NEWMAN COMES HOME

Sometimes gifts come in unexpected packages. Nearly 16 years ago, when my son was twenty and a college student, he had one of those jobs that's an eye opener. All of us have taken a job like that while we work our way through school and launch ourselves into the adult world. His was as a truck driver and delivery person for one of those furniture rental places, where you pay stupid amounts of money for ugly furniture that you will never quite own.

One of the places that he frequently delivered to, and picked up from as well, was a trailer park. While taking furniture to and from various trailers, he noticed a puppy tied with a chain, outside one of the trailers. It spent most of it's time hiding as far under the trailer as possible, in the mud. And, over the weeks, he could see that it was getting thinner, weaker. So he made a decision that, ordinarily, I would not have supported. He stopped by the house to pick up my husband's chain cutter and, while delivering yet another sofa and chair set to another family in a trailer, he watched the one with the puppy cowering under the porch.

He found reasons to wait, looking under the hood of his truck, talking with neighbors, checking the tires of his truck...anything that he could think of to linger. Sure enough, the man who lived in the trailer came stumbling out, cussing and stopping to kick the puppy and then climbing into his beat up truck to drive away. As soon as the man had left the trailer court, my son jumped the broken fence, cut the chain and scooped up the puppy into his arms and drove towards home.

I knew something was up when he parked the truck in the driveway and burst into the house the way he did, like he used to when he was a kid. "Mom! MOM! I need some help." Nothing brings a Mother faster than those words. He'd been a man, living on his own, for a few years at that point, so I knew it was serious. I left paint brushes and a trail of turpentine across the floor of my studio, running upstairs to meet him.

"Mom. Come out here. I want to show you something." He took me by the shoulders and looked me in the eyes, smiling at me the way he always did when he really wanted to connect. " I need help with this but I can't do it without you. I can't have him at my apartment. I just stole him." Him? Stole him? Oh my...

He took me outside to the truck and opened the passenger side door for me. There on the seat was one of the sorriest looking puppies I'd ever seen. He was so weak he couldn't stand up. His coat was filthy and matted and he had scrapes and bruises on him with patches of fur missing. His ears were huge and his belly was swollen from malnutrition. The poor little guy was so frightened he tried to hide by putting his head under his front feet! He was too weak to try to get away from us.

I asked my son to, carefully, pick the puppy up and carry him inside for me. The poor little guy was just a sack of bones! While B held him, I washed him off with warm water and soap. I had to be able to see what was there under the crud before deciding whether he needed to go to the Vet's office. Taking care of strays was something we'd all been doing for years...more often cats than dogs, but sometimes snakes or turtles, birds that needed to grow a bit more before being on the their own, a prairie dog. Animals were always welcome with us.

Underneath all of the mud and crust was a beautiful golden coat and a pair of very clear brown eyes.

" I gave him a name. I'm calling him Newman." Well, no going back now. My son had stolen a dog and named him. Judging from the condition this dog was in, he did the right thing! I hugged him and said "He's perfect! He can be Gypsy's friend. I wanted another dog living here anyway." and that was that. I'd just condoned trespassing and theft in the name of love. If we were going to jail, we were going together because I had just accepted stolen property. It was one of the best things we've ever done and the beginning of a true friendship with B as an adult and all for the sake of a wiley coyote.

We started Newman out on chicken broth and a gruel of ground chicken, bones and whatever leftover vegetables I had in the refrigerator. His teeth were still baby teeth and some of them were gone (thank heavens the "person" B had stolen Newman from hadn't had him long enough to knock adult teeth out!). Newman spent most of his time in my studio, down in the walk out basement we had, hiding back behind the heater and hot water tank. I'd pick him up and take him outside several times a day to pee and poop and not once did he have an accident in the house...not once. I've never had another dog before or since who was so easy to housebreak.

When I was sure he was strong enough to ride in the car with me and strong enough to deal with the stress of going to the Vet's office, we took him in for his first exam. He was full of worms, but nothing that couldn't be fixed. And his hair coat was beginning to grow back, his eyes were clear and there were no other diseases to deal with. He had his first set of inoculations and home we went. He was so excited to leave, to get back to his house, that he stayed upstairs for the first time and explored the house with Gypsy. He wasn't just there to convalesce, he was home!

Over the weeks and months he began to grow. We guessed that he might be about Gypsy's age, not quite a year old. B came by every night to see Newman and we began to take him out for walks around the block. At first he was still so weak, his muscles were still so atrophied from being tied all the time, that he couldn't make it around the block. He had to be picked up and carried until he started to wiggle so he could get back down. That didn't last long though. He was young and recovering quickly. And he had a mate!... Gypsy!

I knew he was OK when he started to eat upstairs with Gypsy, mornings and evenings. But he also started to do something very strange. He would eat his meal and then, very solemnly, would come to me and sit right in front of me, waiting for me to acknowledge him. Then he would lean over and barf up a portion of his dinner! Eeeuw! Now what? I'd never had to deal with that kind of behavior. Then he would wag his tail, perk his ears at me and wait. What to do...what to do. He was so proud of what he was offering, I couldn't get angry. Instead, I wanted to learn more about him...about this behavior.

After talking with the Vet and being reassured that he was healthy, I talked with a friend of mine from the University, a wild life biologist. He came to visit and looked Newman over, asking questions about his history. He ran his hands over Newman, who was very curious about this new person, looked in Newman's ears and picked up his legs and feet to carefully examine. He looked at me and smiled and said "Congratulations! I think you have a coy-dog, a half coyote, half dog living with you." OH MY. Later that was confirmed by a Native American who walked through our neighborhood on his way to Haskell University. He saw me out with Gypsy and Newman, walking, and stopped me to tell me that Gypsy would be a good hunting dog, but Newman was a "junk dog", a killer of chickens and an egg sucker. I needed to get rid of him! Of course, he was seeing the coyote in Newman, not the dog.

