Three, An Odd Number

Three, Such An Odd Number, Makes Agreement Difficult

Copyright, 2009, Terry Turner

Three sat on a bench.

In the distance one saw a vision of buffalo dying.

Another saw the deserted, graying remains of a shattered farm.

One saw the railroad tracks smoothly flowing from destiny to destiny; an endless chain from east to west, that which greets the sun while it awaits the certainty of sunset.


Three Soldiers sat at lunch, at mess some say.

The new recruit saw a handful of friends and lots of strangers.

The Sarge saw a couple of hundred of half trained civilians.

The cook, ah the cook, saw mouths, hundreds of mouths and thousands of teeth which described the perimeter of his world.


Three friends sat at a small dining table.

He saw a week of swallowed independence, a week of hard labor, if only mental.

She saw music lessons, meatloaf, dental work, and shoes.

The other saw a lower middle income paycheck on the dining table. Utilities and necessities ever describe the cage. And, by the way, who sold the rights to utilities?


At Christmas, they shared a table.

One saw a fount of cooking wisdom, a person who could teach the secrets of pecan pie; one who knew how to make real homemade stew.

One saw an Indian woman, Shaman-like, filled with the ancient healing lore of herbs.

The other saw a wrinkled old woman, baked by the sun, and near the end of her journey.


A family and a friend sat on the couch. Sad.

She saw the loss of her endless afternoons of freedom.

He saw debt stretching far into the future.

The friend saw an ordinary, beautiful baby, perhaps a future lady President.


We three sat together.

She thought of it as a bulky obstruction to her decor.

He knew it helped block personal conversation.

I thought of the television as a mind eating monster.


We all get to chose the pipe we want to look through. Pipes are just like binoculars. Choice defines our opinion. Chose your binoculars well.

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Addendum April 2: Shortly after writing the Three blog, I had a nice note from Marty Kleva who said she loved Three. I happen to know that Marty teaches an 8-week Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction course and she tells me that by the 8th meeting everyone is pretty comfortable with the place they have chosen as “theirs” to sit — during this class she has everyone find a 'new' and different place to sit — then they can reflect and relate how the two views are different. She was kind enough to say this particular blog “…is so right on about perspectives — and will save it to use during that 8th class the next time I teach the course :-) ..”

Please allow me to suggest that you visit this link "mindfulness-hero's journey-individuation" that describes Marty’s 8-week course — or contact her directly at mkleva@gemfireair.com Also, there is some really fantastic photography on the http://www.gemfireair.com/ site.
Marty also presents the course with private clients by phone.

Solar Event Takes Down Communications in Britain, 1859

Are you ready for the unexpected emergency?

Copyright, 2009, Terry Turner

The worst thing I can think of in the zone of personal responsibility is to fail to make preparations that you fully realize were strongly indicated and yet did not make preparations. It is even worse when you know you had all or part of the resources to make the preparations. In plain English, I have of late been urging friends and family to make, improve, or extend their preparations for emergencies of any type. These days the sources of emergencies seem to be multiplying. The problem is that few of us are ready for the most elementary disturbance in our life style.


We can expect possible disruptions of every description from the sources we generally think of as terrorists. We tend to think of foreign terrorists but, alas, we have various kinds of home grown terrorists as well.


Those of us who are mature can attest to global climate change (I certainly do not endorse the generally publicized ideas of global warming) but those of us who lived in the days of golden near perfect weather can now see changes that we knew were coming when we began to recede from the golden era of weather.... we are out of that wonderful zone and time frame and weather issues are on the rise to include tornadoes, cyclones, winds, flood, ice, drought, heat, and extensive "irregularity" in weather patters. Any notable local or national variation in these conditions could shut down a city or state, or even the nation, easily, and at least for a few days.

Bigger events, such a earthquakes and tsunamis can not be ignored. There are active volcano's bubbling away in several places including Alaska. Check the Internet for quake maps, you might be surprised at the number of smokers out there.

Civil unrest is disturbing to contemplate, but who can deny an angry mood running the country, a mood that can be tapped and directed like a blow torch or, perhaps worse, simply ignites and cannot be directed. Wide spread civil unrest could certainly keep you from your corner grocer, might cut off things like power and water, and cause other disturbances.

The there is the rising issue of solar flares. They have been a problem in the past and certainly are going to be a problem in the visible future. Solar flares can knock out electric transmission, cell phones, radio, television, and monitoring systems that could immediately disrupt water, transportation, sewage, and other delivery and processing systems. Think about where you live and how it would be without traffic lights, without cell phones, refrigeration and, for example, air conditioning.

Today the former minister Graham Stringer, Labor Party, said that Brits ought to take steps to get ready for a repetition of the solar storm of 1859. When that solar storm hit Earth it paralyzed much of the telegraph system throughout the world. Stringer urged the government to make plans to deal with a powerful solar flares that might disrupt the National (Electric) Grid in England. He noted that such a disturbance in the electric distribution would create severe water and food shortages. He motion in Commons stated ... such an event could now 'knock out the National Grid, which would lead to a loss of water supply, transport and food and therefore create a national emergency."

