road: an old white and teal Scotty Sportsman trailer. To a 15 year old it was a dream home, though to a discerning adult it was barely enough space to fit three small people. However, to us size didn’t matter – we had been having the time of our lives for the past several weeks as we gallivanted across the northern edge of the United States. From Ohio to Michigan, down through Indiana, across Illinois and back up through the vast open wilds of Iowa and South Dakota, each and every state was a wonder to behold; but nothing was as breathtaking as Wyoming.
Many of the greatest memories from my childhood came from the cross-country adventures my Mom used to take our family on. I was seeing and experiencing things most children my age could never even imagine. The best part was that my Mom trusted me to always make smart, safe decisions when I was out adventuring on my own in nature.
Let’s be honest here for a minute, at 15 years old, your decisions are often about as risky as they get. The moment I told her I was headed out onto the prairie to search for rocks and wild artifacts, or land “treasure” as I called it, I knew in the back of my mind that also finding danger was inevitable. In fact, I was chomping at the bit to put myself up against any challenge that would push the bounds of my own bravery.
This was definitely my mindset as a teenager.
As I walked slowly through the prairie grasses, I carefully scanned the environment for any signs of animals. This was the perfect place to find rattlesnakes and whip-tailed lizards, or maybe if I was lucky enough, a snarly badger defending its burrow. How I would have loved to see a badger in the wild, despite the fact that I knew if you tangle with a badger, you are likely going to walk away shredded to bits.
In the distance, I could see a beautiful range of mountains,
the rocky peaks reaching up for the sky and the sun casting down a warm glow that seemed to draw me toward them. I was well off the trail now, and the last thing on my mind was how far I had gone. With each step, my curiosity drew me further from camp with a natural wonder for what was next beyond the bend.
The landscape quickly began to change, as scraggly bushes now littered the path forward and forced me to twist and turn my advancing direction. It was like a maze of obstacles – I battled the increasingly difficult terrain until I came upon a steep wash that cut through the prairie. My boots inched forward cautiously toward the edge and I peered over.
“Great, not much choice here,” I thought to myself… “it’s either climb down, through, up, and over OR turn around and head back to camp so I can hang out with my annoying little sister!”
“Ugh… NO WAY!” I said to myself. And before I knew it, my butt was in the dirt and sliding down the brittle side of the wash.
Parched earth began crumbling under my boots… The hillside broke apart and quickly began to slide me down with it into the wash. I was caught up in a skeet slide, and I thought to myself, “This is bad news bears!” My heart began to race as rocks dislodged around me and I battled to keep my balance. I was now moving as one with the earth, and a single wrong move could find me buried under a pile of falling rocks. I dodged left and back right, my ankles fighting to keep from twisting as the uneven ground attempted to contort my stance and crumple me to the dirt. This was my moment, live or die, and with a confident leap I sprang from the hillside and luckily made my landing in the middle of the wash.
POOF! A plume of dry dust enveloped me as rocks rolled to a stop at my feet. I dusted off my shorts and shirt, took a deep breath, and looked around.
“WHOA! That was awesome, like, way past cool!!” I wished someone had seen me pull that one off.
I jumped around in excitement, my adrenaline at its peak, and then I realized that this was a very dangerous place to be standing. In the event of a sudden rainstorm, flash flooding could come rushing down this wash and sweep me away. There was no point in tempting fate, so I decided to take on the challenge of scaling the opposite side of the wash. With a couple of clever moves, using rock outcrops, some protruding roots, and sheer determination, I shimmied up and out the far side of the wash. I took a deep breath, exhaled, and there I stood, a victor.
I had mastered my obstacle, and laid out before me was nothing but the unknown. I took one more look back in the direction I had come from. The camp was nowhere in sight. Even if I screamed for help at the top of my lungs right then and there, no one would be able to hear me. Boy, was I a long way from camp; I started to wonder if Mom was getting worried.
Standing there in the radiant sun, I began to question my mission.
“Should I head back? Have I come far enough? I haven’t seen any animals yet. I didn’t find any land treasures.” If I returned with only the story of making the descent down a wash, my little sister would most certainly giggle and say, “Ooh so brave, you slid down some rocks… I could have done that… in my SLEEP!”
I refused to be the subject of her snickering, so I trudged onward out across the shrub-scattered prairie. I was not going to return without something worthy of a grand tale. Something epic was bound to happen; it was Wyoming for Pete’s sake, the Wild West! I would have taken anything at that moment.
“Come on nature… present me with something epic!”
With my head down, I was more focused on the thoughts in my head than I was on the surrounding environment, a definite mistake whenever exploring unknown wilderness. I moved quickly, dodging around spiky plants that laced the tall grasses, and kicking at the small rocks that scattered the sandy soil. My frustration was clearly apparent, and it was growing with every step I took.
I picked up my pace. The faster I moved, the less I was paying attention to everything around me, and the danger was compounding.
“No snakes, no lizards, no fossils… shoot, not even a prairie dog standing on its back feet to call out a chatter of laughter which would most certainly be mocking me as I…”
My thoughts froze as all of a sudden the bushes ahead of me moved with incredible force. I stopped dead in my tracks. Like a video game freezing in mid-play, my entire world literally stopped.
Branches cracked back and snapped, the entire bush moved violently, yet I could not make out what was behind it. One thing was for certain – it was BIG.
This was one of those rare moments in life where you can literally feel your heart drop in your chest. Your senses shift into overdrive and begin firing on all cylinders to pump as much adrenaline through your veins as possible.
“Buh-bum… buh-bum… BUH-BUM…”
My heart was pounding out of my chest as my ears tuned in and listened to the haunting sound of deep breathing coming from in front of me, no more than 50 feet away.
I heard a low resonating bellow, like distant thunder… the sound rumbled into my chest, and then suddenly a short, strong snort caused me to jump. It was the sound of air being forced through a pair of nostrils, a crystal clear warning that said:
“I am here and YOU should NOT be!”
My body was paralyzed by fear, yet my mind was screaming at my feet, “RUN, COYOTE, RUN!”
But they could not hear my internal cries of desperation. My heart began to race faster as the sound of crunching sand and stone echoed out across the open landscape. Stepping out before me the beast revealed itself, arguably the most powerful and dangerous animal to roam the grasslands; the American Buffalo.