OCR Text |
Show Wed/Thurs/Fri, August 16-18,2006 fhe Park Record A-18 CORE SAMPLES By Jay Meehan • Slouching toward Defa's "Well my rig's a little old but that don't mean she's slow. There's a flame from her stack and. that smoke's been a-blowin' black as coal. Well my hometown's coming in sight, and if you think I'm fun, come along with me." happy you're right. Six days on the road and I'm --Hank Williams It's become the stuff of folklore. After the coun- gonna make it home tonight." Dancing like no one was watching was far from ty had upped his overhead by requiring porta-pottys and security and the like for his in-house rodeos and the only acquired skill covered at 1the weekend demolition derbies, Ernie Scow decided that maybe training sessions. Hootin' and laughin and shuckin' it wasn't worth all the headaches and that, quite pos- and jivin' like you were among family also received a going over. Huggin' like you meant it and singing sibly, the time for fresher digs had arrived. As the myth has evolved, the old Defa's Dude along like you actually knew the words were also Ranch up on the North Fork of the Duchesne River popular classes. Cantankerously adorable - that's Block and came to mind. Thinking it a most brilliant replacement location for his quite out-of-the-box social Tackle. This is a longtime band of brothers who gatherings, Ernie bought a jug of that stuff that attend to their current mindsets without contrivance turns your cheeks red and proceeded, shot by shot, or caution. They look you square in the eye and call to congratulate himself. it as they see it. They He considered the bothave been there and tle a finder's fee. done that, including a •• Although Heber Valley isn't stint back in the day The derby and headlining "biker rodeo wouldn't survive actually a dead ringer for the south days" up in Sturgis. this shift of landscape, slope of the Uintas, we do have road- South Dakota. but his annual parties have flourished... even "You walk into a houses within which to fine-tune after Ernie left for that cowboy bar, strungdance chops. And this past weekend, out from the road and big corral up in the sky. Those who rode for his you feel the eyes upon Block and Tackle conducted drills." brand learned their you, just shaking off lessons well. And here ^ ^ the cold, you pretend it we are again on the ^ • " • ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ • • ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ i " ^ « ^ ^ ^ ™ doesn't bother you... cusp of yet another but it makes you weekend go-around of tearing up the saloon dance wanna explode." When they get rollin' onstage with one of their floor to the great "Block and Tackle" band and five-minute western novels, they've been known to swappin' lies around trash-talkin' campfires. "An old cowpoke went ridin' out one dark and make time stop and deserts bloom. Their themes windy day. Upon a ridge he rested as he went along can be as deep as a bottomless gorge; "Well it's a his way. Then all at once a mighty herd of red-eyed hard life if you're singing, singings a hard life to live, cows he saw, just plowin' through the ragged sky... singin' for yaur bottle of whiskey, sometimes takes more than it gives." and up a cloudy draw." But it takes more than a bad day at Black Rock This year the opportunity presented itself to get in some additional training prior to the actual bash to knock them out of the saddle: "Bullet in the up at Defa's the second weekend of September. shoulder, blood runnin' down my vest, there's twenty Although Heber Valley isn't actually a dead ringer in the posse and they ain 't never gonna let me rest." This is not to say that there are no happy trails for the south slope of the Uintas, we do have roadhouses within which to fine-tune dance chops. And to this outfit. Their shows often become the stuff of this past weekend. Block and Tackle conducted joyous revival. In fact, most all "blockheads" speak in tongues. It's just that these rowdies have learned drills. They began Thursday as part of the free concert that it's not only in the dictionary that pilgrimage series with a mellow evening at Heber City Park. and pillage are separated by a pill. The lads ran through a couple of sets under some"Well don't it make you want to dance, don't it what overcast skies while the crowd, in lieu of danc- make you want to smile, when you're down, down, ing, treated the affair as a concert. There was, how- down in the country, pick and sing a while." ever, some top-shelf, head bobbin' going on. Parties at Defa's have an option-rich logistic For those who will be participating in the component with avenues of escape that include upshenanigans up at Defa's, but who, for one reason or and-over West Fork, the autobahn that Wolf Creek another, don't make it out on local hardwood floors has become, or, of course, you can always checkout as often as true "blockheads" might, the twilight gig the Strawberry Valley and Hanna by heading up served as a refresher course in "Cowpoke Cool Mount Tabby way. 101." For those who just wandered-by, well, their And then, once you've arrived, if all the cabins inner compass sure is treating them right. have been rented out, there are sites a-plenty for the It would be the next couple of nights, however, camper or tent. Knocking the back seaj down and out at the Other End of town where training for the sprawling out in the rear of your ride has also Defa's weekend would get down to the heart and proven to be a viable option over the years. soul of the matter. Most of the organizing commit- Although leaving home without hiking boots for a tee pulled extended shifts upon the healing hard- foray into Grandaddy Basin doesn't show broad wood of the dance floor while Block and Tackle, insight, not bringing dancing shoes for the with game faces securely in place, strutted their September 8 and 9 shindig would be totally frowned upon... at least by Ernie. stuff. 