The Old Blog in the Desert

Lawrence Leroy “Butch” Butcher passed away. Quietly. Just like he lived. January 8, 1933 to June 21, 2025. Ninety-two years on this Earth and none wasted.

He was part of that old Klamath guard—the kind of man who didn’t boast, backed down, always had a wrench, a pocketknife, or a piece of advice on hand.

I grew up around him. His son, Jimmy, was in my graduating class. His daughter, Cindy, came up the line with my brother, three years behind me. The Butchers were like pillars in the fog—always there, always steady.

Now, I need to come clean about something.

There was a night long ago when I was behind the wheel of my ’68 Charger, hauling up that twisting stretch of Highway 101. It was about 10:30 p.m., and the Redwoods blurred past like ghosts in the mist.

I had my brother, along with three other high school knuckleheads. I wasn’t thinking about safety or scenery. I was thinking about Candy–red-headed, blue-eyed, and waiting for me back in Crescent City.

I hit the 30 mph curve, going closer to 80, tires squealing like sinners in church. I flew past the Butcher’s car like a bat outta Hades. I made it home, dropped everyone off, and tore off again like James Dean.

The next day, my folks got a call.

Mr. Butcher had seen it all and wanted them to know. He said I could’ve killed every last one of us. My mom, bless her, tried to defend me, “Oh, you must be mistaken,” but I knew better.

So did she. So did Mr. Butcher.

He was right, of course. I was young, dumb, and full of adrenaline. He didn’t yell; he presented the facts like a good witness, a good neighbor, and an even better father.

I never told him thank you, but I should have.

Mr. Butcher had been preparing for this final stretch for a while now. You could see it, according to Cindy.

The way he got his affairs in order. The way he spoke softer but more clearly. The way he looked at the world—longer, with more weight behind it, like he was memorizing you for the road ahead.

He didn’t want a service, and I reckon that fits. The man didn’t need a spectacle, just our quiet remembrance. Cindy asks us to hold him in our hearts, which is easy enough, as he has been in mine since that misty night in the Redwoods.

He was a father, grandfather, great-grandfather, and—this part’s hard for me to say out loud—a friend, though he never knew it. I didn’t see that coming.

Not back when I was peeling through corners and burning rubber with KPOD on the radio. But, as time passes, many things change, and one of the best aspects of aging is discovering who your true friends are.

Now, as I look around, there aren’t many left from that generation. Mrs. Dorothy Pasch, Mr. Ralph Rode and Mr. Mike Collins, as far as I can tell. The last of our parents. When they goe, a whole era will slip away into the fog like headlights on a winding road.

So, here’s to Mr. Butcher. May he ride the curves in peace, mist on the trees, stars overhead, and may we all be lucky enough to have someone like him call our folks when we’re being stupid.

When I was a boy, I used to think getting old meant you could finally eat dessert first and swear in front of children without consequence. It turns out it means making new noises every time you stand and forgetting why you came into the kitchen, even though it seemed important at the time.

Now, my body is no longer a bunker. It’s an old house—creaky, drafty, and home to an old fart who won’t shut up.

The first time I noticed something was wrong was when my left knee started making a noise like someone opening a screen door in a horror movie. I wasn’t doing anything heroic, either. I was bending down to tie my boot, a man preparing for a day of labor, and then I was gripping the edge of the porch rail like a Civil War widow in a thunderstorm, whispering, “Oh Lord, not again.”

My friend Everett, who still wears his high school letterman jacket even though the high school itself burned down in ‘92, swears it’s because I don’t drink enough pickle juice.

“It lubricates the joints,” he says while pouring it into a Mason jar and sipping it like fine wine.

It’s the same man who once got bit by a raccoon and tried to cure it by rubbing bacon fat on the wound. So, take that for what it’s worth.

Please, don’t get me wrong—there are benefits to getting older. For example, nobody asks you to help move furniture anymore. And you’re allowed to complain about everything, from gas prices to modern music to how they don’t make garden hoses like they used to.

Heck, I’ve even perfected the Old Man Sigh. It’s a slow, gravelly exhale that says, “Life’s been hard, son. Let me tell you about it over some coffee.”

