Angry Tree-Earth Defenders on the Frontlines

By Greg Mack

This work of historical fiction is seen through the eyes of Silas as he leaves behind his job, car and life back east to stand against the destruction with brave and unshowered Earth First! activists. He hitchhikes to frontlines campaigns and stands up to the dangers of angry workers and wild animals.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Greg Mack
• Release date: Jul 29, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301668793

Greg Mack

Greg resides in Central Ohio with his wife of thirty-seven years, Angie. As a member of a local church, Greg was involved in the Men's Ministry and led many small men's small groups in discipleship training. Greg owns a small business serving the health and fitness needs of his community, and he owns a continuing education company for exercise professionals around the world. He is simply a Christian studying and following the Word so that he can try to understand the world and how to apply biblical teaching to his personal, professional, and social life.

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Angry Tree

Earth Defenders on the Frontlines

Greg Mack

Published by Greg Mack at Smashwords.

 2013 All rights reserved.

ISBN 9781 301668793

For more information about the writer and this book go to:

http://writergregmack.wordpress.com

Dedication

To my family through blood and marriage: Mom, Dad, Joan, the Maryland Macks, the Virginia Macks as well as relatives from Wisconsin and elsewhere.

To my family of activists, supporters, writers, artists and musicians. For all of my couch surfing hosts, meal and supply providers, the Maine crew, scattered Cove Mallard ghosts and warm bodies, Seeds of Peace, Taj, Grumbles, Shameless and my BFF.

To the wild ones and wild lands that never chose this battle.

And a special thanks to Mom, Joan, Chuck, Eric and Fiddlin’ Big Al for their help in bringing this book to publication.

Hitching with the Sun

Yeah, I’m ten years late, but I finally left the east coast for good. A trucker pulls over and I run up and struggle to push my backpack up then I plop down. Those seats are air controlled ya know, just use the adjustment on the side. Do ya like hitchhiking? Oh, it can be frustrating sometimes standing with your thumb out for hours; it really fucks up your shoulder and messes with your mind after awhile, but it’s cheap and you don’t have to worry about someone stealing your feet. I hear ya. Ain’t nothing manmade good for ya. A truck will leave ya stranded in the middle of nowhere. A horse won’t do that.

The sun sets as he drops me off in a small town in Central Colorado. Rain clouds roll in as I set up my tent across from town, behind the ranger station. Tucked away, out of sight, to avoid the consequences of this illegal camp, my tent perches inches from a bottomless hole of an old mine vent.

In town I pull up a barstool and order a pint and a sandwich as the band starts up. Musicians and pool players vie for attention as a scrappy, middle-aged man sits on a barstool near me and slurs out something about Alaska. My sober ear can't translate his incoherent, drunken words, so I nod to appease him. He stumbles off behind me. His friend sits next to me and talks calmly. I freeze inside as a sharp pocketknife threatens me under the bar. So you think you’re a big man? he says, waving his blade inches from my belly. I’m just eating my sandwich and listening to the band. I might play pool then wander home, I say in gentle tones.

In slow motion I finish my pint, put the glass down and move my stool back and reach for my jacket. He jumps up and scurries off. I head towards the door and instantly a hand reaches my shoulder from behind. I guess I’m going to fight. He apologizes profusely, explaining that his buddy told him I said I could kick his ass. Apparently this isn’t the first incident of extreme stupidity for these two. Walking to my tent, I shake my head; yet another reminder of the idiots and idiocy threatening our survival each day.

I walk the shoulder, not to get closer to anything; it simply helps to relieve the boredom. The last car passed hours ago. Deer tracks slide underfoot then bounce through the trees.

Every piece of land is fenced. Is this to hold something in, or to keep something out? Unnatural obstructions always offend me. Ownership of natural areas is highly unnatural. Property rights and territorial claims guarantee problems. If I weren’t so obvious standing on this lonely road I might just take some wire cutters to these thousands of miles of barbed ugliness.

