The thrills of thundering hooves

As I've said, I became a horse lover at a fairly early age. I think many girls go through a 'phase' of waning a pony, maybe reading a book such as The Black Stallion, Misty of Chincoteague or My Friend Flicka or seeing a rerun of the old flick National Velvet.or some more recent cinematic horse tales but for me it became much more. From about the age of ten until my mid twenties my whole life was wrapped up in horses and their kin, mules and donkeys.Many, many passed through my world in those days.

It started with a pair of retired cow ponies that dad bought for us when I was just starting at the school I described yesterday. Lady and Chindy were good to begin with. I know many people go for Shetland Ponies first but believe me, although small, they can be mean and stubborn as any donkey. Most do not get trained by a knowledgeable adult so they are not in the western terminology, properly "broke" and taught some manners. Although it was a hard scramble for me to reach the saddle of a full sized horse at that time, I learned how to do it and from then on was atop a horse every chance I got.

For my thirteenth birthday, although actually a bit before, I received a yearling filly. She came to me around Valentine's Day so I called her My Valentine but she ended up being just Tina. She was a reddish bay with black mane and tail, a blazed face and one white foot on the left rear. Although she was supposed to be sired by an purebred Arabian and her mother was a mixed blood cowpony, she always looked like a Thoroughbred. She grew to a good sixteen hands high (a hand is four inches so you can figure that out--in a word, tall!) and was always on the leggy and lanky side. I never knew a horse with more heart and willingness. She was sure footed in some very rough central Arizona terrain, savvy about cattle, and pretty darn fast when a good gallop was in order. In many ways she was the love of my life, at least equine wise. I had her for just over ten years and she produced two nice colts sired by an Appaloosa stallion we had for a time named Yavapai Chief. Bravo and Rico eventually went to a working ranch in the area and became top-quality cow ponies too. Tina died of a virus in the spring of 1966 at not quite eleven years of age and left me broken hearted for some time.

Here are a couple of pictures of her--and me. I cherish them and the memories they bring back. I am sure she waits for me in that green pasture by the Rainbow Bridge along with a number of other well-loved equines and of course that pack of dogs who've passed through my life. She and Flash just missed becoming good partners as he was gone not long after she came into my world. He'd have enjoyed running with horses though, I know. Many other dogs did and now perhaps they are all together in that good place as they wait for me to return to them.

I'll introduce some of my other favorites soon but Tina had to have a place all her own. She was that special.

Let me close with a verse I wrote in 1957 not long after Tina was broke enough for me to ride her freely by myself. It would be about the time frame of the black and white shot above. I was about fourteen when I enscribed these lines. They're simple but full of feelings and I think evocative!


                      Riding Tina
Wind in my face, wind at my heels,
Faster and freer and wilder than wheels.
Cares left behind, worries left too.
Nothing can catch me when I'm riding you.
Saddle beneath me, reins in my  hand.
We're racing the wind, Tina, isn't it grand?
Oh the glory of riding, of running, of flying!
We beat the wind,Tina, without even trying!
The earth can't contain us, we're high as a cloud
I'm riding my Tina and am I not proud?

        (C) GMW, 1957          

More Novel Childhood

I guess the two big loves of my life, besides writing about the rest. are horses and dogs and then my fascination with "Romance". Yes, that is a capital R! And my unusual early years helped to make me the person I became. I talked a little bit about the one room school I attended a few posts back, where I was the only girl. At that time gender did not mean much to me but the awareness was not too long coming. That tiny school was closed and I went next to a slightly larger one that was not as remote.

Bridgeport, Arizona was a few miles down the road from Cottonwood. Today there is no clear line where one leaves off and the other begins although Bridgeport is still more rural appearing with ranchettes and small farms along the river. Then there was a gap of vacant land in between. The school served the local community and normally had about twenty to thirty students in the eight grades. I haven't found a picture of the whole building in my scanning but a couple show parts of it. One section was frame and the other was a common southwestern style at that time, boulders in cement. Here are a couple of shots that show the two types of construction. As you can see, a lot of the kids wore jeans, or in their generic term "levis" as opposed to the brand name Levis. We had bring your horse to school days--oddly  many more girls than boys seemed to do that--and the whole group seemed to get along most of the time--all sizes, ages, and ethinic backgrounds. It was a real lesson in diversity although I do not recall any African Americans. But there were Latinos and Native Americans and many nationalities of 'gringos' since many areas of Europe proved workers for the mines in Jerome and the smelter in Clarkdale up through mid century or a bit longer..