When Newman was able to walk and run, to keep up with Gypsy, we started to take both of them up to the campus at KU, to Potter's Lake, where several other "dog" people took their dogs to let them run and play off leash, to swim in the pond and to learn how to socialize with other dogs. At first Newman was overwhelmed. He wouldn't go far from me or B and always stuck close to Gypsy. It was just a bit too much for one little coyote to take.

But the second time we went back, the real Newman began to emerge. He began to discover his legs. Newman could run! We're not talking here about the normal lope that you see a dog do, but a full out RUN! B told me that once, when he wasn't able to find Newman and had been out looking for him for a few hours, when he did find him, Newman ran alongside B's jeep and B clocked him at almost 40 mph! Newman could run so fast in his youth that no dog could keep up with him.

He would run up to the other dogs at the park and tease them into trying to chase him, and then he would turn up the speed and leave them eating dust every single time. He flew! He was a beautiful, golden streak who's feet never touched the ground. He could dart to one side, flip up in the air and do a 180 turn and come down running so fast that other dogs would end up standing there looking around for him in bewilderment. "What happened? Where did he go?" When Newman discovered the freedom of being able to move like that completely unfettered, Newman discovered his smile. In all his years, his smile never again left his face. He was rescued. He was safe. He was home. He was free!

Living with a coyote has been adventure, to say the least.He could jump onto the table tops and the counters like a goat with springs in his feet. He loved the full moon and would howl at it, sitting in the middle of my Grandmother's dining room table. My solution to that? I put layers of table cloths on the table. There are still a few scratches on the top of the table and I treasure them! Who else can say that a coyote used to sit in the middle of their Grandmother's dining room table and howl at the full moon? What an awesome history to add to our Thanksgiving dinners, when we always talk about families and our past.

Every year he would capture one of my feather pillows and rend it end from end, using the feathers to make a nest for Gypsy, usually back behind a bed or the rocking chair and, once when the closet door had been left open, in the back of my closet! I would come home and find him sitting in the door of the room where his nest for Gypsy was, wagging his tail and waiting for my approval. I would follow him to wherever that year's nest was and find Gypsy there, curled up in the middle of it. I'd say " Oh my. This is the best nest, the best den, I've ever seen"...which was true because I'd never seen any other nest! And then they would jump up out of the middle of it, running off down the hallway leaving a whirl of feathers flying through the air after them.

So many stories to tell, living with a magical creature like Newman. There's the day he ate a birthday cake that I'd left sitting back as far as possible on the kitchen counter to cool, so I could ice it. I came back upstairs after folding some laundry and there he was, laying back under the kitchen table as far as he could go, curled up in a teeny, tiny "you can't see me" ball. That was always his guilty body language. When I stopped to look around to see what he had done, I saw the cake on the counter with the whole center eaten out. There was a perfect circle of air in the middle of my cake and crumbs all over Newman's face! All these years later I'm still laughing about that one!

After we'd moved out of town, out to our little bit of Paradise, the adventures continued but with the ante upped. Newman faced off with wild coyotes, making sure they knew this was his territory. Sometimes the howling and growling was fierce, but he always won. And there was the day he and Gypsy had disappeared for hours. They'd, all three of them, lived out here for years with no fences, leashes or collars. I never worried about them because this really was a dog's paradise. There wasn't anyplace to go to that was any better than this. But I do admit that I was worried by the time I saw them, coming down the path I keep mowed through the East pasture. Newman was dragging a partial deer carcass, Joe running alongside and Gypsy riding on top! All three of them were so rank that it took three baths on three days afterwards to get the horrible smells off of them, but until they had all laid out in the front of the house, chewing on body parts and rolling on the skin for hours.

At the end, Newman was crippled with terrible arthritis, the curse of all runners who've worn their joints out with joy. He ate his dinner with his bowl placed on top of a pile of books and a dictionary so he could keep his balance. He couldn't lean over anymore to eat from his bowl on the ground without falling over. We decided to call him the only literary coyote in Kansas!

He's gone now. Four days ago Newman slipped out of his beautiful, golden skin and left this Earth behind. His legs no longer worked. We had to help him up just to get him out the door. He was completely incontinent at the end too, something that was mortifying for him. He never dirtied up his den in all the years he lived with us. He died in my arms, looking out towards the horizon. He left this world laying out under his favorite cedar, outside our front door. The flowers and grass were deep enough there for him to hide, something that he always did once he came to live with us out here on our preserve. Over the years his wild side became more and more prevalent. He didn't cuddle. He was too adult for that. He had a job and he did it, right up to the end.

When the Vet's truck drove up our long drive, Newman dragged himself up onto his front legs and he barked, to let us know someone was here, invading our territory.

He died here in the evening, laying in his yard doing his job. At the end, just before he died, he at last laid his head into my lap and looked at me with his ever present smile. It was the first and last time he ever did that. I was the alpha female and, in his world, you never did that with the alpha. He was gone. He had, at last, run right out of his skin to run under the full moon we had that evening. His end was perfectly Newman, just exactly the way it was supposed to be. He died without a collar on. I hadn't used a leash to walk with him for almost ten years. Out here he was free, no chains ever again for our coyote. That was our gift to him.

The energy in the house has changed. Somehow it's too quiet, even with Joe and Miniver here. He was an important presence that, until he was gone, we had not realized was so much a part of our new/ now old life  on our small ranch. Now he's in the Earth that he loved to run over and an apple tree grows out of his heart.

I'll miss you, Newman. It's been a privilege to have a real "junk dog" live with us, including us in his pack. I love you!

I am, always yours, Nancy...remembering

MATHA'S FLAG AND A SALUTE...

Sometimes I just plain, flat out get overwhelmed with life. Too many pots on the stove top...too many irons in the fire, too many things on my to-do list! But the Fourth of July is a place where I always stop to catch my breath and remember. It's in the middle of Summer, the middle of the year and the weather is white hot, slow and breathless.