The potential for disruptions is almost endless. Power issues, local or national, can limit your access to cash disbursement machines, shut down the use of credit cards, and so forth. The time to be make ready for such disturbances is now.

One problem which we all face is that Americans expect things to work all the time. We expect the gas pump to fill us up, we expect the credit card processor to work, we are sure the cash disbursing teller machine will be full of loot; we expect the artificially flavored semi-poisonous high fructose corn syrup yogurt to be on the shelf --- good for us or not. And, thank God, in this country, all things have generally been constantly accesible to us.

But, remember, please, it only takes a small hiccup these days to disrupt things... due to the lack of diversity whole crops, world wide, can be wiped out in the blink of an eye. Delivery systems could be shut down by communication problems, by earthquake, by storm, by fuel and many other issues. It can't hurt to be prepared.

There are many resources on the Internet that discuss how to prepare for emergencies. The following link is an excellent place to begin:

http://www.hmscrown.com/life_tools/emergency_be_prepared.html

One of my favorite things for my emergency kit is heavy duty carpet or upholstery thread and large needles, both straight and curved. You can repair many things, like tennies, backpacks, coats, suspenders, tents, etc., with strong thread and a good needle. I find a fly fishing vest is a great resource to organize and keep such small items ready for my "go bag."

Be prepared for yourself and for your family and friends. You'll feel better knowing you are ready.

Photo credit: The Rainbow over Taos is my own, it appears in the fine art gallery here:
http://www.hmscrown.com/fine_art/HMS_Gallery/Taos_Rainbow.html
It is the best rainbow shot of my amateur career taken with a throw away digital which was given to me by my niece, Linda Jo Reeves, circa 2001.

Taos Spring

Terry Turner, Copyright 2009

Today is beautiful; the clouds are lurking well below the horizon, off in the direction of Canada, and leave only a pure, deep blue sky as backdrop for the two hundred year old cottonwoods and the towering willows that are very yellow this time of year.

We were having snow skiffs just days ago as it is still, barely, winter here. Only a few trees are beginning to leaf out but the hundred foot green spruce are a welcome spot of green against the brilliant blue.

Black, black, huge crows bark from the tree tops, arguing away. One rough old crow asserts "... it's tomorrow!"

A senior crow rebuffs "... it's yesterday!"

And so they quarrel all day.

Of course all crows know it is today, not yesterday, nor tomorrow. The crow’s muttering of tomorrow and of yesterday are mere reminders to be here now.

Their loud arguments are only meant to distract humans from the more serious crow discussions that are conducted further up the mountain around the Sacred Blue Lake.

Cheery robins and great black and white penguin-like magpies take no truck in such discussions because they are relentlessly stalking the perfect twig for their spring nests --- and their discerning mates will accept nothing less than the perfect twig.

Old crow, reminds me, “Governments, nations, and people of importance come and go. The Sacred Blue Lake is eternally tranquil and invisibly reflecting the blue sky invisibly reflecting its own blue waters.

Governments, nations, and people of importance come and go. The Sacred Blue Lake is forever.

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Dreaming on the Edge of Santa Elena Canyon

Circa 1976



Copyright Terry Turner 2009


We were driving across the vast levelness of western Texas headed for the Big Bend mountains and the Rio Grande. My passengers, some engineers looking for fun, and me, a white guide, late to the game, at the age of 37. Loaded with rafts, canoes, and a C2, we were equipped well enough for the river which is calm enough. And it only surprises one, if unsuspected rains come roaring down the canyons and at such times, be wary, hell is rising.

The black night stretched endlessly across the dreamless desert. Though our searching eyes saw nothing, we sensed, we knew the endless flatness of the land --- a long level flatness racing toward a rupture of mountains.

Hours passed. Conversation faltered, then ceased. Finally, out of the darkness, pink and white appeared in the distant eastern sky. Gray fingers of light began creeping silently through the desert. The gray light slowly revealed the stubbled face of the desert floor punctured here there with looming prickly cactus and carelessly strewn boulders.

The gray green of the brush was just becoming distinct from the pale gray morning when the sun, in single blinding flash, leapt over the horizon and stood, angry and red. A blazing Martian god, daring the desert to move or lift its head. Instant by instant the fiery fury rose higher and higher to loose its full burning power on the prostate August desert. Its roaring heat turned the clouds into a glowing furnace from horizon to horizon.

The submissive desert lay quiet, knowing it must feign death to survive yet anther day of scrutiny by the angry red eye. The humiliation of the vast desert and the steady rise of the omnipotent sun notarized our finite existence more surely than death and with much less mystery.

I took great joy in the visual feast of the approaches to the Big Bend of Texas despite the stark and almost lifeless plain which we crossed. We were a mere dot inching across millenniums of erosion for the plain which we crossed had once been soaring mountains, now by time, reduced to a dusty desert.

