One of my favorite places to hike is the Cedar Canyon Wildlife Management Area. It’s quiet. It’s peaceful. If you sit quietly anywhere, you can hear the birds and the crickets. If you’re there on the right day, you might hear elk or see bighorn sheep.
Today, I went for a hike with my friend, Jen, who is relatively new to the Scottsbluff area. We hiked a little over five miles in total.
This is our adventure, or mis-adventure if you’ve ever hiked with me.
A robin rests on a fence post at the Scotts Bluff County Fairgrounds.
On October 28, 2013, Steve Frederick gave me the opportunity to prove I could write. As the editor of the Scottsbluff Star-Herald, he told me on my first day, “I can’t teach you how to write, you already know how to do that, but I can teach you to be a reporter.”
For nearly six years, that’s what I did. I learned about my adopted home of Scottsbluff and all of western Nebraska. I found cool stories to tell and suffered through countless boring meetings, so I could go out and tell more cool stories.
My mom had just taken me to get my hair cut. She had to run a few errands before we went back home. I was sitting in the front passenger seat. We were stopped at the red light by the police department when a friend of hers started talking to her from the next lane over. After a few minutes, her friend asked her who the boy was with her in the car.
“That’s not a boy, that’s Irene,” Mom said. She said it matter-of-factly like her friend was an idiot for not recognizing me. I was six years old.
On May 17, I sat down in the middle of the night to record my thoughts on the state of the local paper, the Scottsbluff Star-Herald, and share a little bit what it was like to work there.
When the Supreme Court of the United States leak of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case occurred a year ago, it was devastating for me. I held out a glimmer of hope that Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey wouldn’t be overturned, but I knew the final decision likely wasn’t going to change. It was still a debilitating gut punch when the decision became official. A right I had my entire life, a right I had exercised, was taken away from me. In that moment, half the American population were told they could not be trusted to make medical decisions for themselves.
Since that time, I’ve written many comments online. I’ve been called a murderer more times than I can remember. I’ve had kind internet strangers step in and tell forced birthers to kindly fuck off. I’ve said so myself. However, it is one thing to be called a murderer by internet strangers. It’s another when it comes from someone sitting in your living room.
One of the lessons my grandmother taught me was to “put your money where your mouth is.” It’s something I’ve hesitated a few times or couldn’t afford to do at the time. Over the years, I’ve provided financial assistance, protested, wrote letters, and made phone calls for issues that were important to me.
For the past few years, I’ve been toying with the idea of creating a podcast about history, particularly, the history of western Nebraska. The biggest factor holding me back was whether I should do it alone and whether my mental health issues would allow for such a committment. From 2020 to 2021, I really wasn’t in a place where I could do much of anything. I was functioning on the most basic of levels and could barely do anything except go to work and sleep.
Throughout the course of 2022, this all changed. I haven’t spoken much about what I did in 2022 for my mental health and how I worked on my PTSD, but I made significant changes and progress in that area, which I will, eventually, write about.
Today, however, I am pleased to announce the launch of a new podcast, Storytelling on the Plains. My friend, Conner, and I have been working for several months on our plan, creating a story list, researching, writing, and recording. Our first podcast went live yesterday.
I recently sent the letter pasted below to my state representative, Brian Hardin. The bill, LB626 passed through the committee, on which he sits, and will now go to the floor for debate.
If anyone wants to use what I wrote, please feel free. As readers of this blog know, this is an important subject matter for me, one in which I never thought I’d have to be fighting. It is 2,285 words long. Regardless of whether or not Hardin listens to me, or even reads my letter, I said my peace. I truly hope the bill fails.
Nebraska state senator Joni Albrecht has once again attempted to ban abortion in Nebraska. My state representative, Brian Hardin, supports the bill. Many doctors in the state oppose the bill. The legislature is taking comments from constituents until Tuesday, January 31, 2023, at 12 p.m., Central Time, 11 a.m., Mountain Time.
Along the Oregon Trail in western Scotts Bluff County.
The world feels different at night when all the people and bullshit go to rest. I am alone with my thoughts and can feel comfortable being me. I don’t need to deflect from the constant intrusion of christianity upon my life. I don’t have to hear empty platitudes of misguided people who think they understand everything about everyone and dole out insincere phrases which only make them feel better.
At night, I listen to the sound of the coal cars rumbling through town and the wind blowing, gently shaking my windows and the trees. This time is mine. I have no obligation to be doing anything. I read. I write. I breathe.
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