Cat Canyon Secrets

Facebooktwitterredditpinterestlinkedinmailby feather
Mountain lion crossing sign

Mountain lion crossing sign

  There is one sacred act of worship that I perform in secret.  Even though I am hiding behind a piece of paper, I still find it embarrassing to confess.  It is an act that I perform in total solitude out among the rugged ridges I like to call cat canyons.

  Mountain lions prefer rugged canyons, steep gorges and sheer chasms.  The muscular cats can cover the vertical terrain swiftly, muscles swelling and melting beneath the tawny yellow fur.  Thick forests and massive boulders provide a hunters cover.  Ambushes are sprung with powerful predatory leaps, unleashing feline missiles of claw and fang.  The big cats go by several names – cougar, puma, mountain lion – like wandering wizards traveling under aliases and like mystic hermits they seek solitude.

  You rarely see people in cat canyons and rarely do you find trails.  The rugged geology that creates the solitude of a cat canyon, where feline kings recline on granite perches, also creates boulder strewn ribbons of mountain stream, waterfalls adorning the gorges like jewels.  Deep pools provide drinking water for the big game who live here; deer, javelina, bighorn sheep, and wild turkey.  The cats just grow fatter and fatter.

  When cougars travel they like to walk on rock, leaving no scent or trace of their solitary meanderings.  On a Sunday afternoon in Soldiers Canyon, recent rains had made the earth soft and yielding, revealing a single feline misstep, an interruption in the series of boulder to boulder launches; a deep crisp paw print, talons digging into the mud.

  The first puma I ever saw in the wild was illuminated in the headlights of a pickup truck.  The big cat was crossing the road as I was on the way up to Rose Canyon Lake for a sunrise fishing adventure.  I have learned since then that sunrise is the best time to see mountain lions, when they are still curious about the day, wandering to select a rock ledge with a good overlook.  Sitting Bull, the sacred dreamer of the Sioux, also liked sunrises.  Up always before dawn, he liked to walk about in the morning dew, bathing his bare feet.  Sitting Bull used to say, “Healthy feet can hear the very heart of the Holy Earth.”

  This thing I do, the one I am so embarrassed to talk about I do at sunrise.  It involves my most prized possession.  I attained it during a quest – like any good object of sacred ritual is found – while searching through the attic of my grandfather.  It is my own personal Excalibur – a silver saxophone – the one my grandfather played in speakeasy jazz bands during Prohibition.  Out there in the middle of the desert, where I am sure no one can hear me except some nervously chattering coatimundi, I play love songs on my saxophone.

  When I stand there atop the ridges of those cat canyons playing my saxophone, I really wail, my #4 alto reed vibrating with feral howls and yowls.  I have to play real loud; it takes a lot of wind to inflate the clouds and open the sky until the horizon seems endless.  I have to play with a lot of heart too, making the pastel reds, burning oranges, and streaking crimsons; filling the heavens with enough color to hold all the dreams that are still possible with the birth of a new day.

  Afterwards I pack my beautiful silver saxophone, gift of my grandfather, into its old case and drive my pickup truck back to my urban existence of jobs, bills, and telephone solicitors.  People see me smiling inanely and wonder if I am “normal”.  They never, ever know of the secret saxophone sunrise serenades that I perform in cat canyons.

Cat Tracks.

Cat Tracks.

  Gary Every’s book Cat Canyon Secrets is available on his website www.garyevery.com.

Gary Every (45 Posts)

Gary Every is an award winning author who has won consecutive Arizona Newspaper Awards for best lifestyle feature for pieces “The Apache Naichee Ceremony” and “Losing Geronimo’s Language”.  The best of the first decade of his newspaper columns for The Oracle newspaper were compiled by Ellie Mattausch into a book titled Shadow of the OhshaD.  Mr. Every has also been a four time finalist for the Rhysling Award for years best science fiction poetry.  Mr. Every is the author of ten books and his books such as Shadow of the Ohshad or the steampunk thriller The Saint and The Robot are available either through Amazon or www.garyevery.com.


Facebooktwitterby feather
Facebooktwitterredditpinterestlinkedinmailby feather

Comments are closed.

  • Additional Stories

    Shop Local – It’s a Small Business Season

    November 22nd, 2023
    by

      As the holidays approach, we will be checking our lists and, much like Santa, checking them twice.  We can […]


    Oracle Fire District announces winners of Firewise Awards

    November 22nd, 2023
    by

    By Nathaniel A. Lopez   On Tuesday, Nov. 14, during the Oracle Fire District’s monthly meeting at the Oracle Fire […]


    Some Oracle residents forced to find new trash service

    July 28th, 2023
    by

    By Mila Besich Arizona’s Copper Corridor has struggled for decades with a growing blight problem, abandonment of properties and not […]


    Red Field Fire and Bowl Creek Fire Updates

    July 28th, 2023
    by

    This week there was noticeable fire activity in the Tri-Community area with the Red Field fire burning on Sombrero Butte […]


  • Additional Stories

    Pinal Airpark may soon have a control tower

    July 28th, 2023
    by

      Pinal Airpark may soon have a much-needed air traffic control tower thanks to a successful amendment added by U.S. […]


    Free virtual diabetes prevention program

    October 15th, 2022
    by

      One in three adults are estimated to have prediabetes, and most do not know it. In Arizona, this means […]


    Oracle Community Learning Garden will grow on you

    August 17th, 2022
    by

    By T.C. Brown   A little over four years ago an idea started to grow. The first seeds were planted […]


    Pinal County Election Updates: new Elections Director hired

    August 8th, 2022
    by

      The primary election for Pinal County held on Aug. 2, 2022, has been fraught with one major “human error” […]


  • Copperarea

  • Southeast Valley Ledger