Memoir Monday Jan 25, 1959

 

Saturday, January 25, 1958

Got up at 8:00. Fed the stock. It was rather cloudy. Ate breakfast. Cleaned the corrals. Went down and met the Mullins girl. Her name is Alberta. She is really nice and I like her already. We talked about her old school, our school, horses, dogs—lots of things. Then Janni came up. We beat Cottonwood 53-35 she said. She and I sawed wood. Lunch. Then we rode up on Mingus to Zeke’s upper spring.  I kept my eyes turned from Apache Maid. It would be much more romantic if Dad had forbidden me to speak of Tyce or think about him or perhaps sent me to Cottonwood for the second semester or even ordered me not to talk with, look at or dream about him. He only makes T out to be an SOB, a skunk, a slut’s son a—Oh to hell with it. Well, back to the ride. Janni stayed until all the stock was put up and fed. She is a game and spunky little kid. Ate supper. Rested a bit. Manana, vamos a la Mingus y trabajamos muchos. Y Lunes yo tengo que hace un decision muy importante. Pero hasta Lunes no peinso en un decision. Well adios for now. Y amor a quien? Manana yo veo a quien va mi amor. G

More 'splaining. Some of it I have to kind of dig to remember myself! Alberta and her family moved in down the street from us in Clarkdale that month, a few days before this. They had a pair of palomino Shetland ponies as I recall. It does not seem they stayed too long but Alberta was nice and we became friends for awhile. A few days later she went riding with me--on one of my animals, not a pony. 

 Janni was Janice Benatz. She was about the youngest in my gang of young lower Clarkdale gal pals and was the right age to be kind of horse crazy. Despite about a four year age gap I considered her a friend and she was mature for her age in some ways. 

The hills between Clarkdale and Jerome were part of the grazing land leased by Zeke Taylor who then sold his interest to Ken Chilton. We rode though that area a lot, always careful to close gates and not disturb the cattle or anything. Where was that spring? Darn if I can exactly locate it--probably about due south of Jerome along the Mingus foothills. 

Tyce--ah yes, Tyce Miller who was about the closest to a high school boyfriend I ever had. We did not go steady or anything but had almost every class together and were kind of friends being both into horses and cowboy stuff. He always seemed to feel he could talk to me as I would listen and not be rude or sneering. We were both kind of misfits I guess. He was just there the one year. For some reason my dad took a huge exception to this boy--I guess because I talked about him a lot? Where and how dad found so much stuff to criticize I have no idea; I cannot imagine why he thought Tyce's mom was some kind of tramp except she had very red hair that looked dyed. They lived out at Beaver Creek Ranch but Tyce boarded in Clarkdale to go to school. 

I was taking Spanish that year and kind of fell in  love with the language. I think there is an error or two here but most of it seems right. I also used it as a code of sorts since my mom knew French and dad knew German but neither really knew Spanish! 

Pictures: Tyce from the annual for that year.  Me holding two of the horses, the early ones we had, at a water tank but do not think this was the mentioned spring. Yours truly but probably 8th grade rather than frosh year. Looking geeky!! That perm was awful! And last, me riding Tina in some of those rugged hills south of Jerome. 

Memoir Monay: Jan 18, 1961

 I just grab a year at random and find the date so there will be jumping around. Next time I will probably go back a few years. It is all for sh*ts and giggles anyway! 

"Jan 18, 1961                                                               Wednesday

Well it was back to school with me again. Evelyn (Graves) and Sharon (Paget) were both absent. We had a test in History and also a movie. I read "Shane" today. It is one of the best books I've read in a long time, a thoroughly different "western." I think I'll call Howard "Shane". If he has read the book he should be flattered. If I can find a copy in pocket book size, I'll send it to him.  The whole day passed quickly. On the way down home who should come whizzing around our bus but "Brick." He passed all four buses and kept going. It hit me again watching him, hit me more strongly than ever. Can I ever really give him up inside? I don't know but I'm afraid I can't. Someway I have to see him as soon as possible and talk to him. I have to see if he is really through with me but from the way he watches me in the rear view mirror and the way his hands tighten on the wheel I can hardly believe he is.  I got a letter from Jack Byers and Nicki B. I wrote several letters tonight. I have used up nearly $1.00 of stamps and and still haven't mailed off all my letters. Dad and I rode Cinder and Trixie out to the pasture where we fed the monsters. We always run all the way both ways. One of these days Cinder will beat Trix. She is fast but he is faster.  Well, I must be going. It is about my bed time. I'm tired as usual and rather thoroughly upset. Damn Brick, why did he have to come back now? If someone does not come along soon I will go back to him. I know it but I am helpless. Adios, Gaye"

Again  since most readers will not make much sense of this I'll try to explain--briefly! Okay, I was back in school as of the fall 1960 term, doing my junior year one late now. While I had been out of school I had  a letter in the pen pal column of Western Horseman magazine in the Junior Horseman section and had received scads of letters.  I tried to answer them all for awhile but finally had to pick and choose even if postage was pretty economical in those days. Howard was one I kept for quite awhile. He had cerebral palsy or epilepsy or something but was fascinated with cowboy stuff and interested in 'fast draw' and all that. He wore black all the time and I later made him a black gaberdine western shirt. 

