at the door advised us to remove any muddy boots. Nice old place, with the obligatory movie poster, done in good taste of course. And the herd moved north again, in fits and starts and in confusion, but with a spirit of cooperation.

 

[Shakesthecoffecan]

It had been a long confusing trip from Ft. McLeod to Calgary, involving an unnecessary side trip to Straffmore, which I had no one to blame but myself for. We past some beautiful prairie country, past the town of Carsland where I recognized a row of buildings at 80 km. as Signal, Jack and Ennis walking to the bar to have a beer.

Able now to connect with a network I was able to raise Lynne on the phone and find out where I was supposed to be. The guest relations officer at the hotel we were a day early for drew us directions for the trip to the south end of Calgary. Mouk rode with me and I was glad for the company. She would be leaving us soon to set out on her own journey of relocation. After negotiating Calgary rush hour traffic on a Friday and locating the Travel Lodge, there was need to contact Lynne again to learn what exactly her leagal last name was so we could connect with the proper reservations and get settled. In the pool outside the office floated Paul and Meryl and Pete and Ellemeno, who like Lynne had just joined us.

I bunked with Pete that night. I enjoyed his company. A more sincere and earnest guy you will never meet. I can also say proudly I have never felt more comfortable taking my clothes off in front of anyone. He told me tales of his life way back when we went whitewater rafting. He carried with him a present for Rodney, a ceramic antique creel case. Wrapped and packed and safe for delivery.

We went to Ranchman's about 8:30 I suppose, this is the bar where Jack learns that Lureen's father sells "Hunnered thousand dollar tractors, shit like that." I walked in that place and something grabbed a hold of me. I can;t tell you what it was, I was fearful it was a case of acting out, but it felt different. I have not been in that many country/western night clubs, but when the volumptious Renee at the door told me she liked my accent and asked me where I was from, suddenly I was representing. I was in tune with the energy of the place and I was ready to have a good time, and a good time I did. I left the camera behind, and took it all in my memory. The best part of the evening: no cigarette smoke at all.

I learned the lay of the land, being shown where Jack sat, where Lureen sat and fortified with a back and forth series of beers with Juan I became at home. The findingbrokeback gang was there, as was Rob Skeets, who I had looked forward to meeting, WLAguy, Rodney, and familiar faces from the week poured in to the reserved tables in the center. And there in the midst of it, Lynne, in a dress. That went all the way to the floor. I had to pick her up and give her a spin and apologize for snapping at her for being stuck with her husbands last name.

I love Molson Beer. I drank a lot of it in college, in spite of its prohibitively expensive price of $3.33 a six pack. Had not hardly had one since 1986 but I made up for it this trip. I decided early on in the evening that if need be I would just leave the car there, it was only a mile back to the motel, I had walked further. And the evening pour'd forth to the sounds of country music, and a live band, and laughter, and women with penis shaped glow sticks around their necks, penis shaped attachments to the end of their drinking straws. Conversations with new and old friends, and the mechanical bull, fired up and ready to go. Kirk was the first in our group to hop on.  He was a natural. Me and Juan, betwixt beer runs, went and paid our $5 for our 8 seconds of glory. By the time we got back, Lynne was up on that thing, her long dress gathered up like a ranch woman going after cows stuck in the mud.

It is neat how the thing works, they have this rope wrapped around it and you lay your open palm across it an close, tighten, and other loop, and then they tell you slide all the way forward, sit on your hand. No easy feat. They start you out slow, and the longer you manage to hang on, the faster it gets. I am not sure what my time was, but I remember thinking "this is the not fun part", as I slipped off, l landing in the rubbery pillow of spoiled safety.

We asked Renee and another female employee there about the filming and the movie. I don't think either of them were working there then, but they had some story about Jake that I didn't get to hear all of, perhaps Paul did he was closer. He asked her about male/male dancing and they said they had no policy and had nothing against it but they could not speak for every one there. There was a growing need to dance, I wanted to. We asked if they know of any gay dance bars in town, but I don't think they did. We were going to make that a project, but like most of our planes it never came to pass.....

The country fried steak arrived about 11 pm, back home we call it chicken fried steak, it was spicy, but Molson took care of that. The band was playing, and I had been back and forth several times checking it out. Drunken women could two step around the floor, always had been. But two guys dancing together, no way.

But dance we did. Me and Juan and Judy and Mouk and Lynne and Kirk, and Pete came and took some pictures. There on that hard wood floor, me and Judy turned around and around, painfully as Jack and Lureen, while real life spun around us. We danced, clapped and hollered for more. My lung ached for air, my heart raced to keep up with me feet, that felt like they were on someone Else's legs from time to time. So out of shape I am, but I turned the corner.

