TALES OF THE SOUTHWEST: THE LESBIANS RE-TAKE THE MOUNTAIN

It was after work, I was coming out of the Bisbee post office with my mail.  I paused at the community bulletin board to see what was going on.

Not every town has a community bulletin board but Bisbee does.   It’s a town of hippies, trustafarians, government employees, copper mine retirees and just all-around folks in southeastern Arizona about a rifle shot from the Mexican border.

I liked to stop and read what folks have posted.

“MASTER MECHANIC WILL WORK ON YOUR FOREIGN OR DOMESTIC CAR AT LOW RATES” read one posting with the bottom cut into tags with the guys name and phone number on each tag, so someone could pull one off if they’re interested.  Then someone had scrawled on his notice….”How can you be a master?  Masters ask no money for their work,” a reference to something Buddhist or Zen or something from the same school of thought that brought us “When the student is ready the Master will appear.”

“BORDER COLLIE PUPPIES, $100 EACH,” read another.

“BENEFIT FOR BREE, THIS FRIDAY,” and it listed the date.  “BRING DONATIONS FOR THE AUCTION.”

“Are you going?” there was a voice beside me.  I turned to see Billie, the town dance teacher standing beside me.

“What?” I asked.

“You’re looking right at it, the benefit for Bree.”

“I don’t know who Bree is, and I’m a working stiff.”

“Doesn’t matter, “ she said.  “You could donate some money.”

“What,” I asked, “Does she have a disease?”

“She’s the town masseuse,” said Billie.  “About three times a week she drives over to the Huachuca Mountains and goes for hikes by herself.”

The Huachuca Mountains are off to the west of Bisbee.  They’re a north-south mountain range that, for the most part, ends at the Mexican border.

“So she goes for her hike last week,” Billie continued, “And when she comes back to her van there’s two Mexicans standing there, one’s holding a pistol and making a motion with his other hand saying, ‘Llaves, llaves.’”

“Wanted her keys,” I said.

“Yeah.  So she doesn’t know any Spanish so she’s trying to tell these dudes that the van and the massage table on the inside are the way she supports her family but the dude keeps waving the pistol around and saying ‘Llaves, llaves,’ so she hands over her keys.

“Then the other dude comes over and starts tying her up and she’s freaking out not knowing what they’re going to do to her and he ties up her legs and her arms behind her back, picks her up and THROWS HER DOWN THE MOUNTAIN.”

“Damn,” I said.

“And she rolls and flips and tumbles and shit down the mountain and she finally stops just in time to hear her van engine and it’s fading away.”

“Damn,” I said again.

“So she’s cut up and hurting and she starts fiddling with the rope around her hands and gets loose and then unties her legs and she climbs back up the mountain and walks down the fire trail to the ranger station and gets help.   But her van is long gone and she’s got some cracked ribs and shit.”

“Wow,” I said.

“I’m giving three sets of tap dance lessons to the auction,” said Billie.

“Of course you are,” I said.  I knew Billie, we talked a lot. 

“Can’t your radio station donate something?”

“I reckon we could announce it a few times, but the GM isn’t going to let me give anything away.  I’ll come Friday night and donate some money.”

I showed up at The Benefit for Bree, attended mostly by women.  I saw Bree, saw cuts on her face and hands.

I walked up and shook her hand.

“You don’t know me but I wish you peace and healing,” I said.

“Thank you,” she said smiling.

The money was going to be used to get Bree another van and another massage table.  I put a 20 dollar bill in a big ol’ gallon glass mayonnaise jar that had a bunch of other large bills in it.

I hung around for a bit.  There were folks reciting poetry in an open mic, a guitar player or two and then Mel took to the stage.  Mel had organized the event.  Mel had a real estate office in town.  Mel also was president of the local Gay and Lesbian Alliance Society.

“Now,” said Mel, holding her arms in the air, her armpits resplendent in copious amounts of armpit hair, “I want to invite all the women in the audience to join us this Wednesday night when we caravan back to Bree’s favorite hiking place and re-take the mountain for her.”

A collective cheer went up from the crowd.

I wondered what Mel meant by re-take the mountain.  I looked around and decided there wasn’t anyone I could ask.  Billie was there but she was in the corner talking to a bunch of other women so I didn’t think to interrupt her.

“Meet here at 630 Wednesday,” said Mel.  She stepped down from the stage, someone else took her place and the auction began.

Days passed and I didn’t give much if any thought to Bree or the auction or how it did until I bumped into Billie again at the post office.

“Hey,” I said, “So how much did Bree’s benefit raise?”

“Oh, it was pretty neat, enough for a new massage table and a down payment on a good used van,” she said.

“So, out of pure human curiosity,” I said, “How did she get the mountain taken back for her?”

Billie stood and looked me in the eyes for a moment.

“Oh!” she said, like she remembered what I was talking about.  “Yeah, I went to that.”

“The re-taking of the mountain.”

“Yeah.  Haven’t you ever heard of that?  You’re such a white guy.  Whenever people have something bad happen to them at some place they really like they get some friends together and go back and have a celebration at the place and…you know…take it back.  It’s better than Bree never going back to the Huachucas or every time she might go back all that she’d  remember is those guys tying her up and stealing her van.”

“Oh,” I said.  “I never thought of such a thing.”

“You’re so middle class, McGee.”

“Gee, thanks, Billie.”

“So we caravanned up to where Bree said she liked to hike, there was about 30 of us in 5 cars and so we get up there and Mel and her pals built a ring of rocks and then inside the ring of rocks they made another ring for a fire pit.  So they start this fire, and it’s dark and so everyone takes off their clothes…”

I raised my eyebrows.

“Not me,” said Billie, “I’m kinda shy, I just watched.  So here are all these naked women, really mostly lesbians from the Alliance, and they start dancing in a circle and singing lesbian songs.”

“What are lesbian songs?” I asked.

“I didn’t recognize any of them so I just call them lesbian songs, I think one of them WAS a Melissa Etheridge song.  Anyway, so they’re singing and raising their arms and moving in a circle and this goes on for, I don’t know, 15 minutes or so?  Then Mel says, ‘It’s time to consecrate Bree’s mountains for her again, everyone follow me.’  So Mel backs up, squats over a rock and pees on it.”

“She…pees…on…a…rock,” I said slowly.

“Yeah,” said Billie, “So just like that all the other women start peeing on rocks in the big circle.  Then once they were done we all hugged Bree and everyone put their clothes back on, put out the fire and came home.”

Billie told the tale as if this was something folks did every day.

I looked at her for a few moments.

“Well,” I said, “How about that!”

“It didn’t shock your middle-class, white boy sensibilities, did it?”

“Nooo,” I said.  “Just interesting, that’s all.”

It would be months before I would run into Billie again at the post office.  In that encounter she would tell me about joining basically the same group of women at a ranch pond for a skinny dip and a bottle holding contest…one of those things a bunch of naked women do when they get together…seeing who can hold the largest bottle tucked under their boobs.

But that’s another story.

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