by Baxter Black
It could have been in Perryton, Texas, Philip, South Dakota, Grover, Colorado, or a million other places where trees are not taken for granted.
Elm trees probably came with the settlers. They took root and made many a squatter’s nest a home. They lined the streets in towns that were to be. They staked a claim for civilization.
Nowadays, lots of folks consider the elm tree a pest, a “trash tree.” They are exterminated from well-kept lawns where the flowering ash and weeping willow are given a manicured stage. And for good reason. Elm trees send out suckers. They have lots of deadfall. They shed, pollinate, and break. They are susceptible to beetles, fungus, and horses. Some might say they are ugly and have outlived their usefulness.
But, ya know, it’s hard to kill an elm tree. I’ve even taken to planting them around my place. I kinda admire something that can take everything God and man can throw at ’em and still keep comin’.
Shade don’t come easy on the high plains. It takes a pretty hardy people to survive.
It’s a wonder no one gets hurt out here!
GIMP
I was out in the driveway scattering stove ash when I heard the geese. It was three days until the end of the season, and I was still 0 for 6. They rose from the field to the north, squawking raucously and aiming straight over the house.
I dropped the coal bucket in the snow and raced back in the front door! I careened off the furniture like a bad billiard shot! At the back door, I grabbed the big twelve gauge leaning against the wall and three shells that I had conveniently placed on the top of the window ledge. Crashing off the back porch, I loaded the gun with the relaxed ease of a thirteen-year-old on his first date! The geese beat the air above me as I swung the shotgun skyward. Boom! Boom! The geese sailed over the barn like a giant manta ray. Nary a feather fluttered to the ground, but my two horses thundered from the barn!
I was in a funk that evening when I went to feed. But I noticed that my new rope horse was packin’ his right hind. After a thorough lameness exam, I concluded he musta slid on the ice and pulled a muscle. Possibly, I admitted, the result of a sudden fright.
Join the club. My old dog, Boller, was favoring his left front. Considering his long history of bein’ shot and run over, I wasn’t surprised.
The cat Lefty got stepped on a couple years ago, and the doc amputated her right hind.
Adding my bilateral bursitis, Dionicio’s bad back, and my teenager’s loss of memory, my place looks like a World War I field hospital. It’s a hazard of country life.
My friend Charlie has a cowdog named Gimp. Charlie has established a breeding program and now has produced a litter of pups that all limp. He wrote me of his success, predicting that he will make a million selling them to cowmen. His theory is that it will save an enormous amount of time getting a cowdog to the bum leg-ged stage.
And, he stressed, it is humane, since they won’t have to go through the agony of getting injured in the first place. He says that a gimpy dog will be more cautious around kicking cows, truck tires, bangin’ chutes, and cattle alleys. They can get right down to business.
It might be a good idea, but Charlie, like me, is gettin’ a little long in the tooth. We’re getting too practical. Playin’ it safe. Goin’ to bed early and eating our prunes. We’re thinkin’ like old dogs.
Young dogs think work is play. They turn over a new rock every day as they discover their world. Kinda like the thrill I got when I saw those geese fill the sky. Innocent wonderment. Made me feel like a puppy again.
Like I said, it’s a wonder no out gets hurt out here!
COWHIDE ON THE SOLES OF HIS BOOTS
I wanna tell y’all a true story that happened to a friend of mine. Big Jim was judgin’ the rodeo at Burlington last year. They call him Big Jim ’cause he’s big as a round bale and twice as tough. But he don’t move quite as fast as he did in his ol’ bronc-ridin’ days.
Big Jim’s always had a way with animals. He roped a skunk one time when he was a little boy and drug it home. His dad made him unsaddle a hundred yards from the house. Jim said his ol’ pony walked right into the pond and stuck his whole head under the water . . . several times. He finally sold the saddle. Two years later. In the winter.
They claim he and his dog, Pat, cornered a three-hundred-pound wild boar in a thicket unarmed and did him in with his Barlow.
So Big Jim is used to animals behavin’ peculiar around him.
The stock contractor told Jim that his blue mare would buck out and come round to the right. Jim positioned himself to see when the saddle bronc rider marked ’er out. The rider called for the horse.