'got a hot rod Ford and a two-dollar bill, and I know a spot right over the hill. There's soda 2 pop and the dancing's free. So if you wanna have YES! YES! YES! 3 OR MORE MEDIUM $ 1-TOPPING PIZZAS each must purchase at least 3 pizzas j. PARK CITY < ^ 435-649-7788 750 KEARNS BLVD. WRITERS ON THE RANGE Unique Rustic Accents For Your Home GRAND OPENING SALE Antique Sleigh Tables Ski Hall Trees Toboggan Shelves Lamp Shades 20% ff offstltcttdftms EnterUwin,?decj CorribbetLKCrnucjor & 'iStk. 655-311 0 6400 N. Hwy 224 • Suite E-2 • Kimball Junction (Next to Starbucks) By Jim Stiles • Nature-deficit disorder is ruining our kids No matter how old I live to be, there will never holes in the ice with big rocks. They thought all this be a place so full of mystery and adventure as a was fun, but it had never occurred to them. And it place of my childhood called The Woods. The sto- occurred to me that it was late to discover random ries that grew out of those trees still kindle power- recreation. The poor kids, I thought. They have no ful feelings, even after all these years. My friends idea what they've missed. and I knew the place was haunted. It had no boundBut I hadn't noticed, not being a parent myself, aries, and in our 10-year-old minds, it went on for- that almost all kids were like my little relatives. ever. Now those kids are young adults and about to have Jump ahead a few decades to a familiar topic: families of their own, and they have no hope of The commercialization of wilderness. What created passing along any of those free-spirited adventures the demand for such a cornucopia of sporting gear that I was so blessed with as a child. To them, such and planned "adventure activities?" There was a stories are hearsay. time when all a guy needed to go for a hike was a True to the American way, someone has been reasonably comfortable pair of shoes and an army able to attach an affliction to this condition. It's in surplus canteen. Now it requires a wardrobe and a the title of a book by Richard Louv: "Last Child in gear checklist, just to walk to the corner. I-recently the Woods: Saving our Children from Naturestopped at a sporting Deficit Disorder." As goods store, looking ; writer Bradford for a canteen; the sales McKee described the • • The photographs of every tour clerk looked at me disorder in the New and its paid participants revealed York Times, "The days blankly. "You know," I said. healthy young men and women who of free-range child"A canteen. A water hood seem to be over. should have been able to walk the mile Parents can add a new bottle." "Oh," he replied. and a half required without adult super- worry to the list of "You mean a portable things that make them vision. And then it occurred to me: feel inept: increasingly hydration system." Portable hydration These people had never done anything their children, as system ? Woody Allen might without adult supervision." How did this hapsay, are at two with pen? When the ^ _ _ _ _ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ nature." plethora of guide^^•^••••^^^^^^^ Children who are books flooded the obsessed with computrecreation market and introduced eco-tourism 15 er games or driven from sport to sport, Louv mainor so ago, I was puzzled by the need of so many tains, miss the restorative effects that come with adults to be told how to have fun outdoors. When I the nimbler bodies and sharper senses that are first looked at a canyoneering Web site, I noticed developed during random running-around in wild that the photographs of every tour and its paid par- places> Modern science will no doubt spend milticipants revealed healthy young men and women lions on research and development to produce a who should have been able to walk the mile and a medication to cure this ailment, when all the afflicthalf required without adult supervision. ed really need is a walk in the woods. But the farAnd then it occurred to me: These people had ther these "de-natured children" stray from a sponnever done anything without adult supervision. taneous natural experience, the less likely they are I thought about my niece and nephews, who, to ever discover a world that seems to me, impossieven 15 years ago, weren't allowed to go out and ble to live without. play in the neighborhood because the world was With an ever-growing billion-dollar industry apparently a dangerous place. We were all at my dependent on these dependent souls, it is in every parents' farm one winter, just after Christmas; it sense of the word, a co-dependent relationship. A was a perfect 160-acre spread in Kentucky, with hay fool parting with his money is a necessary compobarns and spring-fed lakes and forests full of poison nent of the amenities economy, and one likely to ivy and grape vines to swing from and limestone grow ever more foolish and expensive with every ledges loaded with fossils. It was a kids' paradise. passing sunset - an experience that may someday But my nephews and niece came to me and said, arrive arranged and conducted by the "Sunset "We're BORED, Unca Jim," so I proposed that we Adventure Tour Company," go outside and explore. They thought that was a Jim Stiles is a contributor to Writers on the pretty dumb idea, but I made them go. I took them Range, a service of High Country News (hcn.org). to the barn and taught them how to build forts out He is the publisher of the Canyon Country Zephyr of hay bales. We walked to the pond and punched in Moab, Utah. • i |