Chapter eight

Daniel was happy to see that his tirade seemed to be having the desired effect on his friend. Jack had agreed to lecture at the SGC from time to time, and now when Daniel called he actually answered his cell phone instead of letting it go to voice mail.

So one day a couple of weeks after Jack got back in town, Daniel stopped by the house to see how he was doing. He found him in the garage, obviously in the process of cleaning it out. Unlabeled boxes were stacked out in the driveway amidst dusty skis and hockey equipment, bicycles, tools, a very rusty wheel barrow, and a million other things.

"What are you doing? Can I help?"

"Sure! Start carrying that stuff to the curb."

"Why?"

"The Salvation Army is picking it up tomorrow."

"Don't you want this stuff anymore?" Daniel asked, as he examined a pair of what appeared to be perfectly good ice skates.

"No, that's why I'm donating it," Jack replied in a tone of voice that suggested Daniel's question was stupid.

So even though he thought Jack was jumping the gun on some of the stuff, Daniel did as he was told. He figured that at least Jack was doing something and not just sitting on his butt all day long.

The following week when Daniel stopped by again, he came to ask Jack to have lunch with him. He thought maybe Jack needed to get out a bit. But when he arrived, he got a huge surprise. In the middle of the left side of the two-car garage sat something Daniel had only seen one other time in his life.

"Wow! What are you gonna do with this?" he asked as he walked around the potter's wheel.

"What do you think I'm gonna do with it? You do know what it is, don't you?"

"Of course I know what it is, but… I had no idea you were interested in making pots." Then Daniel strolled over to the work bench on the other side of the room where Jack was standing. There he found a figure made of wire, what sculptors call an armature. Daniel was amazed! "Did you make this?"

"Yep!" Jack replied proudly. It was a good feeling to know he had other talents besides shooting people and blowing things up.

"Jack, how do you know about this sort of thing?"

"From my Mom. She used to make pots and stuff when I was a boy. I liked to watch her. She even let me use her wheel once. I remember thinking it was fun, even though my pot didn't turn out too good. Anyway, I thought I'd give it a try. I still need to buy a kiln, but for now I can take whatever I make to the craft store over on Broadway to have it fired."

"Wow! This is really cool!" Daniel was truly impressed. Just then he remembered why he was there. "Say, would you like to go get some lunch?"

"How about if I fix you lunch instead? Ham sandwich, potato salad and a beer sound okay to you?"

"Yeah, that'd be nice. Thanks!" It wasn't what he'd planned to do for lunch, but in a way it seemed better, because maybe it meant Jack was feeling more positive about life.

Jack worked at his new hobby for a few weeks, and it wasn't long before Daniel was telling him his things were good enough to sell. And since the idea that others might enjoy his work appealed to him, Jack stopped at a shop in town one day to see if they'd be interested in buying some of his pieces. He took along four pots that he thought were his best.

After looking them over, the owner said that while Jack's work was very unique and quite good for an amateur, he only sold the work of established artists. He advised Jack to try the gift shops in the many ski resort towns throughout the state, places where there were plenty of rich tourists interested in taking home a piece of locally-made art.

Taking his advice, Jack put a couple of boxes of pottery in his Jeep, along with a duffle bag with a change of clothes in it, and headed to the closest resort towns. But the shops there rejected his work too, saying they had no need for more pottery. So Jack decided to drive a greater distance from central Colorado. It wouldn't be very convenient for him, if he should find someone who wanted to buy his pots on a regular basis, but he could always move if need be. He wasn't sure he wanted to stay in Colorado Springs anyway, especially since seeing Sam on base had been such a disappointing shock.

So he drove on, until he reached the very popular tourist town of Durango. Jack could see immediately that the competition would be stiff here. There were many shops and many locally made crafts, including pottery. But in one shop he met a woman who told him about a new gift shop just up the highway in Purgatory. She said she knew the owner, and that he was a nice Swedish man from Minnesota. She also said he might still be buying things for his shop, which had opened very recently. So Jack got back in his Jeep and headed north, thinking how nice the drive was. He was actually enjoying the scenery, which reminded him a lot of Alaska. The best thing about both places were the tall mountains and the trees!

Before long he reached Purgatory, which wasn't really a town so much as it was a ski resort. Jack had been there before, but it had been many years ago with his ex-wife. So he was surprised to find that the place hadn't changed very much. It was basically just a bunch of condos for rent and the ski lodge with its rustic cabins. There were only a few shops in town, and most of them were in a shopping mall adjacent to the ski lift. But the parking lot was full, so Jack didn't even think about stopping.

However, the gift shop Jack had been told about was located on the north end of town, in a more secluded setting. But thanks to a big new sign beside the highway, he found it with no problem. An arrow pointed up the hill to "Anderson House Bed & Breakfast", while right next to the highway was the gift shop. Both the house and the shop were painted a pale yellow and built in the same Victorian style, with wide front porches, pointed roofs and lots of crisp white gingerbread trim, and Jack thought they looked very cozy and welcoming.

