Hello to Connie Fauske
Heartwarming to say the least, what a tribute to New Orleans a horse with that much WILL to survive is so fitting for a city that had to have that same true grit. Then came the Saints and Brad Pitt to me the Big Easy is the most unique city in America with a lot of history. If we lost New Orleans we would not only lose a great city we would lose a complete culture.
According to what you said in your earlier letter, I think you live on the very spot where we lost lost Buddy, our cockateil, temporarily. That was in the hills above Santa Barbara, the old Rancho Oso Thousand Trails Preserve. That Seattle based campground membership afforded our kids a great life. Over the gate it said, “We Are Family”.
Our first horse worthy of mention was old Dewey. Little Martin Evans had ridden him to Hilltop School before we returned from Seattle. Martin had trained him to count. Well, as horse people know, young horses lose their teeth around 2 or 3 years old. Grandpa Martin asked my dad to go down to the meadow and knock him in the head as he was not going to make the winter in the deep snow. Dad hauled him home on a stone boat sled and pulled him up and down daily with a wire stretcher for a month or two. Now the readers may not believe what I saw with me own eyes, Dewey would stick out his tail in the morning and Dad would help him up……Dewey turned out to be part of the family and did more than his share of work.. He hauled us kids seven miles a day to school, doubled as a saddle and a harness horse. We found a real match for him, his half brother Jim. Then Dad found a horse that made him feel a little John Wayne, I think. An Arabian gelding that retired on the farm. There weren’t a lot of good horsemen and good horses were very scarce in that part of the country at that time.
Connie, did I detect a trace of modesty as you submitted your letter. That horse story should be sent around the world. You came by that modesty honestly…both of your parents were.
Augie Johnson has cancer
Message from Sybil Johnson: Cheyenne, WY.
Dick–
I was talking to Augie last week and during our conversation, he told me that he had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. I have no idea when he was diagnosed or anymore about it. We usually dont talk, but I called him, mostly about the kids. I have no idea why he chose to tell me, but he did.
I just wanted you to know. Take care. Sybil Johnson
Message with a story
Larry Hackman (66): Bismarck, ND
Hello Gary;
I see your wintering pretty good. We had a few days this week that got up into the forties,
in fact one day got up into the fifties. As you well know, That is skinny dipping weather here in the Dakotas.
Well, you know, we were out soaking up the sun in our flannel shirts without the coats.
It was beautiful. I wish it would hang around a while longer. A little sunshine now and then does a body good.
That’s what the old timers use to say, anyway. I suppose where you are, you wonder about a statement like that?
Well Gary I thought I would send you another story for the blog. This one is a little late.
I wanted to get it out for New Years Day or at least near to that time frame. It didn’t work out, so I thought I would wait until next year.
Then a couple days went by and there was no Gary or barely any Gary. I was getting worried.
I thought I better send in another story. This one is ready. Ready or not, enjoy.
At this time, I also would like to express my appreciation, and thank everyone for all their great comments on my last story and previous stories.
I really appreciate your comments, they make my ego soar.
Again, Thank You all.
I also want to thank everyone else for all their great contributions to this blog.
I enjoy reading them and looking at the pictures.
Please continue to send your stories, comments, and pictures in to Gary, and also if anyone wishes to forward any story of mine,
for the enjoyment of another person , please feel free to do so. Thanks to you all.
and thank You Gary for your time and your expertise, for putting this all together and for keeping it going.
Again, Thank you to all,
Enjoy the story,
Larry
Another great Larry Hackman Story:
It was New Years Eve.I was hanging around the house.Not much going on.Watching TV, listening to the hype, waiting for the ball to drop, and knowing all the time that I wasn’t excited enough about it to stay awake for the big event.It was the early sixties; I was a sophomore or a junior in high school.We had been on Christmas break for little over a week already.The weather was cold and miserable and not much had happened. Had played a lot of cards, put together puzzles, and played monopoly for entertainment.I was bored.
Then it occurred to me, that there was a New Years Eve Dance down at the City Hall.I went and got all dressed up, combed my hair and walked downtown to the City Hall.Remember when, people decided to go some place, where there were other people, people actually use to put on clean dress clothes, the older people wore suits and nice dresses and combed their hair.We actually tried to make our mother proud; that they had went through the trouble of having us.
