Potawatomi Ghost Towns of the Oregon Trail

My non-fiction article, "Uniontown and Plowboy - Potawatomi Ghost Towns: Enigmas of the Oregon-California Trail has been published in the Winter 2014-15 ed. of Kansas History.  Get your copy from the Kansas Historical Society Store online.  

Abstract

Uniontown is a ghost town of the Oregon-California Trail near Topeka, Kansas. Tom Ellis illuminates the enigmatic history of this ill-fated community founded in 1848 where little physical trace of the town exists today.  The influence of Kansa Indians, French traders and ardent missionaries is reflected in the precursors to the Uniontown story. Uniontown was also the last effort of the government to unify separate bands of the Potawatomi people into one community. It was an important commercial center and it was also an ill-fated attempt to force together the Potawatomi who were pushed from place to place by the government.  Uniontown was an artificial unification of the Potawatomi at a commercially essential location on the Oregon-California Trail. At Uniontown the tribe was plagued by cholera, corruption and economic predators.  Uniontown was never embraced as the unifying center of Potawatomi life. After attempts to unify the Potawatomi the government changed course and pursued a policy that divided them. Competition for commercial activity on the Oregon-California Trail moved to other prospering towns in the area and Uniontown withered. 

The Falcon

During the early winter months we have had a small falcon – often referred to as a sparrow hawk – routinely visit an oak tree in our back yard.  He perches on a limb arm’s length above ground and close to our glass patio doors.  Between the house and his perch are several bird feeders.  Our raptor stalks the bird feeder and makes his living flushing birds into panicked flight. Invariably, blinded by terror and the sun’s reflection from the glass doors, one of the small birds will fly headlong into the windows and flop unconscious onto the deck.  A heartbeat later our falcon scoops up the unfortunate and returns to his limb for lunch. Using the glass doors to defeat his prey is hunting behavior this falcon has learned.  Finches and juncos are the usual victims along with occasional fat turtle dove that was not smart enough to migrate with the others.  Unfortunately, the sparrows that throw all the seed on the ground seem too smart for this trick.  Today our falcon sat on the limb near the feeder.  The small birds fled except for one bright red cardinal cornered deep in the middle of a shrub denuded of its leaves.  The falcon’s perch was only a few feet above the cardinal and the falcon looked intently before he dove into the thick brush and climbed his way through the thicket to the cardinal.  While the falcon was tangled in the limbs the cardinal dropped out of the bottom and flew for a thicker hedge nearby with the falcon inches behind.  We don’t feed birds to see harm come to them but without the feeder we would never see the falcon.  We have come to accept this life and death drama.  Nevertheless, we enjoy the cardinals and I walked the yard looking for red feathers.  There weren’t any.  

Potawatomi Story in Kansas Inspires Study

For the past year I have become captivated by the stories of the Potawatomi in Kansas. The Potawatomi story is not just a Kansas story. It is a history of European influence, migration and removal from Nova Scotia to Oklahoma. It is a story of missionaries who competed with one another, delivered education and discouraged Potawatomi culture. Epidemics were common on the Oregon Trail and the rivers transporting folks into the places the Indians lived and the Potawatomi joined the suffering. It is a history of commerce and politics trumping the self-determination of people. It is about livelihood and homes found, lost, taken and found again.  

The Potawatomi figure prominently into my newest novel, Twisted Cross currently in pre-publication. The Potawatomi stories add to the gripping complexity, humanity and entertainment value of the novel. The Potawatomi history became so compelling I spent months researching the factual history of Potawatomi ghost towns on the Oregon Trail for an article which will appear this winter in Kansas History published by the Kansas Historical Society and Kansas State University. History is full of details, personalities, dates and places, but I also want to understand the lives of those who endured that history.  

Writing a fictional story led to researching and writing a detailed history which led me back to distilling what I could of the life of a Potawatomi elder in a poem called "The Potawatomi Uniontown Lament". I am honored to have my poem "Potawatomi Uniontown Lament" published in November issue of Hownikan You may read at http://www.potawatomi.org/images/Hownikan_Nov2014_Final.pdf … It appears at the bottom of page 14.

