But then winter comes -īASCOMB: - and winter at 9000 feet is not for the faint of heart, the way you describe it in your book. And if you give me your 5% down and a signed hardcover of Cowboys Are My Weakness, I'll see what I can do.īASCOMB: Now, the third week in September sounds stunning. And the realtor said, You know, I think the widow Blair - who was selling it - I think the widow Blair is going to like the idea of you. And my $21,000 represented 5% down on that place. And here was this place, with this hundred-year-old barn with a big beautiful mountain behind it. Because the aspens are changing in giant, undulating swaths of Tequila Sunrise colors all over the hillsides, and the sky is blue and the air is crisp. And it was the third week of September, and if you can't fall in love with Colorado in the third week of September, you can't fall in love. I got there and looked around at some houses and finally got taken out to this ranch, this 120-acre ranch. A writer friend of mine, Robert Boswell, had said, check out Creede, I heard it's cool. And so I went driving all over the West looking for a place and I got to Creede, Colorado, which was just the next place on the list. And that seemed like good solid parenting advice. And I went looking for a place to begin with, because I sold a book of short stories, my first book, when I was still in graduate school, and when I got the check for $21,000, my agent said, Don't spend it all on hiking boots. It's got 13,000-foot mountains on all sides of it fur and spruce forest and aspen. HOUSTON: Well, the ranch is 120 acres in a high mountain meadow at 9000 feet. “Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country” is Pam Houston’s first memoir.
How did you find the place nearly 25 years ago, and why did you decide to call that home?
Welcome to Living on Earth!īASCOMB: So Pam, first of all, tell me about the ranch that's the focus of your memoir, Deep Creek. And she writes about how the place has gradually helped her heal from childhood sexual abuse she experienced at the hands of her father.
Pam has lived through a lot with the land. In her 2019 book “Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country” she chronicles 25 years of winters that bring temperatures as low as 35 below, and smoky summers that threatened her ranch with wildfire. For writer Pam Houston salvation came in the form of a 120-acre ranch high in the mountains of Colorado. In a vast desert or forest, or looking down at the landscape from a mountain peak, trauma and heartbreak can seem so much more distant, and the burdens of the past easier to carry. Writers have often sought refuge in nature and wilderness. CURWOOD: It’s Living on Earth, I’m Steve Curwood.
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