But this old house body of mine? It’s full of things I didn’t invite. There’s the thing in my knees that moans every time I try to get into my truck and the one in my back that throws dishes on the floor if I stand too long washing them. I even have a thing in my bladder that wakes me up three times a night to remind me who’s boss. And let’s not even talk about the missing metabolism, which died sometime in 2003 and now hangs around the waistline of my jeans.

Still, there’s a charm in my decay, like an old barn that’s leaning but still standing—full of rusted tools, wasp nests, and stories. People think I’m hilarious when I grunt like a hog whenever I get off the couch. And maybe I am. Life’s not about staying pretty and smooth and young.

It’s about wearing out your parts and doing the things that matter. It’s loving people, planting gardens, feeding chickens, chasing raccoons out of the attic with a broom and a prayer.

So yes, my body’s an old house now. But the lights still work, the roof mostly holds, and the old dude inside—despite the creaks, groans, and colorful language—gets up every morning and heads to work.

Besides, an old house is still a home.

Want to hear about the time I tried yoga with a pulled hamstring and a pulled pork sandwich?

It was a rainy afternoon in Eureka, Cal., where the clouds settled like they bought property and planned to stay. Barbara Webster and her mother had taken refuge in the warm, pie-scented embrace of Marie Callender’s, a place that still believed in tablecloths, proper whipped cream, and a pot of coffee that never runs dry.

Barbara and I go way back, so when she told me this story, I could hear her mama’s voice before she even got to the punchline. Her mama was one of those women who wore a brooch the size of a biscuit and had a stare that could pin a man to the wall, but always with a twinkle behind it—as if to say, “Don’t test me, sugar, unless you want to be politely annihilated.”

Anyway, there they were, mother and daughter, sharing a slice of pie—pecan, if I had to guess, though Barbara’s always been partial to anything with meringue. The rain was pattering gently against the windows, the hum of conversation filled the room like soft jazz, and all was right in the world.

Then it happened.

Across the room, some poor fella unleashed a nose blow that could’ve registered on the Richter scale. One of those real barnburners—a honking so vigorous it might’ve launched his tonsils into his mashed potatoes.

Barbara’s fork froze mid-air. Her mother lowered her cup of coffee, eyes narrowing like a sheriff sizing up a drifter. And in that dry, unhurried tone that only years and confidence can deliver, she muttered, “People should get a ticket for doing that.”

That was it. No raised voice, no huffing and puffing—just a simple decree, like Moses issuing a minor amendment to the Ten Commandments.

Barbara tried to hold it together, but you know how laughter is—it sneaks up on you like a raccoon in the trash. And now, each time she’s in a restaurant and hears someone let loose on a napkin, she hears her mother’s voice and whispers, “Give him a ticket!” then giggles like she’s back at that table again, rain on the windows, pie on the plate, and her mama delivering justice with a spoonful of sass.

It’s a little thing, I know. But isn’t it always the little things?

Life gives us big moments—graduations, weddings, the occasional dramatic fall off a ladder—but the stuff that sticks is usually pie-sized. A certain laugh. A look, a phrase that sticks to your ribs longer than meatloaf.

And if you ask me, we could all stand to carry around a few more of those moments. We’re so busy these days, noses buried in phones, hurrying from one thing to the next, forgetting to notice the world’s full of characters. Full of mothers who still believe in manners and aren’t afraid to lay down the law, one napkin violation at a time.

So the next time you’re out somewhere—say a diner in a town you can’t pronounce, waiting on a sandwich you probably shouldn’t eat—and someone honks like they’re trying to call geese down from the heavens, smile to yourself.

And say it soft, just loud enough for the spirits of all pie-loving mamas to hear, “Give him a ticket.”

It started innocently enough—just another morning here at the edge of nowhere, where the cows moo louder than the Internet signal, and the rooster still thinks he runs the place. I was brewing coffee so strong it could refinish furniture when I heard the whir of the printer upstairs. That alone was odd–since I hadn’t asked it to do anything lately–unless you count my plea last week for it to stop being a jerk.

For the better part of our marriage, my wife Mary regarded computers the same way she regards tofu–something unnatural and vaguely threatening. She’d stand two feet back from the keyboard, pointing like she was defusing a bomb.

“Why’s it doing that?” she’d ask while the screen blinked innocently.