Plum Creek Massacre - Reflections on the Tragedy

I recently stood at a small cemetery surrounded by Nebraska corn fields.  The modest plaque briefly explained the history of the Plum Creek Station. The day, August 7, 2014, was the 150th anniversary of a massacre of white settlers by northern plains Indians. It occurred early in what are regarded as the Indian Wars of the post-civil war period. Plum Creek is a massacre site but the story begins decades earlier.

By the early 1840s the Oregon-California Trail was a busy highway.  The Indian tribes of the plains had generally been helpful and welcoming to the trappers, traders, and travelers who traipsed across their hunting lands. Two decades later the travelers and traders had become a flood of Anglo Americans who like chickens, "wandered everywhere and roosted where they pleased."  Americans negotiated treaties promised to be respectful of Indian's way of life but broke treaties when convenient, abused natural resources like buffalo and timber, and delivered plagues of smallpox, cholera and typhoid that killed tens of thousands of Indians.

The Cheyenne, Arapaho and Sioux had been willing trading partners but as their way of life became more threatened, traditional, mostly younger warrior elements, driven by desperation, decided to fight back and formed a confederation that simultaneously attacked American interests across the Plains in an effort to drive settlers out of the areas necessary to traditional Indian livelihoods.

          Plum Creek was a tragedy.  Freight wagons were attacked by Indian warriors and their drivers killed. Then settlers at one of the small ranches along the Oregon-California Trail on the Platte River were attacked and unarmed men cutting hay in the fields were killed. A young mother and other unrelated children were taken hostage.  Because telegraph lines to Ft. Kearny were operating from nearby stations, warning of the attacks and word of their aftermath was recorded at the Army post and within weeks shameful retaliation occurred when nearly 200 mostly women and children of the Cheyenne and Arapaho settlement at Sand Creek, not part of the hostile elements responsible for Plum Creek, were massacred by the U.S. Army.

          At the little cemetery, I could only think about all the families, both Indian and white of the Nebraska prairie who, in the 1860’s desired little more than to make a life for themselves and their children.  Settlers wanted land because they did not have any other on which to produce; the Indians were trying to keep land that guaranteed their way of life. Often the greedy and powerful manipulated everyone. Eventually the economically desperate Indians conflicted with establishment and the side with the power of technology won.  It is the history of the world and repeated often by those leaders who do not understand its dynamics.  Human tragedy is always left in the wake. You can stand in a Nebraska cornfield and hear ghostly screams from long ago or turn on CNN and hear those screams only hours old from some other tragedy in the world.   

  

Historical Thriller - TWISTED CROSS

My next novel is on the way.  Here is a taste.

Alone, Jonathan Thomas buries his family along the Oregon Trail.  In Twisted Cross Jonathan encounters hopeful emigrants and abused Indians facing a plague of cholera.  The hardships of life on the frontier are intensified by encounters with scurrilous opportunists and profiteers with murderous intent. Victimized and stalked, Jonathan struggles to survive. Potawatomi Indians who own the trading posts, ferries, and sawmills at Uniontown give him work, and Clara, a French half-breed girl living in both worlds, gives him reason to return.  He earns a living with the Army on the Oregon Trail and with missionaries building Indian missions on the Santa Fe Trail all the while haunted and hunted by those who would kill him.

Watch this blog for more information about this and other projects.

Western Writers of America conference followup

I just returned from a week in Sacramento at the Western Writers of America annual meeting.  I am a new member and a first time attendee of the conference but in the true fashion of our American West I was treated like an old friend.  This is the same organization where giants of western literature including Louis L'amore, Tony Hillerman and Don Coldsmith welcomed today's luminaries of western writing.

Dusty Richards with 145 books published presided over the group with gracious good humor.  Chris Enss, an authority on women of the west was a whirlwind volunteer and instructed on the finer points of book marketing. Johnny D. Boggs demonstrated the energy it takes to be the editor of the Roundup Magazine in addition to authoring his own novels.  I enjoyed interacting with historians Rod Miller and Will Bagley both of whom publish important non-fiction histories.

It was heartwarming to find publishers who were generous with their time. Anyone who writes a book should appreciate how difficult it is to be a publisher in today's business environment.  I found my conversations with Tiffany Schofield from Five Star Publishing and Gary Goldstein from Kensington Publishing to be enjoyable and illuminating.

This is a fun bunch of folks to be around.  The WWA is a group of authentic, friendly, helpful and fun-loving people who make the serious and solitary business of writing and publishing appear effortless. I suspect  the WWA convention will become an annual pilgrimage.

