Hermits & Freedom in the USA

as promised! more tales from the road trip last month.... been a while since my mastodon vs mountains report, but there's a lot of american goodness to sift through. yellowstone and the glaciers were clearly highlights but KANSAS was way up there. beginning with the lucky timing of visiting amelia earhart's house and legacy on her birthday, then continuing on to lawrence and few amazing spots in between!from the VIKING motel the tucked away in "little sweden" aka lindsborg,to an isolated and empty old school house in the tall grass prairies sponsored by the andy warhol foundation,to the most perfect buffalo burger at "local burger", a dreamy fast healthy food chain serving burgers of all kinds made of only local ingredients,to the noticeble pride of the canadian who invented basketball who once lived in kansas,to one of the best slogans of any city in the world: FROM ASHES TO IMMORTALITY.visiting lawrence, ks was an inspiration and reminder that beyond dorothy and the wizard, kansas is "the birth of the civil war". the fire and determination for FREE STATES was fought hard in kansas, changing the course of history and moral disposition of this country. that free fighting spirit and alternative ways are still very evident there. that epic period of colorful history, is far too rich to tackles in this here blog, but i had the pleasure to discover a lesser known character from that era, that i want to introduce you to: HUGH CAMERONa civil war hero, born under the sign of SCORPIO who fought for slaves and women's rights and ended up living in a tree.he was a peace loving, tree hugging spiritual man and he now lives in his own little corner of a local history museum. the legend has it, that the love of his life married another while he was away at war, and upon return he became a hermit. one day a woman laughingly said she hoped he never cut his hair until women had equal rights. he took her up on it and grew the most wizardly mane. he was straight edge and wrote a book called the USEFUL WORKER to help people with sobriety. as for why he lived in a tree, he said communing with nature gave the greatest satisfaction to the soul. i wish i could've visited him, and if i build a time machine I WILL!xMAdMx