I was not pleased to note that vultures came with the sun and took both an early and abnormal interest in our arrival.

We were still hours from the river and a full day and night from the roaring hell of the rock slide in Santa Elena canyon. I had driven most of the night, so I turned the wheel over, and made myself comfortable on a raft packed in the back of the van., and drifted off to sleep.

But sleep is not my favorite occupation. It’s the dreams --- the people and the things in the dreams--- dreams do not leave me refreshed. I went quickly into a restless sleep and immediately a dream arose. A shape, a darkling shape, spoke to me. "Friend, friend, " it said in a quiet voice, "friend, turn not way. Neither seal your lips, nor close your eyes for I have seen you as you really are. I saw you long ago, a perfect soul then, long before the dark night of this new time."

"I saw you long ago in these mountains. I saw you under the shadowed warmth of a cloudy sky where we stood in the mouth of an ancient cave. I saw reason sparkle in your speechless mind. It was long, long sun years ago." Then he, or it, sighed, and said, " Ah, how true speech would have been could we have spoken then."

Ah, to sleep without dreaming.

Ah, to sleep.

Ah, sleep.

Sleep.

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Be prepared for emergencies
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Addendum: The river, running through Santa Elena Canyon is usually a trickle but, if heavy rains occur up river, it is ranging torrent, class VI or ???. The roar alone is terrifying. If you have not been on the river at flood stage in Santa Elena you have not seen water

How Not to Invest in King Cotton

Copyright Terry Turner

Originally this was part of a letter to my family regarding the financial crisis of 2008-2009 that, for the record, I feel is a moral and ethical and societal crisis masquerading as a financial crisis.

We are now threatened by another depression, mainly due to the loss of our factories and many outsourced jobs culminating in the recent crisis. No matter what you may think, the ability to create something real is the key to wealth whether it is a steel widget or a line of code, the real tangible things are what can be translated to wealth; slicing and dicing financial instruments and setting up indices for gambling purposes may enrich a few folks here and there but for every person enriched someone must lose. Such dealing does not enrich the country or the average citizens of the country in the same way that good nut and bolt manufacturer would.

The Great Depression had receded in some parts of the United States but the depression of the thirties lingered for years in many parts of the southwest United States. It was very much a reality for my family at the time of this story, which it seems to me, was about 1942 or 1943. All of the family members are now deceased, except me, so factual confirmation of the date is beyond my reach.

Cotton was one form of real wealth at the time of these events; but King Cotton was in trouble even though the feared and hoped for mechanical pickers were only about ten years down the road, the synthetic monster was conceived and about to rise up.

Joe Turner, my father, really my grandfather but that is a different story, faced with a series of losses spanning the Great Depression and afterwards was considering investing in a picked cotton field in order to leverage the family out of indentured servitude.

Dad told mom, Annie Turner, that he wanted to sell their remaining furniture, beds, kitchen, and all in order to raise money to purchase the "leavings" of a large cotton field that had already been picked (or pulled).

Dad felt there was enough scrap cotton in that field that, when gathered by the family, would net the family enough cash to get them out of the cotton fields where the Great Depression had landed them. Our particular tribe, at that time, consisted of Mom, Dad, Dot, and Ollie and, of course, me. Our brother, Buddy, the oldest boy, was in far off Egypt fighting Nazis. So with four and a half pickers we could cover a lot of territory quickly. Mom had made me a small cotton sack which I could drag along. My particular job, as the smallest, and certainly the youngest, was to be the “digger” I would gather cotton that had fallen on the ground---every visible particle. I remember it was a huge field. I was standing in the back of a wagon when Dad showed it to me and it ran on forever, stretching to the horizon in all directions, at least so it looked to me.

Annie agreed to risk it. They sold everything except one of Mom’s trusty iron frying pans and one heavy bean pot with a good lid---these two instruments became the sole source of our family treasure for a long, long time. I remember Mom talking about the loss she felt watching the mattresses and kitchen table go out the door and knowing that we would soon be vagabonds camped under a tree and she would be trying to cook on her knees by a smoldering camp fire.

Our entire household goods inventory could not have been much --- remember we are not talking about Emperor Jahan’s Taj Mahal, nor even a small palace. The household goods, if I can recall them, consisted of a very small iron wood burning stove and its hardware, a kerosene fired cook stove on tall legs; two iron bedsteads --- we got to keep our sleeping pallets, a small kitchen table with four or five chairs with rope bottoms, I think I recall Mom’s another chest or table of sorts, and three or four odd chairs---nothing upholstered by any stretch of the imagination. A few pots and pans, and two or three lamps of the kerosene variety that had a sort of pie plate reflecting apparatus attached, and a radio that had a rather large battery. Our “goods” were rounded out by a large iron pot for hog boiling and washing clothes; two or three large washtubs. We had no bathroom, of course. There was a traditional tree stump outside the door with a large enamel wash basin on it and, not far off, the traditional privy of the era. Winter and summer we washed up al fresco and, in the winter that fresco was pretty chilly. There was no icebox, no freezer, no television or anything of an electric nature… all those electric wonders and things like cars, for our family, were still years away from the cotton fields of West Texas. In those fields poverty was king, and the “colors” of his kingdom were not white, black, or brown. The color line was very clear and determined by who pulled boles and who picked the cotton and who did not pull or pick. No black child was any blacker than I at the time.

