Diary of a Cage Fighter (Journalist) In Training

(This post is dedicated to my “You Have Died of Dysentery” shirt, purchased at BustedTees.com).

Things are harder out here on the trail then I could have ever imagined. I thought this two week trek was going to be easy, but the hardships that have befallen my party have made this excursion dangerous and possibly deadly. My father must have been crazy to force us to embark on this journey. “It’ll be like a vacation,” he says. What an idiot. I’m starting to think Papa chose to be a banker just so he could buy more ammunition at the general store. He could have been a carpenter or a farmer, but no! Well how’s your knowledge of how much interest is applied to a 15 year loan coming in handy out here!? Now he just spends his time hunting pixilated game, and killing four buffalo when he knows we can’t use all that food, while his family dies around him. He puts the lives of his family in jeopardy on a daily basis. I swear the man tries to ford every river. Ever hear of a ferry, dad!? He’s so cheap. “We don’t need to buy a spare axle”, well, guess how that worked out. There are so many wagon ruts out here it’s ridiculous. And the thieves! They’re so brazen that they’re starting to steal our diseased and deceased oxen. There are just so many threats to worry about out here: cholera, dysentery, drowning, snakebites, and recently, Papa’s developing an eerie glint in his eye when he holds the gun. I don’t know if I will survive to see Oregon, or make it on the “Top Ten List” that Dad keeps blabbing about, but I sure hope so; because I don’t want my name to be on a makeshift tombstone.

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