Conquering Rural America

AuthorHouse

Contents

Introduction.................................................................ixIn the Beginning There Was Simplicity and Innocence..........................1We Learned To Read, Write, Add, and Love Our Country.........................13Mother Wants Indoor Plumbing.................................................20A Glimpse into the Future....................................................23Government Facilitating Rural Existence......................................27The Marxists Attack..........................................................29Elderly Rural Landowners Fight Back..........................................34Invading the Schools.........................................................40Seizing the Use of the Land and Fleecing Its Inhabitants.....................47Destruction of the Forrest Begins............................................58Our Town Dies without a Fight................................................62Transportation Stalls........................................................65What Happened to the Media...................................................68Uncle Henry Takes a Stand....................................................73Rural Eradication Efforts Make Life Difficult................................75Health Care Takes a Hit......................................................77Our Town Deteriorates into a City............................................86Marxist Officials and Thieves Take Complete Control..........................90Schools Become Complete Indoctrination Centers/Prisons.......................97The Final Stages of Rural Eradication........................................110Australia Goes to War against the Invading Marxists..........................116We are now Refugees..........................................................125References...................................................................137About the Author.............................................................139

Chapter One

Roaring down the new freeway at an astounding fifty-five miles per hour, father guides the aging station wagon over the smooth gray pavement. Light drizzle has subsided as the overcast skies become somewhat broken, allowing rays of sunlight to escape to earth through the infrequent bright blue holes in the cloud cover. Ahead, it illuminates the shiny new seventy-five mile per hour speed limit sign as we pass through a corridor of hundred-year old evergreen trees. The road cuts through the seemingly impenetrable forest where emerald branches are swaying in the slight breeze atop the sturdy, moss-covered, corky textured, trunks. This, and the mild odor of gasoline from the cans and the chainsaws behind the back seat, reminds father that his company will start logging this area tomorrow, also the station wagon is nearly out of gas.

A glistening newer sports car slows drastically as it pulls up closely behind our car. The identifying vanity license plate becomes intermittently visible through the thick blue smoke from the exhaust pipe of our car. The alien flashes his lights several times behind us before driving, illegally, around on the right side of our car. As father screamed, "Go back to Inner City where you belong", the man gestured obscenely with the middle finger of his hand while passing. Father reminds us that they must have seen the shiny new, Native, license plate cover that he had bought last year and recently installed on our car (the ticket for two years past due license plates had prompted him to install the cover).

The noise from the hole in our car's muffler, stirs to flight a flock of snow geese in the swamp adjacent to the freeway. The green and black background of the trees enhances their pure white plumage with black tipped wings. The field, once productive range for cattle, has become a wetland haven for the migrating waterfowl created by highway construction.

Uncle Henry said he was going goose hunting today and would bring over one or two for our dinner if he shot any extra. Last week someone shot his truck when he parked it in the field instead of the designated area, because he did not want to walk into the wetland. When the geese fly into the marsh, the hunters open fire from all directions. Anything in the vicinity is subject to gunfire damage. Father said he might as well have put a target on the truck because it was a candidate for certain mutilation. It is difficult to drive without a windshield, especially in the rain.

As we crest a steep hill, Mt. Constitution comes into full view between the passing wind driven puffy white and gray clouds. Completely covered in layers of deep snow, the mountain's eerie pallor stands ominous against the broken sky. Infrequent puffs of steam remind us that it is an active volcano, but an actual eruption is highly unlikely in the near future.

Our downward momentum is interrupted by the sputtering, wheezing, and lastly a smoke filled backfire of the last gasp of the engine as it ceases to run. After examining the gas gauge, which registered far below empty, father deduces that we have run out of fuel. Undaunted, he retrieves one of the chainsaw gas cans from behind the back seat and proceeds to empty it into the tank of the station wagon. Returning, he tries to start the car. Grudgingly, with extensive moaning, sputtering, popping, missing badly, and with a huge cloud of extra smoke the engine starts.

Continuing our outing, now with a great cloud of extra smoke emanating from the back of the car, father takes the no u-turn road connecting the north and southbound lanes of the freeway because he was in a hurry so it was ok. Hindered somewhat by the gasoline mixture, the car lurches forward, surprisingly, at nearly the same speed we were going before.

As battered pickup truck pulls up to the right side of our car, mother rolls down her window recognizing the vehicle as that of her niece Louise. The woman frantically lowers her heavily soiled window revealing herself and four screaming children in the seat beside her. Mother explained that the smoke was only the oil in the chainsaw gas, and we were not on fire. While driving side by side down the new road, they talked about the highway, dinner, their children, cows, and the weather until we reached our freeway exit to return home. The extensive line of vehicles delayed behind us was now visible, without the smoke. They were shouting, waving, and cheering as they passed thankful of our exodus.