A flattened blue whale on roller skates rises out of the pavement, slowly approaches and stops. I strap my pack next to the blown tire on top of the blue ‘68 Impala, weighted only inches from the ground. The unstarved man clears the passenger seat, but not the floor. I ride happily with my knees near my face while his small dog scrapes the ceiling in back, perched on the driver’s life belongings.

In Arches, Utah I slip past the pay station, grab some water from the visitors center and hike with my heavy pack. Near the towering, red rock wall a park cop pulls up. You can’t camp in the park. I can camp in the backcountry, right? Yes technically, but it’s a long hike in and there isn’t any water, so I wouldn't recommend it. I could come out and refill at the welcome center. That’s not practical; you are better off going back out the entrance and looping around up top. It’s BLM land (Bureau of Land Management); you can camp as long as you want and be close to water and you can have a campfire. I shrug my shoulders, turn around then hike up a jeep trail just outside the park. Night falls before I trek too far. The desert sky opens up as the constellations materialize, then an explosion of stars blankets the sky so fully that even the Big Dipper is swallowed. Heat, rising from the June desert sun, forces me to wake far too early. The beauty and privacy of camp satisfies me. Propping my pack against a three-foot bank, I prepare for a hike into Arches with nothing more than a peanut butter sandwich and a meager supply of water.

I stare at the magnificent arches in the east. The point of a small ridge and window of an arch draw a straight line through my camp, west to east. I hike, with a broad smile, through thick heat towards distant stone arches. Peering over a ledge into a spectacular, red boxed canyon, I sit on top enjoying solitude and soulful beauty. A strong urge to slide down the steep wall consumes me, but hundreds of feet of sheer slickrock taunt. A bird floats by. I’m closed out of the east. My eastern life has fallen into the past.

I turn north to search for a way into Arches. The chasm disappears. Mud pools entice my canteen to cry out for the thick water. Tadpoles and bugs enjoy the shallows as I soak my feet for a brief pause. There is no way in to the north.

Tramping south, I hesitate at my pack to scope out two more landmarks, north and south, forming an X through camp. My wish for fruit and other water-bearing foods is denied; the last were eaten days before. Focusing on the peanut butter sandwich, my growling stomach must be ignored. Only a few drops of water are left with no source in sight.

I cut across the pancake plane and squeeze through a fence as quickly as the heat will allow. I slice open a prickly pear pad. My parched throat constricts breathing. The cactus tastes like a sweet cucumber. This delicious treat does nothing to satisfy my thirst and has left many micro-stickers in my fingertips. The plateau puts me on top of an 800 foot red rock wall overlooking the visitors center. I rest by a big VW-sized boulder hanging on the ledge as I feel privileged and frustrated. My only escape is west along the original route in.

I sit out front of the visitors center gorging myself with peanut butter and water as my muscles relax. The setting sun paints the rocks and sand brilliant shades of red and orange.

Up the jeep trail darkness sets in and I look for markers pointing to my pack. To the west the peak comes into view. Darkness fills the east, blotting out the window reference point. A half-hour earlier it was visible. The beauty of the night sky pours out. As I stand, face to the east, it’s not the beauty surrounding my mind; it’s darkness. Darkness consumes my backpack and flashlight. The heat subsides. A gallon of water hangs from my body and my stomach is knotted up from the sandwich. Checking my western reference point again, I don’t know if it’s right.

The three foot drop, eastward, will put me at my pack. The ledge is missing. I must be close. Hours pass as I trudge and zigzag in all directions to no avail. It’s next to two juniper trees; or is it three? Long shallow ledges and junipers mock me.

The chilly night descends. Walking subverts shivers. Hypothermia and death will take hold if I rest too long. Recognizing the area, landmarks float through my mind again and again. My body and mind are so fatigued I struggle to hold it together.

