Kents space

            For quite a few years, we have made an annual pilgrimage to Idaho…land of potatoes.  Our daughter’s husband and in-laws used to grow spuds and we would, each fall, go and bring a load home for us and our children.   A few years ago they quit raising potatoes, instead, opting to raise sugar beets and grain.  With their connection to neighbors who still raise potatoes, we still make our annual trip to that neighboring state to bring home the food staple that almost all of us like.

            When the apple crop in our orchard is abundant, we take apples with us so they can have and share in our harvest.  This was one of those years when we had plenty of apples, so I took apples to Idaho and brought spuds back.

            The difference this year was that we weren’t able to spend as much time visiting our family there.  We didn’t arrive until late evening on Friday and only stayed until noon on Saturday.

            Before leaving for Idaho, with work matters pressing me, I had to squeeze a whole day of work into five hours.  This consisted of sending out my billings so I can get paid next month, picking up supplies for the jobs, picking up the payroll, going to a job where I had to make sure my electrical boxes and pipes were properly installed in the brick, dig a trench, bore under a walkway, install the conduit and bury it and grade the area that I dug.  Having done this, I still had to clean out my truck, load the apples and shower and clean up before we could leave.  When all this was done, I was so tired that my whole body ached, so instead of leaving when Nan got home from work, I had to have a short "power nap" to insure my alertness for the drive.

             With slow traffic due to an accident and an area of road construction, the drive took an extra forty five minutes.  We didn’t arrive until almost 7:00 PM.  Not getting any younger, I felt exhausted when we arrived and was more than happy to plop down in a soft chair in front of the TV until supper was ready to eat.  Waiting for dinner, I was nodding off, the fatigue wreaking havoc on my aching and tired body.

            Not wanting to miss some visiting with my daughter and grandkids, I continued to stay up and visit after supper.   

I have a grandson, eight years young, who is unusually perceptive when it comes to sensing others needs.  He seems to see the needs of others when it isn’t always obvious to the rest of us.  He will see someone loaded down or in a wheel chair, and go out of his way to open a door or do something to ease their burden.  If someone drops something, he is the first to assist them in picking up their goods.  It seems that he can perceive how people are doing or feeling.

            Now, I’m not saying that this young man is perfect.  He throws tantrums, and is mischievous as most any young man can be at that age.  He can hold his own while fighting with his brothers and sister.  When invited to do chores, sometimes it takes reminding him a few times…Just a normal kid.

            When the noise of the grandchildren and the TV got to be a bit too much for me, I decided to go to the shop where I knew my son-in-law was working.  As I headed out the door, Austin decided to join me.  He didn’t ask, only stated that he was going with me.

            My son-in-law and I get along really well, and we had a nice visit as he changed the oil on a tractor prior to the next morning’s work in the fields.  As I stood and visited with my son-in-law, Austin was spinning around in the shop on a John Deere tricycle that has seen a lot of use and abuse for several years.

            Still tired and aching from the work and drive, even though I was enjoying the visit, I was really starting to hurt.  I heard a noise from across the shop and here comes Austin with a chair.  It was one on wheels like we use in an office and the wheels were noisy in the concrete shop floor.  He pushed it over to me without saying a word.  I sat in it and relaxed, glancing at him sitting next to me on the John Deere tricycle.  He was busy watching his dad put the six gallons of oil in the tractor.  I gently reached over and touched his ear to get his attention, and told him “thank you”.  This perceptive young man casually said “you’re welcome” as natural as if it was part of his normal conversation. 

            Austin, with his intuition to help those in need, had again found a recipient for his good deeds.   Fetching a chair for someone, hurting and tired, will never be forgotten. 

            I’m sure his parents are proud of him.  He’s a fine son to them, one I am proud to call a grandson. 

            This coming weekend is the annual deer hunt.  For as long as I can remember, it has always started at daylight on the third weekend in October.  There was a time when I spent time and money planning for this big event, but that was years ago.  The feeling is upon me that sometime I would like to go again…not to shoot anything, but to spend that time with those I love.

            I’m reminded of the Players.  I spent some wonderful times hunting with them.  They hunted the same place for many years and probably still do.  Garnet, the dad, even in his old age would come on the hunt, if only to stay in camp and cook.  It was an annual event and a great opportunity to spend time with his sons, and eventually grandsons too.  Garnet died the day before the deer hunt a few years ago.  His sons and grandsons went on the hunt as usual, spending the evening before opening day of the hunt, reminiscing about all the years and the good times they were able to spend together and with him.

            As a youngster, when I finally reached the legal age to hunt, and having obtained the proper permits, I purchased a hunting rifle and my father took me into the mountains to hunt.  He hadn’t hunted in years, and probably was not a very good hunter, but wanting to spend time with me and allow me the opportunity, we drove some back roads to likely looking area.

            I would state here that my father was no youngster.  He was forty years old when I was born.   He had worked hard all his life, and had a few health issues…although not severe.  I didn’t think much about him hiking around the hills at his age because he was very active at his construction job and probably in good shape.