Humorous Springtime Problem to Solve

Spring

The robins understand winter is over and are chirping like crazy. Yesterday’s fresh cold rain cleaned winter’s dust from the budding daffodils. Road salt has finally been rinsed from the streets.  Ah, the blissful promise of spring!

Wrong.  The certain promise of backache.  My wife, just like a chirping robin, has started the mate’s call to yard work and home improvement.  I’m thinking a brief spring vacation in a tropical place and she is thinking I ought to build a deck while she sits in a warm place just inside the patio doors smiling with encouragement.

They don’t call them patio doors for nothing.  We have a patio.  My wife doesn't like the patio.  My wife thinks it would be nice to have a deck that is one foot above a perfectly acceptable, if not somewhat cracked and uneven, slab of concrete. As far as I can tell the deck will function solely as a leaf strainer.  The rain and dirt will go through the gaps between the deck boards and the leaves will blow across the deck through the deck door (read former patio door) and onto the carpet.  Dirt will collect on the patio under the deck and ooze out as fetid muck. 

You don’t just get a pile of wood and build a deck.  It takes planning.  Specifically planning the new tools you need to buy before you are ready for wood.  I’m going to need a new computer program for deck design, a twelve-inch chop saw to go with my table saw, a new cordless deck screw driver, a laser level, a new two-wheeled utility trailer to haul tools and materials and a new SUV with the appropriate trailer hitch.

But first, I need to invent a fetid muck removal system.  I’m thinking battery-powered, remote-controlled, toy monster truck with a functioning toy snow (read muck) plow to drive around under the deck.  To have perspective for operating the muck removal technology (read remote controlled toy truck) I’m thinking the deck needs to have a place to mount an operators control platform – like a hammock.  From the hammock I should be able to see the little lights on the muck removal device (note to self, don’t forget to get lights for the toy truck) while it whirls around under the deck. 

Nothing is worse than a half-baked idea.  So, this afternoon, in the spirit of design development, I dashed off to the toy store and bought this really cool remote controlled, four-wheel-drive, monster toy …er… muck removal device on sale for only $150 bucks.  I put it on the winter-browned lawn between the trees supporting the old canvas hammock I found in the attic.

 Things were going pretty good.  I am twisting and turning the monster muck remover in the yard and twisting and turning my tubby little body trying to keep an eye on it from my hammock control platform.  The monster muck truck did a graceful pirouette in the mud and I did a reclining Triple Lutz Combination in the rotted canvas hammock along with it.  When the canvas ripped I was too hog-tied in the shredded fabric to extricate myself from on top of the muck truck that kept spinning its little studded snow tires against my spine.

 That is how spring equals backaches and it’s all my wife’s fault.  Now I have to add one of those cool lumbar back support belts to the tool shopping list.  There will be time for buying tools when I finish recuperating in my new nylon hammock.

Humorous blizzard?

Blizzard?

My path is white by blinding snow;

Cold stabs me like a knife.

Needles of ice the wind doth blow;

Blizzard threatens to take my life.

Against the wind I stumble and fall;

Knees bruised on the frozen glaze.

Path blocked where it’s safe from all;

My cold mind fogs in its arctic haze.

Tortured fingers have lost their feel;

Through frosted glasses I try to peer.

Hardened feet of icy stone I must deal;

This terror in winter is near fatal I fear.

 “Come,” calls my wife a voice of grace,

“Dummy, turn the snow thrower from your face!”

Grand Canyon rafting story - place yourself at the river bank.

Lee's Ferry

            We drove for hours through the darkest land I had ever been through.  The Navajo Nation between Flagstaff and the Colorado River is a place without artificial illumination.  Silhouetted against the rising moon were power transmission towers that trespassed through the land as if they were giant skeletons tiptoeing through the sacred darkness.  Against the hills and mesas, east-facing hogans fused with the night so that we drove by them without knowing they were there.  The dim flicker from a coal oil lamp inside barely escaped small windows and made the panes of glass seem like a faint golden mirage suspended against the black mesa.  Because of the darkness, I fought the illusion that we were in a lifeless, deserted land.  There is a deep undeserved loneliness we felt about this place.  The desert here is a harsh place but the Navajo have thrived in unity with the desert and their mark on this land is only hidden by the night.  The lonely desolation is an illusion.