Following the two lane road eastward into the lowland forests of alder and cedar, we turned onto a highly rutted muddy dirt road. Accelerating through the deepest holes to prevent our being hopelessly mired to the axles, my head nearly hits the ceiling as a chainsaw flies past and hits the back of the seat in front of me. Father and Uncle Henry say they are going to fill the holes with gravel from the river for sure this year.

As we ascend from the woodland onto rolling pastured meadows to our home, our anxiety eases, as the possibility of being stuck and having to walk home barefoot through the mud diminishes. Since school is out for the summer, the necessity of casual footwear, for financial reasons, is delayed until the fall school year.

Our journey over, we parked next to the dilapidated shed that contained logging tools and an old tractor. The roof, covered with water soaked moss covered hand split cedar shingles that we made from the trees on our property, somewhat protected our family's livelihood. Beer cans and various discarded auto and machinery parts littered the oil stained dirt floor. Its cedar siding, along with that of the house and barn, was obtained by trading the mill, logs for siding. The sliding door had long ago had fallen off its track, and was leaning against the side of the impoverished building.

Exiting the station wagon, we followed the grassy path to the twelve- hundred square foot house whose exterior greatly resembled that of the tool shed. A river rock chimney stood against the gray weathered cedar side of the two-story structure; with the contrasting bright yellow green moss covered roof over the black water soaked shingles. If one could ignore the garbage pile, the knee-high weeds and the car parts leaning against the wall, the house was quite the picturesque image. The windows were fairly clean and undamaged in places, while others were broken and caked with dirt. There was little paint on the structure except the cracked and peeling surfaces of the windows and doors.

Amongst the brush and brambles of what, at one time, was a lawn; several abandoned cars, trucks, and machinery surrounded the house. Piles of dirt and debris with gaping holes in the ground scarred the landscape as remnants of a small failed gravel pit operation. This ceased when the dozer gave out which now lay upside down in one of the muddy holes. It seems that a worker or relative may have met his demise there sometime in the past as little is mentioned of the event or the gravel pit operation. When asked about when he was going to take the vehicles to the junk yard, father would say they were still good and he would repair them or need the parts some day.

The muddy sparsely-graveled parking space adjacent to our dwelling, where one could park six or eight cars and trucks at one time, was a breeding ground for many noxious and out of control weeds.

The back door of the house led, via a well-worn path, to the rickety two-seater outhouse. The small shed, whose door with hinges held on by one bent nail, was state of the art twenty years ago. Beneath the holes was a removable box that dictated the relinquishment of its excrement contents when splatter from falling waste covered ones backside. This is how the door came to be in such a state of disrepair. Father and my older brother emptied the box, but did not return it completely into the outhouse, exposing the inside to insects and the elements. Once, when mother found the necessity to use privy and while comfortably sitting nearly finishing her necessary task, the falling debris angered a bee wandering through the area stirring her to action. It rocketed through the hole and planted its stinger squarely in the middle of mother's rather large posterior. Erupting from the outhouse, removing the door with the middle of her forehead, she stood dazed atop what was once loosely fastened. With pants around her ankles, the bare injury site exposed, and her hand rubbing the area to determine the extent of the damage, she put her other hand up to her bruised brow, the lighted cigarette had not been dislodged from her lips throughout her dilemma.

The barn, with its corrugated metal roof and cedar plank siding, was built to a higher standard than the other buildings. Constructed of one-foot square beams and held together with large bolts, the interior had pens for animals on one side with storage and a shop on the other. The center, used for housing large machinery, was half the width of the structure. Above, was a loft once used for hay storage.

Much of the land was sold to pay inheritance tax when grandfather died; our property is now a ten-acre estate of brush and weeds. Slopping down to the creek in front of the house that divides our land, it becomes a five-acre flat pasture on the other side. There is also a small apple orchard with a couple plum trees in the field next to the creek. A small log walking bridge connects the field and the house. The semblance of a fence encloses the bumper crop of tall grass and thistles proliferating there. My brother shot a deer in the orchard the other day so its venison- stew again this week.

We have chickens for meat and eggs but no other farm animals. Our family now harvests trees in place of peas and cabbage.

Uncle Henry lives on the five-acre parcel adjacent to ours. He does not have a barn only a house and two sheds constructed of similar materials as ours. Living alone, since his wife left him, he works with my father and brother logging. His daughter, Louise, married a sawmill worker, after graduating the eighth grade, and now has four children. We have not seen his son for a while because he works on a fishing boat in Alaska.

Entering the side door of the house, we pass piles of rubber and leather boots set under the coats that hung on the wall above. The kitchen/dining room, with the wood cook stove, had a sink equipped with a hand pump for the well under the house. Hot water came from a pan on the stove. A couch and two chairs furnished the living room. There were floor lamps in two corners, a radio in one, and a table in the other. The fireplace set facing the couch in the middle of the wall.

