I dreamed that the Sun had sent the young Swedish Maidens down to earth to capture the earth's gold.
To prepare them for their journey and look like Maiden’s of Gold, the Sun blessed them all by turning their hair into golden locks of blonde.
They were fair of skin, so that when bathed in the sun it turned to a golden tan. The maidens were dressed in gold and white frocks.
They almost looked like angels themselves.
Did they capture the earth’s gold for the Sun? That I do not know, as I woke up. You like I, have to use your imagination to finish the story.
Could it be the holiday season, or just my abstract imagination that prompted me to have such a dream? Perhaps to get the dynamite under my tail
and get on with a holiday story for all our friends and family across the country.
I’m starting this years story out with an apology for not sending out greetings to you last year, but you see what happened was this:
Thanksgiving week-end I was having fun with friends, when someone came up with the suggestion of, “Wouldn’t it be fun to go roller skating?” Everyone agreed, so that’s exactly what we did!
I can’t tell you how many years it’s been since I’ve done that. I can only tell you the rinks have changed. They no longer have the nice hardwood floors, smooth as a bowling alley,
but some type of a painted surface, I can’t describe. It seems to make the wheels stick to the floor, so rather than glide across it, as if you were flying and light as a feather,
the ball bearing wheels just chugged along having as hard a time getting going as a big old steam engine train trying to get up enough steam to move it’s high steppin’ wheels and attached
cross bar mechanism connected to the smaller wheels to help it along so it can swiftly move down the tracks to get to it’s next destination.
As my wheels tried to keep pace with me, I felt like something was pushing me to go faster. The wheels just couldn’t get up their steam to keep up with the rest of me. This threw me off
balance to the point where I couldn’t make the proper corrections and down I went.
I was wearing a large faced watch that dangled on my wrist. When I hit the floor, the unexpected happened. I damaged my wrist. I ended up in a Quick Care facility, where it was wrapped up,
with instructions not to move it for the next couple of months.
My activities became limited. Computer work became very difficult and so did many other holiday activities like wrapping presents, baking, even shopping.
I was elated that I was no longer doing restaurant work, but working in a jewelry store. This seemed to be something a one handed person could deal with.
That was until about 2 weeks later when, what I call, Professional Magicians came into the store to perform their magic, spotting me as the weak link, I became their target.
I followed procedure as best I could. When they strolled out of the store, I finished straightening up the jewelry case. I walked around to the front of the case to make sure
everything was in order. To my surprise, I could see that a couple of elements holding solitaire diamond rings were missing.
My heart sank. No, they couldn’t have stolen anything. I watched them the whole time. I locked the case every time I took a ring out. I was being careful.
Where those elements in the case when I first opened it? I’m not sure. I had no way of knowing. I could only rely on my instincts. I felt an uncomfortable
energy that made me somewhat suspicious so had proceeded with caution. But how could they have gotten anything out of that case?
Replaying the security tapes solved the mystery. Another couple had quietly come in and sat next to the couple I was waiting on. They were their partner’s in crime.
When I reached my hand into the case to pull out a ring way to the front to show my customers, the fellow I wasn’t taking care of jumped up. Like a flash of lightening,
he reached his hand into the case and grabbed the elements.
Fortunately for me, the fact I had followed procedure saved my job. My original plan, when I took the job, was to only working through the holidays.
Now my plans had to change. It wasn’t until the 4th of July, when I bid farewell to diamonds, rubies, sapphires, emeralds, pearls and other not quite as significant stones.
I only said, “Good-bye” to the stones in the jewelry store, as I had discovered, I had my own treasure trove of stones.
Months before leaving the jewelry store Coyote Don consented to my using one of our guest house units as an office/studio for setting up a home based business.
Our ranch hands, Mac and Elsie, had decided to consolidate into one unit, as the doctors had told Mac to start getting his affairs in order.
Both ranch hands had a lot of what Coyote Don calls, stuff. By my utilizing the one unit we were able to allow them to store stuff in the bedroom.
I only needed the living room space for my computer.
Needless to say, a loss to the ranch, we lost both our long time ranch hands this year. Elsie suffered a severe stroke and was put in a care
facility until her death and Mac, who had been living on a wing and a prayer for years followed her in his death about 4 months later.
