Memoir Monday, March 15, 1962

 March 15, 1962 Thursday!

Yes, I should put an exclamation point after today. It began early, ended late, and was exciting in between. We rolled out before sunup and were on the road by 7:30. It was rather chilly for awhile but soon warmed up. We had to do some shuffling but were able to park close and get a go view of the parade. We saw it from start to finish, one and a half hours of bands, floats, riding units and prancing, strutting horses. I have now seen close up real parade horses with silver decked saddles and all the “pretties”. I think I like the Arabians best. The Phoenix JayCee parade is not the Rose Bowl but it’s sure a long shot from the Cottonwood Sheriff Posse. I saw the rodeo queen, Miss Rodeo America, a blonde trick rider whose name I forget, Art Miller, etc. etc. It was fabulous, wonderful, pathetic, ridiculous and ??? We drove down to the Utah horse dealer’s place and almost bought a pretty sorrel Quarter Horse type mare. I rode her some and she handled pretty good but we decided against her. There was a real pretty Quarter Horse colt, too. We did our other shopping and at last loaded hay. We got home about 7:30, did the regular chores etc. Give us about two years and we’ll have an entry of mules. That would be a cool ball. Darn, I can’t go to college next year.  I’ll miss out on too much. What the parade needs is novelty and authenticity, more than the Bill Williams Mountain Men. There is our opening. Well back to my cage tomorrow. Hells Bells. Maybe I’ll get a letter from Jose. I hope so. I think I’ll ditch school.

By this time I was back in school and  varied from enjoying to hating it. I'd gone through a serious rebellion in the fall of 1960 but had recognized I was going to hurt myself way more than any damage or grief I could cause mom and dad so I was pretty straight by now and planning to graduate college-eligible and with honors. . No social life--but I had hopes that would change after I finished high school. It didn't--that took four more years. 

I actually 'ditched' very, very seldom but did take some days away with family permission such as this one. We had to get hay, cheaper and better down in the Phoenix suburban area. That meant  a full load in the big flatbed Ford F-800 we had gotten the previous fall or between 3 and 4 tons pilled as high as was safe and legal. We made that trip to coincide with the Phoenix JC's annual rodeo parade. Yeah, to a backwoods cowboy girl that was pretty impressive!

Art Miller had a flashy palomino horse and about the most decorated outfit I ever saw--a mint worth of silver!!. He was a major parade regular and I had a photo of him for awhile. I think we had met him a time or two but cannot recall the circumstances. Not a crush for some weird reason but anyway...

We carried the idea of a parade entry with a couple or several of our flashiest mules 'someday' but like many rather over-the-top dreams that never came to pass. "Back in my cage" came from one of Jim McLarney's pet sayings. Although I actually dated  him a bit some years later, 1966-67, at that time he was one of my English teachers and I was maybe one of his and Ernest Gabrielson's pets since I could write and spell and even mostly punctuate decently and was not rowdy, dull or inattentive. They both mostly gave me good grades. 

Jose was my current favorite pen pal. I think I  have mentioned him before.

Hard to find pictures, at least new ones. I'll try.  Another pose of a photo posted previously from that season and a shot of Charlie Mike on Prez but showing the big Ford truck in the background. It was dark green and dad had built most of the rack on it to haul animals but it also did many other tasks like hay.

Memoir Monday March 8, 1959

 

March 8, 1959  Sun

Another day spent mostly in the saddle. We rode the mares over to Mickle’s to check on the mules. I’m sure glad that the shoes helped Lady so much. In the afternoon we went up to Ray’s to pull Lizzie’s shoes. I caught her and stopped the old heifer from running off. She nearly tore my hands off but I held her. All and all this has been a nice weekend. I guess I’m a man’s girl in a way because you see I like sports etc.  Guess I must go, Gaye

1959--I was a sophomore at Mingus that spring, basically bored with school and to some degree with life. I tended to live for weekends and getting out to ride . "Heifer" was a word I had adapted to describe some terms that were frowned upon at home if I spoke them aloud like slut and bitch. Charlie Mike and I were getting skilled at adapting words and making up some of our own. We both knew how to cuss fluently by this time but also knew very well that doing so in the hearing of our parents would bring sharp retribution. So we came up with place holders!

