Ole Frackin’ Red is Dead

Ole Frackin’ Red is Dead

They fracked all the oil and gas out of the deep Marcellus and Utica shale in beautiful Carroll County in Eastern Ohio, going even as deep as the Black River formation, which they said they’d  never do.  Many of the poor country folk became rich and moved away to Vegas and Miami…for a while.  But, now, their money is gone, gambled away, spent frivolously on spirits and good times.  And, now, those folks, penniless again, are moving back to their roots, hoping their relatives who stayed behind would take them back.

But, what is left? The countryside is barren.  The cattle are glowing like neon lights on Antiqua Road  from all the radiation that has been released into the top crust by the fracking deep below. THEY said, promised, even guaranteed  that it wouldn’t  happen.  But, it did.  Who is to blame?  The people are deformed and cancerous.  Toothless in a teeth-gnashing world.  Helpless in a chemically-polluted and irradiated environment. Having to import even their drinking water, once their most unknowingly valuable commodity.

But, perhaps the most personally depressing feature: my coonhound, my joy, my buddy… is dead.  And he died young.  Poisoned by the iridescent, frothy water that he vigorously and innocently lapped-up one night while running a one-eyed, three-legged, simulated mutant of a raccoon.  Big Red died young, way before his time.  And I, left with only his collar and leash, sit here wishing that Chesapeake, and Rex,  and Sierra Buckeye would have never left Oklahoma and come to drill in our beautiful Carroll Hills.

Perhaps, in a generation or two, the planet will right itself and self-heal this deep, fracking scar.  Perhaps a distant relative of mine, simple and humble, will be privileged enough to once again hear that wonderous Silvertone bawl of a descendent of Big Red, as his pups will hopefully live-on to produce yet another generation of hunter…  and Hunt on, Ole Frackin’ Red!

Written for: The wonderful Carroll Hills of Eastern Ohio

By: J.D. Graham, the Old Word Whittler of the Carroll Hills

 10-24-11