            Dad sent me ahead to an area he thought would likely produce a buck and he said he would catch up with me in a while.  He wanted to take it slow and enjoy a slow hike.  Anxious as I was to shoot my first deer, I hurried ahead and spent a good deal of time overlooking a little clearing and the draws leading to it.  I don’t even recall how long I looked and watched and waited, but I never saw a single solitary deer.  I waited quite some time, but dad never did catch up.  I thought that perhaps he took a different turn and didn’t know where I was.  Finally I decided to go find him so we could spend the time together.

            As I retraced my route from the clearing to the truck, I passed through a stand of aspen with a few golden leaves on the trees, but mostly a thick blanket of them on the ground.  It was hard not to make a lot of noise walking in those dry leaves.  It was there that I found dad.  I thought he had died of a heart attack.  He was laying face down with his face in the leaves like he had fallen.  I hurried to his side and called “dad”.  He rolled over and sat up, blinking the sleep from his eyes. 

            To this day, I don’t know if he fell, passed out or if he had just lain down and went to sleep, but to my relief, he woke up.

            I wish I knew where that place was.  I know the general area, but of course that was somewhere around forty five years ago and I just can’t pinpoint it in my mind.  Now, the reason I would again like to find it isn’t for sentimental reasons.  When hiking down the trail that many years ago, there were white quartz rocks beside the trail, and they had little veins of gold in them.  At the time, I just passed it off as “fools” gold, but now when I think back on it, I could have passed up the real thing.  I’ll never know for sure, and it would be a “fools” errand for me to spend my time looking for something I know so little about.

            My dad had an uncle whom he loved, and he even worked for him for a period of time.  This uncle loved to hunt and fish.  Dad once asked him “Uncle Will, what are you going to do if you die and on the other side there isn’t any hunting and fishing?”  His uncle replied “you know, when I was a kid, there wasn’t anything better than playing a game of marbles with my friends…but I grew up.”

             I hope I am wise enough to spend my remaining years looking for and developing treasures that I can take with me when I depart this life…knowledge, love, patience, brotherly kindness, and most of all, gratitude for the blessings given my by a loving Heavenly Father.

            In Matthew 6 it says:  

 19 ¶ Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal:

 20 But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:        

            Last night I visited Howard who is eighty eight years old.  I visit him regularly  because he likes someone to talk to.  Having outlived all but one sibling, a son and his wife, life gets lonely.  I would like to think that we can learn from the experiences life has given him.  Some of his life experiences I have heard a few times and others like the one he related last night were new and thought provoking to me.

            A few months before the end of WWII, he was working with an engineering battalion a few miles outside of Paris France.  He participated in the building of different structures, bridges and roads.

            One day, after much stormy weather, the roads were muddy and really a mess.  He was assigned, along with another soldier to take a truck and some German prisoners to an area a short distance away to get some sand for the muddy roads.  The prisoners were given shovels and were to load the truck with some sand from a hillside.  Because of the wet weather, the other soldier stayed in the truck while Howard stood by the hillside with his carbine, watching the prisoners load the truck.  He didn’t see it coming…one of the prisoners rushed him and knocked him down.  Dazed, and trying to get his bearings, it was then, that he realized that part of the sandbank on the hillside had caved in.  Had he remained where he had been standing, he would have been crushed.  The prisoner helped him up, brushed him off and then leaned over, picked up his carbine rifle, brushed the sand off of it and handed it to him.  The prisoner then went back to his shovel.

            The thought then came to Howard that these prisoners were people just like him.  They were patriotic people, serving their country just like him, and probably didn’t want the war anymore then he did. 

            Having listened to this tale, my thoughts reverted to my all time favorite scene from a movie.  In the movie “The Outlaw Josey Wales”, Josey confronts the   Comanche Chief “ Ten Bears"  The dialogue that follows comes from that meeting.

Josey Wales: That's true. I ain't promising you nothing extra. I'm just giving you life and you're giving me life. And I'm saying that men can live together without butchering one another.

Ten Bears: It's sad that governments are chiefed by the double tongues. There is iron in your words of death for all Comanche to see, and so there is iron in your words of life. No signed paper can hold the iron. It must come from men. The words of Ten Bears carries the same iron of life and death. It is good that warriors such as we meet in the struggle of life... or death. It shall be life.

         Mutual respect applies to all generations and peoples.  Governments would do well to learn of the “iron in your words.”  In other words “honesty and respect.”

Ever since my son was a couple of years old, we’ve been attending the annual “fathers and sons” outing.  Some years it has been held in the mountains, sometimes in the desert and this year, at Rockport Reservoir.  The campground was nice and clean, the outhouses were clean but smelled.  Some years we had a camper, some we had a camp trailer or a tent trailer, but this year we just had a tent.

