Restless native

Part 4: Evil turned into pine nuts, yucca fruit and cacti.

Part 5: Bears forever marked by loss of the shepherds.

Thursday, April 8, 2010

Bears forever marked by loss of the shepherds

Part 5
In early times, when pandas still lived in the mountains of Tibet, the bears were white as snow. They were friends with four shepherd girls that took care of their sheep in the mountains nearby. While the shepherd girls were playing with a panda cub one day, a leopard suddenly leapt out from behind a rock and attacked the cub. The young girls, ever protective, threw themselves in front of the small bear to save it and were killed by the leopard. All the pandas were devastated by the girl’s deaths and held a ceremony to honor them for their bravery. As was the custom in Tibet, the pandas blackened their arms with ashes as a form of respect. As they wept for the girls and their ultimate sacrifice, they wiped their eyes with their paws, they covered their ears to block out the sound of the crying and they clung to each other in grief. As they did these things, the ash spread and blackened their fur. In honor of the girls, the pandas did not wash off their blackened fur. To this day, pandas are covered with the black markings to always remember. — From Tibetan Legend

From: Rob Carrigan
To: Rusty Hector
Sent: Friday, March 5, 2004

I know what you mean by articulation. I’m just trying to get some stuff on paper. I don’t know what will come of it.
Refresh my memory on “Mel, two pockets on a shirt are not cool.” I agree with you about the pith helmet. That kind of thing was typical. Bomber hat and goggles on his motorcycle, Orange Crush bandana under his football helmet, having to go home and change his shirt in sixth grade because it sported a cat in a glass jar and appeared with the caption “happiness is a tight pussy.” He did like to stand out.
— Rob.

From: Rusty Hector
To: Rob Carrigan
Sent: Friday, March 5, 2004

I remember the “good ass is hard to find” shirt that he wore under his shoulder pads. The pocket comment came in Durango one day when I was looking at shirts. I was considering a purchase of one that had two pockets.

From: Rob Carrigan
To: Rusty Hector
Sent: Monday, March 22, 2004

Rusty:
Scott talks about Lynn as “a person that I cared about not disappointing, … I looked up to him more than he ever knew.”
You say “he will always be with me, experiences, conversations, moments.”
Are you a religious man? The reason I ask is because, at times in the past few years (since his death), I have felt his presence. Like he was my own personal saint or guardian angel or something. I know how weird that sounds and maybe it is just intense memory or emotion. Whatever it is, it has helped me make some decisions. But also makes me creepily uncomfortable.

From: Rusty Hector
To: Rob Carrigan
Sent: Sunday, April 18

I have been pondering this for quite a while.
Wouldn’t say I was a religious man. To me, the term denotes tradition and repetition. I am a Christian, just trying to live my life ‘Christ like” and have a relationship with The Big Chief. I understand that Lynn also came to the saving grace… I think that he is now in the presence of the Lord, maybe even offering prayers on our behalves.
Perhaps the angel who is assigned to you is using memories of Lynn to help convey things in your spirit, so it would be in a way you understand. I draw comfort from his memory with the different decisions I’m faced with. Sometimes wondering (or hearing) the way I think he would have handled a situation. We all have the utmost respect for him. He just had that way about him. I’d call it “Quiet Confidence.” For those of us who loved him, it was the assurance of him knowing who he was and where he was headed.
Were your decisions good ones?
I still think about several things in my life where Lynn gave me advice. Sometimes, I was seeking it, and other times I wasn’t. Each time it seemed appropriate and it was never sugar coated, but I knew it was because he was trying to help me.

From: Carl Rice
To: Rob Carrigan
Sent: Monday, March 22, 2004

I could see those qualities in Lynn when he dealt with peers. I think is was partly because he had mastered the art of parenting while raising most of his family. He was like an adult in a very young body. He was always the perpetrator of calm and sense of direction. I remember the time I called a time-out in a crucial situation at the end of a game with Mancos. He came to the sidelines and I was going over options that were available for getting a first down on a third and 7. I was carrying on as only I could do and he said, “calm down coach, we will get it.” I said go get it done! He went back in and ran a dive for nine yards and a first down and that let us run out the clock. That intuition or confidence was amazing and yet at times when we were together alone, he seemed like a very small and helpless child. It was almost as if he thirsted for recognition that was not attached to responsibility. I remember when he graduated and we were shaking and grabbing kids. I walked up to him and just stared for a bit then simply hugged him and said I loved him. He broke into tears. I always wondered why that happened. He was however, easy to love as he was to respect. He was to me, the most precocious of a group of wise young men. He was special because of his awareness of the human condition and his willingness to look beyond the obvious. He was to me, both a son and friend, with full provisions of both.

