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Show t MlSSM!yW4Mia66cft4ii6ev0c4oyA"..,.v Rocks are hard, girls are soft coyotes run off with your bones. Let's have Lin Ottinger stuffed 6 mounted before he strangles a ranger: By Dink Bridgers EDITOR'S NOTE: Lin Ottinger is a colorful character and, from time to time, uses colorful language as well. If you can't handle "colorful language," don't read this story. It's 32 degrees, midnight in the desert just outside of Price, Utah. I'm pushing Lin Ottingers beat up GMC diesel pickup three miles on a lonely highway to a mythical all night garage. Lin is in the front seat eking out the engine's last gasps. If s bunting just enough fuel to fill my bursting lungs and freezing sinuses with smelly, intoxicating fumes. Lin had nursed the sputtering monster across a hundred miles of desert, temporarily mending symptoms of a dying fuel pump with spit, air, tape, and hillbilly ingenuity. The truck's top speed, however, slowly decreased to zero. He stopped at a filling station to Mickey Mouse the problem. I stood by and watched as he cussed and tinkered. You don't tell Lin Ottinger how to do anything I tried not to get too close. He blew into the line. "Listen to the tank, he bluntly ordered. I bent over and cocked an ear toward the HAVE YOU GUYS SEEN THE COMET?! HEY, I SAID, HAVE YOU GUYS SEEN THE COMET?!" The brothers stood warming themselves next to die thundering heater, eyes glazed. "Que? Under the hood of the sputtering diesel truck, the mechanic peeked around his huge glowing ass. Lin pointed up, "The comet "Ahhh, la Commetta? Lin pointed skyward. "SL La Commetta. In the sky. Right now. Come outside and see it Lin beckoned and roused the oily, nocturnal mechanics into the cold night; under the stars. I followed. Standing in freezing mud, among the junked cars, Lin pointed a crooked finger at an apparition above. "See it? As my eyes became accustomed to the darkness, the gargantuan comet revealed itself through the bare limbs of a cottonwood tree, the milky tongue of Aphrodite, covering a third of the night sky like a veil of delicate lace across a sparkling bed of lights. "Ahhhh, La Cometta est grande. filler. "What are you doing? Did you here what said? ARE YOU STUPID?! He ran over, yanked off the filler cap, and pointed. "Right, here! I'm in this predicament for geodes, Dugway geodes. You know, hollow rocks, volcanic bombs found a stone's throw from the Air Force chemical weapons facilities at Dugway Proving Grounds. The Air Force was bulldozing a road into the Dugway test area exposing thousands of geodes for the taking. When I passed the rumor and a map to Lin, he simply couldn't resist. They were waiting for us, the midnight mechanic and his two Mexican assistants; a fat, oily man with pants slung way low, and shy brothers who could not speak a word of I "SL Si. "Gracias. Gracias. Lin smiled, "Beautiful, si? If s made of ice. I had to push the truck three miles back into Price with my tongue hanging out like that great big comet. I swear it was up hill both ways. I gave up on the geodes. I got what I came for. Lin, however will do anything to get his rocks. After driving me back to Moab he turned English. Mr. Pants Slung Low opened the hood of the truck and took a long look. "Not getting enough fuel, huh? Lin pointed to the fuel pump. "Something is rattling around in there like a BB in a beer around and headed for Dugway. Three days later he came back to Moab with a few tons of the nerve gas geodes in the back of his smelly GMC bottle. The fat mechanic put gut to grill He bent into the engine compartment, legs in the air, and called for a tool in Spanish. One of the brothers ran to retrieve and deliver the tool, then scooted back to a huge bulbous kerosene heater roaring and fuming away like a jet engine on the greasy concrete floor. The fat mechanic's butt glistened fully exposed under the hood, oily, hairy and steaming. I must have been grinning ear to ear when Lin walked by, screwed up his face, and said out of the comer of his mouth, 1 don't think these guys know what they arc doing. I replied, Tm amazed we found anyone. It's midnight, for pete's sake. Check out that moon. It's worth pushing the truck three miles in the cold and dark for that butt shot. Lin cocked his head and walked away. Lin f;. can spot a desert longhorn sheep at a thousand yards, but he didn't see that big flabby, shiny, butt. I began to worry about his eyesitc, his Lin Ottinger sense of humor. I figured this was normal to him, he must deal with a lot of low pants people. I felt like running out into the road and flagging down a car just to share the moment revved the engine in roaring spasms, blasting thick blue smoke into The the shop for ten minutes. Tm having a hard time containing my laughter. Intoxicating diesel vapors rose from the floor like dry ice at a Doobie Brothers concert. The fat man's pale ass shown through the fog like tropical fruit Lightheaded, I walked up to Lin and said, 1 don't think these guys know what they are doing. "The idiots are going to blow my engine, he snarled. I worried about his temper. Deserved or not, I didn't want to witness a legendary Lin Ottinger explosion, nine point five on the Richter scale. Lin walked to the front of the truck, and finally he saw the fat mechanic's butt. He winced comically, looked at me, looked at the butt, looked back at me, looked back at the butt He paused for a moment, then screamed above the whine of the engine, "The comet! stupid idiot! butt-mechan- ic Goddammit! You Don't go through that salt bo fast! You're going to have to wash the underside of this truck when we get back, and if you take the bumper off on a rock, you're gonna have to pay for it. Elsa and Jean, two very together little old ladies with serious, walking sticks engraved with their names, sat patiently in the back of the Suburban, listening as Lin scolded me, his driver of the day, between tall tales "Indian no spoken in mock sco-uwhite man dialect, macho John Wayne anecdotes, lessons on handmade, homespun geology, and pointing out sandstone formations along Potash Road, "Can you see Brigham Young over there? In the rear view mirror I could see Elsa and Jean, gritting their teeth, knuckles white on their walking sticks, eyes rolling. Pull up right there. WHOA! DID I TELL YOU TO PARK HERE? Don't park it on a slant! which way you pointed those "Whoa! STOP! STOP!! hand-carve- d Tonto-the-Indl- an m & friend Nlook We disembarked to photograph Lin with a trembling tourist on a tiny, slippery, rock ledge seven hundred feet above the Colorado River, a spot from which one of his own guides fell to his death only a few years ago. lie doesn't tell them that. Elsa, the toughest looking 83 year old hiker I've ever seen, walked up behind me and said very softly into my right ear, "If he were my husband I think I'd walk out there and push him off. Like that old Juniper tree under Pritchett Arch, Lin is eccentric and twisted, a rigid repository of bullshit and sacred desert knowledge designed for trusting tourists. He's an unappreciated national treasure that might fall on you if you stand under it. Barren, last of his tribe, he sifts the last precious grit from the played-ou- t ore of a bywhen was to ride out into the vast desert, without a map, across tree gone era, anyone slickrock and virgin cryptoblotic soil crusts in a beat-u- p Volkswagen bus, gathering arrowheads and pots, searching for minerals, fossils, and places to play with a jack and a |