I could sense that we were hopeful and fearful; hopeful for better times and places but certainly fearful of losing our roof and four walls. To my young mind the idea of moving under a tree seemed worrisome to say the least. And, on deeper level I could sense the fear, apprehension, and unknown concerns that could be felt but that were not expressed by the rest of the family. The furniture sold, in my memory, as a single lot to a fellow with a wagon. We helped him load the wagon and our home, barely filling his wagon, trundled away westward bound, around sunset.

Dad handed over the cash price to the owner and, for a brief time, a month or so, owned all rights to the scrap cotton in that particular field. I think the field belonged to Mr. Rice and I think it was near Goree or Munday, Texas. Wherever located, it was a long way from anywhere. I do recall there was a large boulder near the little shack we lived in. I suppose it was too big to blast away. I used to climb up on it and, stretching to stand as tall as I could to see as far as possible, I saw nothing at all in any direction except the endless cotton fields that flowed away in all directions.

That evening, carrying our few possessions, we moved under a tree on the edge of the cotton field which we were going to glean the next day. Mom made red beans and cornbread over the campfire, and we went to "bed" lying on some of the quilts that she had insisted on keeping. You can guess we were plagued by apprehensive feelings

Not long after our supper, a huge storm suddenly blew in with high winds and driving hail. When dawn came, Mom and Dad peered across the vast field of cotton, the black leafless stalks marching toward the bleak horizon. Gazing across that vast expanse, they saw not one speck of white cotton. The storm, possibly a tornado, though it would have late in the year for tornados, had simply sucked up virtually all of the remaining scrap cotton and whirled it away. The despair was palpable.

Cold, wet, hungry, and totally without assets, you can believe that our little family felt very much like Job. No money, no home, no food, and nothing to hold onto except personal grit and one's belief in God.

Mom and Dad decided they would have to go different ways to hammer their way out of the situation. Dad, borrowed some money, I think a dollar or two, from Mr. Rice to "finance" the trip to Mom’s father, Charlie Whitsitt. After herding our little tribe over a period of several days to the Whitsitt family place in Oakland, near Shannon, Texas where at least there was some shelter and a caring family, Dad would set his sights on Fort Worth and its more hopeful economic atmosphere.

These days one can hardly imagine walking a hundred miles with three kids to feed ----remembering as well there were no convenience stores, no bathrooms, no where to rest, no hotels, no motels in the usual sense. just the bleak distance and miles to go and no visible help for mile after mile. Of course many people have walked much further and under worse circumstances. I remember none of this except what Mom drilled in my head later. As to memory, I am reconstructing this to the best of my ability, but I may be mixing and matching events; I can only assure you that this tale is just a typical tale of the times. I know that it was a long, long walk. I am sure it was more than a hundred miles from Munday to Jacksboro which was still several miles from Charlie Whitsitt’s place in Oakland, near Squaw Mountain.

Dad got us situated at Charlie Whitsitt’s, then walked on to Fort Worth where he somehow became a boxer and took enough beatings to earn some money before rejoining Mom. I do recall Dad telling me that he had quit boxing after seeing Joe Louis hit someone. I do not know if he actually saw Louis not. I can’t be sure if Louis was ever in Fort Worth or Dallas or fought there. I know Louis was with the military about that time and in Europe part of that time. I do recall that Dad was happy to quote Louis’ comment that “We’ll win because we are on God’s side” Louis also was widely quoted for saying "Lots of things wrong with America, but Hitler ain't going to fix them." I do know that something connected with Joe Louis put an end to Dad’s boxing career.

Sometime after Fort Worth, Dad worked in an ice house (they produced ice which, mainly was delivered by wagon to family iceboxes). Dad was able to get cheap strawberries at the ice house. Mom joked, later, that he fed her and the family on strawberries at one time for days on end and, for that reason, she has since always hated strawberries. The strawberries, as I recall, preceded Dad going to work in Wichita Falls for the old Fort Worth and Denver railroad. He became a fireman (stoking the boiler on the engine. He later was killed in a railroad accident during the course of which he saved the lives of some fellow employees by shoving them into the water tank while they and the entire train were engulfed in flames from a Phillips 66 gasoline transport. Dad and the truck driver were killed.

