![[Image Description: Two MCC members taking a brief break; one is sitting on a rock, the other is standing nearby. They are both in their uniforms, looking out at the expansive, mountain view surrounding them.]](https://cdn.firespring.com/images/c3f85e97-43a9-4810-8081-e8e6338173d0.jpeg)
Imagine: you’re walking along a dry, hot, sagebrush field. When all of a sudden, your foot plummets into a bottomless pit. Your life briefly flashed before your eyes: that time you peed your pants in elementary school, the first time you ever saw Michael Landon on Little House on the Prairie, all the times you spilled coffee on your shirt when it was too late to change… Yeah, all that. Anywho, you catch yourself and promptly thank the stars above while stiffly waddling in clay mud back to the worksite, thinking, “This will surely never happen to me again.” Day three, day three, oh day three of hitch.
Okay, but what happens when it does? Let me explain! I’m a horse girl, okay! And I saw what I thought was a holding pen, but was really fencing to keep cattle away from a natural spring. So I got excited and thought, “Let me check this out,” and then WHAM! Big ol’ clay hole. Both feet in this time. 7 am. Day eight, day eight, oh day eight of hitch.
Why was I even in the position to fall into such a hole? I joined MCC, of course! “It’ll be fun,” they said. Well, it was. I spent my hitch with almost strangers building beaver dams to expand the riparian landscape in the cattle country of rural Montana. Cue Colter Wall and hopefully a reintroduction of beavs to Fish Creek. It was essentially building Beav City in hopes some beavs will move in and kickstart industry around the harvest of willows and sod, therefore making more frequent, better dams, further expanding the riparian landscape around the creek. Fingers crossed builder grade is up to par for these Montana beavs.