Everyone was checked for clean hands after recesses and noon and sent to wash if they were dirty! We had student officers who did these and other duties, offices that rotated regularly through all the students That's what is happening in the first shot. In the second picture the man in the western hat with the football is Dad who was the teacher of the 5-8 grade group at that time and later had the whole eight grades for two years.

I started out in fourth grade in the lower classroom--in the frame building and then moved to the other in fifth through seventh grades. I didn't get to graduate there as again the school was closed but the end of year festivities were a lot of fun. The ceremony was usually Wednesday and the eighth graders had a free day while the rest of us went all over the community to collect flowers which were usually in full bloom by the end of May. With the bounty, we decorated the hall --in the frame part--for the celebration that night. The next day was a community wide picnic down by the river where all the kids and most of the families who were not at work gathered for games, rowdy fun and lots of good eats. Then it was over for another year except at least two years they had collected a huge truckload of scrap metal which was sold to finance a special field trip. One year we all went to the Grand Canyon and the next went up south of Flagstaff to visit a working ranch owned by one set of  parents, see a US Forest Service fire lookout tower and do some other outdoorsy things. Willard School was a really delightful place to learn and grow and  I feel so privileged to have had that experience.

I was in the sixth grade when I really recognized that kids came in two models, hims and hers! Wow, that was quite amazing. I got a crush on a boy then in the eighth grade and held him as a kind of hero for several years although my fickle fancy did dart off to others like the usual teenage crushes on celebrities. (Mine were mostly rodeo cowboys and the stars of the many TV westerns of the era.) Still I did remain somewhat loyal to my first beau even after we went on to high school and our separate ways. Here's a shot of him at the eighth grade graduation that year. And it does not really show his adorable dimples! :-( He had blue eyes and reddish blond hair, just an ordinary looking kid of fourteen or so to me now LOL. Time does change one's perspective.

I located him about 2000--he was in Albuquerque at the time, a happy father and grand dad--and we exchanged a casual email or two before he passed away in 2004. Heart trouble ran in his family and it hit him rather early as it had his father. And so began my many decades' fascination with 'love' and perhaps the first tilt toward becoming a writer of romance!

National Dog Day!!

Of course I could not ignore this day!  If you are a dog lover as I am by all means celebrate with your K9 companion(s), do a bit of volunteer work at your local animal shelter or find some other way to mark the day. I'm not sure why August is often referred to as the "dog days" of summer. Maybe because it tends to be doggone hot and miserable in a lot of places and most of us are about ready to kiss summer goodbye and move into the mostly better weather of fall. I haven't yet seen that first-of-fall day this year but it should come any time. I am more than ready!

Back to the dogs. I've been blessed with some very wonderful ones over the years. It started with a 'farm collie' or English Shepherd type dog I got at about age 10 and enjoyed for several years until he met a sad and untimely end. I called him Flash and you could not ask for a happier, more loving and perfect first dog for a kid. I have very few pictures of him but did come across one in my recent scanning project. Ignore the very plain little girl and enjoy the pup! He was a lanky six-month old at that time.

After that there were many. I have a special place in my heart for the Australian Shepherds. I got my first one not long after my husband and my Brittany Spaniel crossed the Rainbow Bridge within minutes of each other in November 2003. "Rico" came to me in February of the next year and I kept him until his escalating battles with Belle, my second Aussie, got too severe and I had to rehome one. Due to her health issues, I kept her. Here is a shot of them together when they were getting along. Actually that was most of the time but when they fought it was vicious and became worse each time. Belle was the classic blue merle (RIP dear girl) and Rico was black and white but actually a merle too with only a small bit of that coloration on him. I pray he is still alive and well in Arizona.

