Let me tell you, when you take a great friend from New York to Osage, Shidler and Grainola everyone learns a lot.
David taught me what I loved about home by learning to love and appreciate what we have. I took him up to Beaver Creek behind our old house and we shot guns and turtles. I know some folks will not appreciate that but until you live and work in the Osage you will never understand what freedom is or why we do what we do. Just another side note, Eddy Harris and I went duck hunting with a 306 rifle once and that still does not make since to me either but we had a lot of fun.
I had the great pleasure of taking David to areas where you could see for miles and not see a fence or house or telephone line and miles of great tall grass prairies. We looked over the bluffs at the Codding Cattle Ranch in Foraker and the Adams ranch where you could see all the way to Kansas and of course to the Olsen Ranch (Tanny and Nanny and yes that is another story). He loved our country.
What we assume is common knowledge, like David assuming I knew a Jewish name, is also true the other direction. I informed David that pickles don't grow on trees. Mom let David have some of the best homemade pickles you will ever eat, Mom's sweet pickles. We fed him okra and Head's Bar B Q Sauce (not from Ponca but from Grainola and produced by Danny Head the son of our beloved English teacher, Mrs. Head). As long as we brought this up I have to set the record straight. Danny is the mastermind of making the Bar B Q sauce famous but his two uncles, Tom and Bud Head (welders and farmers) were the first to make Head Country and they were from Grainola and Danny was from Shidler. We use to go over to our neighbor's house (Tom and Bud's) with an empty Karo syrup bottle and get some sauce, not the drinking kind. It is still our favorite and every year my brother, Larry, takes at least a case to South Carolina where he lives. If you look at the bottles you will see the Tom Head cattle brand on the bottle.
Back to David. After a few days in the Osage and meeting my family, David in his green VW Beatle and Shouna and I in our blue Cutlas S left for Chicago. I am still praising God that David had some understanding about large cities. When we got to Chicago (none of us had been there before) we drove in on the south side. Now if you don't know anything about Chicago you should know that is a VERY bad idea. It was cold, February, cloudy and drizzly and it looked very bad and the south side is dangerous. We did not have cell phones and David was following us. I looked over at Shouna and I have to admit I was about to cry. I said, "I don't know why I agreed to this", and I was scared to death. The traffic was off the charts and we drove for hours in bumper to bumper traffic. Luckily David knew this might happen and he gave me confidence it was not as bad as I thought. We finally found ourselves tired and disgusted looking for a hotel around midnight. We were told how much to spend on a hotel and it was not even close so we wasted about two more hours looking for a hotel until we just got mad enough we did not care how much it cost. The next day we started looking for apartments to rent and another eye opener occurred. But thanks to David having lived in New York he understood the cost differential and he cooled my nerves. I remember getting two raises before leaving Dallas plus what is called a COLA (cost of living allowance) of $125 per month to cover the difference in cost of living in Dallas vs. Chicago. Let me tell you after taxes the COLA would barely cover the cost of the train to downtown each day to work much less the cost to park and the higher cost for the apartment. My faith was in God but God sent me a second Jewish Boy, David. Get it?
By the way, in the picture to the left of the young David is his beautiful wife Catherine. They have three children and still live in the Chicago area. They say that we all have friends but each of us has a handful that we can call at any time for any reason and they are there. This story is a tribute to the faith and love I have for my family's friends David and Catherine Goldenberg.
Thank for listening,
Gary
Thanks for listening.
Gary
Glolson21@gmail.com
http://thepioneerman.blogspot.com
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