It's likely true that the lessons you learn as a teenager do as much to cement the real values in your life as anything else.  That said, I spent many of my teenage years attending college in Monroe, Louisiana.  Majoring in geology, I took many science courses but I also dabbled in English and the arts.  Probably the most important course that I took at Northeast Louisiana was a lesson in life - a lesson in how to cope in a world filled with no family and mostly strangers.

When I attended NLSC, a gallon of gas cost thirty cents, or less.  A Coke was a nickel and you could buy a pitcher of beer for a dollar.  My favorite watering hole, along with that of most of the male population of the college was the Trianon.  I wrote about the Trianon in my short story A Talk with Henry.  Henry was a real person and I took much of the dialogue for the story from actual conversations.

I started college during summer school, at the tender age of seventeen.  My Brother Jack and close friend Elwin also attended summer school the same year.  The year was 1964.  There was an air show at the airport that summer and a local pilot offered plane rides in his Beechcraft Bonanza for a penny a pound.  Jack, Elwin and I all took our first ride in an airplane for a cost of less than five dollars.

A Bayou runs through the campus of what is now the University of Louisiana at Monroe.  During summer, Bayou DeSiard is a hot spot for students.  While not quite Florida, sun bathing students line the beach and it was, and is, a great place to meet members of the opposite sex.  Jack, Elwin and I went swimming every day that semester and even light-skinned Eric had a tan before the end of summer.

At night, Jack, Elwin and I would haunt the Trianon.  There were gambling machines, the walls black, lighting dim and music loud.  We chugged lots of beer and discussed every important world issue there was.  At summer's end, Jack and Elwin both flunked out, unable to return the next semester because of poor grades.  I made it, passing, but barely.

Today, I can't remember a single course that I took that summer.  As far as grades are concerned, I almost flunked my first semester in college, but now it doesn't seem so important.  Looking back, I think that I probably aced the part of my life that was most significant at the time.

Eric’sWeb

The weather in central Oklahoma has been gorgeous lately. Tonight is a near full moon, and yesterday I witnessed one of the most gorgeous sunsets that I have ever seen. When atmospheric conditions are right, no place on earth has sunsets any more gorgeous. One such sunset was part of the inspiration for my novel Prairie Sunset.

John and Attie are two improbable, moonstruck lovers. Near the end of the story, at Artist’s Point outside of Eureka Springs, Arkansas, they stop their RV to watch the sunset. Here is a short excerpt of that scene from the novel Prairie Sunset:

*    *    *

Laboring up steep Highway 71, Attie managed to pass several slower moving, sightseeing vehicles.  When they reached the highest point, south of Canada, on the old highway, Attie pointed into the distance.

"Eureka's just beyond the horizon.  Seventy miles as the crow flies."

"Look there, Attie.  A rainbow on the horizon.  Must be where our pot of gold lies."

"Don't see it."

"In the distance," he said.  "Where you pointed."

"Road's too steep.  I'll take your word for it."

Passing through Fayetteville, Springdale and Rogers they neared the final stretch of highway before reaching Eureka Springs.  A road sign said 'next fourteen miles steep and winding'.  It was.  Spiraling ever upward the narrow road flattened only briefly, forming a river valley.  Having gouged its course between two rounded peaks, the river meandered lazily into the distance, creating a lovely mountain vale in its wake.

Crossing the river, Attie pointed 'Ol Betsy up the steepest mountain they had yet encountered.  Ascending the incline, the engine coughed and labored.  Overlooking the river below, their view became even more dramatic as they climbed ever higher.  Near the mountain's crest, the winding roadway took a wide loop, affording a spectacular view of the meandering river, far below.

"Pull over Attie," John said.

Responding to urgency in his voice, Attie wheeled the RV to a scenic turnout by the side of the road.  "You all right?" she said.

"We're not going to make it to your house before dark.  Let's stop here and watch the sunset."

In the western sky, the golden orb had already begun its descent.  Attie parked and waited until John opened the door and fresh air, damp with impending rain, flooded the vehicle.  Stepping to the ground, he smiled and stretched his arms.

"Attie, I feel as if I've finally come home."

"You have, John," she said, taking his hand.  "We both have."

Together they walked to the cliff's edge and sat on a large limestone boulder overlooking the valley.  Purple martins, leaving daytime roosts in search of insects, swirled high overhead and in the distance a chorus of tree frogs began their nocturnal serenade.  Damp breeze whistling through the pines joined the melody, harmonizing with a company of crickets lilting like a thousand violins.

Tightly squeezing Attie's hand, John said, "It's beautiful."

"Yes it is," Attie said, gazing at the red radiating sphere burning a luminous swath in fading sky as it descended toward the valley floor.

"Once," he said.  "On a spring night in western Oklahoma I saw a sunset almost as beautiful.  Particles of dust from some volcanic eruption in the Pacific filled the sky.  Invisible during the day, dispersed particles became fiery streaks of crimson incandescence at dusk."

"A beautiful sunset is something to remember."

"Attie, you remember the horse races?"

"Course I do."

"Remember when I told you which horse I was betting on?  You said he was the biggest nag on the track - had never won a race."

"And you were too stubborn to listen."

"I bet on his name, Prairie Sunset, because until I met you that sunset in western Oklahoma was the loveliest vision I'd ever seen."

"You're incurable," she said, nudging his ribs and moving closer.  Putting her arm around his waist, Attie felt a tremble beneath her touch, like a bridge abutment, stressed with age, beginning to tire and collapse.

"John, need a heart pill?"

