Thursday May 29, 2009
Today I worked with Jerry on John Nelson’s house in Pine Ridge. Earlier in the year, John’s house had caught fire and luckily it didn’t burn to the ground, which is uncommon for Pine Ridge because there is no Fire Department. When something catches fire, it usually burns completely to the ground. Our goal today was to get the electricity in his house working. He wanted it done just so he and his kids could move back in. Even with all the fire damage, no insulation, no bathroom or outhouse, he just wanted electricity so he could move back in and provide for his family. Although the house had a lot of damage to it, it was in one of the nicest placed I’ve seen on the Rez so far. He was secluded in what used to be a park, had plenty of trees for shade, which is hard to find, and was only minutes away from Pine Ridge Village. We spent the day running wires, wiring outlets and switches, and trying to fix up the fuse box with tons of fire damage. Although we didn’t exactly get electricity back in the house, we did get the entire ceiling and walls insulated.
After work, all the work crews met at Bette’s Kitchen in Manderson for dinner. I had an awesome Buffalo Burger. After dinner, Jerry took a slight detour on the way back to Re-Member. We went to Goose Neck, what he considers the greatest view on the Rez. We got up there and it was amazing, you could see everything in every direction. The Rez looked awesome, rolling green hills, scattered pine trees, zigzagging rock formations, and so much more. Jerry said, “if you look off over there you can see in the distance some mountains, those are the Black Hills, they are 90 miles away.” I thought that was incredible, back home you can’t see more than 10 miles off into the distance, it’s just crowded. Here everything was open, vast, and free.
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