The only point to this story is that we are all survived disaster after disaster. Annie and Joe Turner’s genes and the genes of countless similar survivors are still in motion in you and in me and in all the similar children of such similarly hard pressed folks. We are also tough, we are also survivors. And we will all do what our fathers and mothers did before us. We will just suck it up, shave, and go to work. Get over it, get through it.

I think it worth mentioning something that Charlie Whitsitt, Mom's dad, told me when we were talking about chopping down trees. He was well known for being very handy with axes (there are many kinds and they all have a special purpose). We were talking about cutting down the iron-hard Bois D' Arc which is good post material. I was trying to help him chop trees for a fencing project. I had simply failed to make a dent in the tree assigned to me. Charlie was determined to enable me to use the axe effectively, an essential art of the day. He said, "…There's not much to it. Just keep your iron sharp. Strike that tree like you are going to cut it down with one blow. Then just keep hitting it. Keep hitting the same place. It will sure fall down. No tree is harder than the iron in your hand...”

And it wasn’t; I eventually knocked it and a good many others down.

None of us can escape the trials and misfortunes of our personal times or the generational issues that plague the times in which we live --- whether we are the sharecroppers or the Mr. Rices of the world, we all have our hands to play and the pain of one part may be greater than the pain of another part, but we all have a price to pay. Experience assures me that God equips us for the challenges we face and, as practitioners of our faith, we have nothing to fear.

What is the way out; what is the way through? Stick with your prayers, meditate, and stay as positive as you can --- this crisis will pass and life will normalize in some fashion even if you have to walk to Cow Town.

The real problem, it seems, these days, is that while we can survive and get through, at what will we arrive when we “get through?” Lately, our House of Representatives and our Senate are filled, with few exceptions, by a species of uncrowned kings, air head czars, and panjandrums by default, and self perpetuating elite that feel entitled to steal from the public trough. The American Republic is in shreds, what was called a Democracy has propelled itself into a sort of Socialist-Communist tag team and while an immoral Washington DC parties on, whoring on the body of Freedom and auctioning off our patrimony to the highest bidder.

As we watch chaos spreading and we see the lamp of freedom burning low, these are sad times, indeed, In the time of our fathers, this sort of thing could not have continued as they would have gotten the attention of the Congress with and pitchforks and singletrees (whiffletrees, for my Northern friends). The difference, I suppose, is that the immoral transactions and vile conduct are hidden from easy public view by looking-good television images which, like a magician’s hands, divert our attention. Now it seems that we look to television to tell us what to think instead of judging things on the bare facts.

One can hope that some morning soon people will begin to ask of Washington D.C., “never mind what you said, what did you actually do?” Then, perhaps, we, like Joe Louis, will be on God’s side.

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Emperor Shah Jahan described his Taj Mahal in these words
Should guilty seek asylum here,Like one pardoned, he becomes free from sin.Should a sinner make his way to this mansion,All his past sins are to be washed away.The sight of this mansion creates sorrowing sighs;And the sun and the moon shed tears from their eyes.In this world this edifice has been made;To display thereby the Creator's glory.
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P.S. Let the record show that Lewis Jernigan, Himself, roaming the Red River Valley amongst the remaining Wichita and Kickapoo Indians, viewed the industrial activities associated with picking cotton and pulling boles with great reservation, industrial arts that were, no doubt, beneath the purposes of a future Captain.

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Dandelion Generations

Copyright Terry Turner

Out the window I see a fresh crop of dandelions shaking their fistful of bright yellow swords at the Sky God, but already the first dandelion crop that had advanced to the attack, lived brightly, lived briefly, and then suddenly died. Victims not of winter, not of summer, but victims only of time.

Only A few yesterdays past they sprang forth with all the power of youth but, in ain a few small moments, they grew mature, suddenly aged, and stepped over the edge to again become the raw stuff of the universe. How important they seemed; how important the games seemed; but as they and we draw near to the edge of eternity, how unimportant all seems.

Perhaps we should all have more hot chocolates, give and take more hugs, have more well steeped teas, take longer and more pleasant breakfasts, read more good books, and spend more time in the afternoon sun ---- and pay less and lessattention the fury of social clamor. As old Kahlil Gibran said, "… the movingfinger, having writ, moves on.... "

I shall listen more to the barking crows and less to the recurring and meaningless chatter, cajoling, and threats of presidents, kings, brokers, bankers’ congressmen, and terrorists. God and karma, in good time, will attend totheir just needs. Those time stealing people are always with us; but thecrow is only here today and has only a few words to spare for us ere it isaway to speak with angels and other vapor’d creatures.

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Reflecting on the death of my brother, Gene. He fought for our freedom. Gene survived the Nazis but was killed by Helicobacter Pylori Bacteria. H Pylori infects about one in every two mature adults in the United States.