From: Scott Weinmaster
To: Rob Carrigan
Sent: Sunday, March 28, 2004

Rob,
Sorry to get back so late but been a busy guy. Am i religious? i guess in a way. i don’t go to church or anything but i do pray, guess i got my own relationship with the big guy. i really haven't felt a presence of lynn or any of the people that i have lost, i guess i rely on me…
Not to say i don’t think about what some of them might think about my actions. But as always i make my own decisions … good and bad and i have made both. lol i do really hope that i will see them all again someday … but i guess i am a realist … this is what u got so deal with it… the only way i know how to live at this point in life. Live each day!! don’t know what’s in store tomorrow…

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Part 4: Evil turned into pine nuts, yucca fruit and cacti.

Part 5: Bears forever marked by loss of the shepherds.

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Evil turned into pine nuts, yucca fruit and cacti

Part 4
The Navajo legend presents Changing Bear Maiden as a demonic she-bear. Originally a human maiden, she weds a coyote, which her twelve brothers kill. In retaliation, she takes on the form of a bear and slays eleven of her siblings. Her youngest brother manages to shoot her with an arrow; he divides her body and the various parts transform into pine nuts, yucca fruit, and cacti. Her evil is defeated, yielding positive results for the earth and providing nourishment for the Navajo people.
— From Amy Sillup, Suite101.com

From: Rob Carrigan
To: Carl Rice
Sent: Friday, January 16, 2004

Coach:
What did he like and dislike?
What did he love and value?
I would say he was a planner who usually had laser beam focus. He set his goals early and often. As a result, he usually had a pretty good success ratio, and the façade of at least appearing calm. In retrospect, his public persona was one of a person way beyond his years. It was as if he knew his ticket was punched for the matinee only.
He respected you a great deal. That’s the reason for his search for approval from you specifically. You were a different animal than he had seen before. He recognized that early and saw you as one that he could respect. His folks are by no means bad people, but he seemed to recognize the limitations of such an existence — and want more.
You also provided an outlet for his talent and interest in development of strategy, particularly sport strategy.
What did accept less of?
In what way was he fragile?
And finally, though it is off the beam, but I’m curious, how do you see the rest of us?
__ Rob

Carl Rice wrote:
I would say you are very accurate. He was a loving son who was ashamed that he had to scrape. He hated the things that people thought and said about him and his family yet he saw the weakness. He loved his Grandmother and grandfather yet he was jealous of their attention for Scott. He was his own worst enemy because he acted like he needed nothing but he needed support so much that he felt guilty. You guys think he was different than you. I don’t see him that way. He just didn’t ask as much.

You ask what I think about you guys and I almost gasped because I have never articulated that to you. I have worried what you thought of me. I guess that is selfish. You guys were like characters in a Shakespearian epic. You each have allegorical presence to me. Each good and bad, comical and tragic, selfish and understanding etc…
I learned more from teaching and coaching you guys than I had even suspected in the first 24 years of my life. It is impossible to do what Lynn and I have done without adopting the personalities that you are responsible for. I think of all of you almost daily and pray that your lives are full and plentiful.

I think this writing is good but want to examine your motives first hand. You always represented the thinking general type, the overachiever. I talk about you to every team I coach and every clinic I speak at. The conversation is not about football, it is about courage and belief in yourself. It is about what you can do if you don’t consider failure as an option. You personally mean much more than that to me. Have you ever thought about the symbiotic balance that you guys had? Have you ever wondered how it happened? What it represented in your life? And if it would ever happen again? Coach