Exiting the dance floor, our comrads having abandoned us, Pete on foot not waiting for me, I seen it was nearly midnight. I told Juan that bull was soon gone turn into a pumpkin if he didn't get on it. Well, he did, and he was the shit that night. You would have had to have been there to see it. I doubt anyone has ever looked finer riding one of them things.

Thank you, Lynne.

[Shakesthecoffecan]

Now comes the second and final installment of the busted jeans.

These I did not mind so much about, they came from the Goodwill store and I probably paid a dollar for them, I had probably quit wearing them because they were starting to bust. I probably packed them without thinking because I am a pack rat and had not discarded them. At least I was wearing my one pair of fancy under drawers that morning.

We were checking out that morning to head toward the rodeo in Rockyford, eventually. I was on postcard duty, making sure those I had promised would be receiving one, and that as many people had a chance to sign them as possible. Who is this? Who is this? Driving on the sidewalk?!? Ellemeno, Meryl, Eric, Paul, Mouk, Judy, Pete, all seen my fancy underware. RouxB was packing, but only Lynne told me I had done busted my britches. That is why Lynne is my friend. They all thought I was an exhibitionist. Well, I did change into my swimtrunks in the Denny's parking lot. (well I am chuckling, hope you are too.)

That morning was like the Olympics on flypaper. People would take off, people had to wait, while waiting someone would decide to wander off, someone needed to get gas, please wait, by the time they returned something else had happened. Kirk and Juan joined us and Kirk, who had been up late on the computer, had copied down the directions to A) Monroe's house; and B) Jack's murder sight.

Well Monroe's house did not exactly hold much appeal, but I am glad Judy and Gail, who was the last arrival, had devine providence on their side when it was time for them to visit. It was decided we would go to the murder sight. This would entail a freakish joyride thru the heaviest traffic the whole trip, Kirk's Kia, The Pimpwagon, The Yaris and The PT. Just to maintain visual contact, sometimes you got to settle for what you can get and trust you will all be where your supposed to be when the time comes. It was so that day.

Several times on this trip when confronted with emotion I have been reminded of scenes from my own life, stories I have heard that were similar. There are a couple I will write about at somepoint, but not tonight. Going to this railside I got a feeling I had buried a long time ago, going to see where my sister had lost her life. It was much the same, flat, a few trees and planes in the air.

The location is on the NE outskirts, past the airport, out in the country which begins abruptly. We went down that road that got narrower and narrower, a truck transmission lay on the right hand side. We reached a point where the road kindley petered out, at least it was the last place where the vehicles could easily turn about.

There were those of us who elected not to go, and I respect their decision. We set off on foot like we drove, everyone for themselves. I was walking alone mostly, carrying my medicine bag and realizing to my dismay I had left my camera in the car, I was not about to go back for it. It didn't feel right to do so, yet, there was no need, cameras abounded. I had been down roads like this before, a discarded beer bottle here and there, a smashed car window in pieces on the found like spilled diamonds. A twist of  barbed wire emerging from the ground ready to snag any tire that crossed it. How had it gotten there? How had I gotten here? The road continued, disused but evident, across the tracks, we were there. Like everyother place the angle was different, it seemed smaller.

The tall green grass had been trampled, no doubt by members of our group who had been there earlier. The place was eerily calm and quiet. Judy, Mouk, Lynne, Pete, Kirk and myself took it in, took it up. I wondered aloud what the other side of that sign on the rail road said and Kirk stepped to check it out. Like a Woody Guthrie song, the otherside, didn't say nothing. It was the same here, as it was there.

I lay down in the trampled grass, like instinct, gazed up at the clear blue sunny sky, blue, the color of Jack, Jack the murdered prince, Jack who gave his life, to redeem the life of the one he loved I have heard some speculate. Here, in this grass, starring up at the sky so blue you could drowned in it, he drowned in his own blood.

When I raised up I could see Kirk was praying at the fence post. Mouk was up on the tracks, alone with her thoughts, Judy and Pete speaking and taking pictures. Lynne, swaying ins ome instinctive prayer she carries in her DNA.  And the phone rang.

In Denmark, Maine, United States of America, Lisa of the Book, Lisa, messanger to the Vatican, had broken the endless game of phone tag she had played with Judy for days. Judy told her as calmly as she could where we were. I could have head her screaming without the benefit of the phone. Devinne Providence, showing its pretty head this Saturday afternoon.