Taos, New Mexico July 21, 2003
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For your children, for yourself, your family and friends, be prepared for emergencies
http://www.hmscrown.com/life_tools/

A Little Dust in West Texas

Copyright by Terry Turner 2005

The night wind whined around the stark corners of the tiny two room shack perched on the edge of an endless sea of prairie grasses. Coming from the west, the wind carried the sand, a red sand, finer than flour. Dry and powdery, the sand was so fine that the wind could push it through the tiny spaces around the edges of window panes.

The dust was everywhere; sifting through the windows, drifting in little puffs through the damp sheets hung over the shack's two doors. It drifted down from the ceiling rafters, it kept coming in little puffs through the wood burning kitchen stove, it was carried up through the bare wooden floor by little gusts of wind.

I hated the relentless mournful wind for carrying the biting sand and the choking dust. It was, to me, a dusty vampire, smoky red, stalking every living thing in a sun baked, featureless prairie. The prairie, our prairie, our home was a paper dry place where life, nearly sucked dry, had long since been too difficult.

I lay on my rude bed staring out into the impenetrable night. A night made even darker by its burden of dust and sand. My bed, a rude pallet, was made of an old cotton sack stuffed with corn shucks and some cotton gleaned from the picked fields. A piece of ducking, very much like awning cloth, served for a cover when needed in the summer. In the winter a quilt was added and we wore more clothes warmth. The idea of themostats and central heat were a space age away from our prairie place.

I was careful to keep a piece of damp feed sack over my nostrils and mouth. The wet sack was a crude filter of sorts to help keep out the dust out of my mouth and nose.

My mother knew, we all knew, if one breathed in too much dust a few planks would soon be needed to make a burial box. For that reason we all used a damp breathing cloth and the worn sheets draped over the two doors were usually kept damp. The larger cracks in the floor and walls were stuffed with bits of paper or sacking or cotton to help retard the ebb and tide of the dust.

The dust rose through the floor cracks in little huffs and puffs;
it sifted into the ceiling through the gaping spaces between the roof shingles; floated down like a continual fine mist from the open ceiling
rafters; and it blew in around the windows and doors; it migrated like a mist of rain through the very walls that were mostly paperless. On the dining table it built up in little drifts around the base of the salt and pepper shaker, it gathered at every corner in the room, it covered every surface
whether horizontal or vertical..... in no way could the creeping
red plague be avoided.

The rims of our nostrils were outlined by the red dust barely dampened by our own breathing.

Dark circles of red mud marked a patch under every nostril. Red mud grew from each corner of our mouths. Red mud caked at the corners of our eyes.

Our drinking water took on a rose tint and tasted like mud.

The taste of the dust was in all the food.

It was in the coffee.

Our spit was reddish.

Death, disease, and poverty frolicked in the early sunrise. They, being giants could easily see above and beyond the haze.

Small and helpless creatures that we were, we could not see beyond the red haze and morning was only a few visible degrees from night. The darkling sun held no promise as we greeted another dusky red dawn.

Of course, as you might guess, people from the government wanted to tell us how to fix things, what we had done wrong, why we should shoot our cow and such, and, otherwise, to assure us that we deserved to lose whatever little possessions we had.

Fools thought we could know the weather. Fools thought organic farming of no importance. Fools thought government could manage wind, sun, rain, and earth. Fools thought the government would feed, clothe, and protect us.

Not then, friends; not now, friends.

Observe the ancient rules.
Respect the earth.

Preserve water.

Take care.

Care.
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A real bull in Wilbarger County Texas

Pure Bull!

Copyright by Terry Turner

A brief account of a bull I met while in Wilbarger County, Texas.

Yes sir! There's something to admire in purity and, as far as I know, there's a bull, a real bull; a natural, pure bull over in Wilbarger County.

Sure, there are bulls in Jack County and most counties. In fact there is more bull than not in most counties. But this bull, belonging to George Ancell, is an exceptional bull. We all know that a quality bull is hard to come by but, if you have one, his services will be in demand by other ranchers. That's a fact. But friends, have you ever seen a bull that had such a powerful air about him that heifers and cows would tear down a fence to get to him?

I have recently been out in neighboring counties trying to pick up an oil lease or two and, while on the Ancell spread in southeast Wilbarger County, I saw this magnificent bull. Believe it or not, heifers were tearing down a fence to get to that grand old Brahma bull.

The Ancell bull was standing up a knoll, kind of taking the morning sun and sort of minding his own business; he was probably thinking about pork belly prices, the weather, and such. I was thinking about
how to strike a deal when I noticed the heifers on the neighboring spread begin to crowd up along the fence line and they just took to admiring that huge giant of a bull and, now and then, one of them ì
would let out a pretty flirtatious bellow. Well, folks, the first thing I knew, those heifers were tearing that fence plumb down.

Now they weren't violent. They just wallowed that fence down so they could get a mite closer to that Ancell bull. And he, being neighborly and having been given an engraved invitation, so to speak, he just naturally had to go over and demonstrate his social powers which, as I saw were considerable.

Now, as luck would have it, the neighboring rancher who owned these amorous heifers came along and he was plumb upset.

