Highway clean-up

I didn’t want to get up this morning, even though I told the Master Gardeners during the Thursday meeting that I would help out with the highway clean-up today.

The early morning was cold. Kevin was up early to make sure I’d get up (his coffee is a great lure out of bed) and after a few cups I left the house. I dislike these early-mornings outside when it’s still too dark and too cold.

I made it to town at 7:15am. I recognized Dee right away, and he turned around to show me where the tools were for the clean-up: yellow reflective vests, blue garbage bags from ADOT and pokers. I brought my own gloves.

It was just Dee, Maryann and I. There were many more during the last clean-up in April. Sarah joined us moments later to complete the foursome.

We started out with Campus Drive, the quarter-mile road behind Walmart and the community college. I drive this road twice a week and didn’t notice much trash, and in fact, there really wasn’t much. Most of the litter was fast-food bags and coffee cups.

The bigger toil was in another wash, in the north side of town in an older neighborhood. Mature Italian Cypress, Foothill Palo Verde and sumac lined the wide wash. This is the wash that the Cochise County Master Gardeners have adopted to clean up twice a year.

“This looks a lot better than it did last April!” said Sarah. The wash was mowed recently by city maintenance crews and many of the weeds were removed along the rocky wash.

This is where we were all cloistered together and had a chance to get to know one another. I am the newest member so most questions were directed my way.

“So, what brought you to this part of Arizona?” asked Dee.
“The Army…I first got here in 1986 and fell in love with the mountains. I told myself after I retire I’m moving back here. And I did. And I love it! There's something about Cochise County that I find so attractive.” I can't go anywhere in Arizona and wonder what it was like for the Peoples who lived here before White Man came over to claim the land. But I didn't tell Dee that part.

The others were in agreement. Dee himself is an Army brat who was born in Panama. He’s been in the area for 30 years and doesn't want to live anywhere else. He’s also one of the most passionate gardeners in the group, who shines best when he’s teaching others about plant propagation or seed collection. He can look at a tree and tell you the tree's Latinic name, its growth cycle, its characteristics, its growth needs and how to best propagate it.

“Wasn’t it here that a body was found last winter?” asked Sarah, putting a stop to my questioning and changing the conversation topic.
The area she was pointing at was heavily eroded by the summer’s monsoons. If there was a boy found here it would have been embedded in thick layers of mud.

Sarah and Dee had to leave after two hours. Maryann and I decided to finish the rest of our adopted wash. The trail wasn’t that badly trashed, and recent weed moving by the city showed that whatever trash was in the wash had been removed by prison labor.

The wash widened further as we walked north. New houses that were erected in 2006 bordered near the north by-pass. Dogs barked in the distance. Discarded clothes were strewn in the sandy wash..

I found a switchblade knife. I thought it was just a large pocket knife and picked it up.
"DON'T TOUCH THAT! That could be a crime scene weapon!"
Ooops. Too late. "Well, if you read about me in the paper getting arrested for knifing someone because my fingerprints were on the knife, you'll know why!"
Maryann chuckled. "I can vouch for you. Is there any blood on it?" she asked.
I pushed the release button. The blade sprang out. It was well over three inches long, enough to cause some serious bodily harm. "No, no blood."

We didn’t find much on this stretch of the wash. An abandoned couch and an old child’s stroller lay battered in the wash. Months of harsh summer sun and rains did a good blanch job on both. Both were too heavy to lift out by ourselves.

“I’ll have to call the city to have them remove that stuff.”

By now it was 11am and the heat was coming on. Once we decided the majority of the clean-up was done, we sat down by our cars and talked.

I first met Maryann during the first Master Gardener’s meetings in March. She went through the course last year and was still working on getting her hours in (we have to volunteer 50 hours the first year). She became the new highway clean-up contact point. We met again in April for the San Pedro House Native Plant project and hit it off well again.

Maryann is married to Johnny, who works with Kevin on post. Kevin’s talked quite a bit about his coworkers on post. He always has funny stories to say about Johnny and Tommy, his favorite co-worker from New York. (Those two men are a blast to listen to, with their distincitve East Coast accents) Maryann is like me: an avid outdoorswoman who, in her younger years thought about being a park ranger. But she opted to study nursing and I joined the military. (Sometimes I think I made the wrong choice of career, but now that I am retired I am enjoying the pension and great health care coverage.)

“You know, I’ve met so many people in the Master Gardener and Hiking Club here, but there’s so little time to get together with anyone outside of our group gatherings. Work and class get in the way”
“I know, I know. We are the same way…” replied Maryann.

Maryann also volunteers for the Ramsey Canyon Preserve nearby and is a diehard member of the Nature Conservancy. Between the Ramsey Canyon hours, her nursing job and being a wife she has little time to socialize.

Maryann also likes to help wildlife. She and Johnny have four adopted dogs, a few cats and some chickens.

“Wanna kitten?” she asked me. A feral cat gave birth near their chicken coop a few months ago. The mother cat is tame enough around Maryann and the kittens are now old enough to recognize her. She’s already keeping two of the five kittens, but wants to find good homes for the other three.

“Are you going to go to the company Christmas party?” asked Maryann. That would be a cool way to chat with Maryann while the boys hang out and talk boy stuff: like all the construction/carpentry jobs they do on post and the fun times they have working together.

“I’d love to, but I’m driving to Chicagoland during the semester break. If it’s before the break, I’d love to go and hang out with you!”

We departed shortly before noon, promising to get together sometime, and off I was heading south. Gasoline prices in town had dropped another 12 cents to $2.55, which is almost what it was when I first came back from Iraq. (Side note: my old unit redeployed to northern Iraq yesterday, 7 Nov; I’m glad I’m no longer in that hellhole!)

Kevin was asleep on the couch when I got back home. The garden was in full sunshine and the dogs were ready to go outside. With Me. On a hike.

Against my better judgment, I took them to Upper Hunter Canyon Trail. Two horse trailers and tents were parked at Kelley Springs (popular with target shooters) so we drove right past that area and continued our ascent. I kept the dogs at a fast gallop by then so that they wouldn’t remember to dart back toward the horse trailers.

"This way, guys!"

We continued up the rocky trail to the wilderness sign, explored a dry creek bed where I gathered up some discarded backpacks. We returned down the same trail. The dogs by now were on a challenging run downhill to the usual loop, a total of 3.5 miles. When we got back home the dogs attacked the water bucket with vigor.