            On a dark desert night, there are few landmarks.  Even the sensation of speed was gone when the headlights illuminated only the ribbon of highway ahead while the scenery out the car windows was cloaked in the night.  It was like traveling through a dark tunnel not knowing when it would end.  Each dip into an arroyo, we figured, was the final decent to the Colorado River.  When we finally rolled onto Navajo Bridge it came as a surprise.  We wanted desperately to see the mighty Colorado River far below hidden in the shadows.  For a split second, moonlight reflected a tantalizing silvery streak from the river deep in the crevasse.

            The Colorado River created the Grand Canyon and by doing so protected itself from the inevitable scars of man's footprints.  Roads, it seems to me, are among the first scars on a pristine landscape.  At the Grand Canyon there are few places you can drive down to the Colorado River.  Diamond Creek on the Hualapai Indian land just above Lake Mead provides access to the lower end of the canyon, Lee's Ferry just below the Glen Canyon Dam allows access to the top.  Our little party planned to raft the 225 miles in between.

            Moonlight hinted at the surreal geology on the drive to Lee's Ferry.  The road curved around huge rounded boulders that rolled down the canyon walls thousands of years or maybe only weeks ago.  I couldn't escape the troubling notion that one of those gigantic rocks could tumble down and squash our minivan like an annoying insect.  Through a tight canyon and round a sharp turn, lights from a ranger station invaded the darkness. A warm glow of light and a swarm of moths encircled the sign post that directed us to the camping area.

            A full moon rose above the canyon walls to faintly brighten the tamarisk thicket where we unrolled our beds for the night.  The moon drifted above to become like a headlight hung over our heads.  Its brightness penetrated my eyelids and I could not escape its light.  It felt like the light of Navajo spirits was scanning me to determine my worthiness to meet the river.  The black crooked fingers of tamarisk silhouetted against the moon seemed a chilling warning that maybe I was not.

            When all seemed quiet, the sounds invaded.  Night insects announced their claim on the darkness and the mighty river gurgled a Siren's song that invited me to question my mortality.

            As fatigue began to ebb away at my consciousness, I pondered that this had already been a memorable adventure.  I could leave for home tomorrow and not feel cheated. 

            When I opened my eyes the first light of dawn had faded the sky to gray tinged with pink.  I lay in the silence dripping with dew as the canyon walls awoke in skirts of lavender and pink.  I could peek through the brush and see the mighty Colorado in regal emerald green.  By mid-morning the canyon walls ripened to the color of dried pumpkins and parched corn. 

            As we worked hard in the Navajo sun outfitting our rafts the adventure seemed to be just beyond a bend in the river downstream.  Home, it was clear, was at the end of the river two weeks away.

Icy weather coming - time to go backpacking?

Ice Storm Backpacking

Fog and light mist greeted us in the forest;

Dew clung to pine trees seemed scattered there for us.

Fresh winter air filled our lungs at the trail head.

Pointing downhill, "There's the trail," Millard said.

We dreamed of a  hike certain to bring happiness,

And we strapped on our packs with a feeling of bliss.

The group hug was tough because we were all a yard wide;

The packs, you see, kept us from being side-to-side.

We bounced down the trail with gusto and vigor

Up hill and down dale a coupla creeks we crossed over.

Galloway Springs we looked over and paused

At the water bubbling from an outcrop it caused.

Its peaceful and quiet there's been no one on the trail

Surely there are others way out here without fail.

Could it be that the ice storm has kept them all away?

It's damp and it's freezing, but is this a bad day?

At lunch on a large log where the trail makes a "Y"

Millard points where I got lost long ago one July.

And it was nice to take that darn weight off my back

Jimbo pointed and said, "that sure is a big pack."

Jackie nodded quite smugly, "I see. Oh do tell."

John wanted to know if I had brought a hotel.

No way I could admit I lugged far too much gear,

Though it was plain I was also dragging my rear.

Millard hinted a camp just after crossing a creek,

I wonder, did he know that all our boots leak?

Most shucked off their shoes and waded ice water,

Wincing at sharp rocks on arches grown tender.

In a place called Cord Hollow we set up our camp,

And hoped to dry out all the stuff we got damp.

A great bowl of chili came from a community pot.