Out they came, pitchin’ and rollin’. The cowboy was spurrin’ fer all he was worth, and the ol’ mare was feelin’ her oats. She bucked toward Big Jim. He backed up. She kept comin’ toward him. He kept backin’ up till he was backed up against the front of the chute.
Ol’ Blue stuck her head right against Big Jim’s chest and pinned him to the fence! She had her mouth wide open and was squealin’ like a cheerleader at the high school basketball finals. She was strikin’ and pawin’ and flailin’ on both sides of his rigid body. Splinters and sparks were flyin’ off both sides of Big Jim’s head.
He daren’t move a muscle. He was less than three feet from the dumbfounded bronc stomper who was still spurrin’ like a hound dog in a gopher hole! They were lookin’ at each other with Pekingese eyes.
Silver and horsehair were flashin’ and flyin’ in furious strokes as the rider continued to try to impress the judge. It can be said that he certainly had his attention. This continued for a three-second eternity, then the mare fell back, wheeled, and mule-kicked at the petrified judge. Both hooves hit the chute simultaneously on each side of Jim’s head at eye level. Then she bucked off down the arena.
The other judge come runnin’ over. “Are ya OK? Could ya see what happened? Was he spurrin’ on both sides? How’d ya mark ’im?”
“Wull,” said Big Jim, “I know the kid’s got the makin’s of a bronc rider. He had his toes pointed out so far that from where I was standin’, I could read ‘genuine cowhide’ on the soles of his boots!”
“Timed event” rodeo cowboys compete in the roping and bulldogging events. They must pull a horse trailer from rodeo to rodeo in order to compete. It takes more effort, but they consider themselves the rodeo elite. The bronc riders and bullriders are a more low-maintenance group and are not really sure what ropers do for fun.
TIMED EVENT MAN
In the world of rodeo, cowboys usually fall into one of two categories: rough stock riders or timed event men. Each looks on the other with suspicion. Bronc riders can’t imagine havin’ to drag a horse and trailer all over the country, and ropers think bull riding is uncivilized!
Jack and Russell entered the punkin roller at Bokchito, Oklahoma. They were both sixteen and invincible! On arrival, they discovered a mix-up. Jack was entered in the bareback and Russell in the calf roping. Jack complained, “I told Mr. Ward to put me in the calf ropin’ and Russell was ridin’ bares! Besides, Russell’s bought a brand-new riggin’!” Which of course he had! Not only that, Russell had a new set of custom-made bronc spurs and had just attended Mel Autry’s rodeo school!
The secretary glared at him and growled, “Well, Jack, you better see if it fits your hand, ’cause I ain’t changin’ the order!”
They stomped around cussing the contractor, the secretary, their luck, and each other’s event. But as the eight-track played the national anthem, Jack was down in the chute tryin’ to pound his left hand into Russell’s right-hand riggin’!
Minnie Mouse was an eight-hundred-pound grulla mare. Jack made some comment about stick horses and Shetlands. ’Bout not wantin’ to hurt her. Russell ignored him. Jack was sorta scratchin’ his spurs a little and thinkin’, By, gosh, this ain’t bad! I’m winnin’ the bareback! Easier than I thought.
At the quarter-mile pole, Minnie Mouse bogged her head, planted her front feet, and exploded in midair! By the time she lit
on all fours again, Jack had both legs on the left side and was laid across her like a roll of carpet!
He couldn’t get his hand free! With all his weight stickin’ out like a wind vane on the starboard side, he began to drag the little mare right. From his vantage point on the wing tip, Jack could see the arena fence flashing by at eye level. He was stuck hard and fast and pulling her closer and closer. Big square ties and net wire began clickin’ by like a railroad bed.
Gosh, he thought, I hope it’s cheap wire. . . .
He needn’t have worried. He hit a tie! The collision was so calamitous it knocked the mare down!
At the conclusion of this spectacular exhibition, the crowd applauded wildly. As Jack hobbled out the gate, a man in yellow boots and a bolo tie asked him where he was gonna be appearing next.
Standing in the parking lot after the rodeo, Jack observed what a sorry job Russell had done in the calf roping.
