A Belated Sort of Ghost Story

Compared with the thin-veiled night of October 31, the more flamboyant July 4^th doesn’t seem much like a time to expect a haunting. That may be true in normal circumstances, but when you live in Ellis County where you’ve heard stories about the Blue Light Lady roaming rolling hills southwest of Hays, one day is as good as another to encounter disembodied spirits. Our grown daughters still recall the scare of their lives on rise overlooking old Fort Hays.

The little girls’ holiday began with bags of poppers and sulfurous snakes that stained our sidewalk black for months afterwards. After they shrieked at those exploding, powder-filled tissues and lit licorice nib-size buttons that wound into stinky coils, we cooled off at the swimming pool. Later, we cranked ice cream, fried chicken, and baked chocolate cake while my husband patrolled Cedar Bluff. He promised to get home in time to watch Hays’ firework show.

Early July means the sun doesn’t set until after nine, so our sunburned blondes were tired by the time their father came home. Hearing the door open, they wrapped themselves around his legs, hollering, “Fireworks!” He stalled them long enough to grab cold chicken and cake before piling in the car.

Instead of following the highway, my hubs told us he’d drive the back way, south of Ellis. Eventually, he took a dusty country road that eventually overlooked the festivities below our lonely hilltop. A game warden, he’d driven these county roads and knew exactly where we’d have the best view. As neared our destination, a niggling memory inched from the recesses of my mind. I recollected students writing essays about spotting the legendary Blue Light Lady near our targeted parking spot.

Those teenage stories often included realistic encounters with a wandering spirit. Despite suspecting that many such sightings were designed to trigger scared girls to leap into brave boys’ arms, I didn’t want to meet this ghost.

My husband dismissed my concerns with a big grin, and big ears in the back seat begged to watch the show from Blue Light Lady Hill. Apparently, all my loved ones were game to meet a disembodied spirit. I, on the other hand, had encountered a ghost or two and wasn’t eager to hang out with ectoplasm.

We put the car in park just after dusk and lowered windows to catch evening breezes. Immediately, mosquitoes telegraphed every nearby bloodsucking insect, alerting them that dinner had arrived. While smacking buzzing torpedoes, we talked about the nurse who cared for cholera patients at the fort and succumbed to the disease herself. According to the story, she convinced her husband to bury her near the hill where she wandered the prairie every day. All of us were sad to think about her short life, but the irritating drone of invading bugs and the first flashes of early fireworks preoccupied us.

As darkness deepened and exploding diamonds punctuated black skies, my daughters and I stared transfixed at the magic of gunpowder combined with colorful chemicals. Perfectly timing his treachery, our driver cried, “What’s that?”

Our eyes flashed to his corner. Horrified, we spied a monstrous hand covering the windshield. We shrieked like actresses in monster movies. The instigator laughed hysterically. He’d pulled a good one on his gullible girls.

He laid the groundwork by taking us to Blue Light Lady Elizabeth Polly’s old haunt. Then he encouraged our ghost story recollections. In the dark with showers of descending sparkles to distract us, the rascal slipped his long arm out the open window, wrapped it over the glass before him, and scared the peewadlins out of his daughters, wife, and a horde of mosquitoes.

I’m guessing Elizabeth Polly’s ghost laughed heartily at our expense that night. If we’d have quit screaming, we’d have heard her chuckles accompanying sounds of exploding fireworks and droning insects.

More Than a Privy

Several friends recently gathered for supper. One thing led to another once our stomachs were full of home-cooked food, and childhood recollections soon had us laughing aloud. We discovered that rural Texans and Kansans share similar tales, with those growing up in the country contributing more than one outhouse story. These memories triggered mention of the fancy Brooks Lake Campground outhouse, which, it just so happens, thrives under the care of a Kansas couple.

The term “fancy outhouse” generates several mental images. If I hadn’t seen this facility already, I’d envision the multi-level crapper at the Encampment, Wyoming, museum. Designers constructed that particular two-holer to accommodate DEEP snow. Designers built one toilet a floor above the other so that summer users accessed the lower level while winter patrons crossed towering snowdrifts to the now reachable second floor. I’m not sure how functional this was, but it was enterprising.

Brooks Lake’s fancy US Forest Service pit toilet began as a standard single seater with the expected signage you’d find at any campground. These rectangular government postings instruct you to close the lid following use or explain how to avoid bear conflicts. Typically, camp hosts clean these sites and stock toilet paper and hand sanitizer. However, the responsible parties at Brooks Lake exercised originality to make their facility unique.

 When we fish the nearby lake and stream, we encourage newcomers to take a camera along when nature calls. While our friends shake their heads in confusion before they open the privy door, no one leaves without snapping a photo to share with loved ones back home.

So what makes this potty stop without running water, heating or cooling devices, and only the most basic of paper products special? Initially, you note a cozy rug softening your entry. Then bright posters identifying local wildflowers and birds catch your eye. These lighten the mood of the imposing bear warning posters that intensify any outdoor experience in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, including a visit to the loo.