Who lugged all the canned goods I really know not.

A big crackling fire warmed heart and sole,

But a full day of hiking had taken its toll.

Most stayed up and told stories until it was late,

I heard next morn the yarns told were all great.

Too soon came the new day clear, sunny and cold

But finding ice in my boots forced me to be bold.

We soon broke our camp to go off seeking more fun,

(Or at least we got up on the ridge in the sun.)

I was troubled that my achy sore legs tired much faster,

Couldn't wait for lunch break; should I carry corn plaster?

Jackie told me I'd soon catch on to what not to pack,

Each in the group took from my ample lunch sack.

All covered with leaves the trail was much less used here.

Which trail was for hikers; which trail was for deer?

Has any one seen one of those trail marker things?

Nevertheless, we eventually found Hellroaring Springs.

Millard said they were doing some work on the trail,

But he thought it was going at the pace of a snail.

The trail disappeared - we slid down the hill on the ground;

Those orange and pink markers are where bodies were found?

At the end of the trail John and Jimbo were strong.

(I think sprinting with backpacks is fundamentally wrong.)

I chose not to show off and feigned exhaustion complete,

I made everyone wonder, is he dead on his feet?

I have never been out with a group so prepared,

To miss something you need was what no one dared.

Even though at times it seemed to be ten below,

Jimbo and I both carried snake kits, you know!

With a finer folks you could not choose to camp,

Or a better woods than Mark Twain which to tramp.

Winter trips in the Ozarks are a harsh way to train,

Give me two weeks to warm up and I'll go out again.

Political Murder Thriller by Tom Ellis

Candidate to Kill is a novel by Tom Ellis.  Read sample pages at candidatetokill.com

Funny story - Christmas nuttiness.

Christmas Nuttiness

Have you ever watched a squirrel on a fall day scrambling around gathering nuts?  They dash from place to place frantic to gather all they can.  They cram acorns into their cheeks until they look like fuzzed up electrocuted rats with goiter. Nuts!  Just plain nuts!  It’s all that’s on their mind.

My wife is a lot like that at the holidays - particularly the frantic scurrying around and nuts part.  Nuts remind me of the panicked call I received to dash to the store to buy nuts while the cookie recipe was still in the mixer without the necessary ingredients.  When I came home we went nuts with joy at being rescued from the nut shortage crisis contrived from the nutty idea we should start making cookies without all the necessary ingredients.

Today my wife took the cookies to the grandkids' daycare so they could decorate their own Christmas cookies.  These were the cookies, of course, without the nuts because who knows if one of the little darlings would be allergic to nuts.  Go figure.  I wasn't supposed to be involved in this project, but in a panicked rush to load her treasure trove of cookie decorating goodies, she forgot the cookies on which the frosting would be smeared.  I save the daycare day with an emergency cookie delivery.

I am as afraid of going to a daycare center where preschoolers are armed with plastic knives and green frosting as a squirrel is crossing a four-lane road.  This is nuts!  It is frightening to see squirrelly four-year-olds with sugar sprinkles and waving frosting covered knives like Zoro.  Still you gotta hug your grandkids.  Now my clean jacket is covered in frosting and red sprinkles.  Aw nuts!  Merry Christmas, dear wife!  I’ll tell her when she stops scurrying around.   

Spend a night on an island in the Canadian woods

It Takes Time

Ten thousand years ago, a geological heartbeat, the last ice age ended.  In that time the hard rocky ice smoothed island has become home to generations of proud towering spruce, and lively, ebullient birch with clean white bark and fluttering leaves turned golden from last week's frost.

 He reclines on a smooth rock next to a mirrored lake filled with last winter's snow and billions of reflected stars from whence light traveled millions of light years to touch him. Star light above and below burn a hole in his soul.   This month's full moon slides over an island a few minutes west by canoe where loons, hatched this summer, practice their haunting calls.  Mosquitoes hatched yesterday bite him and leave an itch he will feel tomorrow.  The night's heavy dew will be chased away by the dawn but for now he shivers a second.

 The solar wind that departed the sun last week is bent toward the magnetic pole this night.  Curtains of energy light the night with shrouds of green and blue that wave and dance on the aurora's breeze.  Shafts of red light penetrate the lake and orbs of white then green drift across the sky in a kaleidoscope of endless variety.  The lights wash a day's ration of fatigue from his body.