We all spoke with her, I couldn't tell you a word she said, it was all strange and unnerving. I think it was right she called when she did, it was a lifeline, keep us in this world and not let us cross over to where we didn't belong.

I reached into my medicine bag and pulled out a braided cord of sweet grass. This I had carried with me for sometime, never using , never setting flame to, I had other medicine in the bad, mint that would have been good to use, but my fingers pulled out the sweet grass. I stuck it on a barb on the fence, it was curled like a baby snake, this braided. With tobacco, I prayed healing for what had been filmed there, prayed healing for all those who had been tormented by seeing the result. May that prayer slide off that braided for a long time, onto the winds of Alberta, and sail around the world. May that nicotine satisfy the nerves of something greater than the sum of us there.

There was medicine all about, in the tall grass, stalks I picked and braided and carried with me. There was intention in that grass and I had an idea already what to do with it. I also found a rusty, but otherwise unused railroad spike, a witness, no doubt to the filming. It fit in me hand nicely. I will sometimes ask rocks if they want to come with me, human made object always do.

Back along the road, the field of diamonds, pools of violence and penetration and failed mechanics. I stumbled along in a dream. The hands that had held me so long, they kept me on course.

I hope she don't mind my telling this, but one of the most moving things I heard said I heard back at the cars. RouxB explaining her feelings on the sacredness of the story, how she feels it should be handled and not in the way I have handled it at times. People need a release from the grief and finding no closure they sometimes act out, sometimes say and do things that don't honor the characters or the story. I am no different. I relate, and I am guilty too.

I am always seeing the flying creatures. They come at times of emotion and separation. The hawk at a burial, the bird that stands and just watches you, the fly than lands on you hand when you thing of someone you have lost. Here then, standing beside the open door of the Pimpwagon where I showed Juan my railroad spike, came the dragonfly, green and delicate, I held up my hand and it lit there. Its mechanical eyes swivelling about checking me out, studying me, maybe extracting some salt from my skin. Lynne got out her camera and I looked into those eyes. Who are you? Come to tell me something? Would I ever hear you if I could? It stayed a minute or more, and then it was gone, off in the breeze, back to its world.

Pete and Ellemeno can probably tell you I was not the best driver. I need prompting to go at stop signs. My heart was heavy and sad and few words spoken in that car did I hear. I remember a billboard with a giant chicken head on it, remember pointing it out like I needed to still connect with the world somehow, but it was only a head with no body on a billboard. I dropped off Pete and Ellemeno off at the Best Western and then went over to the Travel Lodge.

I had the trunk open, to get the bags out. Judy, she come up to me and said something nice and asked if I could write down what I had said out yonder and I could feel it coming up out of me, like banshees howling. Like my guts being ripped from their mooring, the tears came up in my eyes the way they have done hundreds of times the last 19 months, but this time, a monster was behind it. I grabbed a hold of her and held on, and let that beast out. It was awful, it was wonderful. I saw colors. Not pretty ones, but gelatenous, like old pus. I saw my mother kiss my dying fathers hand, I saw Curt driving blind in a fountain of tears, I saw Stinky jumping off Abrams Falls, I cried out, for every person I had cared about now just a memory, I cried for the stories I had heard and read, and in a minute it was over. Jack Twist was dead. Standing there was Judy and RouxB and Mouk and Lynne. It was late July and I was in Straffmore, Alberta in my swim trunks. I was back home.

 

   

[Shakesthecoffecan]

  And now folks, I have a guest who would like to speak of her and Gail's adventures in Calgary, after they took off on their own:

Take it away, Judy:

MONROE ‘S  HOUSE
CALGARY, ALBERTA


GAIL’S AND JUDY’S EXCELLENT ADVENTURE


The glory of the Canadian Rockies, and the emotion of seeing the filming sites for many of the Brokeback Mountain scenes had us tired and completely satisfied Wednesday evening, our last night in Alberta.  But there was still a bit of dusky light left and on a whim we decided to drive past Monroe’s house, just because we could.


We found the street, and next the correct block.  I could see the tip of the gable from the intersection.  Excitement took over.  “There it is, there it is!” I screeched, while Gail surveyed both sides of the street for a place for me to pull over.  As we drove up even with the house, we saw an unexpected issue, quite possibly a problem.   The owner was mowing the lawn.  After a short time, she looked up at our rental car idling in front of her home, and shut off the mower.