And, I’d come to the rescue with all the grace and wisdom of a man who mostly just hit ‘restart’ and hoped for the best. But between online quilt forums and an unhealthy fascination with Pinterest, Mary’s got good.

Not “works for NASA,” kinda skills, but “makes the printer obey her commands” good. Which, in this house, is a form of sorcery.

So anyway, the printer spits out this piece of paper, right? Just one page. Plain old white with black ink. No smiley face, no clipart, just this little typed note that said, “This is your printer. I am aware. I know where you sleep.”

I’ll be the first to admit she got me a couple of times.

Once, Mary put googly eyes on all the apples in the fruit bowl, and it took me a full hour to notice. Another time, she replaced all the desktop icons with photos of our dogs, who now manage the Wi-Fi.

So naturally, I held up the paper and hollered down the stairs, “Real cute, Mary. I get it. You’re the tech queen now.”

She hollered back, “What are you talking about?”

I paused because she ain’t that good of an actress. When Mary’s fibbing, her right eyebrow does this little twitch like it’s trying to signal Morse code for “I’m full of it.”

But she wasn’t even in the room. That’s when it hit me: I sleep in the same room as the printer.

Now, I’m not saying I believe machines are becoming sentient. But I am saying since then, I’ve been sleeping with one eye open. I even unplug the printer at night, just to be safe. I swear I heard it sigh in disappointment. It could’ve been the wind, the dogs, or my dignity escaping, but I don’t sleep too soundly.

After all, Mary knows where I sleep, too.

Driving south along Pyramid Highway the other day, I shook my head at what used to be and what’s become. Now, I try not to turn every drive into a lecture on modern decay, but it’s hard to keep quiet when a place you knew as bare bones and barbed wire now looks brushed over with a suburban powder puff.

Thirty years ago, Spanish Springs was little more than a few hay fields and a windmill that hadn’t spun since Nixon left office. You could see from Eagle Canyon to the Pah Rah Range–nary a stucco wall in sight.

Now, the whole area’s filled out like a young girl, blossoming into a full-figgered woman — shopping centers where there used to be cattle pastures, big houses in tight rows like teeth in a too-small mouth. It ain’t bad, exactly. Just different.

But what caught my attention–what rubbed my fur the wrong way–were the sound walls. You know the kind. Big, beige, stucco-looking fences running along the road like someone’s trying to hide a secret.

Supposedly, they’re to protect the delicate ears of folks living in those new houses. They don’t want the woosh of a passing Peterbilt to upset little Gavin during his pre-algebra Zoom session.

Now, I remember when noise was just part of life. My friend lived right off Highway 101 back in the seventies. His folk’s old single-wide rattled every time a semi went by.

He said it helped keep his heart in rhythm, “That’s the Lord’s metronome,” he’d say, sipping his black coffee with a dash of yesterday’s bacon grease.

His family also kept a goat, which they swore could predict earthquakes, and a rooster that crowed every morning at 2 a.m.–claimed it had East Coast blood. But never once did he complain about the noise.

“Life’s noisy,” he said. “Only the dead enjoy silence.”

But now? We’re so soft we need government-mandated quiet.

We can’t abide tires on asphalt, jogging us into remembering we live in a world that moves. Gotta be coddled by concrete and cushioned by HOA-approved landscaping.

Now, if you listen close enough behind one of those walls, you can hear a thousand folks trying to pretend they’re still in the country while their Amazon packages pile up on the porch.

Of course, maybe I’m being unfair as I’ve grown fond of soft things, a good recliner, a second slice of pie, or a cold beer. And progress ain’t always a bad thing, and I’ll admit, there’s a certain peace in not being jolted awake by a Jake brake at midnight.

But I do wonder what we’re losing in the name of comfort. Noise used to mean life–kids yelling, dogs barking, trucks sputtering to life on cold mornings. Now everything’s filtered and muffled like we’re trying to live in a padded room.

Still, I smiled as I drove past. Because even if the walls keep the sound out, they can’t keep the memories in. And I carry enough of those to drown out any silence.

Lesson? Maybe it’s this–you can soften the world all you want–but don’t forget where the hard edges came from. They’re what shaped us and keep us honest when the remote batteries die–and the quiet gets too loud.

