Dog Story

I have told the story of how I gave my dog Slick to a caring family that apparently loved him more than me. Slick and his adopted family still live nearby. On a walk through the neighborhood a few days ago, they stopped by for a visit.

Slick, a beautiful black Gordon setter, will be thirteen in March. His black hair has turned gray and he walks now instead of runs. When he was my dog, he never stopped running. I was at work when Slick and his adopted parents dropped by, but their visit jogged a distant memory.

I have a tiny little oil and gas company and operate a few shallow gas wells in Noble County, Oklahoma. One summer, many years ago, I took Slick and Lucky with me to check out the wells. Both dogs loved riding in my 1992 Acura Vigor. It was hot, the temperature over 100 degrees when we reached the first well. It was then I made a mistake that I will never again repeat.

I got out of the car to check the gas meter, leaving the car running and the key in the ignition. Slick immediately jumped up to see where I was going and depressed the door lock. When I returned from the meter, I found myself locked out of the car, the two dogs, and their tails wagging, unable to open door.

I quickly learned that it is almost impossible to break out a window of tempered glass. Frustrated, I searched the ditches for a clothes hanger (yeah, sure!) to open the door. Twenty minutes later, a very nice young man drove up in a truck. Amazingly, he had a clothes hanger and we soon managed to open the car. I waved in appreciation as he drove away down the road. I wasn’t even upset when Slick and Lucky bailed out of the car and took off running.

Happy to be back in the air-conditioned Vigor, I simply followed the galloping dogs down the unpaved, section-line road. They ran for almost two miles before I finally corralled them at an abandoned oil lease. Slick and Lucky were pooped but happy when they finally jumped back into the Acura.

Lucky passed away in November after a long and wonderful life. Slick is old, but he has also had a wonderful life. He doesn’t run thirteen miles a day anymore, but then who among us still does?

Eric'sWeb

Garden Penis - a pic

Here is a pic of a strange plant Marilyn found growing in one of our flower beds. Any one know what it is?

Gondwana Press

Relationships

As I sit at my computer, I hear Celine Dion singing on the radio in the background My Heart Will Go On, the theme song from the movie Titanic. This song has great meaning to me because I heard it the first time, at the movies, just before my second wife Anne died.

Music definitely evokes memories and Celine’s song brings back many memories for me - some good and some bad. Anne was in horrible shape, almost ready to give up her battle against the Big C. Then Barrett, her law son arrived from Stilwell to bolster her resolve.

Barrett is neither Anne’s real son nor mine, but it would be impossible to imagine having a biological son as incredibly caring as he was. It seemed all our friends and family was abandoning us at the time, certain that Anne was about to die and not wanting to be around when she did. Barrett was different. He may have felt that she was going to die, but he wanted to spend as much time with her as possible before that event actually occurred.

That weekend, Anne dragged herself out of bed. Later, we had a call from old friends Sam and Stephanie. They asked us to join them at the movies to see Titanic. I do not know how Anne made it, but she did. The movie was long but heart-rending, and prophetic for what was about to happen. Still, it was one of the best of Anne’s last days.

I consider myself a lucky person because I have had two great loves in my life – first Anne and now Marilyn. As I tap this little story on my computer, I think about Celine’s song, and the last days of a wonderful relationship.

Gondwana

Running on Empty

I’ve never run a marathon but I have competed in a half marathon, a 15 K and more 10 Ks than I can count. I was overweight and out of shape when I ran the half marathon. I didn’t win the event but I didn’t finish last either, well at least not dead last.

Oklahoma City inaugurated a yearly marathon event several years ago to commemorate the heroism and sacrifice of the people of our City, and others that lent helping hands during the aftermath of the Oklahoma City Bombing. Before that there was only the yearly running of the Jim Thorpe Half Marathon around Lake Overholser.

I ran track in junior high and kept up the practice through most of my life. Even so, I never ran a 10 K until the oil crash of the eighties when my little oil company went belly up. It was a strange time in my life. I had a bloated body and a deflated ego. I needed something to regain my self esteem and somehow decided that running was the ticket. Since I was too fat to run I began walking laps through the house. Soon I was jogging through the neighborhood at what I thought was a healthy clip. Feeling better than I had in years I entered my first 10 K.

