Remembering.

No one becomes a writer alone. Although it is a solitary pursuit, the pursuit of writing requires saddle pals to blaze the trail, to lead the way, to lend a hand.

There have been many writers I consider saddle pals who have ridden off into that sunset of the great beyond. In one way or another, in ways large and small, they have helped me in my attempts to be a writer. And I will never forget that. Or them.

Here are the names of some of those saddle pals. Some you may recognize, some not. But all are heroes in their own way—at least to me, and, I suspect, many others.

·         Dale Walker—historian, writer, and editor extraordinaire

·         Elmer Kelton—gentleman and all-time great Western writer

·         Dusty Richards—made a career of helping other writers find a career  

·         Frank Roderus—ever encouraging, ever helpful, ever informative

·         Don Kennington—kind and considerate, talented beyond measure

·         Pat Richardson—rollicking rhymester steeped in wry humor

Even though they are gone, for me they will never go away.

Writing in my sleep.

Over the years I have heard and read any number of ways writers go about their business. Most are relatively straightforward, others a little quirky. There is, for instance, a writer from Texas who strolls the streets at night with pencil and paper in hand, writing as he walks. There are people who do not write unless certain conditions apply: a prescribed number of freshly sharpened pencils all lined up; a favored selection of music playing in the background; a cowboy hat perched atop the head.

And so on.

Me, I can and do and have written things anywhere and everywhere. In airports and on airplanes, on the bus, alone in my office, at the kitchen table surrounded by family, in motel rooms, at all times of the day and night, in front of the TV, with a radio or music or nothing playing…. Well, you get the idea.

I also write in my sleep. Don’t ask me how it happens. But many (it would not be pushing it to say most) mornings, I wake up with a string of words stuck in my mind. If I went to bed with an advertising assignment pending, I would often awaken with an idea, a headline, and even a draft of the copy ready and waiting.

It happens with poetry, too. A couplet, a quatrain, a stanza, even the basis for an entire poem may greet me with the sun. Or dialogue—a whole conversation between characters—for a novel in progress. A way to say a passage, an opening or closing line. An idea for a character, a story, a detailed concept for a novel, the framework for an essay or magazine article.

Sometimes I even see it happen. In that not-quite-asleep-but-not-yet-awake time in the morning, ideas and words and phrases ricochet around in what passes for my brain and I just sort of lay there and snooze and watch as they turn into something useful.

That’s all for now. I’m going to bed. Maybe, come the morning, I’ll have more to say.

Back in the Saddle.

In the June-July issue of Ranch & Reata magazine ( www.RanchandReata.com ), you’ll find a feature article I wrote about Amberley Snyder. But all my words on all those pages do not capture her spirit and attitude, I think, as well as the closing lines of Charles Badger Clark’s poem “The Westerner”:

For the sun wheels swift from morn to morn

And the world began when I was born

      And the world is mine to win.

Amberley has been horseback from an early age, and winning buckles and saddles and trophies in the rodeo arena for nearly as long. A truck wreck—and the resulting paralysis—that would have sidelined most of us barely slowed Amberley down. She, and her horses, learned to ride again and she is back to her winning ways.

There’s just no holding this young woman back, and her enthusiasm for making the most of every new day is an inspiration.

( The photo of Amberley and her barrel horse Power is by Lauren Anderson: www.facebook.com/Landersonphoto )