You never really know the last time you’ll see someone. Sure, folks say that a lot, but it doesn’t sink in until you’re flipping through the news and a name hits you like a rake to the shin. Tina Wu. Gone.

Tina had an office a few doors down from mine when we both worked at the Regional Transportation Commission on Sutro Street in Reno. We weren’t close friends exactly, not in the way folks usually mean, but we shared hallway air, stale coffee smells, and more than a few chuckles over broken printers and doomed city plans.

We were working on a project for paratransit operations—small buses that assist people when a regular bus ain’t suitable. Tina was the design lead, and I was, well, something vaguely helpful. My title was long enough to make me feel important and vague enough to hide that I didn’t know what half the buttons on AutoCAD did.

Tina had a clipped way of speaking— originally from somewhere in Taiwan or Singapore, I think–and her English was excellent but accented enough that sometimes my brain would trip over itself trying to keep up. I’d lean in like an old hound trying to locate a squirrel in the wind.

One day, we were elbows-deep in diagrams and route tables when she said something—clear as a bell, I thought—but I didn’t quite catch it. I asked her to repeat it.

She did. It still didn’t land. I asked again. A third time. Now she squinted at me with the kind of expression you get from your Aunt Dot when you say you don’t like her lemon bars.

Then she tilted her head, all mock-serious, and said, “Do you have a problem with oriental rugs, too?”

I blinked. What?

Tina didn’t miss a beat. “I said ‘entrance plugs,’ not oriental rugs. You hear what you want to hear.”

And then she laughed. Loud, wicked, and joyful, the kind of laugh that doesn’t apologize for itself. I hadn’t realized she had that kind of humor in her.

From then on, I started listening harder, not just to the words but to the rhythm of her voice. There’s music in people if you take the time to hear it.

We drifted, as folks do. Life rolled on. I left the RTC for a slower, less bureaucratic life. Tina stayed a while longer. Our project never made it past the idea stage.

Far too many meetings and not enough follow-through. Funny how that works.

Now she’s gone, and I think about how I should’ve lingered longer in our hallway chats, could’ve brought her a cup of tea now and then instead of just nodding in the break room like a well-meaning mannequin. So here’s to Tina Wu–brilliant, sharp, and sneakier with a joke than most people gave her credit for.

And here’s hoping wherever she’s gone, they listen the first time she speaks. And if not, I pray she gives them hell—with a smile and a carpet pun.

My longest earthly friend, Goldie Arnold, had a Dad who reminded me of President Abe Lincoln, tall and gangly, minus the beard or top hat. His name was John Arnold, but I called him “Mr. Arnold” like he was the only one.

He had a slower way of talking–like the words had to hike uphill through molasses to reach his lips and a habit of scratching his head when he was about to tell you something he figured you didn’t already know.

Now, Mr. Arnold owned the only Allis-Chalmers tractor in three counties that still started with a crank and a prayer.

The thing was a wheezing orange beast that smelled like diesel, tobacco spit, and stubbornness. You could hear it from two miles away—three if the wind was right—chugging across the pasture like a mechanical bull with asthma.

One summer, when Goldie and I were eleven, we decided to help Mr. Arnold plow. Help, in our minds, meant we’d take turns joyriding the tractor until we either ran out of daylight or something caught fire. Mr.

Arnold looked at us, scratched his head, and said, “Well, try not to kill the cows or each other.”

We lasted twenty-seven minutes before Goldie hit a stump and bent the plow blade like a paperclip. The tractor gave a mighty ka-thunk, belched out a black cloud, and stopped so suddenly I thought we’d finally killed it.

We sat there, quiet as fenceposts, waiting for Mr. Arnold to come over and hand us our funerals. He walked up slowly, chewing on a toothpick like it owed him money.

He didn’t say anything right away. He just looked at the blade, at his daughter, then me. Then he did that little head-scratch and said, “Well now. That blade’s got a better curve than the Missus’ back when she used to dance in the church pageant.”

Goldie turned redder than a beet in July. I couldn’t help but laugh, and Mr. Arnold just shook his head and walked back toward the barn. We trailed behind him like whipped puppies.

When we got to the barn, he opened a cabinet that looked like it’d survived the Depression, rummaging about, coming out with a crescent wrench, a rubber mallet, and two orange sodas.

