The Coach

Last week I was out for my evening walk, stretching my back form several hours of writing on the computer. The soft evening air and setting sun took me back to a time, not so long ago, when I stood at the high school track and timed my daughter, Liesel as she practiced he 800 meter run. She had lagged a bit on the back stretch and I knew that this time would not be her best. I made a mental note to stand over there next time she ran to cheer her on. I should still have time to cut across the field and check her time at the finish line. She approached the line red-faced and spent but pushed forward and leaned into the finish as she had been taught. My stop watch showed a time of two thrity-seven; not bad, but not Liesel's best. Her questioning eyes clouded with disappointment when I called out the time. She jogged the track slowly, cooling down, then came back to stand by me.

"What am I doing wrong Daddy?" She sighed. "I felt like I got a good start and the first lap felt good, but I started to run out of steam on the second lap." I looked for ansers, got an idea and started to give it to her, then paused and remembered that she would learn more if the idea cam efrom her.

"Do you remember what Coach Kidd talked about the other day?" I prompted. "Well," Liesel pondered, "I guess she would say that I started out too fast, ran out of steam and didn't start my finishing sprint until I was on the home stretch."

"Yes, that's it", I encouraged, "and she also said that if you imagine that the last curve is a slingshot it will help you remember to kick in your sprint early enough to finish strong. Now why don't you try it again and start off just a bit slower? Remember, 'Rise up on the wings of eagles, run and don't be weary.' "

She smiled and put her toe on the line. I raised my hand and then dropped it and off she went. This time the stop-watch read two thirty-four, a new personal best! Liesel grinned from ear to ear. "Thanks Daddy!" "You did it Sweetie, I just reminded you of what you already knew."

I smile at the memory, get out my cell phone and call Liesel's number. She answers after a few rings. "Hi Daddy." "Hey Sweetie, how's track?" I ask. "Oh, I'm kind of discouraged. These girls don't seem to want to pay attention when I try to coach them, and one of them, who is really good, seems to feel like she knows more than I do. I'm a bit intimidated by her."

I'm tempted to tell her what to do and then I remember that 800 meter run. "What's your plan?" I ask. "Well, I thought maybe I would take them on a long run tomorrow so they can see that I can keep up with them, and then I'll ask Callie, (she's the good one), if she will be the captain and help me teach the others how to get their best time on the 800." "Good plan, Sweetie. I better hang up. I love you." "I love you too Daddy, thanks."

Last night Liesel called. she was just home from the first track meet of the season. "Daddy, would you believe it? My 800 meter medley team came in second place and Callie got a personal best!" "Good job, Sweetie!" I smile. Coaching the coach is pretty good work if you can get it.

A Tiny Patch of Blue

My Grandpa Boyd was divorced from my Grandma Mabel long before I came along.
My Dad had a hard time reconciling everything that had happened, but he tried to see that we had opportunities to know our Grandpa.

Grandpa Boyd was a rough character. He had been a game warden and spent most of his life out in the "wide lonesome". He had been in on the search party when Earl Durrand killed some of the law sent to arrest him for poaching, and had stopped the car Earl was in, sticking his pistol into the window and ordering the driver, in pretty colorful language, to stop or get his head blown off. Durrand escaped the car and later was killed in during a bank robbery in Powell, Wyoming.

Grandpa was known for his legendary feats of driving skill, like the time he took a tank truck full of trout fingerlings across a swamp by chaining an aspen log to the rear wheels over and over again, or the time that he rode the ridge line for miles because it was swept free of snow by the howling Wyoming winds, when the highway between Meeteetse and Salt Lake was closed by a blizzard. He led countless pack trains into the back country and was a resourceful and skilled hunting guide.

That's what he was doing, one summer in the early sixties, when he invited Dad to bring my brother Dave and I up to the camp for a weekend. We were thrilled. The days between the invitation and the trip went by so slowly, and the anticipation was almost unbearable. Dad had even found Dave and me, suede vests and matching chaps so that we would "look the part".

The Friday afternoon before we were to leave, an unusual low pressure system descended on the Big Horn Basin. Usually, this time of year, the only moisture consisted of passing afternoon thunderstorms, but this looked more like a winter storm, with deep dark low overcast and a cold, heavy, sustained rain. The weather report said that it would continue all weekend long with no break. Dad broke the news to us as gently as he could that we might not be able to get up the Northfork to where Grandpa was, and even if we did, Grandpa might not be able to ride the miles from the back country to come and get us. Two disappointed little boys got ready for bed that evening.

Later that night I went to my Dad and said, "Daddy, I just prayed and asked Heavenly Father to let it not rain so bad so we can go see Grandpa, and He said O.K. Can we at least try to go up tomorrow? I know it will be all right." What does a Dad say to that? To his credit my Dad said, "We'll give it a try. Now go to Bed. we have to get an early start."

So early on Saturday morning we loaded up the Chevy and headed up the Canyon toward Pahaska Teepee. The further we went the worse the weather got. The clouds were so low that they became fog and the rain drummed steadily on the windshield. Dad kept saying, "Boys we should probably turn around," Each time we would beg him to go just a little further. Two hours later found us at the trail head to Camp Monaco, just a few miles from Yellowstone Park.