We've had a whole month of hundred degree days with occasional breaks of "just" 95 with thunderstorms and more tornado warnings than I can count. I can't say that's classic weather, but it is Kansas weather. We're a place of extremes, so every year is different. After more than a few years of it, you just kind of learn to roll with the punches. I did turn on the AC about half way through the month. I usually can make it into July, but this year the heat was exhausting, so we've been cooking some energy, sooner than we'd planned .

I had a lot of profound things to say here, but decided instead to talk about everyday heroes. I'm not much interested in politicians. As a lot, I find nearly all of them very disappointing. And I'm not going to talk about soldiers or war either, or not much anyway. I'm going to acknowledge the quiet hero...the everyday hero that we never hear about.

He's (that's the grammatically correct 'he') the one who pays the bills, goes to work everyday, cleans the bathrooms and sweeps the carpet, mows the lawns and loves his children without complaint. He keeps the world going in a quiet way, behind the scenes, tying shoes and putting bandages on scraped knees, walks the dog and rubs your shoulders when you have a kink in your back.

She's (and that's also the grammatically correct 'she') the one who makes sure the tank is full in the car, the oil is changed on time, the horses are let out early in the morning and the stalls are cleaned everyday. She's the one who makes dinner, stretching the budget and being creative with eggs and spinach at the end of the week while you try to make it to payday. She laughs at the same old stories and calls every weekend to see how your life is going.

They (one more time, always grammatically and every other way correct) bring you bags of organic lettuce and sugar snap peas from their garden to share, pick up your mail for you when you're out of town and check to make sure the doors are still locked and mow the lawn so you can deal with the crisis that needs your attention without the mundane to distract you.

Here's to the everyday American. I salute you. And I thank you for the offer to help in small ways. "Could I carry that for you Mam?" or  "Do you need help? Are you OK?" when I pull off the road to answer my cell phone. Here's to the "people down the road" who never judge me for being a renter instead of an owner...who accept us without reference to our religious or political affiliations, who're just there to be friendly and to help when there's a stray horse in the yard who's owner we're trying to find.

And here's to old red trucks and the old guy that lives up the road that stopped by one evening just to say " I just wanted to tell you how much the Missus and I bin enjoying yor floowrs you got growin' everywhar round here. (shifting his tobacco chaw from one side of his mouth to the other) You got just about the prittiest yard round these parts." and a nice, hard hand shake and off he goes, hand waving backwards out the window of his truck!

Here's to the possibility that things can get better, that the ideals I used to believe in are still possible. Here's to the everyday man in his everyday life. Thank you America! Happy Birthday!

About our beautiful flag :  It's a funeral flag from World War Two, in memory of a young soldier named Matha Dalton. We found it at an antique show years ago in Lawrence. I'd walked around the corner of one booth and saw it laying across a chair with the end falling onto the floor. No matter what country you come from, the flag of any country should never touch the floor. It stands for all the people who've given up their lives to defend the idea of the place they live in.

I bought it from the person who had the booth along with the box it had come in, without the comments I wanted to make to the person who had left it out where it could touch the floor. When we got home, I found under the flap of the box a letter that had been written to the family of Matha Dalton after his death at the end of the War in the Pacific. The address was in Golden, Missouri.

A few weeks later we drove to Golden and stopped by the local library, which was also the local post office and sheriff's office. It was a very small, rural community. I asked if the librarian knew the family of Matha Dalton. I told her about the flag we had, that we wanted to return it if they were still in the area. As all local librarians do, she did know of a living relative. And she made the call too.

We waited for about 45 minutes, walking around the tiny town square and stopping to visit in the local cafe and hardware store. By then the whole town knew why were there and people were beginning to show up to see what would happen when we met with Granny Dalton.

Granny Dalton owned several thousand acres of farm land that she still farmed with the help of her Grandsons and some of the local teenagers. She drove up in a clean but very old and faded Ford Truck, getting out still dressed in her daily overalls and muck boots but with her hair combed and her purse on her arm.

She walked right up to me, introducing herself first to me, then to my husband and, in her blunt Missouri accent, she said "I'm Granny Dalton. I here you've got something of mine. You want to tell me the story of how you came by it?" I liked her right away. She was lean, tough and leathery with big hands and a no nonsense way about her.

We walked over to sit on the bench under a tree in front of the local cafe with a small crowd gathered up around us to hear about why we were there. It was like being inside a Clint Eastwood movie. All we needed was the right kind of music to set the stage.

After I told her how we came to have the flag, I gave her the letter. She carefully opened it up and read it out loud so everyone could hear her. Then she paused, taking a moment to wipe her eyes with her hanky, and turned to me and said " I was supposed to marry Matha when he came back from the War. We fell in love when I was fifteen and he was seventeen. Instead, he died. When they sent us his things along with this flag from the Philippines, all we got were some scorched coins they found next to him. He was burned to death."

She paused here to wipe her eyes again. She was crying and so were most of the rest of us listening. "I married his brother instead. He was a good man and I don't regret any of my life with him. We've had four good sons and two good daughters together. My oldest son was named Matha too."

"My Father in Law died in my arms of a broken heart, out in a corn field, just weeks after we got this letter from the War Department. Neither he or my Mother in Law ever recovered from the grief of loosing Matha that way. "

"You keep that flag. You've got more respect for it than his sister's ever did. They're the ones who sold it in an auction after Mom Dalton died last year. I don't speak to them no more. They sold all of Matha's things...a whole trunk of them, without saying anything to any of the rest of us. If you give it to me, I'll just die and they'll do the same again. All my kids moved away from here. Those sisters would just take it along with what I have before my children could stop 'em."

And here she paused again, looking out towards the place she'd driven from. Everyone around us sighed, waiting to hear the end of her story. Then she turned to me and said " I thank you from the bottom of my heart for caring so much that you drove all this way to bring my memories back to me. I can see you and your husband are good people, that you love each other. Do you have children?" ... an important question to ask when you've grown up in a farming community where large families are still a part of running a farm.

