Art Chowder January | February, Issue 19 | Page 33

You facilitate Diverse Voices
Writer’s Circle.  How did this get
started and what is your vision for
this group?
I was honored to have a short piece
chosen for the anthology, Spokane Writes,
and attended the book launch gathering
(excellent cake!). Though there were at
least two women of color represented in
the book, I was the only one in attendance
that night. In thanking Sharma Shields
for the anthology inclusion, I wondered
whether there was a writing group for
a more diverse pool of writers. There
was not; she made it so! Somehow, I
ended up as facilitator, and Spark Central
has kindly hosted it once a month. The
group has created its own ambience –
an atmosphere of acceptance, support
and trust. Our collective vision now
encompasses the publication of our own
anthology, with sales to benefit Spark
Central. Sharma Shields, whom I call our
fairy godmother, is giving generously of
her time and resources to make it happen
this winter.
Excerpt from “The Backhoe,” a true story in
True Adventures & Random Meditations, a work in slow
progress by Jackie McCowen-Rose.
In 1989, the early Spring of – chilly Idaho Spring – 85’s liver quit on him. As the
toxins built up, he began to stagger, wide-eyed, terrified, leaning against the
barn wall to keep upright, wouldn’t settle unless I sat out there with him. Spike
paced anxiously outside as I called my vet. Doc, an ex-rodeo bull-rider, was a big
man of big compassion and gentleness, but grounded in the realities of life and
death among animals and their people. He gave it to me straight that, at 25 years
old, survivor of a rough early life on a rent string, 85 wasn’t going to get better
and that it was time to say goodbye. Crap, you think, recalling all the miles in the
saddle with this horse, the brush-popping, the hill climbing, the creeks crossed,
the buck-offs and get-back-ons. That long gray head peering round the corner of
the yard, nickering, so glad to see you coming, nudging you to hurry up with that
grain bucket, please. Above all, you remember the trust that never doubted, the
companionship that never complained or judged, and it seemed there had been
so many years, so many.
But the reality of life and death among animals and their people is having to
do the final kind thing. What you’d sure as hell want done for you. Doc went to
his truck for the syringe, used the house phone to call a guy he knew who had a
backhoe, who would come and bury 85 down the back of the pasture, afterward.
I called my best friends, Sandy and Bill, who came right over. Lewiston was, is,
small like that – you can always come right over.
What are you working on now?  
The working title is True Adventures
& Random Meditations. It seems to
be, so far, an all-you-can-read buffet of
true stories from my life, and strange,
unbidden thoughts. 
What are the best ways for
someone to engage with writing? 
I think, to engage with writing, write!
Make word salad, on paper, on tablet,
wherever. Be in love with words, let them
flow like a waterfall, like tears. Be outta
control! To engage with writers, find the
writer in the people you know; ask your
elders to tell you stories, ask your friends
to tell you stories, and above all, listen
to chance-met strangers – everyone has
remarkable stories, everyone.  People will
astonish you.
Spike was beside himself by then; I haltered him up, Bill held the lead rope and
Sandy held me while I talked to 85 and explained how it was going to be. He
already knew, though; his blind eyes were fixed right on me, ears perked to my
voice. He already knew. The jolt from the first syringe tranquilized him; the spurt
from the second killed him. He went down like thunder on his side, all 1300
pounds of beautiful him. My heart went right down with him, but kept beating
when his stopped. Spike reared, roared, pawed — what had they done to his
friend, his old-man friend?
Then the backhoe man came. His machine looked 40 stories tall, snorting and
rumbling down the short graveled drive, through the gate, to 85’s body. The
backhoe man dug the grave, then as carefully as a mother scoops up a child,
lifted 85 into the front bucket. He lowered him into the hole as gently as he
could, but scraped a patch of hide off one of 85’s withers. That scraped patch was
so pink. It didn’t bleed. It was just such a bright pink. The backhoe man filled in
the grave, tamped down the disturbed earth while we all cried and Spike danced
and whinnied.
January | February 2019
33