 In the universe it was an unremarkable brief event infinitely repeated.  For him the northern lights were one sleepless autumn night.  He will remember it always which will only be for a moment.

Halloween Short Short Horror Story

Reverend Ridley’s Horror

Reverend Thomas Ridley sheltered from the cold drizzle. The winter’s cold hadn't bothered the Lord's work thirty years earlier, but that was when both his zeal and heart were stronger. Since his heart attack he quit his congregation and now helped the Bishop with special projects. Meeting with prospective buyers for the old church was one. 

Pleasantries were brushed aside as the tall white-haired man and ashen-faced woman arrived. They were a reserved, unfriendly pair seemingly in a hurry. They hastily surveyed the building while Reverend Ridley chased after them being solicitous. 

When they stopped at the altar, Reverend Ridley felt pain in his arms. He tried to explain through shortened breath but the woman seemed to ignore him and nodded to the man who rushed outside. The Reverend found a seat in the strait-backed chair behind the pulpit and wiped sweat from his florid brow. 

The man returned carrying a silver bowl and a scarlet gown. She hooded herself. Her hand dipped in the bowl. On the white wall behind the altar she drew a five-sided pentagram with the bloody fingers as the Reverend sat in wide-eyed shock. 

The Reverend stood, No. You can't..." 

She reached into the bowl and revealed the dripping severed head of a white goat and hung it on the Crucifix above the altar. 

"In God's name, no!" the Reverend begged as he clutched his chest and slumped to his knees. 

"We'll take it," she said to the Reverend as his heart beat its last.

            

Short short stories - The entire tale in 2 minutes

Train Robbery

            "They'll remember you as Baby Face Tommy," the tall one said. 

         He had just been discharged from the Army after the war and looked huge and threatening in his wrinkled old uniform.  Tommy twisted his face into a fierce glare that dramatized his intention to use the six-gun.  He had practiced looking mean to make up for his small size.  They robbed from seat to seat in one car after another.  Tommy held a gun on the passengers and the soldier did the talking and scooped up the loot.

            She startled, "Hi, Tommy."

            "Sorry to wake you Ma'am," the soldier said softly.  "I get off in Denver."

            "Mommy look, I got seventy-six cents," Tommy announced.  "Sergeant and I robbed the train.  We said, 'Stick 'em up!'"

            "Just playing, Ma'am.  Hope it was alright.  Mostly we robbed my buddies."

          "Thank you Sergeant.  Long day on this train with a six-year old . . . I really needed the  nap."

            "My pleasure Ma'am.  I didn't spend any time with kids in Korea.  I sure missed 'em.  Tommy's a fine boy."

            The Sergeant got off in Denver and Tommy sat beside his mother and spun the cylinder on his toy pistol.  Outside Tommy's window, the Sergeant ran to a woman on the platform holding a small boy and enveloped them in his huge embrace.  Before the train left the station Tommy counted his pocket full of pennies for the third time.

Humorous essay written when teenagers lived at home

Kids and Cars

I can remember the day thirty-five years ago when I told my Dad I wanted a car to drive on a date.  My peach-fuzzed and freckled face beamed in anticipation of the certain moment when he would reach in his pocket and toss me the keys to his car.

            Dad said, “Great son, go get one.” 

            Following a moment of contemplative silence, while I tried to figure out the meaning of his words, I realized that Dad’s keys were in his pocket to stay.   Dad went back to his paper and I went to the back yard to kick the heads off dandelions out of complete frustration.  Eventually I scrapped up seventy-five dollars and bought a rolling death trap with paper-thin tires and four-barrel carburetor.  Dad looked it over with aloof detachment and allowed that it might need some new rubber.

            My kids have a way nicer dad.  He is intelligent, thoughtful, warm and understanding …er…I mean… gullible, dumb, blind and apparently with excess cash.  When the time came for my kids to drive I told them to go get a car in just the same tone as my Dad used with me.  This time, however, the blank stare came from my wife who clearly signaled with her eyes that I was a thoughtless dinosaur.  The kids, each in there own tone of incredulity, simply replied, “Ya right!” 