Russell studied his pardner. Jack’s shirt flapped in tatters on his right shoulder. The off side of his head looked like somebody had hit him with a fourteen-inch rasp and his arms no longer hung symmetrically. Russell figgered the eyebrow would grow back.
“Ya know,” said Russell, “I never could get too excited about ropin’ calves but after seein’ you ride, I might switch. Wanna buy a riggin’? Only been used once.”
It is said that some academics or lawyers relish a good debate and can be quite ferocious, yet it is all done without malice. This story about John could sure be true. . . . I knew his brother.
SEMI-TOUGH
Jack was lamenting the way pro rodeo had changed. He said in the old days it attracted a “less sophisticated” participant, though certainly a more colorful one! Back in the days of six-and-a-half-foot bareback riders and bronc riders, who drank the champagne and ate the glass!
He told me a tale about a Montana cowboy. He told me several tales, but this one is fit to pass along.
John was big, slow talkin’, and easy to entertain. He’d been workin’ his way home and had made a hundred miles in two weeks. This particular afternoon, he was passing time in a cowboy bar in Whitehall.
A tourist came into the bar and ordered a beer. Since John was the only other patron, the tourist slid over and opened the conversation. “Whyn’t we push arms for a round?” John looked at the big ol’ boy and drawled, “By gosh, sounds good to me.”
They put their elbows on the bar and clasped hands. John thumped the tourist’s hand on the bar so hard, the cigarette fell outta the moose head’s lips!
“I wuddn’t ready,” complained the tourist as he looked at his bleeding knuckles. “Let’s do it again.”
“By gosh,” says John, “sounds good to me.”
This time, John bent the tourist’s wrist into the shape of a G and flattened his class ring!
“How ’bout a finger pull?” challenged the good-natured tourist. “By gosh,” says John, “sounds good to me.”
They locked fingers, and John jerked him off his bar stool and outta his Acme stovepipes!
“Maybe you’d like to rassle for a round?”
“By gosh, sounds good to me.”
John thrashed the poor feller around the bar, tipping over the pool table, breaking the front window, and scattering chairs all the way to Three Forks! Finally the puffing tourist raised a protesting paw, and John released him. There was an 8.20 X 15 tread imprint on his forehead and a tooth mark on his right ankle where John had chewed through his boot!
“Do ya box?”
“By gosh, sounds good to me.”
The tourist squared off in time to see a big fist at close range. He went backwards like a bent sapling, sprang back, and took a left cross in the other eye.
The tourist stood there with two black eyes, a bloody nose, sawdust stickin’ to his sweaty back, and nothin’ left of his shirt but collar and cuffs!
“I guess I better be goin’.” The tourist smiled and offered his hand.
John shook it and said sincerely, “By gosh, if ya ever git back . . . stop.”
This is not a bar like T.G.I. Friday’s or Hooters, where you can get designer beer and put it on a credit card. They don’t take checks or have a dartboard. Either one would make it too easy to commit a felony.
MIDNIGHT AT THE OASIS (BAR)
“It’s midnight at the Oasis, and I’ve been here since nine . . .”
The Oasis Bar, perhaps you’ll recognize it. It looks like this: gravel parking lot, cinder block building, bars on the windows. A neon sign with at least three of the letters working at any given time and the inevitable palm trees. You walk up to the door and there’s a sign on it that says USE OTHER DOOR.
“Everyone’s still in their places. I know ’cause I’m still in mine . . .”
You walk around to the other door. There’s a sign on it that says WATCH YER STEP, and there ain’t no step! As you press through the door into the cozy surroundings, you notice that one of the regulars has stuck a cigarette butt in the moose head’s lips and the hair has worn off its wattle. There’s duct tape on the pool table, KWITCHURBELLYAKIN behind the bar, blue spots on the ceiling, and a guy asleep under the shuffleboard.
“The pickin’s ain’t great . . .”
Pinto and I wrote a song called “Midnight at the Oasis (Bar).” It’s about the kind of place I described. We figured it was highly unlikely that Barry Manilow or Madonna would cut it, so Pinto did. It’s hard for non-big-timers to get the radio play necessary to sell records, so we decided to promote his classic honky-tonk song another way. We would send a copy of the record to every Oasis Bar in the Western Hemisphere. They could put it on their jukebox.
