Heading Into No Man's Land--OK Panhandle

Woodward, OK

It will be a while before I am in a library again reading your notes, and leaving my own. Thanksgiving dinner was a rattlesnake cooked in ramen noodles, one chili pepper, and old conversations playing in my head. The snake, victim of the road, would have suffered a slow death, recently clipped by a car. Fresh meat has become a rare feature on the menu...even boney white meat that tastes a bit like fish. I thought about turkey, and fat red cranberries. I thought about homemade heavy pies teasing me with smells until my mouth sweat far more than the snake warranted.

I arrived in Woodward yesterday with every staple I carry on empty. First stop, after a full stomach, was the post office. Tony (White?) made a few calls, and between him and the chief of police I was given a motel room at the Sands for the night. Delighted, I washed off a few layers, bounced on the bed, and sorted new/old winter gear for the cart I now pull to help with the the great distance between supply points. I also patched my sleeping pad that kissed a few too many quills somewhere along the trail. Morning came too soon.
Now I head west along the panhandle of OK. Kansas, Colorado, New Mexico? Wewather will dictate alot of my couse taken although New Mexico is the course I will travel through.
This is a rather dry blog. Time is short and already the sun is heading off ahead. I am excited/nervous for the new roads, new faces, new lands. More years are falling away. Soon this 2006 will feel less than real, as my worries become water and twigs to brew my coffee......and the great unknown itself still moving in the wind before me with winter beginning to wake.