Finally here is Ginger, my latest and current K9 companion and Rojito (Little Red.) They both share my bed now--oh my! But I haven't the heart to put either of them off. So long as they leave me about a foot and a half of space on one edge, I can manage! Ginger is mostly Border Collie with probably a bit of Aussie and the little guy is probably Dachshund and King Charles Spaniel. Those of you who've been with me for awhile have met them before, of course!


So happy National Dog Day to all my canine friends, present and long gone and to all of you fellow animal lovers. Go in peace and happy sniffs, walks, rides and play to you all!

Life's Archaeology--a poem

I mentioned a verse a few posts back (in Sentiment and Superstition I think  it was) that I said I would look for, one dealing with delving into the past. I did find it and now for what it's worth, I share it with you. I find my poetry has changed a lot over the years..Mostly more somber and philosophical now but I occasionally still wax lyrical or romantic. Can't take all the basic stuff out of yourself, not even life can.

Digging Through Past Life

Sorting through shards of the past,

Mostly words from long ago,

I read and wonder as I read

Was this someone I used to know?

Digging through old artifacts,

Pictures so dim I barely see

The distant scenes that they portray

Was this someone I used to be?

As I sift through all the debris

Each hazed and distant memory

Finding who I am in who I was

Rewards my archaeology.

I’ve not done all I planned and dreamed

Nor found the world the fairy tale

I thought it in that far off past

Yet I can see I did not fail.

Much that I said that I would do

And much that I aspired to be

Has filled the time that passed between

That self of old and this day’s me.

                                    (c) GMW Feb 2012

More good old days

After my two years at Camp Wood, I went to another small school, this one in the town of Bridgeport in the Verde Valley. The school was called Willard School after a pioneering family in the area who may have given the land on which the school was built. Although larger than Camp Wood it was still a 'country' school and my frequent wearing of jeans was not odd or out of place. Many of the kids had horses or ponies and after a few months, I did too! I enjoyed my four years there very much.

For fourth grade I was in the lower group. At first there were two rooms and two teachers. I had Mrs. Velma Fuller for that year and made friends with several girls who were either a grade or two ahead of or behind me. There were several other fourth graders but they were all boys and I had not yet truly recognized that there were two models of kids and those "other guys" could be pretty amazing!

The next year I moved up to the 'big room' and again had my dad for my teacher. By the time I was in sixth grade, the whole school was put into a single room and I discovered boys, one in particular who remained an off and on 'fancy' of mine for several years. He was two grades ahead of me and his little sister was one of my 'baby sister' friends. I was always inclined to kind of adopt younger girls and befriend them, perhaps on the example of a couple of older girls who did this for me when I was small.. When I went to the high school reunion a few of them greeted me warmly and said how they appreciated my kindness and friendship. Two or three years was a big gap then, but now it is almost nothing at all. Funny how time changes one's perspective.

Anyway just for fun here is a picture of mom and me on the first two horses we had. I'm at the left on the bay at about age eleven. They were both retired cow ponies and came to us already named. The bay was Lady and the gray was Chindy. That was a kind of corruption of the Navajo or Dine word tchindi which is the restless and often wicked spirit of a departed soul who has not broken ties with the earthly plane. The name suited as she was a bit wicked, and had a whole bag of tricks. She was gentle but just sly and tricky to a naive young rider!

Here is an example of one of her tricks. At that time I was still not full grown and had to reach hard to get my foot in the stirrup. She caught me once with my left foot there and planted her big foot on top of my right toes! I was helpless for if I kicked my left foot free I would probably  fall on my butt and had no way to urge her to get off my toes. I had to wait until she decided to move. Ouch!! I did not quite pour toes out of my boot but doggone near it! I do have some severe arthritis in that foot now perhaps as a result.

Oh the adventures I 'enjoyed' in those days... I will share some more as we go along. In retrospect, it's almost amazing that my first broken bone came years later in a hiking accident, the incident that inspired my novel Healing Hearts. That book, by the way, has been out of print for ages but will be reissued as Hearts to Heal in January 2014 by Amber Quill.  At least for me art often imitates life... That is my twist on the old "write what you know" saw, I guess.