Deep into the night, I have walked forty miles with few breaks for twenty hours. My legs beg for separation. Excruciating pain shoots from my feet, through my legs, up my back entering my numbed head. Crouching, I choose not to sit for fear comfort will allow sleep to pull me into a cold death. Squatting serves to shift the pain into different parts of my back and legs. I can only bear a few minutes. I can’t tolerate anything. Screams of rage echo from my hollowed shell. My clenched face explodes at the stars, spewing anger at any god who might be awake. An inner calmness sweeps in to comfort the constant pain.

The rising sun will ease my pain in a few hours. I wander slowly, frequently stopping and standing to abuse my legs as little as necessary. The eastern sky throws light generously outward. A new burst of energy charges me.

My semi-hidden pack eludes me the first hour of sunlight. Near tears, I scream through pain and frustration. Seconds later my pack appears twenty feet away. My eyes close momentarily. The torture has ended. Spreading a tarp and bag, I remove boots and lay in temporary shade with fleeting thoughts of scorpions. The heat of the day renders sleep impossible, although my muscles, brain and spirit sigh with relief.

After a day’s rest, I hike thirty miles into and out of Arches because American tourists refuse to give me a ride. The following day, sitting by the roadside heading north, I envision the same fate due to heavy tourist traffic. Determined not to walk, I wrap my blown out knee in an ace bandage, in hope of a sympathy ride. A pickup with a dirt bike pulls aside and two young guys offer a ride to Salt Lake, if I’m willing to slide under the bike in back. We were just in an accident where our friend was going too fast on a gravel road and he came to a split and couldn’t decide which way to turn, so he turned at the last minute and the truck flipped and landed on us. Damn we were lucky, see, we only got these little cuts and bruises and he only broke his arm.

In their apartment, they tell me the story of Everett Ruess who disappeared in Canyon Lands sixty years earlier at age twenty. His journal from the previous year became a book. Next year’s diary vanished with his body. Yeah, some think he planned his disappearance and swam across the Colorado to live with an Indian woman. Well, if he tried to swim the Colorado he probably drowned. I fantasize about searching for his notebook, although he may be buried with it under the stagnant waters of Lake Powell.

The Road to Jail

Jail isn’t always an awful experience. As I wait in a holding cell, sweet singing breaks my solitude from a cage across the long hallway. This wonderful being sends music and kisses my way. I return a few and bask in her warmth. Catching Jack’s eye, as he sits in the fingerprint room nearby, I whisper, What about Ron? He nods; all is OK.

How did I end up behind these steel bars? Pull up a chair, some sand, dirt or a log. Along my travels a stranger told me about a national gathering of environmentalists in Northern California. Now the rendezvous is over, and we are preparing for a protest against logging of unprotected old-growth redwoods. The destruction will pay for a greedy money monger’s bad business decisions.

Darren frantically calls for volunteers the night before the protest action. I sign up for a non-arrest support role. Although the redwoods move my spirit deep inside, I can’t afford an arrest since I want to commune with the wild in Alaska. Darren takes a second count and shouts, We need more arrestable people. Hesitating for two seconds, I give in as Alaska disappears in the distance.

The scout crew wakes us at 3:00 a.m. with disappointing news. Jack and I were to lock our necks to the push bars on the doors of our intended target. The doors have door knobs. Did you see anything else we can lock down to? Ah, no. Sleep is impossible the few remaining hours.

Eight of us sit and ponder what lies ahead as our van leads fifty other vehicles towards our undisclosed destination and destiny. Darren talks about the problems with western second and third growth forests and fire suppression. As some of us play with U-locks, I ask, When will the rest of us get our locks? Oh, they’ll meet us there, he responds. One activist tries hers on and exclaims, I’ve got my Earth First! power tie!

Pulling into the California Department of Forestry (CDF) in the tiny town of Fortuna, my heart beats hard as we jump out. Our locks are still en route. Darren leads us to the main office. The door is locked. It’s too early. We try the door of another building and several dozen activists follow Darren, calmly leading a fake tour. This is the supervisor’s office. The employees are dumbfounded. I trail Darren out of the building and a teenager rushes up with a grocery bag full of bike locks. The locks are in their plastic packaging and, somehow, the keys migrated into a mixed up pile at the bottom of the bag. I shake my head and frantically search for the right keys as chaos consumes 200 demonstrators excitedly weaving about the grounds.