I told her we did, two sons, and that they were the core of our lives. She smiled, gave me a hug (drawing a sigh from the group of people around us. Granny Dalton was not one to express herself openly.), and said " Well, you go home and tell them about us and Matha. You be our memory. And you love those boys every single day like it was the only one you have." And then she got up, tucking her hanky back into her purse,  walked to her truck and left without a backward glance.

Before we left, I asked the Librarian if she knew if the Dalton family was descended from the Dalton Gang, a notorious gang of robbers from the years after the Civil War. She said " Well, we don't talk about that much around here. It's a part of our history we ain't too proud of. " and left it at that.

So I have one more salute...to Matha Dalton and all of the young men and women who've given so much  so that the rest of us can hold onto our dreams. Thank you, Matha. And thank you Granny Dalton, for taking the time to tell us about your life.

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY!

BIRKENSTOCK GOSPEL

When I was a wild and crazy hippy chic with a baby in my back pack and Birkenstocks on my feet, my world was a radically different place. It was 1976. The USA had only just withdrawn from Viet Nam. John and I had two babies, no car, no insurance and a grocery budget of $18 a week. And we walked everywhere. It didn't seem that big a deal. I was only 25 and completely invulnerable...a lioness who could run an easy ten minute mile (eight on a really good day!). I was going to change the world, make it a better place for my sons to live in. I could do anything!

We had no washing machine or dryer, so walking to the laundry mat was a twice a week event for me. I'd put Ben in my back pack and Ryan in the stroller and drag the laundry behind me in my shopping cart . We'd walk two blocks over and four blocks down to get to the laundry mat that was located across the street from my old High School. I used to laugh when I told the story about how easy it was to clear out the truant high school kids by opening up the diaper bucket to load up the washing machine. I was probably the best form of birth control around! One look and smell at what babies give back to the world in the "shape" of dirty diapers and barfed on clothes usually sent all of them out of there with a truly horrified expression on their faces. I always imagined the girls saying "No way Jose! You aren't putting your hands on me! I'm not going to end up like her!"

I loved my life though. I've always looked at it as a great adventure. Anything is possible. Just keep your eyes open and listen to your intuition. It will guide you to wherever you want or need to go! Guess you could say I was a "leaper". I loved jumping off the cliff and into the water, yelling "Yeeeeeeeeehaaaw!" all the way down. (Course, I usually did that after watching someone else jump and come up safely. I wasn't completely stupid, just liked that feeling of taking a chance.)

One Sunday in April, while John was at work (he was in school and working two jobs to keep us going.), I packed up the boys and all of our laundry to make our usual hike towards cleaner pastures and sweet smelling sheets. On our way we had to pass a little white church. I loved to walk past. The congregation was mostly African American and that place rocked on Sunday! People were clear out onto the sidewalk, mingling, talking, fanning themselves in the early Summer heat...and singing. Oh my, the music that came out of that little building. It was wonderful! It was such a celebration. The energy coming down the sidewalk at us was huge!

I'd forgotten that it was Easter! How could I not know that? I stood there, watching the people go in and out of that church wearing their Sunday best. The little girls all had on pretty dresses and ribbons in their hair. The little boys were kind of squirmy in their tiny little suits, pulling at the neck ties. The ladies smelled like lavender and powder and were wearing dresses all the colors of the rainbow. Some of the younger women had dared to wear pants suits, bringing looks of disapproval from the older women.

It was Sunday and there I was, walking to the laundry mat again dressed in my cutoffs, Birkenstock sandles and T-shirt that said "Give Peace a chance!" My boys were wearing Osh Cosh by Gosh overalls and tennis shoes. the smell of dirty diapers preceded us, I'm sure. It was Easter and I'd forgotten! I stopped up the block, waiting for people to finish fileing up and into the church. I didn't want to offend anyone with my dirty laundry.

While I stood there a feeling, for the first time, washed over me of being alone. My family was spread out to the four corners, Grandparents and Mom gone, and a Dad that wanted nothing to do with us. Just for a moment all of my brave "Yee haw!" was forgotten. I'd always thought that my kids would grow up with family around them too. I stood and watched and remembered, smiling and hearing my Grandmother fuss over my dress and shoes, worrying about my fly away hair.

"Come on in sweetheart! I've been watching you walk past for months now, loving up on your pretty babies and always a smile on your face. You just come on in and sing with us." It was one of the ladies who always stopped to smile and wave at us as we walked past. She was wearing a hat with feathers in it, a huge corsage made out of  peonies and a lavender dress. And she was a force to be reconded with. She was not the sort of person you could easily say no to.

"Oh, I couldn't. Look at us! We're not dressed for Easter Sunday. And where would I put my laundry? It smells pretty awful." She just laughed. " Honey, the Good Lord don't care how you're dressed and he sure don't care about dirty laundry. He just cares that you're here!" And with that she swept me and my boys up, leaving the laundry cart sitting around the side of the building, and away we went into that amazing church.

The pews were full and the paper fans were going. All of the windows were open, but it was still hot inside. My escort moved through the building like a battle cruiser, people stepping out of the way, parting the sea  to the front of the church. There was a place held for her and others scooched over to let me squeeze in with my babies. I felt distinctly out of place. Everyone was dressed to the nines except me! But they all had smiles for me, with much exclaiming and passing around of my boys. They were fussed over, hugged, kissed and rocked by nearly every lady in that congregation before the end of the service.

And, oh, the music. It was pure gospel, all of it. We rocked and swayed to the music, singing and laughing and saying "Amen!" at the tops of our voices. I loved all of it! Not one of them ever said a word to me about how we were dressed. We were part of their community for the length of that service. I've never had so much fun on a Sunday morning before or since. My voice is an alto when I sing, so I harmonized with the sopranos around me, all of them smiling their approval at me. Now that's what I call church!

That little church is gone now, knocked down to make a parking lot for an apartment building. Many of the older homes are gone also, to make room "for progress". It's a shame . There were beautiful trees arching all the length of that street that were taken down too. When I drive past and sit in my truck on that same corner, waiting for the light to change, I still imagine that I can hear the sounds of Easter Sunday, when the wind drifts past just right. It's a good thing people are used to seeing other people "talk to themselves" with the addition of cell phones to the world. They never miss a beat, watching me sit there and sing old gospel tunes, remembering.