A novel childhood

When I mentioned an unusual life recently, I was not joking! I went to small rural one and two room schools through most of my grade school years. Second and third grade I attended a tiny one room school in a little community called Camp Wood, which was about fifty miles on some gravel and dirt roads north and east from Prescott, the county seat of Yavapai County in the geographical middle of the state. I was the only girl among the eight students and my father was my teacher. Before the second year was over, my first brother, the one I now live with, was born. I spent a few months back home in Jerome where we then lived (permanent residence anyway) with my Mom and the new baby since it was risky to take a new-born so far out into the wilderness. I missed the fun out at Camp Wood while that went on but read a lot of books as well as keeping up most of my school work at home. Mom was qualified as a teacher too.

Here is a picture of the school and grounds during that winter to illustrate why Mom and young Charlie didn't come out! Isn't that beautiful but sooo cold looking? I would say there was about eighteen inches of snow on the ground right then. During the week we lived in that little trailer sitting to the right. It was slightly bigger than one of those tiny travel trailers but not much. We had no electricity or running water!

On a milder day, here I am with my classmates who ranged from the first to the eighth grade. I'm the one with the pigtails in the back but otherwise was pretty much just one of the boys. LOL. I am flanked here by two of the Foster boys. The other two are in the front row. The middle row is the three oldes boys, Fred Merritt, Jack Crow and Bill Pehl, seventh and eighth graders. Bill and Jack lived on the nearby Yolo Ranch, another property of the notorious Green Cattle Company and part of the empire of fabled Colonel Green. As I recall, Bill's father was the foreman there. Jack was part Indian and his dad was one of the ranch hands. The Foster boys father worked for the sawmill which was owned and run by Fred's father. That was about all there was out there too! The Merritts also ran the Post Office and a very limited "company store."

We were in the middle of the woods and often saw deer, wild turkeys etc.I had a great time those two years and probably started to get a little bit tomboy and a lot uncivilized. I am not sure if I ever recovered completely or not! I wish I remembered more details about those two years. Mostly only vignettes of highlights remain in my memory.

First-day-of-fall and Hummingbird Summer

As a true aficionado of the high desert southwest, my favorite season is fall. The harsh heat of summer is over, the humidity goes back down and it's just a terrific time to get outdoors and enjoy everything! With that in mind, about this time of year I start looking for those first subtle clues that the seasons are getting ready to change. As long ago as when I was a teenager, I recognized what I called the first-day-of-fall. It came somewhere between m id to late August and early to mid September and was marked by a certain feel to the wind, a dryness in the air, and a delicate touch of coolness. It might be far from the last gasp of summer but it was an omen and a promise. That day I would get restless and want to ride or walk all day long--get out on a high hill where I could survey a vast stretch of countryside and revel in the blue skies and maybe just a few little scraps of cloud over the higher terrain. Such a day made me feel so blessed to live where I have spent the greater part of my life!

And, along in the same general time frame, there is a period I call hummingbird summer. Although I do not recall seeing these tiny birds in the Verde Valley in central Arizona where I grew up, I became acquainted with them a bit when I moved down to Cochise County after I finished college and began my civil service career but I really came to know them when we returned to the area from California in 1984. I hung feeders then and became an avid watcher and fan of the flying jewels. Cochise County is called the hummingbird capital of the USA as more species visit there than anywhere else. Here is a hummingbird summer picture at my old home in southeastern Arizona. This is very typical!

Along a bit before Labor Day they began to grow more numerous. I had some that came early in the spring and others that hung around all summer but all at once the population doubled and doubled again until no matter how many feeders I put up, at least a half dozen busy little birds were squabbling around them from daybreak to dusk. For two or three weeks there were constant aerobatics and you could hardly go outside without getting buzzed. Then slowly they began to depart. The area was just a favored rest spot along their incredible migration routes from far to the north to the equatorial tropics.

Last year here I noticed some increase in the numbers about a week or two later than this. It was noticeable but not as exciting as in Arizona. The last few days I have begun to see a few more. At least two pairs have been here since late spring and I think raised their customary two chicks but now an extra two or more are around. I've glimpsed a Rufous, the only species that appears in North America that has no green but instead sports rusty red plumage in its place.I'm not sure what the others are but I am guessing Black Chins which were the most plentiful species I had in Arizona and perhaps some Allan's or Anna's. My two feeders hang by the garage since we were invaded by bees last summer when I had them along the patio. Not many bees this year so maybe I can move them back.... Anyway I cannot see the subtle colors enough for positive identification given the distance and they are not as tame or bold as my long time visitors were in Arizona where I could stand right by the feeder and they would ignore me!

