Yellowstone/Northeast Corner

I have been to Yellowstone four times now. Each time, I spent just one day exploring one part of the park. Money being the main issue. Staying either in the park or one of the surrounding towns can be rather exspensive. If you plan to spend several days there you will need to make lodging in the park at least a year in advance. It would also be advisable to make reservations in the outside area at least 5 to 6 months in advance.
This past fall when GiGi and I went we stayed in Cody Wyoming the night before. Since I don't like takeing the same route every time if I have an alternative, we went into the park on the northeast corner. I hadn't seen this part of Yellowstone on my previous trips. After seeing it, I would have to say that it is my favorite part of the park. A lot of wide open spaces with streams and wildlife in this area. There were also lots of people fishing the streams here. If you're a fisherman, this would be an area to focus on.
We went when most of the kids were in school. So the traffic was not near as heavy as the other times I visited. X.

THE TREE

When Sam first found out
he won the lottery,
he rode all the way back to the mountains
of East Tennessee.
Said he had to get away
from all the racket,
but it just came with him.
So he parked under a cut,
by Dead Man's Curve,
jumped off, and ran through the woods.

About a hundred yards in,
he broke through some bushes
to a clearing and in the middle
there was an old red oak
that spread out about thirty yards,
it's trunk as big as a house,
the bottom limbs so thick
their own weight pulled them down
toward the ground before
they could sweep back up
at the perimeter.

Sam says it's what saved him.
Says, "I just climbed right up
one of those limbs,
laid back against the trunk,
and listened to its song
"till I fell asleep."
Next day, Sam went to the courthouse
to find the owner.
Bought all hundred and nine acres for
fifty-two thousand dollars.

Old man Morton laughed about it
when he told his buddies what that
damn stupid hippie from out west
had paid.
Sam went home
and took a bath in his very own crick.



By: Vol Lindsey

"Mom and Dad"

The picture above is of my granddad and grandmother Buckman on thier wedding day. But to me they were always mom and dad. I spent a lot of time on the farm with them through out the year. Thier youngest son Sam was my uncle. However, he was only one year older than me. So, he was more like an older brother. And since I started staying there at a very early age, I just imitated him and would call them mom and dad. To me it was like a name, not a title. My mother gave me some of the letters that I had written to my grandparents while I was in Vietnam. Sure enough they started out "Dear mom and dad". It would be much later before I would use the grandparent phrase, after 'dad' had passed away. I began calling mom, grandma. She lived to her mid 90's and was a specail lady. X.

Night Skies

"The essence of any religion lies solely in the answer to the question: why do I exist, and what is my relationship to the infinite universe that surrounds me?" Leo Tolstoy

I never cease to be amazed and be in awe of our skies on a clear night. Last night was one of those nights for me. The stars were out in all thier glory. At times it can be a spiritual experience, just observing the beauty of a night sky. A one on one relationship with the natural world in it's rawest form. It's not hard for me to see how the ancient people had a solid connection to the heavens and the stars in the sky. And why it was so important to them. Modern society has become so far removed from that connection that I feel sorry for the masses. They have lost an important part of thier being. They have lost the magic that comes with that connection. X.

Kid Stuff/1950's Version

After hearing what kids want for Christmas this year I started thinking back to my childhood. I'm old enough that I was around during the "Middle Ages" of the 20th century. The good old days some would say. I don't know about that, but I do know that things were a lot different back then.
I was about 8 or 9 years old in the mid 50's. Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, and Davey Crockett were a young boys heros at that time. So anything that could be associated with them was high on our Christmas list. Toy western gun sets, cowboy hats and coon skin caps were highly prized. Today it's anything from cyber space.
A Snickers bar was a nickel and a Coke was 8 to 10 cents. But one has to remember that a dollar ment a lot more then. Wages were much lower than today. Me and my friends would scour the neighbor hood looking for empty soda bottles. They would bring .02 cents at the local grocer. So if you could come up with ten or so, you could treat your friends with a soda and candy bar.
Something else I remember, it didn't take a lot to entertain us back then. When stuck inside during the winter, we could amuse ourselves with a cardboard box we had converted into a make believe western fort.
The picture above reminds me of the time me and some friends discovered an old Harley in the neighbors barn down the street from my grandparents house. We were out doing some exploring. Some days we would sneak down to that barn, climb into the hay loft and jump out the upstairs door for fun. The fact that we were doing it without the owners knowledge made it more exciting.
Ummm. Come to think of it. Those were the good old days...............X.

On The Road

Sam learned about life
from the books he'd read,
but learned how to live
on the road.

"You meet a lot of people on the road",
says, "Everybody knows something,
and most of them are lookn'
for someone to tell."
He likes to listen.
That's how he learned where
all the good bathn' cricks are.

He says you can see stuff from the road.
like how deep the desert sky can get.
A sky like that, always makes him laugh.

Once he found a lottery ticket.
Won.
Three Hundred eighty thousand dollars,
That's a lot of money,
figures he can live forever on it.
Sam is careful not to laugh about that.

By: Vol Lindsey

Happy Hollidays

May the days ahead be filled with happiness and joy. But please, either keep the plug in the jug, or don't be driving around with your instant glee. We all have loved ones out there, that we would like to see come home ok. X.