My sons are grown men now with their own lives and paths to follow, living in other states. We see each other once or, if I'm really lucky, twice a year. They both live with wonderful young women that I'm proud to call my daughters in law, all of them learning how to deal with this world. And I'm living on a little ranch on the edge of Oz with my horses, dogs, cats and a donkey, and visited every year by a new herd of cattle who come to live in our north pasture for the Summer. The closest I get to Sunday Gospel now is when I sing in my barn when I clean the stalls, always in my alto voice.

All of my days begin and end with my menagerie, gardens, singing and dancing with Lucky or Apache. It's hot now and we're in to the full swing of Summer here with tornadoes one day and sunshine and wind the next. The haying has started and I ride my horse everywhere instead of walking. Guess you could say I'm still leaping off those cliffs while I try to start my next career with horses and their people, learning how to teach them to dance and sing with their horse partners.

Life is good! " Yeeeeeee Haw!"

I am, ever yours, Nancy ... singing at the tops of my lungs, with a smile on my face!

A WHITE TORNADO

Here in Kansas, Spring is a time of weather extremes. We swing back and forth from temperatures below freezing and late snows to temperatures the next day that rise into the nineties with high humidity. There's a reason Frank Baum used a tornado as the vehicle to transport Dorothy and her little dog, Toto, to OZ. Tornadoes are a part of our landscape...like the open sky and rolling land under the prairies. We've had a standing joke in our family for years. "Kansas ain't for sissies." (Well, OK, except for my three terrified, farty dogs all of whom are jammed  up here under my desk. The air can get pretty rich when the weather gets like this!)

My first memory of a tornado was the Ruskin Height's tornado in 1957. 39 people died that night. We lived in one of those brand new sub divisions that were springing up all over the US at that time. It was just a few years after WW2 and people were having babies...lots and lots and lots of babies. Every house on our block had two or three or four kids living there, all of them in my age group. It was never hard to get a pick up baseball game going in my neighborhood. All I had to do was walk out the door with my mitt, a hand me down from my brother, my slightly dented bat (also a hand me down) and a baseball. I'd yell "Ball! Who's up?" and we'd have a tournament going in no time.

At the end of May in 1957 the weather had been perfect for days. School was almost out and we were mostly coasting to the last day. Summer was nearly here. It was hot and muggy with "heat lightening" on the horizon all afternoon. I was just six years old and nearly ready to move on to second grade.

Dinner was light and easy that evening. I think we had baked beans and hotdogs. We ate outside on our brand new patio, watching the lightening display. I was drinking my first iced tea. I felt very grown up. It had a white pile of undissolved sugar at the bottom of the glass that I couldn't wait to get to! We were between wars and anything was possible.

We had no air conditioning so the windows were open that night and the attic fan was blowing, pulling cool air through the house. It was still so hot and humid that I didn't want a sheet or blanket. My dog, Shotsi, was up on the bed squooshed up next to me and trying to pant the heat away. I wasn't very sleepy. There was a kind of tension in the air and Shotsi kept making these little whimper sounds and getting up and walking around on top of me. I loved her too much to ask her to get down.

The house was dark and everyone had gone to bed when the storms began to roll in. I was sitting in the middle of my bed, holding on to Shotsi, when my Mom came in and swooped me and Shotsi up in her arms. There was no explanation. She just came up to the bed, her face visible in the constant lightning, leaned over and picked me up with surprising strength!  And then she ran!

I remember the white muslin curtains in my bedroom blowing straight out, making these strange high pitched flapping noises. The air was flashing like the strobe lights you would see twenty years later in a Disco. When I looked over my Mom's shoulder, there was my Dad running right along next to my Mom with my brother in his arms. Out the front door we went, not bothering to close it or lock it and across the street to the neighbor's house. They had a basement. We didn't.

It was my first tornado and it was coming straight for us! It looked like a giant white snake crawling across the sky. I was riveted. I didn't know enough to be afraid.

All these years later that's the image that stands out in my mind, even though I've seen two more since and had one rip the siding off of our home and destroy my beloved maple trees. We've always been the lucky ones though. None of us have ever been hurt. I learned very early on that things were just that...things. As much fun as I have making people's homes and businesses look beautiful, selling fine art for other artists or even playing with my own environment, it's all just stuff. It's not a bad lesson to learn.

I've had some requests to write about Newman, our half coyote. I think I'll save that for another story. I can tell you that he's the one who lets us know when the real deal is coming in. When my wild child comes to me and puts his paw on my leg, sitting down in front of me with a direct look, I listen. He's the reason we spent the evening downstairs the night the tornado hit Joplin. There were two coming our way also, but they pulled up and veered around us. Again, we were some of the lucky ones.

My cousin and one of his daughters weren't. They lived in Joplin and both lost their homes. But, I should correct myself here. They WERE the lucky ones. They lived through it with no injuries. Houses, furniture and even photos can be replaced. Stuff is just stuff. Family and friends are everything!

I am, always yours, Nancy...happy to be here!

MY SECOND FAVORITE MONTH

May was always my second favorite month. (My first was September...new clothes, supplies, books, teachers, subjects. I love to learn!) It was the last month of school and the first part of Summer...the best of both ends of the spectrum, a beginning and an ending.

I'd sit there in every class, doing a mental countdown and watching the clock. There were tests with all of the usual nightmares the night before. Mine always involved wrong classrooms, being naked and not prepared to take any test! and any other horrible thing that the young mind can concoct when under stress.There were end of school parties, show and tell about where we were all going during the Summer and the anticipation of endless days. I'd plan on stacks of Library books to read, swimming, baseball, freckles on my nose (much to my Mother's consternation!) and laying in the grass watching the clouds drift by. All of that time on my hands to use my imagination, dream, think and just be. Bliss!

