The Rambling Insomniac

Halloween is upon us. Local streets, graveyards, basements and closets are crawling with ghosts and goblins. The local papers are chock full of articles about ghoulish activities going on all around town. Our homes, bars, restaurants, stores and businesses are all decorated with spooky images of spiders, jack-o-lanterns and black cats. Each newscast we see features a couple of scary segments related to Halloween. Cable TV stations are airing show after show about hauntings, killings and other creepy things to frighten the wits out of us. The movie theatres are oozing with slash and gore horror flicks. Haunted houses are open in nearly every community, and the “haunted corn mazes” that have gained popularity the past few years seem to be everywhere. On top of all that, the moon has been full this week, making things quite a bit eerier than normal.

What are my kids dressing up as for Trick-or-Treat on Halloween you might ask? Well, bacon and eggs, of course! So, if any of you are out and about in Hubertus this Wednesday evening, consider this your warning! I’d hate to see someone make a mess of their pants from such a bloodcurdling sight.

G’Night G’Town!

Deep into the darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.
~ Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven

trust – noun – reliance on the integrity, strength, ability, surety, etc., of a person or thing: confidence.

Those friends and family that are close to me know that for some time now, I’ve been going through some rather significant emotional swings in my life. Not sure I’d classify these swings as a mid-life crisis, as in my mind, I’m not really having a crisis per se. Not sure I’d say I’m going through “manopause”, because I’m simply to young for that yet! But whatever it is that’s happening in my life, “trust” has become a paramount issue. It’s sort of like a broken record for me, and there’s a list of questions that keep running through my head in almost any situation I’m faced with these days.

Who can I trust? Who trusts me? Should I trust everyone? Should I trust anyone? What is trust anyway? How is trust built? How is trust earned? How is trust lost? Why is trust lost? How is trust different than faith? How is trust different than hope? How can I influence my trust of someone else? How can I influence someone else’s trust in me? Doesn’t all trust come with a certain amount of risk? Can I even trust myself? Eek…that last question scares the hell out of me.
So anyway, I recently had a perfect situation in which many of the questions above came into play. I was up north grouse hunting with my buddy Dave. We were hunting some large hardwood tracts of public land he was somewhat familiar with, but of which I had never been on before. Now, with all due to respect to Dave, I’ve never placed a large amount of trust in his ability to navigate large tracts of land without getting lost. Even he admits that his woodsmanship skills aren’t the greatest. So when we parked at our first hunting area and he informed me we were going on a “2-beer hunt” (the type of hunt that takes you so far away from the truck that you better put 2 beers in your pocket), I have to say that I was a bit nervous. Once again, my broken record of trust questions started going through my head. But what was I to do? I had to trust my friend. I had no choice if I wanted to continue our hunt together. I knew there was a good chance we’d get lost in the next few hours, but the risk would be worth it if the hunting was good, so off we went into the woods.

We hunted for about 3 hours, and the grouse action was outstanding. We had a few grouse in our vests, which seemed to make the fact that it was pouring rain on us the entire time a moot point. We had already drank our second beers, we were sopping wet and muddy from head to toe, and we were both starting to get tired. And that’s when it happened….we got lost in a swamp. Anyone that’s hunted before knows what it’s like to walk through a swamp. It’s difficult and annoying navigation, and is no “walk in the woods” by any means. So after stumbling around in circles for what seemed like eternity, my frustrations got the best of me and I barked at Dave “Get us out of this @!$#ing swamp!” His response was a simple and positive “C’mon Tombo, we’ll be out of here soon”. I must say that Dave’s positive attitude about the situation made me feel better. Besides, I had to trust him at this point because I honestly had no clue where we were. And before long, somehow someway, Dave had led us right to the road where our truck was parked. Whew!

 

Despite my lack of trust in Dave and his ability to get me out of the woods that day, he somehow pulled it off. I feel terrible that I didn’t give him the respect and trust that he deserved. Given the outcome of the situation, he obviously deserved my trust, but why was I so hesitant to give it to him? I guess that’s why the broken record keeps running through my head. Sometimes trust comes with a certain amount of risk. If we are going to navigate life’s journey successfully, we have to be willing to place trust in ourselves, in others, or in the things we simply cannot control.

One must be fond of people and trust them if one is not to make a mess of life.  ~E.M. Forster

 

It was a cold October afternoon when the Treasure Hunting Expedition Team gathered at base camp. It was nearing 3pm, and they knew they had to start soon to reach the treasures and return to camp before dark. They quickly gathered their necessary gear, and headed out. They had a distinct advantage, in that they had a virtual map of where the treasures they sought were hidden. They also had several clues as to where to find them. The team consisted of three men, and two women. Between them, they had the experience, determination and will to finally find the treasures they sought.