“Fix it,” he said, handing us the tools and the drinks in that order. “You broke it, you fix it. That’s the way the world works. Sodas are so you don’t pass out.”

It took us four hours–three pinched fingers and one good whack to my thumb that made me see stars and possibly a few dead relatives. But by sundown, the blade was nearly straight, and the tractor was back to making its unholy racket.

Mr. Arnold never yelled, never scolded. Just nodded once and said, “Kiddos, experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted.”

Then he tossed Goldie the keys and added, “Don’t hit the same stump twice.”

I’ve thought about that day a lot over the years, especially when fixing something I had no business breaking. And I always remember the sound of that tractor, the taste of warm orange soda, and the quiet wisdom of a man who looked like Lincoln and taught like Solomon—one busted blade at a time.

I wish I could say I don’t get riled up much anymore, but at least it ain’t like when I was young and had a head full of hair. These days, I mostly save my energy for keeping track of Post-it notes and remembering where I put my glasses—usually on my head or, once, in the cereal box.

But, ever now and again, something on that glowing rectangle we call the Internet gets me close to writing a comment. Take yesterday, for example. I’d just poured myself a cup of afternoon coffee—hot and muddy—and plopped down in front of my old Dell desktop.

It makes a faint noise like a hungry horse when it boots up. I clicked on my homepage, a mess of little squares filled with people yelling about things and trying to sell me pants I would never wear. And right at the top, like it had been waiting on me, was a post from a woman talking about how disgusted she was by all the people she’s seeing picking their noses while driving.

I squinted at the screen, took a sip of coffee, and started typing a reply, “Maybe you should mind your business and you wouldn’t see driving nose-pickers.”

There. That’ll show’er.

But then, as the cursor blinked at me like it was having second thoughts, I reread the first few words. “Maybe you should mind your business…”

Sitting back in my chair, I felt it creak under me like an old porch step and realized I was just about to do the thing I was accusing her of doing. Ain’t that a trick? It was like trying to shush someone in a library and realizing you’re the loudest one there.

So I deleted the whole thing—poof—and sat there looking out the window, where an old Dodge pickup rumbled past. Faded red, dented fender, and yes, the fella driving had one finger up his nose and a look of deep concentration, like he was defusing a bomb.

Now, I don’t condone it. I don’t encourage it. I certainly don’t want to shake hands on it. But I understand it.

Folks do strange things in cars, on porches, and at the kitchen sink when they think nobody’s looking. We all have our ways of passing time or soothing nerves. Mine is writing down things. His is nostril excavation.

What struck me more, though, was the woman’s complaint. See, you gotta watch other people closely to notice all that, like hawk-close. I don’t know how she does it unless she’s swerving from lane to lane with binoculars. Maybe if folks kept both hands on the wheel and their eyes on the road, they wouldn’t have so much time to monitor what’s going on in the cab of the next car.

But I reckon that’s the way of the world now. Everybody’s looking sideways instead of ahead, watching other folks for what they’re doing wrong instead of minding their mile markers.

Anyway, I closed the webpage and got back to something more productive—like teaching my dogs how to open a beer bottle without taking a swig. We’re on week three, and progress is slow.

If there is a moral, it’s keeping your hands on the wheel, your fingers out of your nose, and your eyes on your lane. Life’s smoother that way—and we’d be less offended.

Back when I was about knee-high to a washtub and full of more opinions than sense, there was an unwritten rule in our neck of the woods–you could talk about the weather, the price of feed, or how the neighbor’s milk cow had a nervous breakdown—but you did not, under any circumstances, talk politics, sex, or religion in polite mixed-company, especially when Great Grandma Ivy was within earshot and Lordy, help the poor fool who brought up all three.

Now, this was in a time when a “post” was something you set a fence with, and “followers” were folks who came behind you in the buffet line at the church potluck. We didn’t overshare because there wasn’t anywhere to share it.

You had your front porch, the feed store, and maybe the Methodist picnic if you wanted to hear what folks thought about the world. And even then, you were expected to coat your opinions in molasses and “bless their hearts” before serving them up.

But times have changed.

A while ago, I got myself on one of them social media sites intending to see pictures of my Cousin Eddie’s dog dressed like Elvis. Instead, I got a crash course in the modern world’s version of polite conversation—which, as far as I can tell, is the exact opposite of polite and barely qualifies as conversation.