            My wife explained with firm exasperation that the kids could not go buy their own cars because they needed help locating, financing and insuring a safe and acceptable vehicle.  I always thought my Dad had the right approach until my wife began to explain how little we, as underdeveloped males, understood about automobiles and the requirement they are safe and dependable.  She is right of course.

            So, I have bought enough cars to start my own used car lot.  Fortunately they are not all at my house at the same time.  My teenage son ensures that.

            When it comes to cars my son is truly a multitasking sort of guy - multitasking in the sense that it takes three cars to keep him mobile.  At eighteen years old, he is a magnet for car problems.  It must be an elevated testosterone level that attracts car problems.  Someone sideswiped his pickup while parked in front of the house.  While he was pushing its replacement out of a snowdrift, a friend driving made a mistake and blew up the transmission.  The next car had the brakes fail while it was sitting in the driveway.

            I have, as a father of kids driving, developed survival skills.  I know a guy out in the country north of town who does inexpensive body work.  I have a buddy out in the country south of town who does major mechanical work.  When I was a kid, a Sunday drive in the country was a treat but now it means we are going to get one of the cars repaired.

            My brother who lives in balmy Biloxi, Mississippi is also a big help in keeping my kids' cars running.  Over the phone, he will tell me that some mechanical problem is a minor repair.

“That’s easy to fix,” he’ll say.  “Put that water-pump in last week in twenty-minutes.”

Deluded by the notion that I can do anything my brother can, in a ten-degree garage with frozen fingers, the wrong tools, no skills, no experience and a bad temper I spend two days on the same minor repair.      
            So what’s the point, you might ask.  If you have teenage kids about to drive, move to a tiny island with no roads.  If that won’t work, just send the kids.     

Poetry Sampling

Poetry Sampling 

Dad’s Apparition

Last night Dad appeared in my room.

The stiff, slow walk of an old man,

Plaid shirt tan jeans and the same smile.

He sat on the edge of my bed.

“Dad, I am so glad to see you.

It’s been such a long time.

You died.

It’s been fifteen years.

I’ve missed you.”

His face was peaceful understanding.

We stood and I gave him a big hug.

Then we walked silently to the door.

He got on the elevator and stopped me while

Pointing, “You take the stairs”.

And was gone.

Poetry Reading

Poet looks poetic.

Sounds poetic.

Image matches expectation.

Thoughts in shorthand.

Meaning there?

Sometimes hidden.

Stories in shorthand.

Understanding?

Sometimes.

Few nod cognition.

All polite.

Mostly blank stares.

Above Platoro

From the desert basin we bump-grind

up the ungraded mountain pass.

The high Aspens are

not yet fully greened.

Our tent stands erect;

a rationalization of security in gossamer.

Cups of hot tea - later Scotch

radiate tranquility.

The fire glows warm.

Stars burn holes in the soul.

The morning snaps coldly.

Day lights the high peaks

gathering strength to melt the frost.

Our nylon womb is sympathetic.

But the cold fist of dawn

presses our bladders.

Discomfort is warm and cozy;

relief is freezing.

Wood smoke burns our eyes

but warms our hands.

Coffee fortifies existence.

Sun on the valley below

warms the heart.

Long Drive

Far looms the mountain

Endless two-lane center lines

Will they ever meet?

By the Pale Moon Light

By Monument Lake in the Spanish Peaks,

In whispering pines, by babbling creeks.

We set our camp in the towering spruce,

For modern convenience we have no use.

Thin mountain air has flushed our cheeks,

Unwind we must, of work no one speaks.

We wander, explore, and hike the main trail,

Searching for wild flowers dainty and frail.

For pine cones, chipmunks and trees that are old,

For white shiny rocks that we hope will have gold.

We climb to an outcrop after quite a travail,

And scramble down quick when a storm brings small hail.

Damp misty air has chilled us to the bone,

We truck back to camp to the place we call home.

But, a stones throw from camp we find lots of spoor,

Big piles of dung, this place has lost its allure. 

What digests Cinch Saks and has freedom to roam?

Have we invaded his space?  Will we have to atone?

I don't tell the family of what I afear,

There are really big critters, I am sure, that are near.

Our camp stove I've lit and it glows hot and bright,

We need to have supper before we lose light.

A grandmotherly camper wanders by, "Oh my dear,

Last night did those nasty old bears come by here?" 

"Bears? You said bears? We just got here this morn,

We drove all night long."  I musta sounded forlorn.

