On The Shenandoah Circuit with Robert Duvall, my mother, Mssrs Oxy and Contin

I was watching Lonesome Dove last night in the family rancher.

You ever watch it?

You see Robert Duvall, the once-colonel-Kilgore from Apocalypse Now and Tommy Lee Jones, a real son of a real Texas ranch.

Down in the man-cave, it was them, me, mssrs oxy & contin, bag o peas, the family dog and my bag of broken bones.

Mssrs Duvall and Jones rode their own stunts, breaking the Hell-Bitch

Crashing real horses into the real Nueces River.

Why did they take on the story?

Why do we test ourselves, each other, on the track?

I looked over to my mother. I said

“Does this help you understand why we do this?”

In between her Mothers-Against-Motorcycles rants, she said

“Yes”