Life and Death on the Reservation

The last two days have been the most bizzare of my life.

Let me start at the beginning: Tuesday morning at 3am I was awakened by my cell phone alarm. I hit the snooze til 3:30 and then decided I needed to get up and pack for work or I would have to work on the drill site naked. I packed my things and loaded the truck. After stopping at the office for some equipment, I drove 2 hours South to the Reservation where my company is drilling water wells. The work day began normal enough. Reaming out the hole that had been sitting for 4 days. No biggie. The only incident of the morning was noticing two illegals walking on the dirt road past the sight. I say incident, but that isn't very unusual for this area. Hordes of illegals pass through this particular region every year. We noticed them and I watched them for a while to make sure they were moving on. Again, no biggie.

In the afternoon, we were constructing the well. We had just finished adding several sacks of Colorado Silica Sand and were about to tag the depth when the driller pointed toward the road. I looked up in time to see the water truck from our other site go by in a cloud of dust. The driller's flew to action. The three of them jumped into their truck and raced off after the culprit. I was left standing there with an overflowing pump that was turning my site into a mud pit. I made some calls and finally decided to call the Border Patrol. Then my supervisor told me to go look for the drillers. I ended up back at the site after receiving a call from the driller. The ultimate result: The illegal ditched the truck in the desert and ran. My drill crew gave chase on foot. (what were they thinking) He got away. The Border Patrol didn't even try to find him.

In case that isn't enough excitement for you, I have a story that totally trumps that one.

Today (Wednesday): We finished up at the site in the story above and moved to the next site. As the crew was setting up to drill the surface casing I decided to walk around. I walked over to the cemetary that is adjacent to the site. I find cemetaries interesting and wanted to check it out. I walked around the cemetary and wandered back to the site. On the South side of the site, there is a berm and then a wash with trees in it. I realized that I could see what was around us more easliy from on top of the berm. I began walking along the berm, just checking it out. I was scanning the desert for anything interesting when I looked out in front of me about 30feet. I saw something strange. It was legs. One was out straight and the other bent and sticking up. My first thought was that some one was lying there and I should run because what if this person is dangerous and trys to grab me. Then as I moved forward another step I saw the head. Skull is a better description. I won't go into too much detail but it was obviously not a living persons head. My next thought was that this could not possibly be real. It had to be a halloween decoration . . . right? It was like in the movies where the camera zooms in frame by frame with Psycho music in the background. In the next split second I realized that what I was seeing was a real dead body. OMG!!!! My heart stopped for what felt like an eternity. I was intensly scared. I turned away and made a beeline back to the rig. While I walked my brain tried to convince me that I could not have seen a body. I was wrong somehow. I approached the rig and said, "Guys? I think I just found a body." They did not really believe me. I didn't believe me. I took them over to see for themselves. As we got closer, they could see something. Bobby asked me, "Do you mean that pile of garbage? Its just trash, Patrice." I told them just to go look a little closer. Then the two guys had the same moment of realization that I had. After the initial shock, Bobby turned to me and said, "You need to get on the phone!"

What followed was a little exhilarating and a little frustrating. I called my supervisor and told him that I had found a body and was going to call the police. He suggested driving to the villiage and getting the police and escorting them to the site. That sounded great to me. I took off. There were no officers in the villiage when I arrived there. One showed up, but when I tried to flag him down, he saw me waving and trying to catch him, but turned on his lights and DROVE AWAY. I was infuriated. Standing in the middle of the villiage with my mouth hanging open. UGH!! I wanted to scream, "THERE'S A BODY ON MY DRILL SITE!!!"

I had to get the police phone number from the Border Patrol station. The rest is a blur of phone calls. Everyone was very concerned about my mental and emotional state. To tell the truth I barely had time to think about it. I was fairly calm. I think it was because I had to solve this problem. I had to alert the authorities and make sure they found the site and I had to keep my bosses updated. I think I talked to everyone I know today and alot of people I didn't know until today. I teared up once while I was waiting for the police, but then the phone calls started again. I'm sure I will have an emotional moment. Right now I just can't believe this happened. I can't believe it. Just can't.

Hopefully tomorrow will be uneventful.