At that time we had animals farmed out at different locations and visited often to check on them and give any care needed. Within a couple of weeks we would see five mules sold and gone, Lizzie being one of them. We'd had her a year and she was generally well behaved but still had a few mulish tricks that you had to watch for. I had learned a lot about how to handle the equine and related critters since I got Tina, my special mare, in February of 1956. I was well on the way to becoming pretty much an expert horsewoman. Lady was actually Lady II, a mare we had acquired some months earlier from Bob Reeves. We named her in honor of our earlier mare, Lady I, although that might have already been her name. That I do not recall. Apparently she had gotten sore footed or lame and shoes helped. The mares would have been her and Tina. "We" I am sure was my dad and me. Mom was not a big horsewoman and also about seven months pregnant with our baby brother who was born that May and Charlie Mike was only eight at that time. 

I'd share more of the earlier time, say 55-57, except most of my entries were pretty sparse at that time and I was not discussing a lot of things. Journal keeping was still a new effort and I was thinking in terms of more traditional diaries where maybe three lines were provided for each day. It wasn't that nothing happened or I had no thoughts or emotional reactions, but rather than I did not write them down. 

Actually there were lots of fun things during that time when I was going to school at Willard Grade School in Bridgeport with my dad as my teacher. I started fourth grade there in the fall of 1953 when it was a two room school but it went to one room two years later when I as in 6th grade.  I liked the country school where jeans and even bringing a horse to school was okay! In my main memoir, a work in progress, I do go into that more. 

Photos: Dad riding Lizzie and working with Albert. They both were 'rejects' from the Grand Canyon herd that we got in the spring of 1958. This was probably mid-1958. Next I am riding Lady II and looking over the first large batch of mules we got at the end of August, 1959. And last, mom on Chindy (Tchindi) and me on Lady I in the winter of 53/54. My posture was much more relaxed than mom's even then.

Memoir Monday March 1, 1960

March 1, 1960, Tuesday 

Another day of this will drive us all insane. It wasn’t as bad outside as yesterday but the scattered showers kept us from getting outside and working. I kept busy on odds and ends and I did the usual chores. Charlie Mike and I went up to the library. I got to watch “The Rifleman. It was a good show tonight and reminded me just how much I’d like to meet a man like Lucas McCain. I was just born seventy five years too late but that can’t be helped I guess. Didn’t see Blondie today. He is a poor substitute for the kind of man I want but you’ve got to have somebody. Adios, Gaye 

This was the spring when I was out of school. I came to hate days when the weather was ugly and I could not get out and ride--that was a chance to be by myself, maybe see someone "interesting" (as in male over 15 and under 75!) and  avoid any lectures or boring long "talks" generally about what I should and should not do and how to do it and all that. My dad was a master of overkill on this! Ugh!! The regular feeding and stock care chores did have to be done every day and in cold, wet, muddy or windy times were not at all pleasant. 

I was certainly suffering with my "addiction to romance"  at this point and was frustrated with having little to no social life or even much in the way of substitutes. So I watched TV westerns, started writing to pen pals and read lots of novels! Hobbies like sewing, drawing and writing my early efforts at fiction and poetry helped fill the time. A prior essay on the 'addiction' is here: https://deirdre-fourds.blogspot.com/2019/01/memoir-monday-addicted-to-romance.html

Being a "cowboy girl" was fun in some ways but it was so far out of step with where the rest of the world was going at this point. That made it easy to feel like a misfit, often sorry for myself, and a bit mistreated by life in general. Of course that is a typical teenage thing, but from about eighth grade on, I was just not anything like my schoolmates and contemporaries and felt I had so little in common with them. Our family was basically poor and our lifestyle miles away from anything 'average' or typical. I often felt friendless, ignored or invisible, and believed for sure those in my age group were mostly laughing at me. 

In reality most were not, if they even thought of me at all, but at that time I'd heard or overheard just enough snarky comments to make me somewhat standoffish. I was always very shy anyway and the situation exacerbated that. You have to be a friend to have one; I did have a few but with many people I had no idea how to approach them or really why I might need or want to. Because of that, any boyfriends were mostly a bit older and girlfriends younger. "Blondie" was another nickname for one of my crushes at the time. 