I felt joyous over the idea of sitting at my computer and writing short stories. That exuberant feeling didn’t get a chance to really take
hold of me and send me on a prolonged fantasy trip. As I was about to roll up my sleeves and start on my new endeavors Coyote Don fell off a
stool on to his back in an attempt to get some outside windows cleaned on the guest house. Though, he didn’t injure his spinal column, he was
in a great deal of pain and required a lot of my time and attention.
After doctor appointments, drugs and rest, there still seemed to be something that wasn’t getting uncovered. His son, Randy, came out to
the ranch to help me find an avenue to get the results we needed.
I picked Randy up at the airport about midnight. He was offered to be a guest at the Straw Nest Ranch (SNR) while staying in the desert.
He, as well as I, were looking for answers to prayer. Five o’clock the next morning, I put in an emergency call to the SNR for Randy to
come over quickly. Coyote Don had woke with a high fever, shivering cold, no amount of blankets seemed to warm him.
Randy and Webb came over immediately and between us we decided to call the ambulance. Unfortunately, in this part of the country you can’t
usually get any attention at hospitals unless you arrive in an ambulance.
With in a short period of time, we had the answers to our prayers of what was truly Coyote Don’s health problem. Bladder infection,
due to kidney stones in the bladder. This turned out to be quite an ordeal for all of us. This was the first trip to the hospital for
Coyote Don in over 30 years. Probably, the second time in his entire life. Add to that formula a little morphine, antibiotics and you’ve
got a cantankerous, disorientated Coyote Don wanting to still be in charge, without a lot of cooperation from the nursing staff,
and unbeknown to us, his family.
Randy and I had left the hospital the night before, assured that everything was in order and Coyote Don would be fine.
When Coyote Don had arrived at the hospital in the early hours of the morning he was in his pajamas. His favorite pair, may I add.
Knowing this, as soon as he was slipped into a hospital gown, I whipped up those favorite blue pajamas and put them in my purse for
fear of getting lost somewhere between the emergency room and the assigned room he would be moved to.
The next morning, I called him to say, Randy and I would be up after we got ready and had breakfast. Coyote Don didn’t like that,
his idea of our being there was right now, but said it would be OK.
Breakfast took a little longer than we anticipated. Arriving at the hospital about 10:30, we walked in, to find all hell had broke
loose from the time I had called him to the time of our arrival.
Coyote Don came to the realization he was alone, not just alone by him self, but as a naked body in a hospital gown with no blue pajamas,
no clothes, no slippers, no jacket and included in that no phone book. Panic struck. He had no clothes and couldn’t remember any phone
numbers, except for that of the Maharani of the Million Dollar Mountain, but he couldn’t get through to her. This was probably due to the
fact he had made 2 calls to 911 from his hospital bed, after which the main switchboard operator had his phone disconnected.
In his confusion, he thought I was taking Randy back to the airport for his flight out before I came to the hospital. He’d had the
nurse call the airport to stop Randy from getting on his flight, but they couldn’t find a scheduled plane departing to Minneapolis at 1:00 PM.
I’m sure that gave them reason to think there were more problems to contend with, but what hadn’t been reviled was the fact that Randy had
flown out of Midway in Chicago to Las Vegas.
Somewhere in the midst of all this Coyote Don’s daughter, Roberta, had called him from Detroit. He was ordering Roberta to call the police
to go to the airport and stop the plane. Being 2,000 miles away she had no idea what was going on.
Coyote Don’s world had completely turned upside down.
Upon our arrival to his room, we got read out by Mr. Coyote Don, himself. He was still in charge in an in control/out of control kind of a way.
After hearing the whole story and Randy rescheduling his flight to a later date, peace was restored at St. Rose.
He did need to return to the hospital about two weeks later to have the kidney stones broken up and removed from his bladder.
Coyote Don took the last of his antibiotics yesterday, in hope the infection is all cleared up. By the way, through all this, it appears
the shingles he was diagnosed with about 3 years ago are also gone. The prognosis is that they may never have been shingles at all,
but a result of a chronic bladder infection that has just recently been resolved.
Coyote Don went back to work yesterday at the final phase of the construction of Dr. Steve’s straw bale house, here in Goodsprings.
He told Steve and I, he was not only elated, but it was a privilege to be back to work.
It’s almost Christmas. It has been one heck of a year, so when you think about it, perhaps those Swedish Maidens that came to earth
to capture the gold for the Sun were really angels in disguise. Who knows, some of them may even have been Norwegians.
Love, Bon
Holiday Greetings from Coyote Ranch 2002
I woke up this morning in a light frivolous mood due to a little dream I was having.
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