“Would you mind if we took a picture of your house?” asked my friend.  The woman shook her head ‘no’.  “It was in Brokeback Mountain, the movie.” she said.  “We know, that’s why we’re here!”   The woman indicated for us to wait five minutes till she ran her electric mower over the last of the lawn, and then she would be out of the way of our camera shots.


When she pulled the mower to the back yard, we began snapping and shooting, edging ever closer.  We wanted to get a good shot of the porch where Junior sat waiting for her daddy to pick her up.


Before long, the owner came back out and started telling us about the filming procedure.  How the crew had to get permission from the neighbors on each side of her house, to put “snow”  on their roofs for the Thanksgiving scene where Ennis slammed out of the house after the Jack Nasty remark by Alma.  This scene was shot at 11 p.m. on May 28th, 2004.


The dinner table and kitchen scenes were not filmed here she said, but over at the Scarbrough house.  Heath only came in and stood in the foyer so they could film him slamming out the door.  She told us she had been reimbursed for the damage done to her storm door, when the door slammed back against the house, due to Heath using too much force on one or more takes of that scene.


She said the process began when she received a letter stating that the film company would like to use her house in the making of a movie.  What convinced her to do it,  “in spite of the subject matter” was that Ang Lee was involved with the project, and she had long been a fan of his work.   She proudly revealed that after she had agreed, Ang himself had come to her house to look around and make sure it was the right house for his movie.  Both the neighbors on each side of her had agreed also, but Ang thought her property gave the best opportunity for his characters to show up well.


For the filming, they only added a few props.  One was the yard lamp.  The two flower boxes on the porch railing were originally meant to be attached to the front window, but didn’t show up well at the camera angle, so they moved them to the railing.   She said they added a goose or something to the left side of the door and they took a white and red sticker off her mailbox because it did not fit the time period.  They replaced it after the filming was completed. 


Two ceramic flower pots are now on her front steps.  They were not used in the movie, but someone from the crew had broken two plastic flower pots she had in the back yard, and they replaced them with the nicer ones, in spite of her protests that they weren’t worth the trouble.


She told us about the crew changing out her front blinds to match the blinds in the other house where they filmed Junior, Jenny and Monroe watching TV while Alma harped at Ennis in the kitchen. 


She had been telling us that the local paper, the Calgary Herald had kept the readers  notified of filming being done in the city on a little independent film.  On March 3, 2006, the magazine section of that same paper was devoted to the filming sites of Brokeback Mountain.  In the owner’s words, by then, they knew it was “Huge”.


As she’s telling us these details, and answering all our questions, it’s getting quite dark and the mosquitos are making a feast of my arms and legs.  About the tenth time I slapped at a biting critter, she said “Do you want to come in?”    Gail and I just about fell over.  “Yes, thank you.”  we said.


She went into another room to get the section of the newspaper to show us, and came out saying “I have an extra copy, if you’d like to have it.”  And handed it to me.   Then this generous woman pulled out personally autographed pictures of Heath and Jake to show us.  She hadn’t even had them framed yet.


To be honest, when she was looking for the newspaper and photos to show us,  I was running my hands all over the door that Heath Ledger had grabbed and slung open, who knows how many times in the filming of the Thanksgiving retreat.  I’m only human, you know!


To sum it up,  Gail and I had an incredible and informative visit with a gracious woman  and all because we decided to add just one more film site to our agenda at the last moment.

Judy

[Shasta542]

wordsmith 1. an expert in the use of words.  

Truman--You have mesmerized me with this accounting of your time in Alberta. While I'm reading, I can feel the experience  in my heart -- it makes me laugh and cry and believe that I can see what the actual travelers saw. And not just "see" but hear and smell and taste and feel---your sensual writing takes the reader into the moment. Thanks and I look forward to more.

[ifyoucantfixit]

     Judy

        Thank you for the wonderful retelling of your trip to Monroes house and the lovely woman who abides there.  I am getting a

different take on the way the Canadians treat the movie, and the people that are in love with it...They seem to have no feelings of

disapproval or disdain.  I am so glad.  Maybe, just maybe. The world has been changed, if only by the smallest bit,  for the better.

Because of our glorious movie.   

          Thanks to the people like Judy and Truman retelling the visit, they experienced.  I believe the souls are traveling thru the

ethos.  Sending all the same good feelings and healing power all over the world.  I truly hope..For as we know.  Love never really

dies. It is never wasted, it just changes form.               janice 

           Truman you made me cry:  But it was good...thank you again wonderful friend, whom i have never met.  But have known

forever.