Some pix from the era:  First is me, probably fall 59 before I quit school. Next is me as the typical cowboy girl I was most of the time at home and when not in school.  Three is the first batch of mules we got that were the ultimate cause of my quitting school. Fourth is Charlie Mike, then about nine, showing how gentle Beano was, one of the mules we acquired in the 59-60 period. Beano was sold to a trail riding lady in Louisiana and shipped there by rail!

Memoir Monday, February 22, 1959

Me with Louie (left) and Lily (right)

Two sketches

 

Chuck Connors, The Rifleman

Kelo Henderson, 26 Men

Feb 22, 1959 , Sunday

Happy birthday, George! Didn’t do much this morning. Enjoyed myself some in the afternoon. Rode Tina. Even gave Mike Rutledge and Jonah a ride. Tina had never carried double before but she took to it okay. I love to run her. I’d swear she floats. Lord, I wouldn’t trade that mare for a house full of TV sets. Not when she goes like today. She jumped once but I jerked, spurred and cussed her and she settled right down. I’ve got my room pretty well decorated. I look up and see the Superstitions and George Phippen, ropin’  a calf, up more and see Kelo, Chuck, Jim, Jack, Johnny etc. and four of my own sketches. Reckon I am pretty well fixed, Huh? Well, tomorrow we get another new mule. Hope she is nice. Guess I’d better light and ride. Gaye

1959--how long ago was that?  I think back in the Dark Ages when I was growing up "in the old country." Yes, we did have automobiles and even television, refrigerators instead of ice boxes and a few other modern conveniences LOL. But no cell phones, no internet, no Yahoo or Google or You Tube etc. How did we ever amuse ourselves? 

Most of my readers know now who Tina was. I had enjoyed her for three years by this time and she was pretty well trained but still young and could be frisky at times. Mike Rutledge was a neighbor kid, about Charlie Mike's age and I think Jonah was a Native American boy about that same age. He may have been one of Charlie Mike's friends. Mike R was one reason Charlie hated to be called Mike. That was one ornery little kid; he had been sick (maybe rheumatic fever?) and I think was kinda spoiled! By then I was getting pretty competent as a horse woman and only occasionally allowed Tina to intimidate me a little. She was a big mare and high spirited. And yes, I did cuss!! I had learned I could say Damn and Hell and worse and lightning did not strike me--so long as it was not in front of my parents. 

My wall decor. I dimly recall a photo or maybe painting of the Superstition Mountains; not sure where I got it or where it went. George Phippen was a fine western artist who lived near Prescott and did calendars and covers for magazines like Western Horseman  of which of course I read every issue. I had written him a 'fan' letter and he sent me a signed copy of one of his good paintings--it was probably not a self-portrait but there was a cowboy roping a calf with Granite Mountain in the background. 

The guys named were all actors in the TV westerns of the time, most of which were big faves of mine. I sent lots of fan letters and got lots of pictures, probably mechanically signed but a good collection anyway. I still have a few in a souvenir binder. And I was actually sketching faces--I had suddenly found a way past the kiddie art I had done  earlier: lumpy horses, stick figures and crayon-colored landscapes--and was doing some fairly realistic faces of some of my current crushes and heroes. I have shared a few of them in other posts. I even illustrated some 'ranch romance' type fiction I was starting to write. "Rio Ransom" was one of the heroes of a Zane Grey imitation.

As for the new mule, we had already entered a deal to sell some of our older ones and the new one was to be a replacement or maybe go with the five we were selling so we could keep one of them. I called her Louisa (she looked like the old mule Louie we had) and  Luz for short but she somehow soon became Nelly. So much for my exotic names. I recall little about her now as she did get sold with four others and left in March that year. 

