Watching The Sagebrush Roll

Lonely But Free I'll Be Found Drifting Along With The Tumbling Tumbleweeds


Bike Trip
Sitting On A Dilapidated Porch Watching The Sagebrush Roll
May 24, `72

Finally out West, I was sitting in the middle of nowhere, in the
South Dakota, Badlands. After a day of bicycling 120 miles, and
getting a flat tire too (the tire was easily repaired with a patch
on the tube), I was looking out at the clouded horizon from the
front porch of an old deserted shack. The wind was blowing sand
everywhere, even through the gaping cracks in the shack's
sideboards. My bike was leaning against a hitching post (a real
horse hitching post) right in front of me. I half expected to see
Kit Carson come riding up. If it rained I could take shelter inside
the shack. Except for the family of mice that went scurrying away
when I stuck my head inside the door the shack was empty. Sitting
there, reliving my old cowboy fantasies — exquisite memories—I
thought, "life is good."

Earlier in the day, I had been warned about rattlesnakes. I hadn't
seen any yet. I didn't have to worry about mosquitoes. There was too
much wind for that problem to arise. Last night I slept under an
overpass because it rained from late afternoon on. Before I actually
entered the Badlands, I rode up to a scenic overlook and viewed the
silhouette of the Badlands at sunset. It was beautiful. This place
puts you in the past; its like nothing has changed. "Oh, look! Is
that a smoke signal on the horizon?"