Sentiment and Superstition

Since I have a lot of Celtic blood, especially Irish and Welsh, I am naturally a person who tends to extreme sentiment and also some strange superstitions. Lately I've been engrossed in a couple of long-term projects that brought both to the fore. I finally got a good quality photo scanner and am starting to work my way through a zillion years of family photos. I have some from my late husband's family, both sides of it, and from the families of both my parents. Then my husband's dad and mine were both avid photographers and both Jim and I took the habit forward into the next generation.

I know the collection is in the thousands--maybe even into the five figures! There are prints in many sizes and both negatives and transparencies ranging from the roughly 3"x 4" of the large press "graflex" type cameras that used cut film through the 120 and 127 that were for the double lens reflex cameras like Dad's Rolleiflex and the "Brownie" box camera that was my first step into photography. And of course both slides and negatives from the 35 MM SLR type cameras that came along later. Now we have digital, at least I do, and take a lot with it but most of them I upload right away.

The second project is writing a kind of memoir. I think it is safe to say I led an interesting life, rather in the sense of the old Chinese curse: May you live in interesting times. Indeed I did and many aspects of life, some that I chose and others that were visited upon me by various influences, made it more so! I did have experiences not a lot of women in today's world have had and of course they mark me to this day. In seeking to be accurate on dates and events, I've been reading my old journals. I started keeping one a few days after my twelfth birthday, on the May 1 back in 1955. There is still so much of the child and girl that I was in those days left in me! Some of that is good and some is bad, but nonetheless, it is there. I still keep a journal, too. I quit for many years from about the time I started college and then went to work on through my marriage of thirty two years. There was not time and it seemed frivolous or pointless. Now I am a bit sorry I did not but that's okay. In a lot of ways that was the 'dull' segment of my life!

Yes, I am still sentimental and ruled much more by my heart than my head. I did pride myself in being practical and pragmatic, too, and to a considerable degree I am, but that is more of a veneer or facade than the real me. I am also a chameleon. I change my outward 'hue' to fit wherever I am and especially to those who are closest to me at any one time so I blend, fit in and encounter few conflicts. Yet despite the many guises I have hidden behind and lived inside over the years, the inner self is still there, almost unchanged. Older but not much wiser perhaps although I have learned much. I handle my quirks and protect my weak spots a bit better.

 That is where the superstition comes in perhaps. While I am not a true believer in most "fortune telling" and such, I do study astrology a bit and read tarot cards, runes, and a variety of self-created omens that I observe in my daily life.  And I do heed and respond to them all. I've had  "readings" done--some were close and most were miles off--and I do find that astrology, especially, does shed some light on who and what I am and how things occur.

Here I'm talking not the internet or newspaper sun-sign horoscope but a much deeper and more complex look at where the various celestial bodies were when I was born and how they move through the houses that were established at that instant. Actually my personal belief leans more toward where things were at the moment of conception--when those two first cells joined and began to replicate to create a new being, the energies and radiation from the closest part of the universe has to have some impact. Perhaps at birth too though when the protection of your mother's body no longer shields you and you become an entity on your own. That's how I give it a certain credence or quasi-scientific cachet anyway.

Just for spits and giggles, I'll close with a couple of photos recently scanned--yes, they are both me, long ago and far away. I'd say at least two or three 'lifetimes' ago since I have lived several epochs so different they may as well be separate lives.



In the first one here, I was about five years old, perhaps as old as six. It was not dated so I am not sure. Then the next was when I graduated from high school. I had a dress under that gown which my maternal grandmother had made. It was a sweet virginal white, with puffed sleeves and a full skirt, probably more suited for a first communion at the age of ten or twelve than an nineteen year old graduate but it was made with love and I was happy with it. Those were simpler times. Now eighth graders wear strapless formals and I'm not sure what high schoolers wear--do I even want to know?! How times have changed.

More soon on these strange efforts of mine! Delving into the past is a peculiar kind of archaeology. I wrote a verse about that. Maybe I can find it for my next post.