The last day was the best. All we did was go to school and put in our time, waiting for the bell to ring. When it went off, everyone...even the teacher...would jump up and GO! The kids weren't really supposed to run down the hallways yelling, but almost all of us would. My trick was to do cartwheels and flips down the hallway and walk out of the doors on my hands. It was expected. If I didn't do that, they'd make me go back inside and come out again. I was a one trick pony and I looked forward to it every year. There would always be a teacher at the door who said " Now Nancy...that's not really a very safe way to leave the school grounds, now is it?" But no one ever stopped me either.

I'd run all the way home, excited because it was here...SUMMER! Sleeping in every morning, breakfast whenever I wanted it, my dog Shotsi at my side and time, all the time in the world. I was a Buddhist and never knew it. I was completely in the "now"...no past, no future, no clocks or schedules. All I did was breath and follow my heart. It was wonderful!

We had no air conditioning so the sound of the fan running and screen doors slamming were an important part of the background to me. I always had a vegetable garden that my brother and I grew tomatoes, green peppers, lettuce and spinach and, sometimes, even peas in. I loved standing in the garden after watering it and squishing the cold mud up through my toes. It was good dirt because my Grandpa always helped us to get it started. It was mulched with compost from his farm, so the vegies would leap out of the ground. We always had extra to share with the neighbors. Somehow the tomatoes were bigger and sweeter then.

I still love May second best. It's an old habit, and not one I want to change either. Even when the weather is record breaking high the way it has been the past two days (95 yesterday and 96 today and the afternoon's only half over!), it's beautiful. Here in Kansas the average temperature in May is 50. That doesn't mean somewhere between 40 and 60. It's more like an average between  zero and 100! Part of the price we pay to live in some of the prettiest grass lands in the US, or that's what I tell myself when I'm sitting here sweating because I refuse to turn the AC on until July. I still like the sound of screen doors slamming and the birds and wind outside too much, to cut myself off from it.

Our Mockingbird is back too. It sits in the top of the Catalpa tree just outside my bedroom window, singing it's heart out. I start and end my day listening to it sing like a Robin, a Cardinal, a Finch. Who knows what the Mockingbird's real song is? It's so busy singing the chorus to all the other birds, it doesn't really matter. It sings before the sun comes up and after it sets too. Hearing all of the daytime songs at night is another piece of the magic of Summer.

We're working on a new beginning here too. I've never adopted a mostly adult dog before. There are so many unexpected things to work on. Mrs. Miniver is settling in here very nicely, but she is a bit needy too. She was at the Humane Society for six weeks before I found her and put my application in to adopt her. And who knows how long she was on her own, looking for her person and trying to understand what happened to them. She knows she's been saved (although the Humane Society here has a no kill policy) . There were all kinds of small and medium sized dogs flying out of there, but she and most of the other larger dogs were languishing in the cement kennels, waiting.

When we came home, it was obvious that she'd never seen a staircase! She stood at the top of it, looking down at me, with a puzzled look on her face. It took her a good ten minutes or so to come down to me. She's only just started to express herself too. This morning was really the first time she offered to play with me, getting down on her front feet and putting her wagging tail in the air. We're going to have to work through some of her unknown issues as they present themselves. No worries! We'll be in the "now" and deal with them as they come to the surface.

[ "Let me hold that for you John."]

We've had to go back several steps with the horses too. They're more aware of her as a potential predator, so we set up the temporary fence we use when the horses go OUTSIDE (out side the fence to graze) and went back to ground work one at a time. I worked with Mini while John played with Apache and, then, vice versa with me playing with Lucky while he worked with Mini.

It was a bit more intense when I was with Lucky. She came bounding out, barking at Lucky, ready to "save" me. It was a good opportunity for me to do some Approach and Retreat with Lucky and Mini. He was a bit nervous at first and then he lost interest in Mini and paid attention to me. That was a real breakthrough for us too. It was so exciting, that he didn't want to put his head down much at all. Between me keeping him occupied and giving him pauses "between the notes" and John working with Mini to teach her to be polite, it was a very interesting session. I have to admit I really enjoyed the challenge of it too!

Lucky's energy came up and we were able to do some lovely Traveling Circles, Figure Eights and Falling Leaf patterns. He definitely still had his eye on her, but was looking to me to be the leader. I love it when all the arrows in my quiver, all the bits of information I've learned, come together and we're able to deal with an entirely new game plan. One step closer to my goals!

It's going to be a fantastic Summer. But I'm not going to think about that. I'm going back to the Dream Time, back to being here and now and breathing in an out. Our herd and our pack with adjust over the next week and then, who knows where we'll go!

I am, ever yours, Nancy ... in the beginning again and loving it!

MRS. MINIVER COMES TO THE DREAM TIME

When I was a kid, we didn't have a television. My Mom wanted us to be readers and thinkers. (Just between you and me, she was right! TV really does suck the brains right out of your head.) Of course, I thought I was the most deprived little girl on the face of the Earth. On every other house in the neighborhood, there was a TV aerial. If you walked to the top of our block, set on a hill, and turned to look back down the street, it was a forest of aerials one bigger than the other. Except for our house. We lived in the "open meadow", the place where there was no forest.

One of my favorite things to do was to play in the water hose on a hot Saturday afternoon, then go inside one of my friend's houses for cookies and one of those little six ounce cokes in an ice cold bottle. We'd sit down in front of the fan (no one had air conditioning...oh, the horror!) and watch a Saturday afternoon movie on channel 4.

The movies were, every single one, from the thirties and forties. One of my favorites was a movie made right in the thick of things, 1943 I think, titled "Mrs. Miniver" starring Greer Garson. She was beautiful, elegant, brave and the perfect Mother. I always thought of her as the eye in the center of the storm, where the sky clears and the colors are brighter. Since there were only so many movies formatted for TV, it was on fairly often. I loved all the characters, especially the train conductor who named his prize rose after her...the Mrs. Miniver. And when her son would fly over their house and cut the engines so she would know he was safe, I always cried. I wanted to be just like Mrs. Miniver when I grew up!