Cinder and Trixie were two of the smaller cow pony sized mules we had gotten and were still working on and had not yet sold. The pasture was some land we leased out on the back side of Tuzigoot and we rode or drove out twice daily to feed and handle animals there. The road was round-about with several; gates so we usually rode down a dirt track and then along the river bank as the shortest route.

Brick (I used a lot of nicknames and code names in my journal just playing safe) was one of my inappropriate crushes who had flirted back with me quite a bit the previous summer and with whom I almost got into some serious trouble. I had told him to get lost but he still had a nearly fatal attraction for me. He was one of those 20-30 age bracket blue collar guys that I called "the young and restless," most of whom would say their wife was married but they weren't--and although I was 'jail bait' still, they were not above seeing how far they could go. I got into that rebellion the previous summer and skated some thin ice, my unofficial 'rumspringa' in response to a very strict home situation. I was not allowed to date at all through high school and had a very limited social life.

And some pictures; The first one is a drawing I did more or less of "Brick"  Next is that year's school photos of first Sharon Paget and second Evelyn (Graves) Morales since I mentioned them and last is me in our backyard in Clarkdale. That may have been the next year actually like winter 61/62. I did not get my school photo that year; cost and the fact I did not like it!! Normally I hated my photos!! 

es: 

Memoir Monday: Jan 11, 1960

 Here we go again! 

" January 11, 1960                                                                                                Monday

One of those awful rainy days when you can't do much except sit inside and suffer through it. I spent most of the morning sewing on the machine. I patched several pairs of levis and such. I ironed after lunch until Charlie-Mike came home from school. Then we played baseball out on the walk. The destruction crew was working down at the corner and WW kept standing out on the porch smoking cigarettes and staring at us. He gives me a great big pain. I forgot to mention yesterday that I saw this interesting guy at Safeway in Prescott. He was a solid middle sized guy with coppery hair, tanned and dressed in reel-heeled boots, a Lee jacket and the tightest Wranglers I ever saw on anyone. We listened to a lot of classical music and then finally hit a western program on KFI. Quite a change from Grieg and Dance of the Hours and Beethoven to Ferlin Husky etc.  No one can ever say that I just like one thing. I'm not narrow minded anyway. I didn't eat much today. I am trying to obey my father! It's getting pretty bad when the mules are allowed to eat more freely than a man's kids. So long, Gaye."

Okay--definitely some explanation or discussion needed. First this was the year I was out of school, at starting with being banged up badly in a riding accident and then spending the rest of the year working with dad on training a bunch of mules and a few horse that he had contracted for and planned to sell, mostly for 'big bucks' which idea met with  moderate success at best. I was definitely totally into 'cowboys' and totally out of people--male type--my own age bracket. I'd been doing an adult cowboy's  work myself  and was sure I had nothing to offer my contemporaries and they had less to offer me. I had already felt a bit of a misfit and this year certainly intensified that. 

Who was WW? I really do not recall but apparently one of a crew that was gutting and reworking one of the more trashed out houses in lower Clarkdale. I think the last folks who had lived there left it pretty well destroyed.  

On the term 'levis', that was what all of us to include those my age group generally called blue jeans regardless of the brand. The ones I repaired may have been Sears or J C Penney's or some cast offs from my two male cousins in California that their mom sent for us to wear. I did use brand names in some cases as in describing what the guy in the store had worn. My mom did not sew well nor want to so I took over the machine and made it mine starting in about 8th grade. 

The day before we had all gone to Prescott to put an advertisement for Western Horseman magazine in the mail after a big push to get it done and there for a deadline. On the way home Charlie-Mike and I got a lecture about "temperance and self discipline" which made me say dad should have been a "Holy Roller preacher." Lectures were not an unusual thing and got much for frequent and harsh in the next several years.  I probably weighed 115-120 at that time and was the tallest I had measured--lost an inch or so later--at 5'7"+ and Charlie-Mike was a skinny nine year old. We hardly ate like hogs but were told we needed to be less greedy. So I almost hunger-striked for a bit. Yes, we did not have a lot of money but that seemed a bit extreme. I was edging closer to some serious rebellion! 