I arrived at the City Hall, the music was playing, and I was getting excited.I ran up the stairs and had just grabbed the handle of one of the two swinging doors to enter the hall, when this fellow yelled through the window of the ticket room, “Larry, you have to pay here, before you can go in.”I turned around and walked back to the window and asked this fellow, who I knew well, you mean I have to pay to get into a free New Years Eve Dance.He laughed, and said the dance was put on by the Jaycees to make money.Well, I explained to him that I had no money and that a New Years Eve Dance should be free.He said, “Sorry”.Well I said, I guess I’ll be heading back home.He said, “Just a minute,” and passed through the window this quart, seven-up bottle in a brown paper bag. He said go ahead and take a drink. Man, it was good stuff.It warmed you up, slowly, from the pit of your stomach out to every part of your body.It made you feel good, real good, right away. It was a common drink at the time; people would buy a quart of seven-up or squirt, pour out or drink about a quarter of the bottle, then pour in a ½ pint or mickey of Everclear.It was good stuff, and definitely made me feel better, and it definitely was going to keep me warm for my long, lonely walk back home.I handed the bottle back through the window, said thank you, and started to zip up my coat.When the guy stuck the bottle back through the ticket window and said, “Here, have another drink, its cold out there.”He knew I had about a four block walk and it was very cold and dark out, and that I wasn’t too anxious to go back home and finish out the night watching TV anyway, and I was getting less anxious, every time he passed that bottle back to me.In fact I was starting to think that this wasn’t too bad and was thinking of spending the rest of the night right here beside the ticket window.Who cared what that New Years ball was going to do anyway?Finally, Guess what?That stuff must have been getting to that guy in the ticket window too, He says to me, I’ll tell you what.I’ll let you into the dance free;”if you promise me that you will dance with them older ladies standing just inside the door in the back of the hall”.
I have always had trouble understanding? A hall must be like a church when you are outside looking at the entrance to the structure.It’s the front.When you are inside it’s the back.Go figure.
I took another pull on that bottle, and I says sure, I can do that, no problem.I was getting pretty agreeable to almost anything at this point.I went into the hall, looked over at them ladies, and then looked back at the ticket room door.That fellow was standing there grinning, like a cat that had just swallowed the canary.He was right, all those ladies looked to be at least 40 or close to it.Now I would consider them to be still young.Funny, how your perspective changes after you get a little past 50.In fact there was no one in that whole hall that was my age or even close to it.It did cross my mind, “Where the hell are all the kids”?I suppose they all were at home, watching TV, waiting for that damn ball to drop.I didn’t care, I was fired up, and ready to do some dancing.I walked over and asked the first lady I came up to, “If she would like to dance”?She agreed, and I was off dancing the night away. I danced every dance until the band quit playing for the evening.The guy in the ticket booth had a smile from ear to ear.He must have had more than one bottle in that little room.Why, I even seen him dance a couple.I was happy, and did occasionally stop by the ticket booth on band breaks, to get reenergized.The ladies appeared to be happy too, to have this young fellow dancing with them.The husbands also, appeared to be happy.I suppose the ladies were happy to have this young handsome fellow giving them all this attention and the fellows were happy that I was keeping them ladies occupied and out of their hair, and I suppose they figured that I was too young to cause them any worry. Those husbands appeared to be sticking pretty close to that ticket booth, anyway. Apparently it worked out well for everyone concerned, because I had a great time.In fact, I hardly remember the walk home.In fact, I think I ran home.
The next morning was bummer though.In fact, I don’t think there was a morning that morning.In fact I remember waking up once or twice and looking at the clock and not being able to figure out why it was daylight in the middle of the night.I didn’t dwell on it to long though because I remember it made my head hurt.I suppose it put too much pressure on the few remaining living brain cells, I had left.How many brain cells got killed by alcohol that night?I think I’m still trying to recover.Did I get out of bed that day?Yes, I did.I think got out in time to go back to bed.
Remember to, eat some beef, drink some milk, and to laugh today.
Larry