To the uninitiated 10 K is short for ten kilometers, a distance of six-point-two miles. My first was the Red Bud, a yearly Oklahoma City running event that recently celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary. I finished the distance in less than sixty minutes and I was hooked.

It was during my first 10 K that I learned I wasn’t the only busted oilie that had turned to jogging as therapy. Hell! Half the oil community was competing, and finding so many kindred spirits only bolstered my desire to continue running.

Many events followed but somewhere along the line I quit training and did nothing as my weight ballooned back up to one-eighty-five. I had made excuses for the past three Jim Thorpe’s and decided that I couldn’t live with myself another year without at least attempting the distance of a bit more than thirteen miles.

I arrived for the event late and unregistered. Only the convincing of some of my oilie brethren got me registered and I was still filling out papers when the starter pistol fired. It didn’t matter because I hadn’t come to win, only to compete and prove to myself that I still had the goods, even if they had shrunken slightly.

Months had passed since I had entered an event and word began trickling down through my group of friends. Amazingly, many waited on me, or dropped back in the pack to pat me on the back and offer encouragement. Before long I felt like a fat Forrest Gump, surrounded by friends determined that they were going to will me to finish the race.

Somewhere near the halfway mark I convinced my friends both male and female to run their race and that I would run mine. One by one they broke away, disappearing into the distance, leaving me alone in a pack of twenty or so very slow runners. It was then that I realized that I desperately needed to go to the bathroom.
Lake Overholser is a City Park and I soon spotted a bathroom. Breaking from the pack I headed straight for it. When I finished my business there were no runners around and I was, I realized, really bringing up the rear.

I somehow continued trudging forward, although I was already spent. A Seven-Eleven convenience store marked the three-quarter mark. Having a few dollar bills stashed in my shorts I stopped for a cold drink but once inside I settled on an ice cold Coors instead.

“Why not?” I told the clerk. “I’m so far behind that I can do no better than last anyway.”

“No way,” the pretty cashier told me. “At least ten runners just left here. They were all drinking beer.”

My dim hopes suddenly bolstered I slammed the Coors, gave the pretty girl a confident wink and hurried out the door. The potty and beer breaks were what I needed. I soon saw a group of runners ahead of me and could tell that if I continued my pace I would catch them before the finish line. With that goal in mind I began moving at a rate I soon realized I couldn’t maintain.

Most of the runners ahead of me continued their pace and when I reached the last turn before the finish line there was only one runner still ahead of me. I was out of shape but I wasn’t particularly old at the time. The runner in front of me looked at least ten years older than me and about the same weight. It didn’t matter because I could see the finish line in the distance and she was somehow managing to pull away. Closing my eyes tightly, I made a wish, took a deep breath and started to sprint.

Don’t ask me how but by some superhuman effort I managed to overtake the old lady and beat her by a foot or two across the finish line. My efforts didn’t impress her as she just frowned and shook her head as she walked past me. Everyone, it seemed, had already gone home and not even the scorers were left to welcome us to the finish line.

I was so sore that I could barely get out of bed the next morning and I had difficulty walking up the stairs. Still, I had a grin on my face that didn’t disappear for the rest of the weekend. Maybe I had beat out an old woman just to keep from finishing dead last but at least I had finished, and it came flowing back to me why I had begun running in the first place.

I learned a good lesson in life that day. No matter how bad you feel just keep putting one foot in front of the other. And, maybe more importantly, before giving up, stop, slug an ice cold Coors, then regroup and get after it again.

Fiction South

Two Edmond Pics

Here are a couple of pics taken near Edmond, OK

Fiction South

Edmond Author's Book Fair

I will be attending the Edmond Author’s Book Fair this Saturday, the 24th of January, at the Edmond Historical Society & Museum. The museum is located at 431 S. Boulevard in Edmond, Oklahoma.

The event begins around 1 pm. If you are in the area, please drop by and introduce yourself as I would love to meet you.

Eric Wilder

Eric's Website