From: Rob Carrigan
To: Carl Rice
Sent: Monday, Jan. 19, 2004

Coach:
I always have been a persistent little troll. Everyone wants to know what others think…
The team we are talking about offered an unprecedented honesty that I saw neither before, nor after that particular time in my life. If I was an ass, I was usually told about then and there, and the same was true for others.
Balance was a good way to describe it. We kept one or the other of us from tipping the scales too far. The dynamic with you was a little different in that you were the adult-in-charge and beside that, could have easily stomped a mud hole in us — but not that different.
In many respects, you offered us an equality that most adults never offered us before. In my own wistful reminiscence of that time and space, I miss the honesty the most. Sometimes you need people to tell you when they think you are screwing up. But as I get older, I either quit listening or most folks just quit telling, or both.
I can’t believe I’ve completely quit making mistakes. (Neither can my wife and kids.) My own honest evaluation of you is very positive. You are a good guy that cared about us. You noted our successes, you told us when we screwed up. You even allowed us to see some of the chinks in your own armor. But you also challenged us to create our own legends. You asked us to ask more of ourselves and to consider the possibilities. Thank you.
Back to Lynn: I don’t see him as that different, except for what I call “the faraway eyes.” I can’t help thinking that some of the things he did, the way he did them, he did because he could hear a clock ticking. — Rob.

From: Carl Rice
To: Rob Carrigan
Sent: Monday, January 19, 2004

I agree about the eyes and the presence. You were not a persistent little troll. Your body was not as big as your heart. That is a good thing. I will take heart anytime. Carl.

In the midst of gathering information about Lynn's life, his younger brother Lane, died of similar causes.
From the obituary pages of the Dolores Star and the Cortez Journal:
Funeral services for lifelong Cortez resident Lane Leavell will be held at 2 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 21 at the Lifeway Baptist Church. Pastor Jimmy Kennedy will officiate. Internment will follow at Cortez Cemetery. Lane was born the son of Kay Leavell and Darlene (Sparks) Leavell on Feb. 8, 1971, in Cortez. He died at Southwest memorial Hospital on Thursday, Feb. 19, 2004. He was 33. On July 10, 1993, Lane married Amy Sue Risenhoover in Dolores. A heavy equipment mechanic for Nielsons/Skanska, Lane loved his job. He was an active and devoted member of Lifeway Baptist Church, and he was a member of the Dolores Fire Department. In his free time, Lane enjoyed building model trucks. He was proud that he was the one trusted annually to haul the Galloping Goose train to Durango to put it on the tracks. Mostly, though, Lane loved his family and cherished those relationships. Surviving Lane are his beloved wife of 10 years, Amy Leavell of Dolores: his children, Garrett Leavell and Madelynn Leavell both of Dolores; his parents, Kay Leavell and Darlene Leavell of Dolores; his parents in law, Leon and Saralynn Risenhoover also of Dolores; and his grandmother, Jean Sparks of Hendersen, Nev., Three sisters, Penny Thompson and husband, Gene of Mancos, Lisa Balderrama and husband Rudy, of Cortez, and Lori Willbanks and husband, Keenan of Dolores also survive Lane. Preceding Lane in death was an infant daughter, Sarah Leavell; brother, Lynn Leavell; grandmother, Bernice Leavell; and grandfather, Paddy Leavell.
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Please click on the following to view:

Part 4: Evil turned into pine nuts, yucca fruit and cacti.

Part 5: Bears forever marked by loss of the shepherds.

Monday, April 5, 2010

Dolores, and other bears laid bare

Part 3
Spectacled bears, the only bear native to South America and its largest carnivore, are under threat from loss of habitat and from poachers. But Dolores, a spectacled bear who lives at Leipzig Zoo in Germany, had more immediate concerns. In November of 2009, her coat which normally should be thickening up at that time of year in preparation for winter's colder temperatures, began falling out in clumps. Bizarrely, Dolores and all the female Spectacled bears at the zoo have lost their fur completely. Despite the hair loss, some itching and perhaps a bit of self-consciousness, the bears are not showing any ill-effects. — From Metro of London, Nov., 2009

From: Rob Carrigan
To: Carl Rice
Sent: Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2004

Coach:
I consider myself a storyteller anyway. I am working on some stuff that might hit print somewhere. Given that, there is always the possibility that something said to me could see the light of day. I very much enjoy our recent email exchanges, but if you want something off limits, please tell me and I will respect that.
Lynn’s story is a great one on many planes. It is a bit of a painful exploration on my part, but nobody said anything in life has to be easy (note: previous discussion of Intensity drills.) I have no intention of exploiting anyone, but think it is a story worth telling. Hoping to explore some of the themes we have previously discussed as it relates to his life. Hoping to identify the lessons learned. Finally hoping to make some sense of it myself and find some peace in the process. ___Rob