            We didn’t get an early start and didn’t feel like cooking, so we decided to stop and buy a burger before making the drive.  We sat and visited while we ate.  The burgers were big but a little greasy and we ate too much.  We had to stop and get some ice so we stopped at the local Maverik for that.  Dinner was too much for Ben and he headed for the restroom where he tossed his cookies.  Feeling much better, we made the drive to the camp ground. 

The years when we had a camper, we would bake chocolate chip cookies and eat them hot with cold milk before retiring.  Since we didn’t have the means to cook them, we bought cookies and just had cold ones with milk before we went to bed.  In fact, we brought way too many snacks, most of which went unopened.

            After an evening of activities and watching the stars, we finally retired for the night.  We weren’t as prepared as we should have been, because it got cold.  We both got cold in the night, but especially Ben did.  At around 5:00 AM, Ben got up, watered a tree and came back to bed.  He borrowed my extra cover and was trying to sleep.  Nature was calling me, so at 5:30 I decided to get up.  I dressed and threw the extra sleeping bag on Ben to help him get warm.  I used the smelly outhouse, and then trying to be really quiet, I went to the truck to get a drink and    to get some paper to help starting a fire with.

            Living in the vicinity of some retail spaces and across the street from a church, I have sometimes been annoyed by people who inadvertently have set off their car alarms.  It seems that sometimes they don’t realize that it is their car, so it keeps on honking for quite some time.  In fact, I’ve accidently pressed the button on my key while our car was in our garage, disturbing my family.  In the dark, I’ve pressed the button, while using Nan’s car, being unfamiliar with her key.

            I’ve been driving my truck for two years and have never had an experience quit like this one.  There was a tent about twenty yards in front of the truck, and not wanting to wake the people in that tent with my truck lights, I decided to unlock the truck with the key instead of the keyless entry.  To my surprise, the truck started making little quick horn sounds so I pushed the red button on my key to quiet the honking.  It didn’t stop so I quickly closed the door.  When the door closed, the truck went into full alarm.  There I was, trying to be nice and quiet, fumbling with the keys in the dark with the lights on the truck blinking as the horn was honking on and off in a campground full of tents and campers.  Finally, I found the red button…I’ve never been so grateful for silence.

            I decided to blame it on Ben if anyone asked, but ultimately took the blame upon myself.

            Embarrassed as I was, at least no one got up or yelled at me.  If I hadn’t said anything, perhaps I could have gotten away with it.  I did apologize to the ones in the nearest tent.

            I gathered a little wood in the dark, started a fire and enjoyed a while of peace and quiet before anyone got up.

            As I sat there, I watched a herd of deer work its way down the hill and cross the road about 50 yards away.  What a peaceful way to start the morning…after such a noisy blunder just an hour or so before.

            After a nice breakfast of French toast and bacon, juice, milk and chocolate milk, we sat and visited, enjoyed the sunrise over the hills, and broke camp.  With much to do, we departed and pointed the truck in the direction of home.

            Home safe at last, everyone at home was happy for the snacks that we didn’t eat. 

            As for me, I have a new appreciation for the way the alarm system works on my truck.  I’m sure some of the other campers appreciated the fact that we didn’t stay another night.

            A few years ago, while rushing up the stairs two at a time, something in my knee gave way.  I was able to walk only with great pain.  Like a sprain, I figured it would heal in a few days and I’d be back to normal.  When that didn’t happen, I went to my doctor who referred me to a sports medicine specialist.  After some poking around and a couple of x-rays, it was determined that I had a torn meniscus.  To further complicate things, I have arthritis in the knees and in some places, bone on bone.  With surgery and some healing, I was able to walk normally, with little pain.  Since that time five years ago, the knee conditions have only deteriorated.  Some days I’m able to walk with no pain, and other days, I can barely walk.  The doctor told me that some day in the future, knee replacements would be in order.  He said that when the time comes, I would tell him, he wouldn’t have to tell me.

            Along with my bum knees is the pain in my lower back.  A few years ago, I blew a disc in my back and had to have surgery.  I was told that I have degenerative disc disease.  It isn’t really a disease at all, but a flattening of the discs that causes the bones to rub together causing pain. 

            One of the things I was told by both doctor’s who performed the surgeries, was that I shouldn’t run, jump or do anything that would impact the back or the knees.  This would prolong the normal use of them and not cause as much pain.

            I’ve always been active and used to doing what I please.  This meant that if something needed moving, I’d move it.  If it needed lifting, I’d lift it.  If I needed to run, I would run.  The same things goes with jumping, playing sports and many other things that I normally used to do.  Gone are the days!

            I don’t consider myself as getting old but I do qualify for senior’s discounts at some places.  I occasionally have to run in an emergency.  I have found that it isn’t too difficult or painful. 

            So it was that last night I found myself running.  It was actually quite pleasant.  I wasn’t winded, the knees felt good and my back didn’t hurt.  I was surprised how well it went…a totally pleasant experience.

            Then I woke up!  Darn, it was only a dream.  As one who used to run, it stirred up some sweet memories.  They were pleasant and I felt at peace…would that I could feel that peace each day when I awaken.