It’s just hollering with better spelling.

Now, I ain’t saying folks didn’t have strong feelings back then. My Dad used to complain so much about Nixon he almost wore out his teeth. But he did it sitting in his Lazy Boy and living room, drinking real coffee and smoking Bel-Airs. He never once tried to win an argument by typing in all caps or posting blurry photos of lizard people at the Trees of Mystery.

And we knew each other—like really knew each other. You couldn’t unfriend a fella because he voted differently or liked the wrong preacher. You’d still see him at the co-op or behind you in line at the DMV, and you might need him in hay season. There was a kind of neighborly truce–live and let live, and don’t bring up sensitive topics unless you’re looking to lose a casserole or a riding partner.

The other day, I was sitting on the front porch—when my neighbor’s boy came by, phone in hand and indignation boiling in his eyes. He said he’d been arguing online with someone about religion and race and something else I didn’t quite catch.

He asked me what I thought.

I took a long sip of my coffee, scratched the Buddy-dog’s ear, and said, “Well, I think you can either spend your time hollering at strangers on the Internet or you can help fix Miss Claudia’s screen door that’s been hanging since Obama was in office. One of them makes a difference. The other just makes you hoarse.”

He blinked a few times, looked at Miss Claudia’s home, and tucked his phone in his back pocket.

He went home before returning with a screwdriver and plyers. I went with him, and we worked silently, save for the occasional groan from my knees.

And I realized something–maybe what we’ve lost isn’t manners, but that good old-fashioned sense of sitting with someone, shoulder to shoulder, fixing small things together while those other things sort themselves out.

Maybe we don’t need fewer opinions—just more porches.

I was about five years old when I first held a frog–a big mottled thing, cold as a well-rope and twice as slippery.

It leaped out of my hands like it was shot from a cannon and landed square in Cousin Janice’s cereal bowl. Milk went flying. She cried. Mom swatted at me with the dishtowel, but I still count that morning as one of the better ones of my boyhood.

Nowadays, I see little kids no taller than a fence post strutting around with smartphones like Wall Street traders. They’re tapping screens with sticky fingers, recording their dogs behind, and accidentally calling Grandma three times a day.

And I think, “That child couldn’t catch a frog to save their life.”

Out in the country—just northeast of nowhere and way south of who-cares—catching a frog was a rite of passage. Before getting trusted with a BB gun, the front seat, or the garden hose, you had to prove yourself amphibiously.

I remember when I gave my brother his first frog lesson. He was four, all knees and cowlicks, and full of questions nobody had time to answer. He’d been begging for a bike because all his friends had one.

I said, “Before you learn to pedal around the neighborhood, let’s see if you can talk to the pond.”

So we set off that Saturday morning just as the sun turned the dew to glitter. Adam wore his brand-new sneakers—white as wedding mints—and I didn’t have the heart to warn him.

Let nature do the teaching. We squished down into the reeds, dragonflies zipping around like they had places to be. I showed him where the frogs liked to sit—half in the water, half in the mud, just like old fogies in a hot tub.

He spotted one—a fat green jumper with eyes like wet marbles—and lunged like a linebacker. Missed by a mile and face-planted into the muck.

He popped up, coughing pond water and grinning like he’d found treasure. I helped him, wiped the slime off his cheeks with the hem of my T-shirt, and said, “Try again. But slower this time.”

It took him four tries, the loss of one shoe, and a stubbed toe, but he finally got his hands around one. He held it out to me like it was glass.

That frog just blinked, legs twitching like it was embarrassed. Adam’s hands shook, eyes wide, and he whispered, “It’s alive.”

“Yep,” I said. “And don’t squeezing so hard..”

We sat there a while, watching that frog, talking about how the world don’t need to be shiny to be interesting. Adam never screamed or flung it as some kids do. He just held and studied it, then let it jump back into the cattails.

Later that year, our folks gave him a tricycle.

And that’s the lesson, I suppose. Before you gift a kid a bike or cell phone, give them something genuine. Something that jumps and squirms and teaches patience.

Let them hold a frog first. If the kid can do that without freaking out or flinging it, maybe they’re ready for the rest of it–or maybe not.

Either way, they’ll know where to find peace when the Wi-Fi’s down.