The photos: The top one is Trixie. In her winter coat she looked like a fuzzy toy and she had that cute Arabian slightly dished face. I expect her mom was an Arab mare. BTW that is my favorite little saddle she is wearing. It was so light even with the full mule harness attached that I could get it up on the taller ones easily. Trix was barely 14 hands. The next is a photo that probably appeared in the ad we went to mail. It shows Mom holding Blackie and Cinder, Charlie-Mike with Beano and me with Jupiter and Trixie. By the end of that season, Blackie, Beano and Jupiter had all been sold. 

Memoir Monday-January 4, 1959

This is kind of fun. I don't know if my readers agree, but maybe I am just doing it for me. You think? So anyway here is January 4, 1959 which was apparently a Sunday. 

Jan 4, 59: Shod Tina in the back. Rode up on the Cement Hills and just missed Bryants. Watched "Maverick" as usual. It was quite funny,. Another episode featuring both of them. Those I go for. Glory, I hate the idea of going back to school. I'm spoiled, I guess. Viva vacations!

So to clarify. I was fifteen and a sophomore at Mingus, the first year that Cottonwood and Clarkdale/Jerome were consolidated. I had somewhat picked up my old crush on a former classmate from my years at Willard School in Bridgeport as he was a senior that year. (Name deleted to protect the guilty!) but it was not enough to make me really enjoy school. I much preferred to be out with my horses or mules and exploring, free of the rules and routine that school demanded. 

Tina of course was my beloved mare. She was four now and a big strong mare who could scramble over the rough ground with the best mules. The Cement Hills were those big white hills behind Clarkdale where the "C" was painted and where they began to mine limestone for the plant when it was built and started. We accessed them roundabout since the old smelter yard was still securely fenced but could go up at either the west or east side of that. They were a good rough place to ride, challenging in spots. 

The Bryants were friends. He was an old cowboy/horse trainer and a real horse whisperer who taught me so much about riding and training--more by example than any effort at teaching but that as fine.  He had been raised in south western New Mexico but came to Arizona when young. He had little formal schooling and did not read or write much but oh, he was a genius with the equines. He did not drive so his wife drove him around in their little old car although he rode most everywhere he went.  He always had a horse or two and was usually breaking or training one. And most of them were for guys half his age!! He was probably early 70s at this time. One of my youth's heroes. 

And I was in my TV westerns phase. We did not have a TV so I watched at some friends' homes and was probably a nuisance!! Big faves were Maverick and The Rifleman. Had a huge crush on Chuck Connors. 

Photos: Me on Tina, charging up a hill. She was always full speed ahead and not at all fearful of rough ground. Next two feature Charley Bryant. One I am beside him standing by our truck and the other he is on a big palomino he was training. Then a general view of Clarkdale. Those Cement Hills are behind the last smokestack at the smelter which stood for a few more years. The last was probably my school picture for the 58/59 year. I had just started to insist on letting my hair grow. It was pretty long my senior year. And I took my glasses off for pix as I hated them!! I also did not smile often for a photo as I hated my overlapped front teeth.

Memoir Monday: Dcember 28, 1957

 To carry on with the idea I started last week. Two years made a lot of difference in the way I wrote and to some degree what I spoke about.  In 1956, I got the first really "my own horse" and she has now assumed a big place in my life! Chores were becoming a much bigger aspect too, mostly centering around the animals we had, the two old mares, a mule and my filly. I was now fourteen and in high school but was edging into  the 'cowboy girl' life and persona that I lived under for a good ten years. 

Dec 28: Got up medium. Usual horse chores. Ate breakfast.  Out to work. Sawed several logs. Went riding. Worked them out real good. When we got back Mom said Charles Ortmann had been by. I guess he got my letter. I hated to miss him. Poor guy, I guess he hated to miss Tina. Mom said he had on a red, white and blue shirt with the cuffs double rolled. No, no, no. Ate lunch. Papa left. Mike and I stacked wood. I did the horse chores. Came in and took a bath.Papa came home. Greenough was feeling pretty good. He had gotten my Christmas card and note and appeared to enjoy them. He is so lonely. I really feel quite sorry for him. I am glad I sent the card. Perhaps it cheered him a little. He is old enough to be my grandfather. Well, adios, Luz/Gayle/Peg/Tal. (I used a lot of nicknames!)