Carl Rice wrote:
If I understand correctly, your purpose, it sounds like a passionate task. Did you read “Beachers”? Each of us has a story and it is a conglomeration of quotes and misquotes that have been dealt to us and by us to posterity. I loved Lynn and stand beside his life and memory with pride. I do however know a pile of weaknesses and inconsistencies that were demonstrated in his life. I choose to regard the great things that he was. I support anything that you do that is honorable and with in reason, factual. You, yourself are a chapter in my emotional book and a most valuable part of the lessons that life has provided me with on my way to becoming a better person. We have a responsibility to teach and honor within the confines our lives. Please share with me more of your intentions.
Carl

From: Rob Carrigan
To: Carl Rice
Sent: Thursday, Jan. 15, 2004

I have not read “Beachers,” but will try to locate it and take a look. That is the John Grisham novella about a star player’s struggle to forgive himself and his coach, right? His buddies meet in the bleachers and discuss the “Old Days” and past glory. Just goes to show you, there are no new ideas. From reviews, Coach Eddie Rake is central in that story. Any relationship to Carl Rice?
Lynn was a good man. Like all good people, he was not perfect. He was not really a hero figure, (although to some, maybe?) but an above-average cat. But in his relatively short life, he touched people in profound ways (as noted, we all do). When we showed up in November, mostly it was out of respect for Lynn’s memory and the circular coincidence surrounding a Dolores/Akron playoff match-up. Some of the connections were uncanny and it felt like some strange “juju.” My current leading idea is to try to capture a bit of that energy on paper with the different perspectives. I envision a treatment where a story is told through different characters eyes… It shapes up as a circle of life sketch. Is that too similar to “Bleachers”? Is there a better way?
Can I tell “evil black-hearted coach” stories in order to create a decent villain?
As Mark Thompson would say, “Just funnin’ ya.”
We all know you were trying to teach us honor and that your heart is not really black. The “evil” designation, I suppose, is still open for debate.
— Rob.

Carl Rice wrote:

Rob,
I had a player come up to me and with tears in eyes tell me he was being encouraged to press assault and battery charges on me because of my coaching. He said he didn’t know what to do. I told him to do whatever he needed to do. My conscience is indeed mine and is of no concern to anyone else. I now tell you, do what you need to do. You guys are dear to me but I am not in charge of what you think or your memories and perceptions. You have my blessings to do what you want.

From: Rob Carrigan
To: Carl Rice
Sent; Friday, Jan. 16, 2004

Coach:
Yes, and I have been sued in Federal District court for turning in someone who wrote me a bad check. At times, right and wrong gets a little cock-eyed in the short term.
Earlier you said, “I do however know of a pile of weaknesses and inconsistencies that were demonstrated in his life. I choose to regard the great things that he was.”
In my own experience, the Lynn image is mostly positive. Perhaps I didn’t see something I should have. Your acknowledged general perception is good but it has an edge on it. Maybe that is just your way.
My choice of Lynn as central is admittedly mechanical. He has been dead for years. To most of us, he wasn’t particularly controversial, but for me provides a common thread, glue to hold events together, wins and losses and noble fights. The truth be known, this writing, though I hope to dig out and present different perspectives, is mine. It is my view of what happened. You all can write something for your selves.
So where were the holes in his armor? I won’t dwell on it, but I need to know what put the edge in your voice. What were the great things he was? __ Rob.

Carl Rice wrote:
Rob, I knew Lynn from the time I first went to your town. He was the first student I met the first day I arrived in Dolores. He hung around me like a bee hangs around sugar water. He would do anything I asked of him, it was like he was thirsty for someone to approve of him and recognize his value. Lynn was a fragile person who put on a marvelous show, his talent was he was cool under pressure and that he was the most stoic youngster I have ever met. Few knew what he disliked and even fewer knew what he loved and valued. The edge that I have is not for the personality I loved. I don’t want anything to cheapen his memory. I don’t know what the perception of Lynn and my relationship was but I know what it was to me. We talked more than his parents did. Through college, we sent letters to each other and following college he came to live with me in Akron. He became closer than an old player. He was like a son. I was proud of him. His flaws, like all of ours are best left to the wind.

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