After stumbling across their first treasure at the bottom of Pikes Peak, the team triumphed in what they had found. They held a celebratory toast to commemorate the find. It was a grand score, and they took only the most valuable possessions from the bounty, as to not tire them for the next leg of their journey....to the top of Pikes Peak. As they got further into this leg of their journey, they realized it would not be easy. The climb was steep, and even the cool October air couldn't prevent all the members from breaking a sweat. As they climbed further and further up the massive hill, their legs began to burn, their backs began to ache, and they questioned themselves as to whether or not the pain would be worth it. At least one of the female members of the party could go on no further, but the men were determined. She was carried most of the way up the rest of the hill, with a promise that the trip back down would be easier.

Once atop the massive hill, the team quickly learned that the treasure was not yet within their grasp. According to the map they had, it appeared as if it was hidden down a steep cliff to the south side of the peak. Hand in hand, they traversed down the hill, grasping whatever limb, rock or structure that they could hold onto to keep them from tumbling down to certain death. Just when they were ready to give up, one of the members looked up and saw what appeared to a military box nestled in some bushes. The team knew then that they had found what they had worked so hard to find. Another celebration and toast was now imminent. The youngest female member of the team walked away from that find with a beautiful silver necklace, worth more to her than any treasure she had ever found before.

Okay, so maybe I'm embellishing this story a bit, but after being invited by some close friends to an afternoon of Geo-caching in Pike Lake State Park recently, I learned what an adventure it can be. Our expedition team consisted of some close friends of ours from Hartford....Steve, Suzanne, and Garett Weis. They were joined by me and my daughter Lyndsy. As a matter of fact, Lyndsy was the expedition team member that couldn't handle the walk up to the top of Pike Lake's biggest hill, and had to be carried by her dear old dad (whew!). The silver necklace she received was actually just a set of silver beads from your typical parade, but to a 3 year old, it might as well have been made from pure silver.

For those not familiar with Geo-caching, I'll describe it rather quickly...using a GPS unit, you seek out caches that have been hidden in obscure places by other geocaching enthusiasts. People hide a "cache" somewhere, which is usually some sort of weatherproof box or container. In it are placed a bunch of rather meaningless trinkets, which are meant as rewards for anyone finding the cache. Note that it is customary for a fellow geocacher to leave something behind if something is taken from the cache. Also included in most caches is a log book and pen, so each party that has discovered the cache can document it. As for knowing where to find the caches, the originator goes to a website called www.geocaching.com and enters the GPS coordinates of where their cache is hidden. They might also include information such as clues for finding the cache, the difficulty of the terrain in which the cache is hidden, and a list of what has been placed in the cache. Once found, fellow geocachers can then log into the site and document their find for each individual cache listed on the site.

I have no idea how many geocaches exist in the world, but doing a search by the Hubertus zip code on the site revealed hundreds of caches within a few miles of my home. Seeing as how it is a worldwide site, I suspect there must be millions of caches hidden all over our planet! In the log book of one of the caches we found at Pike Lake (the Pike Powder Hike Cache) there was an entry from some geocachers from Ohio that stated this was their 1,000th find. That's pretty cool if you ask me!

Seeing as how I've always loved hiking, and that I love an adventure even more, I might just have to go and get a GPS unit and start doing this as a hobby with my kids. As my buddy Steve says, "If I'm going to go hiking and stumbling around in the woods, I might as well find something cool along the way".

And a quick update from my blog last week, those lots on Bark Lake that were listed on E-Bay each sold for about $8,000 each. Congrats to my neighbors, Bob and MJ Mann, who were the lucky bidders to purchase one of the lots!

G'Night G'Town!

Climb the mountains and get their good tidings.  Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees.  The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves.  ~John Muir

This past week, the Town of Richfield did something I consider to be rather unusual. The town owns some land on Bark Lake, and has decided to sell it. Instead of doing a typical sale via realtor or public auction, they chose to list the properties on E-Bay. I’m not sure why I think that’s so unusual, especially given the popularity of E-Bay these days. It just seems odd that a government office would be selling something on E-Bay to me!

So anyway, here’s the scoop…the town bought the parcels a few years back to provide public access to Bark Lake. The Wisconsin DNR has now told the town that they will be installing a public access site on the lake in 2009, which somewhat makes the Richfield site unnecessary. They have divided the site into two parcels, each 10 feet wide by 20 feet long. Quite small actually, but big enough for someone to install a pier and have lake access. As of this posting, the bids are up well over $6,000 for each site. Now I’m no real estate expert, but a 10 foot by 20 foot piece of land on Bark Lake doesn’t seem worth nearly that much money to me. It’ll be interesting to see what the final selling price comes in at when the auction ends on Monday, October 8th.

And for any bidders that do not win the E-Bay auction, my homestead is on Bark Lake Drive. I have a pond, which is right across the street from the sites on the lake. So I’m thinking, if you’re willing to dish out an obnoxious amount of cash for a 10 by 20 foot piece of land, call me and we’ll work something out for some prime pond access!

May the holes in your net be no larger than the fish in it.  ~Irish Blessing