Of course, as the rancher came to the party late, he accused the bull of breaking down the fence and generally sweated up his Stetson. Well, I told him that no such happened and that those cows just took down the fence to get at that Ancell bull.

Then that gentleman questioned my honesty and implied that my powers of observation were deficient. Further, he said that he had built the fence himself and that it was a good fence.

"Well," I said, sort of smart-alecky, " George Ancell had learnt to build fences that were "caballo alto, toro fuerte, and serpente seguro."

And he said, kind of insulting like, "What the hell does that mean?"

And I said, "Well that's how George's Grandfather taught his boys to build a fence and, anyone ought to know, it means "horse high, bull strong, and snake proof" which is the way the Ancell bunch have built their fences for more than a hundred years."

Then, kind of loud like, he shouted, "You can't build no snake proof fences!"

And I said, real quiet like, "I never said I could. I said that was how the Ancell boys built fences."

Hot like, he says, "Nobody can build a snake proof fence!"

There not being any rattlers real close, I said, "Well do you see any snakes around here?"

And he says to me, "What has that got to do with this damn bull mounting my heifers and tearing down my fence."

"Well," I reminded him, kind of soft like, "What I said was that the heifers tore the fence down"

He says, "Do you expect me to believe that?"

So I said, "Do you see any of the fences down on the other parts of this ranch?" And then I said," Mister, I don't know your name, but I have driven all over this place and I have five tires ruined and my own hide full of thorns to prove it and I know the fences are up in all other directions and, further more, as you claim to have built this fence which is not strong enough to keep heifers in, you ought to check with George Ancell on how to build a fence. George knows how it is done."

"Well," he says to me, "You are an insulting cuss if I ever saw one."

And I says back to him, "Well, I never meant to insult you or your ugly heifers for I am a stranger around here and, aside from owning one percent of the sperm that the bull has seen fit to share with your heifers, I have no interest in the matter except to help arrange for you to pay for the noble and registered sperm which you have taken from this ranch without a proper handshake."

I had no ownership in the bull at all but, as I was trying to do business with George, I thought I ought to try to protect his interests and why should a bull do all that work for nothing?

Then he says to me, "I ought to correct your attitude with a cattle prod."

Then, with the beads of sweat fairly popping out of his hat band, he says "Nothing but that elephant of a bull could have knocked down that fence."

And I said, "Well, it's a funny thing to me that I have seen nearly thirty miles of Ancell fences standing up to the bull on one side and herds of cows on the other and none of them are knocked down. So, it seems to me, the problem has got to be with the quality of your fence and the fact that your heifers are not properly serviced on your own ranch; any damn fool can see that."

Well about then he reached behind the seat of his fancy pickup and swung a double barrel shot gun out and laid it across his lap.

About that time a big old blue racer, about seven feet long, came snaking across the broken down fence onto the Ancell ranch and I says, "Now look what you have done! George will have snakes all over his place if you don't get that fence back up."

And he says to me, "Mister, in order that I can ship your body to the proper place, just tell me where you are from and what name do the misfortunates who know you call you?"

Well, from the glint in his eye, I thought that I had gone too far but, not being entirely stupid, I says to him, kind of straightforward like, " Why I am from over to Zacaweista and some folks call me Bucky."

Then quick like he says, "You ain't Bucky"

And quick like I says, "As you have never had the honor of meeting me, how do you know that I am not Bucky?"

He looked at me for a minute and he stepped down and started trying to get the heifers back on his side of the fence and he says quiet like, "Mister, I do not believe you are Bucky, for he is a well knowed gentleman in these parts and a scholar of sorts; and I believe you are neither."

Well, seeing as he was in a bad temper, I left while he attempted to convince his heifers to depart from the company of the bull.

Since then I have received four legal cease and desist orders from some legal outfit representing Bucky of Zacaweista; and a friend told me that George had brother by the name of Tom and that George had offered Tom a thousand dollars if he could find my body at the bottom of a well; and I have made up my mind to try to avoid dealing with people from Wilbarger County for they are nearly as peculiar and troublesome as the folks in my own county.

You folks know, of course, that my real name is Terry Don Turner; and this whole matter is a fiction. It sort of happened when my friends, Howard Bennett and Richard Ford Thompson, and I were drilling an oil well with George Ancell on his historic ranch in Wilbarger County. Don Elliott could have helped us lose a deal of money on the same occasion. but he declined as we had no mustard sandwiches to sweeten the deal for him.

A dry hole in Texas, especially a deep one, will drive you to do, say, and write peculiar things.

Since then, George has had four offers to build twelve thousand miles of ranch fences "caballo alto, toro fuerte, and serpente seguro."