Okay, now for the 'splaing! Tina was the mare I got; she had come to me as an eight month old filly in February 1956 and was now two and half and by now was fairly well trained. Charles Ortmann was who I got her from. He was working as a cowboy at  the Miller Ranch and had supposedly been a concert violinist. I think health forced him to retire from that.  He was still very interested in how Tina was doing and I had a slight crush on him.  

By now I was making my own Christmas cards and sending them off to some of my heroes and friends.. Mr Greenough, a guest ranch operator and lion hunter, was a friend of Dad's.  I had a crush on him too even if he was, as I admit, old enough to be my grandfather--probably early 70s at this point. The wood mentioned was for the heating stove in the living room of the  house--we got our own fuel from a number of place and Charlie Mike and I were responsible for most of the cutting and bringing in work.  Apparently I did not think the rolled cuff idea was cool; that is all I can figure from that. Clearly Christmas had slid into past history three days afterwards although that year I had received some nice things to include a new hat and a nice work and study table that dad had made for me.

Now for a few pictures. The first is me and Tina , in the summer of 1957 when I had begun to ride her regularly. The next is me and my friend Evelyn Graves. She had borrowed a pair of my jeans to wear and we were going to go riding. Then the notorious Mr Greenough. An odd connection, Evelyn's older sister Shirley had worked for Mr Greenough at his ranch for a number of years and inherited part of it when he died. Dad had made the stock for the rifle he is carrying and given it to him as a gift. Dad did several very beautiful gun stocks and gave to friends and one for his own .257 which was later stolen and we never got it back.

Memoir--not-Monday

 I've been working on my memoir as a 'big project' this year since fiction and poetry just do not want to flow.  I suspect my muse has Covid-itis and maybe political allergies and has gone into a deep hibernation to try to recover. Anyway, even my urge to do essays be they a look at some past matter or a diatribe, has flagged a bit. Therefore since I do not want my favorite blog to wither I've sought a new inspiration. I started keeping a diary/journal on June 1, 1955. I had just turned twelve years old a month before and was a sixth grader at a small rural school where my dad was my teacher. 

So on December 22,  1955:  Didn't do much. No fun. Got a letter from Heidi. Went to the Xmas celebration in the park.

What does that recall?  At that age 'fun' is rather important so the absence of any was worth noting. Since school was several miles down the valley and none of my school friends lived nearby, I may have a been lonely. I did have a few local girl friends in Clarkdale having lived there for about two years at this point. Evelyn Graves and Arlene Blahnik come to mind. Perhaps they were busy elsewhere. I think Loretta Watson, my first Clarkdale friend, was gone by then and the two horses we had owned for about two years were pastured down near the school so I could not go riding.

Heidi was Heidi Carter, an early pen-pal. She was the niece of the Ireys who had a ranch across the river from Cottonwood and we had known them for awhile. Heidi lived in La Jolla, CA but had visited the previous summer when we met, two horse-loving girls who formed a friendship and vowed to keep in touch. We corresponded sporadically for quite awhile but I do not recall we ever met face to face again. 

The celebration in the park refers to the central park of Clarkdale which is perhaps a quarter acre square with grass and trees and a gazebo or band stand in the center.I really cannot quite picture the event but I think Santa was there and probably small treats were handed out to the kids. There was probably some music like a choir from a local church or some other group singing and maybe even the Clarkdale High band played.  Brother Charlie who had been born in November of 1951 was now four and I imagine I took him up town for the event. Our house was on Lower Main so it was maybe a half mile walk mostly uphill, to get to the park. 

So long ago! Memory is not too detailed from those days and the small notes I was keeping do not tell much that can awaken them. I can find a few of photos, so let me share them. 

In order of their appearance. Riding down at "the ranch"--20 acres the family had bought south of the area where the school was. I was riding Lady and dad was on Chindy with Charlie perched in front of him. I was already very much into horses!  The next shot is Heidi Carter and her brothers and their dog. She gave this to me as a keepsake. And last is yours truly; I think this was 4th or 5th grade but it was undated and looks a bit younger than I would have been in 1955, then twelve. I did not have any more school photos until the start of 7th grade. 

Sky Watching

 When did I become fascinated with the sky? It's been so long I cannot begn to pinpoint the date. I "always" loved sunsets and then when I was barely a teen the 'space race' began and I started to look for and at the satellites, the ones humanity added to those a Higher Power had given us. Also the moon, the stars, and now and then a UFO. 

Then when I was briefly an Air Force Historian I was assigned a project to write a history of the Spacetrack program to date (c: 1975). About the same time my late hubby gave me my very first astronomical telescope. Between those two 'chance' events, I turned a much more serious eye to the sky. I will never forget the first time I found Saturn in that scope. I gasped at the beauty and felt a sharp pang of sadness--it looked so far away and so alone out there in the big dark sky. 