Memoir Monday Feb 15, 1962

 Feb 15, 1962 Thursday

Another good day. I can’t believe my luck. Please don’t ever let it end. It is so nice. I got up fairly early and was ready to be off. School was o.k. I read in study hall, wrote in English and didn’t do much else. In Art I glazed my bowl and jewelry yesterday. Now they are ready for a final firing. Reen’s horse is coming along. Her Dobbin cut his foot badly yesterday, thus her absence. I got lots of mail today, the most interesting being a scholarship from Grand Canyon College. I’m so thrilled that I can’t think straight. I’ve got to find out more about the details from Mrs. Fitzgerald. Anyway I think it is just too fabulous. I rode Annie out and swapped her for Trix. Ritz is recovering nicely and the fact she is feeling better is proved by her decreasing docility. I’ve spent the evening doing nothing of importance. We are all sort of relaxing. We need money again but somehow I just can’t feel too worried. Something is bound to turn up. It always does. I got the third letter from Jose which I have not read yet (no privacy). I’m so happy tonight—not really—but more or less. (Now that makes lots of sense doesn’t it?)Well anyway today was pretty good for me and I am proud of myself for winning that scholarship to GCC. I hope I can go there. I think I’d like it. 

Still stuck in my senior year.  The "Reen" was Maureen Jewell. She had come to Mingus as a freshman the previous spring and since she was also very into horses and western stuff we became close friends. We had PE together both years and were both in Art in 1961-62. She had made a gorgeous horse statue about 15 inches high working in clay. Tragically it broke in the kiln when fired. I felt very sad for her as it was really very well done. Clay was not my medium. I made some sloppy bowls and things and a few little squares or conchos that I intended to use in jewelry but most of them later got tossed.  I may still have one simple dish somewhere--it was glazed in red and had livestock brands or Native symbols engraved on it. 

Stella was a nice little mule we had that was more or less mine since we had swapped a little Navajo pony that was given to me a couple of years earlier for her. She was sold to a lady in Tucson who decided she was "not friendly enough" and sent her back to exchange for another that did not please her either. After three we gave up! I always liked Stella. She eventually went to a buyer in California,. Ritz or Ritzi was a young mare who had been born to a mare we got in a deal in early 1960 and was supposed to be mine. She had distemper, I think, just before this and that fall she died in a sad accident. She was a hard luck creature though very pretty and generally well mannered. I had just begun to train her. 

I ended up not using that scholarship since I did not manage to go off to college for four years and when I did it was to NAU where I also got a scholarship and a Pell Grant that covered me for four years with just a fairly small deb,t mostly for my last year when I did graduate work. By going most summer sessions I got two degrees in four years. 

As I mentioned last week, Jose was a pen pal who wrote very long letters, using several colors of ink to delineate different moods or themes. He was probably the most interesting of the varied pen pals I wrote over the course of three or four years there. We never met and eventually quit writing.  

Here are the pictures given to me by Wayne, the rodeo cowboy and Jose. I don't have a photo of Stella but this is about that same time and I'm holding Prez; not sure why I was still in school clothes for that photo. The other is Maureen sitting on the steps of the Art Building up at Mingus on the last day of classes in May 1962. I finally had a camera and was using it a lot!

Memoir Monday--Feb 8, 1962

 

Feb 8, 1962     Thursday

Hello myself. Today was a perfectly gruesome day weather-wise. Otherwise it wasn’t too bad. It rained most all last night and most of today. Up at Jerome we were buried in the clouds all day. School was o.k. In Art I splashed around with tempera paint. It’s rather fun but untidy. I got a letter from Wayne today. He wasn’t mad at what I said. He seems to be a reasonable guy. I guess I’d really like to get to know him. Of course there could be no riding tonight. We drove out to do the chores and the whole place was a mess. Ditto for here at home. When I am rich and famous I will never wade in mud and crap. I’ll have cement and flagstone everywhere. And I won’t pick up hay anywhere either. I spent the evening stringing beads—I made four necklaces and just messed around. I wrote Wayne, worked on a few of my poems etc. I sure hope the weather is better tomorrow. I hate C&W music. I can’t even bear to listen to it anymore. Give me Exodus, Wonderland by Night, Apache, Warsaw Concerto, Moon River, Meditation, a Strauss waltz or even Bach and Beethoven. Anything but “Luv her, lose her, cry sniffle heartbreak”. Gads that’s sickening. I must go. I want to go to bed and listen to the music on KSL (Salt Lake station). That is Jose’s station. I wonder if he does listen to it? Perhaps he’ll tell me. Wish he would hurry and write again. I get too impatient.