Dad pulled the car into the soggy gravel of the turnout and stopped. Just then the rain, which had not stopped since Friday night, petered out, but he clouds were still just as heavy and all the trees hung low with moisture. It looked like the rain would begin again any time. Dad said, "Boys, I don't think the trail is dry enough for Grandpa to make it down from the camp, maybe we should just go home."

"Dad, could we just get out of the car for a minute?" I asked. Dad sighed and opened the door. As we stepped out into the mud we looked up into the sky. Just above us was one tiny patch of blue sky in the otherwise gloomy mass of clouds. "Could we just walk up the trail a little ways?" We pleaded. Dad got out our backpacks and with some misgivings headed up the trail.

The tiny patch of blue seemed to be our friend. It followed us up the trail. It was raining all around us, but our little part of the trail was not getting any rain at all. We stopped about a half mile up the trail and sat down on a log. Dad was just getting up the nerve to tell us that we had to go back, when we heard a noise. We looked up and saw Grandpa, in his poncho, leading a string of horses down the trail. "Hello Bruce, let's get these kids on the horses and get them back to camp." He said.

All the way back to camp, that little patch of blue sky followed us, like a lonely puppy. Nary a drop of rain fell on us on the trail. But when we got to camp and were safe in the tent, the little blue patch disappeared and the rain came down in buckets. The rest of the week was beautiful, though, and we had the time of our lives. That was the only trip that we ever had with Grandpa. I will never forget and always be grateful for God's answer to my trusting little boy prayer, that let a tiny patch of blue guide us safely to camp.

A Story About Grandpa Ben

As long as we are talking about grandpas and guns, I have another story to get out of my system. It has to do with another Great Grandpa. This is the story of Grandpa Ben and the Antelope.

Grandpa's name was Edgar Bennion. His son Boyd, my grandpa, was a game warden.
Edgar was a poacher. he had grown up in the time when there weren't "seasons" on shooting game. If you wanted some meat you went out and shot it.

One day he and my Dad, Bruce, whom Grandpa Ben called "Buddyben", were driving between Cody and Meeteetse, Wyoming. Grandpa saw an antelope out across the barbed wire fence along the road. "Get me my rifle, Buddyben." said Grandpa, and Dad handed him his Thirty ought Six. Grandpa put down the antelope with one shot and he and Dad dragged the carcass under the fence, threw it in the trunk and headed for home where they planned to butcher the meat in the garage.

As they crossed the Greybull River Bridge and drove down Meeteeetse's main street, a sudden and terrible clatter arose from the trunk. Dad said that bulges appeared in the back seat upholstery and dust rose as the car rocked to and fro. It was apparent that there had been an antelope resusitation. Strange glances were seen from bystanders on the boardwalk outside the bank the drug store and the Meeteetse Mercantile. Up the hill toward Grandpa's house the two culprits sped, accompanied by the commotion of confined but flailing hooves.

Reaching the garage, Grandpa pulled in, closed the door and said to Dad, "Buddyben, get me my pistol and stand back." Then Grandpa unlatched the trunk, whereupon the captive sprang from it's automobile prison and began to run in panicked circles around the car. Grandpa followed in hot pursuit, pistol waving as he tried to acquire the target. Finally he got a good bead and put the fugitive out of its misery.

As Dad finished the story he said, "Of course the meat was ruined, to much running and too much adrenaline." Thus ended the sad tale of a poaching gone awry.

The story of Grandpa Peoples and the Wild Night in March.

(Photo is Grandma Peoples and her parents. She is middle of back row. Her name was Mary Barbara Feyhl)

Elisha Walter Peoples (My Great Grandpa)

Grandpa and Grandma Peoples lived in Meeteetse, Wyoming. He was a tough old cowboy and she was a sweet refined lady. He had herded cattle and driven stagecoach. (He had a bridge collapse under him between Red Lodge and Meeteetse, and break his leg.) He was about forty and she about 20 when they married. They opened a bar and restaurant on the dirt road that was the main street in Meeteetse. He ran the saloon and she ran the eatery. He had a crooked finger and once a drunk tried to straighten it by smashing it with a bottle. Grandpa knocked him flat.

Late one wild and windy March evening, Grandpa closed up the Bar and headed for home, about half a mile distant up the hill. He had all the day's receipts in a money belt about his waist, to be deposited at the bank the following morning. It is possible that Grandpa had imbibed in a bit of his own stock to fortify him for the trip home, it was, after all, blustery and cold. Be that as it may, as he passed the school yard, a dark shape loomed in the shadows, beneath the waving branches of the trees.

Grandpa knew a possible ambush when he saw it, so he drew his six-shooter and yelled, "Get yore hands up you blankety-blankin' no good hoss thief!" There was no answer from the ominous shape. "Ya answer me you cussed so-n-so or I'll blast ya ta kingdom come!" Still, there was no answer. Grandpa aimed his gun and blazed away, all six shots! Then turned and ran like a rabbit for home where he arrived safe and out of breath, but otherwise no worse for the wear.

The next morning, when the school janitor went to retrieve the pot belly stove that had been taken outside in the yard for cleaning, he was chagrined to find six bullet holes stitched from top to bottom. Grandpa may have had an overactive imagination, but there was nothing wrong with his shooting.