RIDING DRAG with DEBRA COPPINGER HILL
My
first cousin once removed Zella always started her letters with “Just a quick
note to let you know...”, followed by the news of the week. I had long ago learned
from corresponding with her and my Aunt Carol that if I wanted letters to read
that I had better write letters to be read. I would read her ‘quick notes’ that
would go on for pages and feel a part of my family that was so very far away. I
would read it several times over, pick up my pen and write back. Reading made
me feel less separated from my relatives and writing made me feel less
homesick. Tucked away in several shoeboxes in a steamer trunk in the old dairy
barn lie each and every letter they each wrote to me over the years.
They
and their letters were my lifeline as we travelled from one job to another. We
lived in a thirty-five foot travel trailer and pulled an eighteen footer as an
office for Husband. Back and forth across the country we moved while our
friends settled into homes here and there. We dreamed of other things, saved
money by staying in the trailer and waited patiently for acres, cattle and
horses. Zella lived on homesteaded land claimed the last year you could file
for a homestead in Oklahoma. She understood about wanting, needing land. Carol
understood about moving and taking your house along with her as she and Uncle
Bill had been nomads like us at one point as he too worked in the oil fields.
Last
week while I was laid up with a messed-up shoulder, I went looking for a book and
found instead those boxes of letters. Good news, sad news, jokes, good-natured
gossip and stories made for good reading. It is my family’s history compiled
for the most part by two women who taught me that love quite often comes in the
written word.
Zella
is long ago passed through the gates of Heaven, while Aunt Carol lives about
thirty-five minutes from me. It seems strange to think about writing a letter
to her when she is so close. But as I write this I am prompted to remember that
it was she who wrote the last letter to me and therefore, I owe her a letter. I
also believe my first line will be “Just a quick note to let you know how very
precious your letters have always been to me...”
*For
more about Debra go to the Cowboy Poetry section at AlwaysCowboy.com.
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RIDING DRAG with DEBRA COPPINGER HILL is featured each week at ALWAYS COWBOY where Debra is a Resident Western Poet. Join her and her Cowboy Friends for Cowboy Poetry, News and Events. http://alwayscowboy.net/debra_coppinger_hill_poetry.html