It was almost sundown and Jack was tired when he pulled into the parking area in front of the gift shop. He got out, careful to avoid the muddy puddles which were left over from the snow storm that had passed through the previous week. Then he took the two boxes of pottery out of the back end of the Jeep and very carefully carried them toward the porch. Jack was relieved when he arrived safely at the entrance, where a white wooden sign hung over the yellow clapboard siding. The sign proclaimed, in black, loosely flowing script with green and yellow daisies all around it, that he was about to enter "Anderson House Gifts".

More than any shop he'd been to thus far, this place appealed to him because of its old-fashioned homey style, and also because of what it contained. Unlike the other shops, it wasn't pretentious, or filled with over-priced items, or with things made in some foreign country. Inside the small, well-lit rooms that divided the first floor, he was pleased to see there was a variety of hand-crafted gifts and souvenirs. The offering included candies, soaps, kites, paintings of local scenery, quilts, Christmas ornaments, carved puzzles made from local pine and cedar, bean bag animals, crocheted hats and scarves, three kinds of local honey, and much, much more. There was even a second story, with one big room where there were more nice things for sale, such as hand-carved pine furniture and lamps with rawhide shades.

There seemed to be a little of everything, but Jack noticed that one type of thing was lacking, and that was pottery! So Jack felt encouraged. And even though this place was a long drive from Colorado Springs, he hoped this shop keeper would be willing to give his creations a try.

After explaining that he wished to sell and not consign his work, Jack carefully set the boxes down on the counter next to the register. Then he went browsing, while the owner took a look at the things Jack had brought with him.

There were three customers in the shop as well, a young couple and an older woman by herself. Jack hadn't been in the store very long before he heard the older female customer asking about one of his pots, which the store's owner had taken out of the box in order to examine it more closely.

"I just love this one. If you won't buy it from him, I certainly will!" she exclaimed enthusiastically.

The shop keeper quickly told the woman that he intended to buy all of the pots from the artist, and if she could wait just a minute, he would price the piece for her. Then he came over and discretely asked Jack how much he would take for the pot.

"Whatever you think is fair," Jack replied. He had no idea what to ask. He still wasn't sure his stuff was worth anything.

"Mister, if you do business like that, you won't make a dime! I'll give you fifty dollars for it and three hundred and fifty for the rest."

"Sold!" Jack cried excitedly, but not too loudly. Then the man went back to the counter and conducted the sale. The woman quickly paid $150 for the pot with a credit card, and was out the door two minutes later. Then the shop keeper wrote Jack a check and began putting price tags on the pots.

Jack was tired and hungry, so once he had been paid, he decided it was time to call it a day. He was about to leave when he decided to ask the shop keeper if he knew of a place that might still have a vacancy. But before he had a chance to say a word, the young woman spoke up. She had one of his pots in her hands.

"Oh look, Brad! Isn't it clever?! How much is this one? I want it." The pot was actually a mug with a silly face, like the ones he'd seen his mother making when he was a child.

"That one is one hundred and sixty."

"Great! I'll take it!" The man pulled out his wallet, while the shop keeper took the pot from the woman and began wrapping it. The young woman turned to Jack and smiled at him.

"I think your pottery is wonderful, Mister…?"

"Thank you! My name is Jack O'Neill, but I use the initials J-O-N," he said, turning over one of the other pots, so she could see the mark on the bottom. Then Jack stood aside while the transaction was completed.

Once the young couple had left, he asked the shop keeper about a room. "Say, Mister Anderson, do you have any idea where I can get a room for the night?" When he saw all the cars parked at the ski lodge, Jack had realized that not making a reservation had been a mistake. But of course he hadn't known where he'd end up.

"Call me Olaf or Olie. Golly, I don't imagine anyone has a room for tonight. But I have one room left at my place just up the hill, if you don't mind staying in the honeymoon suite. The bed is big and soft, there's a hot tub out on the back deck, and my wife is the best cook in all of Colorado," the older man said with pride.

"And how much will this palace set me back?" Jack asked, smirking. He figured he was about to get taken. But any price was better than driving all night.

"For my new friend, fifty bucks, if you'll bring me more pots when I run out?"

"It's a deal!" Jack cried happily, and the two men grinned at each other and shook hands. But now Jack knew he would need to tell Hammond that he couldn't accept the job offer. He would need to move closer to Purgatory. He couldn't be driving back and forth all the time. Besides he didn't really want to live so close to Sam now that she had another man in her life. Running into her was just too upsetting, as he had recently discovered.

"Now I've got another question for you. I'm gonna be needing a place to live. Do you know anyone who has a small house to rent? ….something with a garage or someplace I can set up my wheel and a kiln?"

"Yah, sure, you betcha! I've still got my old house in Durango, the one we lived in before we moved here to the new house. It's nothing fancy, but I could let you have it for eight hundred dollars a month, including utilities. And there's a garage out back where you can make your pots."

"You've got yourself another deal, Olie."

And so Jack O'Neill struck two deals that day with Olaf Anderson. And now he had to go back to Colorado Springs and sever all ties to the SGC for once and for all.

TBC