When I arrived for the fund-raising party on the equine rescue farm, my favorite local blues band was playing in the shed where the feed for the animals is kept. A friend waved me to me through the window, encouraging me to come in and dance. There was a hole in the cement that I quickly learned to dodge, even while my dance partner spun me and swung me in and out. He pointed out a beautiful lizard running across the floor. It had patterns in its scales that reminded me of the eyes in peacock feathers done in shades of brown, probably a Holbrookia Elegans—elegant earless lizard. It ran into a corner. The band admired it and kept playing.
Most of the guests sat around tables outside and on the porch of the house, drinking, eating the potluck dinner. The view of Turtleback Mountain and the rough dirt hills was stunning, Bright blue sky, 101 degrees, a fine June evening. In a pen behind the shed where the band was playing were two gray-and-white donkeys, a white pony, a tiny brown-and-white mini horse, and a couple of mules. The pony was apparently upset with the mini horse, charging at him, kicking up dust. I approached the pen to pet the donkeys, and they both turned their backs to me. I took it as rejection, but was later informed that it was a gesture of trust. They were asking me to scratch their butts. I just don’t speak donkey.
When I returned to the shed, one of the party-goers was drinking tequila straight from the bottle. He was a round-bellied, very white man with tattoos on both arms and long white hair, but a rather young-looking face. He lives across the dirt road from the donkey farm, and said that he felt fine drinking the tequila, since he only had to walk home—which could still be a bit hazardous, though safer than driving. One night, he had stumbled and spent about twenty minutes in the ditch, which we agreed sounded like it could be a blues song. “Twenty Minutes in the Ditch.”
He said, “You can do anything out here that you want, and no one bothers you.” He also said there’s a cave you can see from Sixth Street, and that people sometimes live there for months at a time. I’m not planning on drinking in the ditch or sleeping in the cave, but it’s good to know that there are places that wild within the city limits. Dancing on the donkey farm was wild enough for me.
Amber Foxx Mysteries 