I never did achieve my goal of being like Mrs. Miniver. I was like most of the Mom's I know...disorganized, worried, tired, proud, happy and worried one more time. Most of the time I wore blue jeans smeared in paint and my hair in a braid or a barret. But I did make a heck of a chocolate chip cookie and I know I loved my sons WAY more than any fictional character ever could have. I never gave up on the idea of Mrs. Miniver though. Today, I came close to achieving my goal by bringing her home to live with us!

That's Mrs. Miniver in the front seat of my truck and Joe (Crazy Joe Cocker) in the back seat. We adopted Mrs. Miniver from the Humane Society in Lawrence. We couldn't really afford to adopt the horse that I wanted so we brought home a 1/2 St. Bernard and a 1/2 Golden Retriever. She's big enough we ALMOST have our "horse"! (And after the healthy deposits she left out in the yard today, it's probably a good thing we already have a poop rake too!)

I met her a week ago. I woke up after having a dream about Gypsy, early on Saturday morning. In the dream Gypsy and my Golden Retriever Lightfoot walked into the bedroom and up to my side of the bed. Both of them stood there next to each other, tails wagging back and forth in unison. They rested theirs heads next to my pillow and smiled at me, waiting for me to pet them. I reached out and rubbed them, one at a time, in their favorite itchy places while they licked me in the face. I can even remember the smell of their breath on me. When I woke up I was crying and laughing. It was like I'd been told it was time. There was someone waiting for me. All I had to do was go find her and bring her home. That was the day I spent more than five hours, meeting one dog after another at the Humane Society.

I was completely impressed with how clean and well run the Humane Society is in Lawrence. If I were someone doing a consumers review, I would give them a 10 out of 10 rating. They were very patient, kind and willing to show me around. The whole place was spit spot and ship shape. It's surrounded by all of these big, fenced in yards for people to take the dogs to so they can be off lead and run around. And there has to be someone who does nothing but clean up the grounds too. No poop anywhere. Blew me away! Everyone there was very nice, very professional and obviously devoted to finding homes for all of the dogs and cats housed there. I was so impressed with the way the place is run that I'm going back for volunteer training. I'd like to be one of the walkers and/or holders (for the cats). If you're looking for a dog to add to your household, I cannot say enough good things about the way the Humane Society in Lawrence is being managed. And there are all kinds of dogs and cats there too. It's definitely worth the time to go out there and look around!

Mini (I know. Can you believe I'm calling the largest dog I've ever had Mini! I crack myself up!) was the last dog I took out. We'd walked into the second building and back into the kennel area where nearly every kennel was full. The noise was deafening! There were big dogs, little dogs, young dogs, old dogs and nearly every single one of them was barking for attention...except for Mrs. Miniver. She was sitting at the front of her kennel, tail wagging and a smile on her face. When I leaned down to look at her (didn't have to go too far to do that either), she very politely held her paw up, cocked her head to the side and said "I think we should meet!" Not a bark out of her, not once during all the times I went back to see her last week and not since we've come home.

The young woman helping me took the leash and hooked it onto Mrs. Miniver's collar (her name there at the Humane Society was Olive) and out we walked, into the fresh air and sunshine, across the parking lot with cars coming and going, dogs and people everywhere, doors slamming, engines starting, people talking and laughing and not once did she pull on the lead, try to go ahead of us, barge into anyone's space or bark. When we got to the large fenced yard, I asked how long it had been since she was outside. J said that she hadn't been out since she was brought in more than five weeks ago! I thought "Uh oh. This dog is going to come out of her skin with excitement when we take her off lead."

Nope. Never happened. She was just as polite and calm outside as she was inside. She wanted to stay with us too. And then it happened. She choose me over J, came to me and sat on my foot, leaning into my leg and rested her head there with a sigh. As far as she was concerned, she was home. Every dog I've ever taken home with me has done just that...leaned on me and sat on my foot.

But none of them has ever rested her head on me like that. It wasn't her begging for attention. It was her saying " I choose you. I'm ready to go home now." And that was that.

I went back to see her several times this week while all of the processes were finalized so we could take her home with us. There she was, every time, waiting at the door to her kennel with her tail wagging and her paw lifted, head cocked to the side with a smile on her face. And when we went in to pick her up this afternoon, it was the same again. She knew where she was going and was ready.

We took Joe in with us for a dog meet first. But that was as easy as everything else. They smelled all the things dogs smell to identify each other, jumped into the truck and off we went towards home. It was like they knew each other... like we'd gone on rides together for years! Some things defy explanation, and this was one of those times.

When she met Newman, she was very gentle. He was interested but, even in his final days and as frail as he is, still aloof as is his wild nature. The horses were interesting, but their poop was the star attraction. Willow took one look at her, the first time she's looked a dog directly in the eye since they're nearly the same height, and pretty much made it clear " My side of the fence is mine. No dogs in my paddock. We'll be just fine as long as you remember that." Mini looked at me for conformation of that, so I let her know that I had agreed to Willow's territorial rights long ago.

Lucky and Apache were amazed by her and their reactions were exactly the way I thought they would be. Mini leaned on me, uninterested in touching noses with horses. Lucky hid behind Apache, ready to let him get hurt first if Mini turned out to be related to a Saber Tooth Tiger. And Apache leaned way over the gate, trying to put his nose on Mini. Classic!

Our first day home is done now. Joe is asleep on the floor to one side of the desk, Newman is under the work table and Mini is laying here with her head resting on my feet. The room is redolent with the smells that dogs make in their sleep. I'm sure I don't remember any scenes like that in "Mrs. Miniver", but it's as close a second as I'm ever going to come to.

My sons both called me today, and they sent the perfect gifts too...rich, gooey chocolates and a gift certificate for LL Beans, my favorite place to buy my work clothes. The weather has been windy and warm, the frogs are singing and the stars are out. It just doesn't get any better than that!

My dog is home, here with us in OZ, living in the dream time.

I am ever yours, Nancy, smiling at you REALLY big time!

