Blog
Doggone Accents…or What’s in a name…
I have always been fascinated with the Deep South and the War between the States. I have read many novels and history books about this period of time. So it wasn’t any mystery why I have loved the movie “Gone With the Wind” with Clark Gable and…
read moreElly, A Gift Horse
We always had horses. There was old Joe when I was very small. My Dad always called them “Hay Burners.” We had a variety when I was growing up. As they say there are a thousand tales and this is just one of them. This gift horse was called Elly. She was an orphan. We got her from the Great Northern Railroad. They used to ship horses, cows, pigs, and sheep by stock cars. Elly was with her mother and apparently the mare died in shipment. The Railroad official gave Elly to my Dad and we bottle fed her as she was still a small foal....
read moreWith Grace and Peace
Some people handle sickness and disease with such grace and peace, it is amazing. Two people come to mind. My own mother who handled TB and osteoporosis so gracefully. The second was my mother-in-law Rosemary C. who had M.S. for years. When I first met her she was still able to do the household chores and the cooking. She had just quit driving as the disease had made her feet numb and she couldn’t feel the brake or the accelerator any more. As the years went by the M.S. progressed and she gradually went down hill. She went from a mother...
read more“Make Do” or “Do Without”
I am a true child of my parents. The were both around 42 years old when I was born. They had lived through the 1930’s, the “Dirty Thirty’s”. They had seen some really tough times so they always “Made Do”, which meant they used things up, didn’t throw things away and were the opposite of wasteful. They watched their money like a hawk and “Did Without”, which meant they didn’t run and buy everything just because their neighbors did. They did not try to keep up with the...
read moreOld Work Horst named Bill
My Dad always made light of his name, he said Bill was a good name for an old Work Horst. Not a horse mind you but a work Horst. If you tried to correct him on the pronunciation he would just ignore you. He said he should have been born with a set of Tugs and a Horse collar on his neck and to fit his image of himself. I am not surprised that he felt that way as his Dad my Grandpa left when Dad was 5 years old and till Grandma married again my Dad felt like he had to be the man of the family. He worked around Gildford doing many odd jobs to...
read moreHard Work Never Hurt
Working when I grew up was just something you did. There was no excessive sitting in the house watching TV or listening to the Radio if there were things to do and there was always work to do. We picked rocks, we picked weeds. I picked a weed called cheat grass out of our fields by the gunny sack full. I hoed weeds in the garden and pulled more weeds affectionately called “Fire Weeds.” For two summers I hoed and pulled weeds on newly planted rows of trees, which totaled 7 miles. These are called “Wind Rows.” I remember...
read moreRock Piles
One of the monuments on the Prairie has always been Rock Piles. They are sadly disappearing because farmers don’t like to farm around them anymore. They take a bull dozer, dig a pit next to the Rock Pile and shove them in to bury the rocks. Very sad. These Rock Piles are tributes to hard, hard work done by hand by many people on the Prairie. My parents were some of these hard working people, they knew how to work hard. I grew up watching them work. When I look at these old Rock Piles I think back to how they were built. Most Rock...
read moreDarn stinkin Sheep
Growing up on the farm I had all kinds of animals. I had rabbits, ducks, chickens, cows and calves, horses, dogs, cats, pigeons, and sadly sheep. I never liked sheep. I didn’t want them around and I hated the day my Dad decided he would bring sheep home to the farm. His favorite saying was, All day you smell their stinkin hides and at night you hear ’em bleat. Yep that about sums it up, still don’t understand why he brought them home. For those never around these smelly creatures here are a few facts learned a long time ago....
read moreRattlesnake Tales..
One of the constant things in Northern Montana where I was raised was snakes. Rattlesnakes. They are the Pits. We had a whole jelly jar full of Rattles we cut off the snakes when we killed them. A trophy jar so to speak. My mom always killed them with a sharp shovel, cutting their heads off. She said my Grandpa Light killed them with a whip snapping their heads off, he did the same with chickens. No gun ever for Grandpa. My sister tells about shooting one near the wooden garage when babysitting me and my cousin Bobby G. The story got more...
read moreUnique Good Montana Folk
My Aunt Achsah was there when I was born at home. She was my mom’s closest neighbor and between the two of them they had more than a passel of kids. So I suppose she was the midwife at my delivery. We lived just north of my Aunt Achsah and my Uncle Fred’s house at that time in a little grey house. They could holler at each other in the yards, we were that close. My mom’s first husband Hollis was my Uncle Fred’s brother so technically they weren’t my Aunt and Uncle but my sisters. This made no difference to me...
read moreGet Your Copies Today!
My newest book, The Dread, has just been published! Click the book cover below to read more.
The Long Awakening is now available in Paperback and eBook formats. Click the book cover below to purchase!