The front door led to a covered porch, where there was located an electric washing machine with a ringer attached to the top, for getting water out of the clothes, before hanging them to dry on the lines strung around the porch. Since we have no indoor plumbing, we heat water on the stove and pour it into the washer when we start the cycle. A hose attached to the drain sends the discarded water into the front yard and into the ditch by the road. Once when relatives were visiting from the city, a boy noticed the head of a chicken swimming amongst the swirling clothes in the washing machine. His quiet moment of meditation sitting on the railing of the veranda thus interrupted. The chicken seemed complacent and not troubled regarding the thorough cleaning it was getting. He noticed the wind whipping through the cottonwood trees and heard the rushing of the water in the stream in front of the house. Occasionally, he would glance at the chicken in the washer as it went around and around and back and forth ridding itself of whatever filth a chicken would need washing. After a while, mother came out to check on her wash. He questioned her about why one would need to bathe a chicken especially in the wash with the clothes. Noticing the hapless chicken, mother screamed a few obscenities, grabbed the beast by the head and much to the horror of the young city boy, dragged it out of the wash and thoroughly wrung its neck. She stated, as she walked back into the house, that she was cleaning it for dinner tonight.

Upstairs there were three rooms two small and one a little larger. Each had a bed with a chest of drawers where we put our smaller clothes. On the wall, there were hooks where we hung our coat. Our parent's room also had a small closet. The walls were of painted plaster roughly attached over wooden laths. Sunlight blazed through dirt and dust laden windows somewhat illuminating the exposed blank interior. Perhaps the lack of cleansing was to protect the occupants from some harmful rays that might bring about abrupt awareness of their surroundings.

Adjacent to our property in front of the house beyond the orchard is a field occupied by several beef cattle enclosed by a six-foot fence. The owner, a lawyer from Inner City, had obtained it from my father and uncle when grandfather died to pay the inheritance tax. The barn with its reflective new roof housed hay for the cattle and a shiny new tractor.

The lawyer also bought the field to our north at a government sale when the elderly owner could not pay his property tax. Surrounded by a polished new fence, it is used to grow hay for his livestock. When asked why he wanted to raise cattle and have a farm, the lawyer stated it was a hobby. Thus, his cattle sold for far less than their market value to minimize his taxes. Farmers, whose income depended on the sale of their beef cattle, were forced to find other avenues to supplement their earnings.

The timber company has logged expansive forests that were behind our house. Large stumps, from ancient trees, protrude from the earth remnants of once majestic woodland. Strewn about upon the ground, are trees that were cut but left because of little monetary value. It is easier and cheaper to cut all the trees rather than just the marketable timber. Father and my brother cut these up for firewood. Great piles of limbs hewn from the harvested trees lay heaped among the stumps. The barren landscape, reminiscent of the aftermath of a great explosion or storm, spreads out against a leaden sky beyond the horizon. Tiny iridescent green seedlings protrude from the decaying debris emerging to replenish what has now departed.

The creek has salmon that come up to spawn in the shallow areas among the rocks and sand. Deposited in the bottom small round red eggs perform the last act of their existence. Bears dined on the fish in the past but not recently. Carcasses litter the stream until they decay away to nothing. There is a pool deep enough to semi swim behind a large boulder where the crystal clarity of the water allows one to observe the entire habitat of the fish, frogs, and insects that live among the rocks. Stones, cleared from the fields, line the banks to prevent erosion. Bleached by the sun and topped with jade green moss, they stand guard protecting against the encroaching waters. Hastened by gravity and impeded by granite boulders, the moderate crashing sound of the rushing water echoes through the gorge as it continues on its descending journey to the river.

Between the house and stream is the rutted muddy semblance of the driveway to Uncle Henry's house. Carved from the rock-encrusted hillside, the clay and topsoil have made their presence known with the gelatinous thick mucky goo that fills the ruts and potholes. It would be wise to maintain a constant speed since any unhurried travel might require a long tow chain. Winding through the brush and blackberry vines and disappearing into a grove of immature alder, cottonwood, and hemlock, the thoroughfare seems more like a cruel act of nature than a road. In summer, a thick cloud of dust propelled airborne by passing vehicles and deposited on everything in the front of the house replaces the mud, a major reason for very dirty windows. They are going to put gravel on the road someday.

Wind whipping through the trees, the sounds of the rushing stream, and the light drizzle upon the roof and leaves penetrate the air of our isolated estate. Occasionally a heron squawks, an eagle screeches or a robin chirps but usually silence is the rule here.

With school on the horizon, our yearly journey to the store for school supplies and clothes draws near. I have worked on the dairy down the road much of the summer to pay for what I might need.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Conquering Rural Americaby Robert Bay Copyright © 2009 by Robert Bay. Excerpted by permission.
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