“. . . but they never were . . .”
So I wrote a friendly letter to the Liquor Control Board in every state capital, asking for their computerized list of Oasis Bars and their addresses. The response was overwhelming! More than forty states wrote back and wished us good luck. Plus friends and folks have been sending us addresses of Oasis Bars in their hometowns.
“. . . out here where the buffalo roam . . .”
Eleven P.M., elbow-deep in barflies, beer dryin’ on yer lap, seven dollars wadded up in yer shirt pocket, and hope in yer heart. If you’ve been there, this song is dedicated to you.
“. . . and it’s midnight at the Oasis, and nobody’s goin’ home.”
Although I have logged many thousands of miles on airplanes in coach crisscrossing the United States and also Canada, I rarely go overseas. I’m not sure how much sense this story makes, but it describes my mental numbness.
JET LAG DIARY
This huge draft horse of an airplane takes off from the Sydney airport. Australia, not Nebraska. It’s too big to be real. It’s like a Popular Mechanics prediction. I have no idea how it flies. Magic, the flight attendant said.
I have deprived myself of sleep last night in an effort to trick my body clock. I set my watch to Colorado time. One-thirty P.M., Sydney time, becomes 9:30 P.M. the night before. At midnight, by my watch, I doze off . . . for four hours. My eyes itch, my muscles ache, and my brain thinks it’s noon!
This morning I woke at 4:00 A.M. I lay there waiting for the sun to come up. By 5:00, I was out in the driveway, diggin’ up an electrical wire I’d buried with the water line to Dionicio’s casita. It is in a trench five inches wide and four feet deep! By 6:15, I was back inside and called everyone I could think of who might be up. They weren’t!
Last night, I dozed off during supper. I’m dreaming Australian dreams. Kangaroos stick up out of the tall grass like young boys wearing Mickey Mouse ears. We top a dirt track doing 70 kph to find the road filled with sheep! I’m trying to adjust to the weightless stirrups of the Australian stock saddle.
STILL WAKING UP AT 4:00 A.M.! I find the shorted-out splice in my buried wire about 5:30 A.M. I walk down to the pasture to check on the two ol’ cows left to calve. I think I see a kangaroo on the slope above the creek. By 3:00 in the afternoon, my eyes are burning and my brain is mush! I vow to stay awak
e till 10:00 P.M. By 6:00, I’m asleep in my chair.
Tonight I’m tellin’ my poetry to the cowboys in Clay Center. It’s hot. We’re all sweating. My body is fighting my memory for control. I forget a line.
Last night, I dreamed I was laying in the muck with my arm up a cow, trying to bring the calf’s malpresented head around. The two Australian vets who had generously offered to allow me to show ’em the “American way” were solicitously bracing my feet and encouraging my efforts. I woke with my right arm tangled in the sheets and my wife standing beside the bed with a surprised look on her face!
I slept twelve hours straight! Woke up at 11:00 A.M. It’s suppertime now, and I’m still goin’ strong. Maybe I’m back on track.
After giving some clear-headed thought to my jet lag problem, I’ve concluded that it’s no wonder I was in such a state. I spent so much time down under, all the blood ran to my head!
I never really thought about the muckety-mucks who play polo as being cowboys, but after riding a mile in their jodhpurs, I’m convinced they are.
THE POLO CLUB
“. . . The game was so terrific that ere half the time was gone / A spectator’s leg was broken just from merely looking on.” So wrote Banjo Paterson in his famous Australian poem, “The Geebung Polo Club.”
Sounds pretty rough, I thought as I drove up to the Denver Polo Club for my initiation. I’d played cowboy polo, which is like playing croquet with hand grenades. But real polo had to be different.
Pictures in the polo magazines showed aristocrats drinking champagne and charging San Juan Hill. Advertisers included Rolex, Mercedes Benz, and hotels in Switzerland. I glanced down at my chinks and Wranglers, suddenly conscious that my jodhpurs were in the laundry! I was thankful that I had worn my official R.M. Williams Australian stockman shoes.
My first concern was that I had never in my life sat in an English saddle. My second was that I was as left-handed as the AFL-CIO.