I slip into the previously closed office with locks neatly tucked under my shirt and around my neck. A barrier separates us from the office. By the door, a small opening sports a low plant stand. Jack and I scan the office for something we can lock our bodies onto. I see nothing permanent. With one leap, I jump the plants, hit the ground running, zip to the chair and wrestle with a lock I wrapped around the desk drawer handle. An office worker races over and violently pulls my hands apart as I fight to lock down. I withdraw as her anger and determination overpower my inexperience.

Retreating back outside, people approach Jack and me. You guys have to try it again. OK, but we need blockers in front distracting the cops. Yaahhh! We rush the plant stand with a boisterous yell. Dirt flies, plants sail and bodies rush in mad confusion. Cops stand and threaten people as I slide to the floor by a computer table. I struggle to get locks around electric wires and equipment. Feet jump all about and the back of one cop’s leg is three feet away as I strain with my locks. I turn and sit facing the lively crowd with a smile and a securely locked neck. Only Jack and I remain in the office, locked down, while fifty activists squeeze into the small public area past the barrier. Cops stare down the crowd. Nervous excitement spills from the others into me.

The sound of stomping feet on the roof resonates from people who climbed with banners and determination. A giant, pink flower launches from the crowd, landing at my feet. I slip it into the rip in my pants knee and smile at the protesters raging on. An activist named Jim badgers the cops for an appointment with the head rubber-stamper. Then one of the many bearded protesters starts flipping through the atlas of forests and approved clearcuts conveniently left on the counter. Ah, look at this; this clearcut runs all the way down to the river, and this one and this one. Hmm, it seems you accept just about any clearcutting plan. Isn’t your rubber-stamping hand getting tired? What are the requirements for approval? Submit the plan, stamp, enjoy your destruction? Maybe you should think about the sensibility and impact of these projects before you sign off on them. We do; not every plan is accepted. What percentage do you OK? Ninety percent? Ninety-nine? Well, it’s a high percentage, but we go over the paperwork. Have you ever walked any of these areas before allowing their destruction? Our aerial maps are very accurate. You can’t do fish, animal and plant studies from aerial maps. We just don’t have the time for field work. So, you rubber-stamp everything? Not everything! How many logging plans did you turn down this year or even last month? I don’t remember. His probing questions jab as the CDF employee drifts into silence.

The cops stand in icy defiance. Jim imitates a cop who is receiving an urgent call over his radio. We have a make on one Charles Hurwitz, proceed with arrest. What crime did he commit? He stole people’s pension funds, committed inside trader scams and did a hostile takeover of Pacific Lumber. Now he is chopping down the remaining old-growth redwoods, destroying habitat and eliminating jobs. Copy that, we are approaching his house. Unit 1, cancel the arrest. A horde of protesters are standing around the California Department of Forestry holding banners. Turn around, proceed to the location and arrest them. But we have Hurwitz. Can’t we just arrest him? No, arrest the protesters.

Jim and the bearded activist pretend to read the cops’ minds as they stand as emotionless dummies. What’s that one thinking? God, I miss the ‘60’s when we could just bash their heads in and not worry about it! And that one? I wonder what’s on TV tonight. That one? Damn hippies! I only have three weeks before retirement and they pull this shit. And the other one? Silence floats in the air. He is wondering what it would be like to join us, I blurt out.

Two cops strut into the room as if they own the place. Anybody left in the building will be locked in and arrested. Protesters file out and I yell, You’re standing in a public place. It’s legal to stay. The flow stops. The cops try to force the door shut.

Don’t let them close the door! The tide crashes in then sucks everything out. Cops push everyone out except Jim. The lead cop crouches down beside me, with saw in hand, and says, I guess we’ll have to cut through this old-growth furniture. He hacks the fiberboard attached to my neck. His eyes fall on the lock around the mass of electric cables. Oh, smart guy, he says. Methodically, his hands unplug and untangle cables. He walks me out the door into the ecstatic energy of 200 people. A woman screams, Stop it! You’re killing him! She is reacting to the three locks and pieces of fiberboard hanging from my neck.