 Finally, guests find themselves examining a table displaying a wilderness lending library stocked with popular mysteries, romances, adventures, and science fiction along with magazines. Fellow campers add to this collection as they finish books and periodicals brought from home.

For fun, these clever camp hosts included an old rotary dial phone in their display. I suspect youngsters visiting this latrine have no idea what this is, but the older generation chuckles when they spy this out-of-place décor. One clever camper commented, tongue in cheek, on his USFS evaluation that the phone didn’t work.

I once chatted with the caretaker of this loobrary and asked what inspired his clever efforts. This fellow Kansan couldn’t recall the initial motivation, but he mentioned the result was that users kept the facility astonishingly clean. Ultimately, this made an unpleasant job easier as well as more interesting because these custodians never know what books, magazines, kitschy doodads, or funny comments they might discover tucked amongst their own contributions.

As a writer and former English teacher, I seek life truths in every day experiences. The veritas in this story is that anyone can positively affect another’s day, even while cleaning toilets. Who doesn’t love finding surprises in unexpected places?

A Wizard in a Cowboy Hat with a Paintbrush for His Wand

If you ask youngsters to name a wizard, they’ll immediately offer Harry Potter’s name. I have news for HP fans. The real wizard lives in Wyoming, and he wears a cowboy hat. His wand happens to be a paintbrush. This is all true—I and other artists worked with him for a week to improve our use of light and shadow in our paintings.

What, you say! Yes, a real cowboy early in his eighth decade uses a paintbrush and earth-tone pigments to turn a flat canvas into a vision of soft buckskin baby shoes that look as though you could pick them up and place them in your palm. This magic takes less than seven hours when he’s not wrangling livestock or riding into the Wind River Mountains after this year’s elk. The man takes props such as his son’s worn,  beaded baby moccasins and an old brass bell, puts them in a lightbox, and tugs his spectacles down to get a closer look at the combination. Within an hour, he’s roughed in a sketch to direct his efforts.

Students of varying abilities hang on every word as he narrates a painting from concept to finish. They focus on the back of a well-worn, dark felt cowboy hat that amplifies the wisdom of 70 plus years. Every now and then, this man of a thousand talents turns to his audience, who note his crinkled eyes and his broad grin. He loves to get the group laughing whether it’s through his imitation “Golleeeee,” that reminds them of Gomer Pyle or his audacious chuckle that states outright, “It’s a good day to be alive.”

Tom Lucas started painting his senior year of high school during his first art class. At that time, he determined he’d master using a limited palette. From the looks of his finished paintings, his sales, and awards, he’s succeeded. Now he shares his how to’s with others who want to breathe life into their own art with a few well-directed strokes of color.

Over decades, he’s built homes for family, worked numerous occupations, and earned scores of friends and acquaintances’ respect. Surprising even himself, he’s become a public speaker, filling in for the preacher when called upon. Modestly, Tom explains he never thought to fill a pulpit, but everyone sitting in church is glad he did. His message is obvious: God works through his humblest servants. It’s clear that’s true when you see a man who’s learned to speak effectively despite the cleft palate that troubled young Tom.

So where does Lucas’s paintbrush wizardry fit in. His students can explain that. Obviously, he uses a brush and a little paint to turn light and shadow into life-like drama in his own work. However, his most amazing gift is his ability to scan and analyze student paintings. In a flash, he instructs how to incorporate a delicate stroke of color to reveal what the mind perceives. That lucky learner will never see the world the same way again.

As one of his pupils, I marvel at his ability to zero in on exactly what needs improved with a deft brush of paint. Using the student’s palette to repair issues that troubled the aspiring painter, he swiftly transfers knowledge that took him decades to master.

If you told Tom he’s a wizard, he’d blush and give you a country boy, “Ah, shucks.” It’s obvious he feels blessed to earn his living painting and teaching. His students would tell you they’re lucky to learn the secrets of light and dark from a wizard in a cowboy hat whose paintbrush is his wand.

For those of us who learn from him, we’re lucky to be in the presence of a master of both painting and good-heartedness.

In Praise of Wild Game

A fellow hunter recently posted an invite to his and another friend’s 23^rd annual wild game feed. We won’t make it this year, but seeing the reminder began a lively conversation at our house. We couldn’t help but talk hunting and its rewards—healthy, delicious meat, friendship, and great stories. That’s what this wild game feed is all about. Longtime companions joined by newcomers share their best recipes and swap tales as an October sun sets over Cedar Bluff.