SMOCKED APRONS, FAILED VIDEOS AND SPRING CLEANING...

Not so many years ago, at least in Geological terms, Spring was the time for the Grandmothers, Mothers and Aunts to get together for the annual SPRING CLEANING. It was always said in Capital letters too... "SPRING CLEANING", with a kind of an echo behind it and maybe some movie music to bring attention to the fact that all of our houses were appallingly dirty and disorganized. (NOT! Houses were always cleaned every Saturday without fail. All dust, grit and untidiness was AGAINST THE LAW!) Naturally, being the only Niece, Granddaughter and Daughter, I was expected to not only participate, but to remember everything they taught me so I could pass it along to the generations to come. This was their idea, not mine. It was "IMPORTANT!" and I was the Last Historian, there to learn and bare witness to the Sprint time rights and rituals.

We each had our own tools of the "trade", ie. aprons with big pockets, dust clothes made from old PJ's and outgrown work shirts, brooms (I had my very own corn broom that had a shortened handle, my Grandpa had made for me), wax pastes and buckets. We didn't use store bought cleaners. My Mom was a chemist and knew the potential for contamination to the stuff being sold on the shelves of the local grocery stores. Instead, we used vinegar and hot water, baking soda and salt, real paste wax and lots of old fashioned blood, sweat and tears (mostly on my part).

They/we would descend on each house as a group. All males were ushered out the doors with little pats and "There...there." 's. Oh, how I hated my brothers and the other male cousins. I loathed them all with great passion! I wanted to be dispatched too, out the doors and into the freedom of baseball diamonds, hotdogs, hikes and bicycle rides. I wanted to be out there with them, riding on the bench seat of my Grandpa's truck, climbing trees, sliding into base, fishing...anything but trussed up in an apron with a broom and a dust rag in my hands. It was shear torture for me!

They'd laugh and gossip, spend time on me since I was so "cute!" in my new little apron that Nana had made for me, with cross stitching and French smocking on the bodice, no less! They taught me to start in one corner, take everything...EVERYTHING...out and scrub the floor boards, throw away the old and cracked things, polish the china and silver and even the gol-dern light bulbs! AAAaaack! There was no escape. This was all for "my own good" . I was going to learn how to be "the very best wife there is!" And I would do everything I could think of to get out of it. It was going to be days of serious cleaning, the old farm wife, Navy Nurse, Chemist way...spit spot and ship shape.

I would come down with mysterious ailments, easily dismissed by the "Terrible Four" (my nick name for them when it was Spring). They were all way ahead of me when it came to faked illnesses. Then I would, all of a sudden and for no reason at all, sprain my ankle. Nope. Didn't work. An aspirin and a bandage, expertly placed by my Nana, former Navy Officer and Head Nurse at Bethesda. I pleaded homework! I was that desperate. "But Mom, I have to write a story for school!" It was Easter Break (what they called Spring Break then) and there was a week ahead of us. She had me tell her the story while we worked! I COULDN'T GET AWAY WITH ANYTHING! Oh, the horror...the horror! All I wanted to do was go outside with my dog and get dirty, maybe fall down and skin my elbows...anything but clean four houses in a row.

Just between you and me, I would give anything to be "tortured" like that again. I loved those women, even when I was being taught to "be the best wife ever." I miss the noise and laughter, the gossip between the four of them as they caught up on what they'd all been doing that Winter. I miss the Doris Day music in the background and the fact that I was safe. Nothing was getting pass the "Terrible Four" when I was with them.

I also came away with a list of things I was never going to do again...like gossip. I really don't care for it. I'm never comfortable when I'm with a group of women and I listen to them talk about someone who isn't there. It invariably devolves into meanness. I was also never going to clean the baseboards behind the china cabinet again either. Sorry. It's just going to have to be dusty. The dust bunnies can have the wee, tiny dark spaces until I'm ready to paint or to rehang art. And the only time I wear an apron now is in the studio. John says it's taken on a life and personality of it's own, it's so old and crusted with paint. No French smocking on the bodice either.

Instead, that need for order in the Spring has come out in my barn and in my gardens. The cob webs and old wasps nests are all knocked down, the tack and brushes cleaned and oiled, the tools all arranged on the shelves and peg boards, much to my husband's consternation! The gardens are all dressed with new compost and new seeds tamped into the soil and nursed along until I see tiny green sprigs coming up. My hands and knees are dirty and I'm outside, where I belong!

And this year we planted an apple tree too, over Gypsy's heart. And there's another one in reserve for Newman, held at the Green House for us. It's been a year of change for me. That's the only excuse I have for neglecting my BLOG. Sometimes going with the flow and accepting the way the tide rolls in takes me to a place where communication, even one as much fun as this one is, just has to wait.

But there's one thing I haven't stopped doing, and that's playing with my horses. If the wind is blowing us sideways or it isn't hailing on us, we play! It fills me up, these games we play. Lucky loves it too. Some days are better than others, grace wise, but we always laugh.

Lately I've been adding in an occasional Walk About. We go where Lucky suggests we go, although there's still an occasional Driving from Zone 5 game, or a Sideways up the driveway game or Traveling Circles to get there. He really gets into the game too, taking us to the neighbor's house or around the pond, over the berm and up into the far meadows where the grass is already 18 inches tall. We always have to stop and roll there! And, sometimes, we just stand and cock a leg, watching the sky together. He's always so soft when we do something quieter, with less pressure to learn something new.

Well... I tried to delete a failed video upload and it won't come off the page. Sorry about that. Nancy, techless wonder here.

I was trying to do a "Spring Cleaning" on the BLOG too, but that didn't work. Sure was easier when all I had to deal with was a smocked apron and Doris Day! This will either publish with a blank in the center or two videos that don't play.     ... sigh ...   No worries. The sun is out and it's time for afternoon barn chores and Playtime! Horses don't care about failed video uploads. Lucky will ground me in the real reality! Doesn't get any better than that!

More later Gaiters!    Nancy, laughing at the way things unexpectedly go!