For a couple of years I looked at many things with the scope and marveled at the accuity of the Baker-Nunn cameras that were one of the main devices with which the growing number of--and possible threat from--man made satellites were followed, catalogued and observed. Colorado was too cold to be out in the winter but I became friends with the summer sky and its constellations and the varying tracks of the eight planets that each marched to their own drummer. I also began to regret my stubborn and foolish rejection of math and science during my schooling because there was so much of astronomy  I had trouble understanding. To this day that gap bothers me but lacking the groundwork to build from it is hard to delve deeper into the celestial mechanics and other scientific aspects.

Then in 1977 we moved to north central California where the summer nights were the nicest time of the day and the cold did not set in nearly as early. Never much of a TV fan, I preferred to be outdoors from dusk to bedtime. My husband felt the same way. Almost all summer, to include the late spring and long fall, we spent most evenings in the front yard sprawled on a tarp looking up. Summers were very dry there so rain or even clouds rarely interfered with the view. I grew acquainted with more stars and more constellations and watched the bright fast 'stars' of the satellites zip across the sky. We counted them. I think once or twice we saw as many 25-30 in a night. At times we saw meteors and maybe once or twice space debris coming in, blazing as it hit the atmosphere. Once a glimpse of the northern lights, oddly red, that no one else ever noted anywhere but I am sure that was what they were. 

Then in 1983 we came back to Arizona and moved our watching to the back yard at our home in  Whetstone, just north of Huachcua City.  There was little light pollution in the area and viewing was fine though now summer evenings could be interrupted with lightning which we also enjoyed watching until it got too close.  I had gotten frustrated with the small, basically kid-level telescopes and especially the never-quite-steady mounts and tripods but the real good ones were too costly. Then we made friends with a guy who had an 8" Celestron that had become to heavy for him and his bad back to manage. I traded him a couple of my late father's professional level cameras and got that scope.  

Wow, a whole new universe! Oddly the scope featured a Schmidt-Cassegrain lens system, the same style of magnification that was the centerpiece of the Baker-Nunns. That was compact, efficient and made the scope itself very short for the power it had. The tripod was solid and the mount an engineering  wonder. We did a lot of looking with that instrument to include several eclipses and a comet or two as well as the stars and planets. 

From Wickapedia, an explanation of the system: The Cassegrain reflector is a combination of a primary concave mirror and a secondary convex mirror, often used in optical telescopes and radio antennas, the main characteristic being that the optical path folds back onto itself, relative to the optical system's primary mirror entrance aperture. This design puts the focal point at a convenient location behind the primary mirror and the convex secondary adds a telephoto effect creating a much longer focal length in a mechanically short system.^[1]

That scope was set up and we had watched a partial moon eclipse the night before Jim fell ill with the beginning of his fatal heart attack in November 2003. In a day or two I wrapped a tarp over the scope and it sat there for some time before I finally took it down. I really have only set it up once or twice since. Somehow watching alone is not the same and I no longer lie out on the grass looking up at night for the same reason. It's been seventeen years now. 

I always intended to set the scope up in Alamogordo for the eight years I was there but the light pollution locally was too much and the scope was getting heavy for me, too. When we got ready to move to Arizona in the fall of 2019, I disassembled the whole tripod and mount. It is still heavy and awkward but packed and shipped easier. For the most part our skies here in J-6 ranches are dark and unobstructed and I do go out and look up some evenings for awhile. The head meteorologist on KGUN TV that we watch always mentions neat astronomical stuff that he recommends folks look for.  I once kind of glimpsed this summer's comet but the clouds and Tucson glow made it hard to find. 

in time I may put my big scope up once more--if I can remember how it all goes together. The electronic tracker is too old now to calibrate for the current sky but that would not be a major issue.  And it will be willed to one of my grandsons or even great grands if they show an interest as it is still a fine instrument. 

I will never tire of watching the sky, and the memories I have made over the years will certainly go to the last breath with me. If there was nothing to look at but the sky I could be almost contented. The wonders and beauty and breathtaking fierceness of it all, the vastness, the curiosity--it all draws me very strongly. I cannot afford it but I would love to be on that first or even a later space ship trip that may be available to the public in the fairly near future. I envy the astronauts for that chance to look back at our planet from some distant point.  One little green, blue and white ball, third out from Father Sun... yes, I am definitely solar-centric and sun-powered but I know even it is just one small speck of light in that vast infinity. Who else may be looking back from their distant world and wondering about this one? Maybe we will meet on the other side.