Six of us sit on the pavement in front of a cop car with handcuffs resembling thick plastic trash bag ties. The trash has been taken out. We watch helplessly as Jim is dragged, put in leg manacles and a tight waist chain. They mistreat him because, in the tradition of nonviolent action, he allowed his body to go limp. They put us in a paddy wagon and a van behind it. The California flag drops down the pole and an Earth First! flag rises. Owww! A resounding howl sweeps the crowd.

Arrestees chant, Lock down the gate! Lock down the gate! to slow our departure. What did they say? All the locks were used to lock people to furniture. Some activists slip out of their plastic cuffs. Ron squeezes through a van window and frees himself. Surprised at the ease of his maneuver, he stands by the van for a minute pondering his next move. He climbs onto the paddy wagon and sits on the roof with his fist raised in solidarity. Minutes later, he is reacquainted with cuffs inside the van.

As the paddy wagon inches forward, the crowd lays or sits in front of it. Yarn is tossed in and out of the paddy wagon, forming a web pattern connecting the outside world to us while we sing songs. Cops suddenly reach for their clubs and pepper spray. People died from pepper spray in California this year already. Shouting out the windows, No violence! No violence! we desperately try to deter the cops. Billy clubs extend the fists of anger and frustration onto the lying bodies. Police drag protesters aside and they return like the tide. Some activists lay face down in the road. Cops yank heads up by the hair, pull off activists’ glasses and spray directly in their eyes. Certain cops enjoy torturing people as they swing and spray with smiles and hate consuming their faces. A few uncomfortable cops wince and look worried while spraying people. Activists float down in an endless wave of support, repeatedly returning to lie in the path of our vehicles as soon as a cop pulls them out of the way. Lacking space for more arrests, cops struggle. Drivers squeeze by on the grass. Heading the wrong way down a one-way street, they deliver us to the jail basement.

A medic walks in and proclaims, I know I’m wearing a police uniform, but I’m a medic and I have sworn an oath of neutrality. Does anyone need my help? Jim’s waist chain is too tight. The medic removes it then says, The red mark around your waist must be because your belt is too tight. A cop is a cop, I yell out.

Thirty-four of us sing repressive, prison-type songs, sitting on the curb in the basement. Swing low, sweet chariot... Mr. Big shows up without his sense of humor. Cops uncuff us in groups of four and a Wobblie (union) man pulls out his freed plastic cuffs and says, I think you might want these. Mr. Big grabs a new set of cuffs and tightens them to the point of cutting into the union man’s skin. Now maybe you’ll shut up and act like a man. We all protest, You can’t do that. It’s cutting off his circulation. Fifteen minutes pass and blood starts flowing into Mr. Big’s brain again as he cuts the Wobblie loose.

Upstairs, at the check-in desk, four of us engage two cops in conversation. We will be in jail a few hours, but you spend every day here. One cop says, All the redwoods are dying anyway. The mist kills their tops then they die. That’s not true, we laugh. It really doesn’t matter anyway, because there are too many people on this planet, he says.

The guys are thrown into the recreation room where bodies are splayed all over the floor as most men sleep. Resistance is printed on a piece of exercise equipment.

Two of us question a normal guy pacing frantically. He might be an infiltrator who got swept up in the confusion. His fear of us is obvious. He explains, I’m a local who was walking by the demonstration and saw the cops abusing you guys. I couldn’t stand by and watch these barbaric acts. So, I sat down, blocking an office door, until they arrested me.

Guards pull me out to ask inane questions by the desk. Suddenly a maniac in an orange jumpsuit yells and flails his arms, I’m going to kill you, you tree-hugging mother fucker! What’s his problem? We isolated him after he beat the hell out of two cellmates for no apparent reason. Bars deter