She said, "Now don't worry, Hon," as I stirred the hash,

"Those bears just come through and get into the trash.

I've camped around bears since before you were born,

Just keep your camp clean and nothing gets torn."

So I stashed all the food out of reach of the bears,

Don't feed the beasts is the rule everyone swears.

I can't stay awake - thirty six hours without sleep,

(Remember, last night we drove here in the Jeep.)

My wife and the kids watch the fire with blank stares.

I'm tired.  Let's sleep.  Let the bears come. Who cares.

Some time after midnight there went up an alarm,

Down the road, cross the creek, a few screams, but no harm.

It will take more than screams to get me full awake.

Its been days since I slept.  Leave me alone for Christ's sake.

"Where's Mom ?"  my son asks, his nails dug in my arm,

He's alert and perceptive, but at midnight lacks charm.

Fresh mountain air, couple Cokes and you know,

Sometimes in the night a person just has to go.

She wandered around by the creek near the falls,

Just to find the right spot for when nature calls.

Just then I saw movement in the creek bed below

"There's bears out there Dad," my son says soft and low.

Sleep walking in camp, she was really a sight,

Dropped her drawers, shot the moon in the pale moon light.

They both were there squatting, their backs to each other,

"My dear God!  Don't look son.  Oh my Lord!  It's your Mother.

Just then fell our lantern and we startled in fright,

And from off in the brush came two gasps in the night.

They spied each other from over their shoulder,

Mother took off one way, a big rock she crawled over.

The bear musta had the crap scared from him too,

Cause he bolted the creek and ran down long the slough.

"If you don't come in now, you won't grow a day older."

Tomorrow night I will sleep at the Best Western in Boulder.

North of Home

Smooth gravel road

Ends at the 4-way

Must manage ruts north

Anticipation builds

So close to the farm

Old barn on the hill

Evening sun glints off roof

Sides once red

Kids bounce on the car seats

Turn at the lane

Jackie and Julie at the end

Pink boulders to the left

Trash ditch to the right

Both drifted with snow

Windmill turns slowly

One light on the pole

Dog at the car window

Jack breaks bales for calves

Looks up and runs

Park in front of the house

See Janet just inside

Separator whirls

Pails of milk and cream

Jeannie coming from the barn

Julie close behind

Struggling with buckets

In the dark

Cats at the door

Manure covered coats hung near

Rubber boots in a line

Frost covers the farm house windows

Silhouettes in the kitchen

Something good inside

Smell it in your mind

Fresh cut cedar for lights

Leans against the wall

Best part of Christmas

Arrival

 Limericks 

There once were two lads from the wheat lands,

Who went looking for trout and fine gold sands,

But from drinking too much,

(and influenced as such),

They saw hills as small Tetons at hand.

There once were two boys from the plains,

Who thought they were mountain-type swains,

But in looking for gold,

(and trout we are told,)

They decided sleeping was best when it rains.

There are these two guys that you know,

To find gold and to fish they did go.

Out West to the mountains

To camp in the high lands,

But all that it did was to snow.

Copyright © 2013Tom Ellis. All rights reserved.

Novel by Tom Ellis - political murder thriller

Candidate to Kill

This political thriller full of twists and turns tells what happens when a district attorney with a dubious past succeeds a congressman who has suddenly died.

A Midwestern Congressman is killed in a car accident four months before his re-election. A stunned state party hierarchy scrambles to identify a likely candidate who can become a four month incumbent. The prestige of the state's most powerful senator, who is planning a future run for the Presidency, requires that they salvage the campaign and retain the congressional seat. Joe Murphy, a young ambitious county prosecutor, is appointed to fill the unexpired term after a hurried investigation into his background reveals nothing. Hidden in Joe Murphy's past is a dark episode from his college days, which twenty-five years later he has pushed into the hidden dark attic corners of his life. Joe Murphy's campaign is headed for victory when people and events from past threaten to ruin everything. Powerful forces of evil take over. The campaign ends with a thrilling surprise that evolves from a primeval soup of excitement, love, anguish, greed, justice, corruption and power.

Tom Ellis is a new author but an old political junkie. Candidate to Kill is his first novel which looks at the dark side of power and corruption to craft a thrilling story, richly described, with plenty of twists and turns.

Order at:  www.candidatetokill.com