This was my last semester of High School. I had gotten my little rebellion pretty well taken care of the year before and was now dedicated to getting the best grades I could with an eye toward hoping for a scholarship and maybe graduating with honors. I was still a 'cowboy girl' in many ways and deeply involved in the livestock work but my music preferences had changed from two or three years back. I always had fairly eclectic tastes and those titles tend to reflect that. I was still not really into rock but did like the Ventures and mostly preferred a pretty melody, even schmaltzy, to much of the pop sounds and still liked a lot of classical music. That has not changed too much in all these years!

I was not dating or doing much of anything social at that time. School and ranch work; that was my life. I had quit asking to go anywhere for the most part and found that the best way to avoid either lengthy lectures or blunt refusals. Instead I was writing to pen pals. Wayne and Jose were two of my favorites at that point. Wayne was a rodeo cowboy living in Washington state and Jose lived in Provo, UT and was on the staff at BYU. He had classes in fencing and horsemanship and was always going off on expeditions. At least he wrote interesting though sometimes odd letters.  It is hard to believe now that there was no internet, no email or even cell phones for texting!! People actually wrote and mailed letters or used the old land lines. I did talk to Wayne a few times that way. 

Even then I liked to mess with making jewelry--often then remaking some odds and ends my aunts gave me. That later became a semi-paying avocation when I got involved in lapidary and took some silver smithing courses. I have always liked to make things and have sewed, drawn and painted, strung beads and of course written most of my life. Well I was nearly 19 by now and getting more to be the person I would be for the rest of my life. 

No photos this time. Nothing in the archive really illustrates this little blurb. 

Memoir Monday-Feb 1, 1960

 

Monday, Feb 1, 1960

Another busy day as ours usually are. We took Tina out to Coon’s today and were going to move Mary and Carrie but changed our minds. Blackie wasn’t acting good so we ran her and Colonel nearly all the way home. I rode Col up to mail some letters after noon. One of the pipeline guys was trying to make conversation but I shut him up quickly. We rode out to the pasture and brought the herd down and fed them. Lobo is better still. In a few days he will be well. Got the chores done rather early but to no avail. I went to the stupid Cub Pack meeting and was bored to death. Sometimes I get so damn mad and sick inside that I could kill myself. Saw “Curly” today. He had to stop and look at me as always. Some old goat is driving RE’s tractor. I hope he was transferred to rhubarb. Of course I‘ll probably end up there too so I shouldn’t talk. I feel like crawlin’ in a good deep hole tonight. Bye, Gaye

Back to the year I was out of school or what in my ongoing Memoir project, Shoving Smoke and Herding Cats (being written which has kind of triggered these posts) I call "The Mule Year." Being out of school by now was no longer much of a holiday and adventure--mostly lots of work, out in the weather whether good or bad, and very little 'fun' to be had.

Riding was an every day thing and we had parts of our growing herd located in several different places. The Coon Ranch was north of Clarkdale off the unpaved road that went out to the mouth of Sycamore Canyon where it ran into the Verde River but that was much farther north. The ranch/farm was maybe two miles north from the bridge--the old bridge--at Clarkdale.  Colonel and Lobo were both horses we took on consignment when we got various batches of mules from the Kansas dealer, Willis Grumbein.  I don't think I have photos of either one--still did not have my own camera yet. Colonel was a very plain bay gelding, fairly well broke and placid tempered. I rode him quite a bit.  Blackie was one of the mules that I think I mentioned before. Mary and Carrie were also some of the mules. They were really too big for saddle animals and more suited for being driven as a team. Not sure what we were going o do with them. 

In the previous fall I had met and got interested in a guy who drove a tractor for installing the natural gas pipelines around the area. That did not end well and I marked him off my 'handsome hero' list. "Curly" was another member of that same 'former fancies,'  a very un-exclusive club! "Rhubarb" was one of my brother's and my pet pseudo cuss words, here I guess used instead of hell. Obviously I was not in a good mood or frame of mind that evening! I can't recall what I was so pissed off about and upset over since I really did not say. That was not too unusual! I was close to 17 but still in that teenage self-centered and over-reaction stage.

So a few photos:  The old bridge at Clarkdale over the Verde. Now blocked off and falling apart.  Next, holding baby brother Alex who was a year old in the spring of 1960. Charlie Mike ready for school.Part of the Coon Ranch which was behind  or north of the old Tapco Power Plant; I think it may be razed by now.  Gaye on Tina, out in the rugged hills east of the river from Clarkdale.