2006. P.S. Obviously some of you kids are too young too know spit about history or Texas. The Ancell ranch adjoined Zacaweista which was the operational headquarters of the W T Waggoner Ranch. The Ancells and the Waggoners used to take turns moving fifty miles of fence line a night in order to take advantage of more grass. They spent a lot of time shooting at each other. I have been in the cellar where old man Ancell, George’s grandfather, holed up while the Waggoner’s were pumping enough 30-30 Winchester lead into the premises to make the whole area sink two feet. These guys, boys and girls, were men; PC had not been invented. And liberalism had not dawned in their day (or mine).

With the advent of genetic engineering few things are real any more, not even beef. Beef tastes more like cardboard than steak these days. I guess it can lay around the refrigerated section without spoiling, maybe for a month or two, but neither time nor red dye will make it a steak. I don't care how many excitotoxins you inject in that mystery meat it will never be the t-bone or sirloin of yore.

2009, P.S. Some of with those memories are nearing the end of our string, and one of these days, folks, one of these days even those who remember will be a memory and the final gates will close on those memories and the fading process will begin as our world passes away.
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Diogee, my old dog, decides to run for Congress

How it was that my dog, Diogee, became a pig!

Copyright by Terry Turner

This story is hard for me to tell. It is complex-like as the actual story is about how my dog, Diogee, come to run for congers. But, of course how I can I tell you that story when you never knowed I had a dog anyhow. That is why I am not sure where to start but I guess this is as good a start as can be got.

As you know some towns are kind political like and filled with traffic traps and goings on that are not quite democrat like. Our little town is like that and in prior times has been knowed to have a murder trail over and a hanging done, a burial finished, and supper served in one day, at least before the gumit wouldn’t allow us to be so quick like. Anyways, here we do what we can and I only mention how quick like justice can be in regard to what happened to me and Diogee. But we were innocent, of course.

Buford's Barbecue and Barbershop
I wisht I had never gone down to Buford's Barbecue and Barbershop for a barbecue sandwich and a hair cut. I never did like the smell of burnt hair so I seldom go down there even though Buford is well knowed for his singed barbecue sandwiches and ribs. But while he was cutting my hair his dish washer, Lamonz, ast him, “What do you want me to do with these turnip scraps?” And Buford sez, “Just throw them out back and Turner's pig will eat them.” Well, I jumped out of my chair and told them I did not have no pig, nor any truck with no pigs and, except for Areta's pigs that are always visiting around, that I seldom even had nothing to do with a pig.

And Buford sez, “Well what is that eating them turnip tops?”And I sez that is my dog, Diogee.; And they all laught at me and said, "That ain't no dog," and went on insulting like. A fellow setting there was reading a hunting magazine and he sez to me look here at this here picture of a a dog knowed as an Irish Setter, and he sez, “Now that is a dog and any fool can see your Diogee don't look like no Irish Setter.”

“Course not,” I sez,. “And, besides, Diogee is from Oklahoma and neither of us has never been to Ireland or even to Arkansas.”

Then another fellow go piped up and he said to me, "That durn dog of yourn is a pig and any way you can tell just by his curled up tail that he is a pig."

Some blood flowed, but it was not violet
Well, I could not have Diogee called a pig. Him being a dog, and all. So I grabbed a hot barbecue sandwich and mashed in his face. It had mustard on it. And Buford he jumped back and grabbed my arm and I swung around and hit smack on his nose. Then unfortunate events followed which caused the air to turn fairly blue and some blood flowed. It was a fair squabble for a time even though it was among friends and not violet like family doings. Nobody got an ear bit off or nothing like that.

When the Sheriff, who was sort of insulting, took me before the Justice Judge. That durn judge, he fined me $10 for public frolic and mayhem and then he said to me that the court declart Diogee was a pig.

Now don't that beat all?

My dog had become a pig, and in just one afternoon.

Here I have had a dog for going on a dozen years and the gumit has declart my dog was a pig. Well I commenced in on him and he said I was a contempt and he was going to lock me up to honor his court and raise the fine which I could not afford on no account. So he said to shut my mouth, which I eventual did, because of the fine and his honor all that. So that is how it come out, all of a sudden, that my dog, Diogee, is a pig.

If I had wanted a durn pig I would have got one from Areta as she is the pig expert instead of the gumit declaring my dog is a pig. At least they did not say he was a horse which would have cost me dreadful more for feed.

I have never trusted the gumit and I believe to that extent I am absolutely right as it seems the gumit cannot tell the difference between hogs and dogs. And anyways that durn Justice never even went outside to look at Diogee. So he ruled against me as you might say from a distance. At least the Sheriff had seen and kicked me and Diogee.

I told Diogee I had no idea how judges could get so much power. He said it was easy and that all you needed to be a powerful judge was an acquaintance with a snake and about a fifty thousand in cash.

Of course, all this happint long after Diogee had developed an interest in my Mother-in-law's grant piano and her solid silver tea service. But these are the things that begun to get Diogee to think about making the run to congers. You know, so he could be right up there with all the other hogs and dogs in Washin DC.

Not the end
This is not the beginning and not the end, but it is how Digoee become a pig.
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