As a cook, I love arriving at a cabin overlooking steel grey waters, red and sere grasses, and golden cottonwoods to discover counters and tables laden with overflowing pans and platters of meat. Old standards like grilled bacon-wrapped dove breasts or fried pheasant or quail tease nostrils and eyes as guests first arrive. Presentation gets creative. Innovative cooks deliver casseroles of wild turkey tetrazzini and enchiladas for those who like ethnic foods. We’ve had Asian variations and twists on McDonald’s McNuggets. Brave appetites savor rustic offerings like fried chunks of snapping turtle or rattle snake and the occasional mystery meat.

One year, a trapper froze some of his harvest in anticipation of this event. He and his wife marinated and grilled meaty strips for us to sample. A line of folks with empty plates kept him busy at a Traeger preparing second servings. Diners enjoyed debating the source of this food until he eventually told us we’d eaten slivers of bobcat steaks. Once he shared this info, several diners lost their appetites for this dish. I’m guessing they owned house cats. At first, I shared their response until I recollected reading trappers’ journals from the 1800s. Many of these historic writers praised cougar meat over elk or moose. I’d always wondered about this. After trying this smaller cousin of the big cat, I decided these old- timers’ praises had merit. 

While native game serves as the focal point of the menu, several cooks specialize in homemade jellies from wild fruits. One of the participants spends time in Montana every summer where he competes with bears to pick gallons of native huckleberries. His jellies and cobblers always get rave revues. Another friend brings her wild grape jelly that she makes in years when she can beat birds to the purple orbs. For those who’ve never tasted this treat, they’re missing out. Others offer chokecherry and wild plum syrups and jellies to slather on homemade rolls and biscuits. No one leaves hungry.

One of the organizers worked with a news writer who also contributed to Saveur foodie magazine. After attending as a guest, he joined us one year specifically to gather information for an article. He’d grown up in eastern Kansas and wasn’t yet a devoted hunter, angler, or wild game cook. After reading his article and seeing that he clearly understood the conservation ethic driving the efforts of these sportsmen, I was glad he shared their story. I hope his essay opened people’s minds about harvesting and preparing wild game.

While food is the focal point of this special event, the shared hunting stories make it memorable. This good friends’ feast weaves our lives together through shared hunting and fishing tales.

The End of an Era

Recent headlines that Bass Pro Shop purchased Cabela’s empire for 5.5 billion dollars triggered lively conversations at our house. Like many folks, we’re wondering how our outdoor shopping habits will change. We frequently visited relatives in Sidney, so we had a front row seat to watch this corporation expand out of a red brick warehouse to its current multi-store empire during forty years of marriage. Over those years, I’ve written several columns about family adventures at this American landmark. Recalling our affection for Cabela’s led to memories about its predecessor—Herter’s.

Coincidentally, I happened to pick up a boxed 903 Herter’s deer call at a garage sale this weekend. When I handed it to my husband, he immediately recalled glorious hours he spent pouring through old catalogues to make his childhood hunting, fishing, and trapping wish lists. Watching him share these happy reminiscences gave me a peek at a boy filled with dreams of Daniel Boone-style adventures. I’m guessing this current generation of outdoor enthusiasts feels the same when they flip through Cabela’s catalogues.

As soon as we started talking about old Herter’s mailings, my husband could tell me exactly which ones he saved. He could also detail accounts of his orders of fishing lures and hooks as well as his hunting and trapping supplies that included decoys, traps, and a special knife. For a youngster who grew up a few hundred yards from the Kansas River in the Flint Hills, Herter’s offered the very best Canadian Guide-tested materials to guarantee success in the field and on the water.

 Hearing him recite this litany reminded me of distant days when delayed gratification ruled young lives. I heard disappointment in his voice as he recounted the high school canoe trip that took him and friends to Waseca, Minnesota—home of Herter’s actual store. Unfortunately, the travelers arrived after business closed and left before it opened.

Like many fellows who grew up during the 60s and 70s, he didn’t have much money, so he hauled bales, pulled weeds, and performed other farm chores until he fill out that order blank and attach a cashier’s check. From our earliest dates, I heard from relatives and friends about how hard my husband worked to reach his goals. When he bought my engagement and wedding ring, Herter’s missed his order until he replenished that account. However, until they closed, he relished reading and rereading each page of their seasonal mailing and planning the next year’s list

Like many friends, we began marriage with little more than a few hand-me-downs and a supply of old catalogues, traps, decoys, and fishing supplies bought throughout the years. Before we got on our feet, Herter’s went bankrupt and closed. Since then, we’ve diligently scouted auctions and garage sales to find remnants of George H’s outdoor empire. We’ve collected boxed deer, crow, duck, and quail calls along with the famed Bull Cook book sent as a Christmas gift from my brother. He shares my husband’s love of pouring through those old catalogues and finding memorabilia in dusty corners of second hand stores and garages.

The business deal between Bass Pro and Cabela’s makes me wonder if a new generation of outdoor enthusiasts will stash catalogues and treasure purchases carrying Cabela’s logo the way we saved our beloved Herter’s ephemera. It’s the end of an era. Who knows what will take its place?