"Already took two," he said, his breathing suddenly coming faster and then in short gasps.

"John!" Not answering, John closed his eyes and shrank back against the boulder.  "Get up John.  We're just outside town.  There's a hospital there."

Neither speaking, nor opening his eyes, John grasped Attie's hand.  Squeezing it tightly, his lips began to quiver and he fought to open his eyes.

"Attie," he said in a whisper.  "Help me up."

"No!" she said, tears welling up in her red-rimmed eyes."

"Help me Attie," he said, his voice low and becoming increasingly hard to hear.

She encircled his waist, struggling to lift him.  Managing somehow to boost him into a sitting posture, she positioned herself behind him, bracing his frail weight between her legs, against her body, embracing him as death's head danced ever-narrowing circles above them.  Finally, it kissed his cheek.

"This can't be happening.  Not now.  Not so close to home.  Let me help you to a doctor."

Holding her hand, John shook his head and said, "Don't cry Attie.  This has been the happiest week of my life.  I never met a kinder, sweeter person than you."  His voice was barely a whisper when he squeezed her hand, one last time, and said, "I love you, Attie.  You kept your promise and took me to the Magic Fountain.  Before I go I want you to make one more promise."

Clutching his hand in a desperate clasp, Attie nodded sadly, as tears streamed down her red and puffy face.

"Bury me on an Arkansas hillside, facing west.  I'm home now and I never want to leave again."

Attie promised.  Then, until the sun had long disappeared below the western horizon, and distant thunder heralded gentle rain, she clutched him to her breast, crying silent tears as she rocked him in her arms.

Eric’sWeb 

Back in the early nineties two petroleum engineers, friends of mine asked me to testify for them at the Oklahoma Corporation Commission on a geologic matter.  Their geologist was out of town, on his honeymoon.

“The map is already done,” Irv told me. 

“All you have to do is go over it for the Judge and answer a few questions for the group that’s protesting our spacing hearing,” Ron added.

The task seemed simple enough and I agreed to help them out in the hearing scheduled for consideration in Tulsa.  As we all drove east down the Turner Turnpike, their lawyer John regaled us with stories about when he was a Captain in Korea, working for the Military Police.

It was spring, the weather wet and stormy, much like Oklahoma’s weather today.  Running water filled ditches on both sides of the turnpike and clouds were a dark shade of ominous gray.  You didn’t have to be an Okie to know there was yet another storm brewing overhead.

The Tulsa branch of the Oklahoma Corporation Commission is in an old school building near the west edge of town.  We headed for the coffee shop to discuss our strategy and to look at Mike’s exhibit.

“What do you think?” Ron asked after I had studied the map in silence for a solid ten minutes.

“There’s a little bust in the contouring,” I said.

Irv grabbed the map out of my hand and said, “Where?”

I showed it to him.  “It’s not a material bust.  Just something I’d have probably done myself if I had been contemplating marriage and honeymoon in Jamaica.”

John, our attorney, appeared concerned and Irv asked, “What’ll we do?”

“I can correct the contour with a pencil but it changes the map’s interpretation.  I don’t think that it would be to your benefit,” I said.

“We can ask for a continuance,” John said.

“I don’t think it’s that big of a deal,” Ron said.  “Like Eric said, the bust isn’t material.  The other side probably won’t even notice it.”

“What are you grinning at?” Ron asked me, seeing the smirk on my face.

“Mike, the opposing attorney used to work with me at Texas Oil & Gas.  If he or his geologist notices the bust they’re going to scream bloody murder.”

“So?  What can they do about it?”

“They’ll pick us apart,” John said.  “Maybe we should call for a continuance.”

“Nah, we’re here.  Let’s do it,” Ron said.  “If things get nasty then put me on the stand.”

“Is that all right with you, Eric?” asked Irv.

“Hey, I’m just a hired gun.  You tell me what you want me to do, and I’ll give it a shot, but – “

“But what?”  Ron demanded.

“Mike is an attack dog.  If he smells blood, he won’t stop until he has us gutted and quartered.”

“I say we’re here and we should put on our case.  What we’re asking for is the right thing.  That little bust in the map is immaterial.”

“I think Nixon said the same thing about the Watergate Tapes,” John said with a grin.  “But hey, it’s your call.  Eric and I are both just hired guns.”

“Don’t give me that malarkey,” Ron said.  “We need to get a ruling on this hearing today.  Let’s go for it.”

“Fine,” I said, “But I think we should disclose the error and explain why it has no relevant meaning.”

“It’s such a minor error, they’ll never notice it,” Ron said.  “Let’s don’t show our hand before it’s played.”

I had a lump in my throat as I was sworn in before the judge.  I knew that there was a narrow line I had to traverse without telling a lie.  I also felt a little dirty because I intended to testify only to what was positive about our case and say nothing about what was negative about it.

John understood my quandary and questioned me about the exhibit without asking me to stretch the truth.  Shortly after he finished, I sat facing the doggedly resolute eyes of Mike, the opposing attorney.  The first words out of his mouth were, “Mr. Wilder, did you notice that there is a geologic bust in your exhibit?”

“Yes, but it’s not material,” I said, protesting.

Mike slammed his hand against the lectern.  “Not material?  Judge, this exhibit is a total fabrication meant to showcase their argument in the best possible light – a false light,” he added.

“Judge,” John said, standing.  “May I approach?”

Mike and John stood in front of the administrative law judge’s bench, bickering back and forth when a bailiff burst into the courtroom.

“Judge, we have to evacuate to the auditorium.  There’s a tornado bearing down on us.”

We had all heard the rain and hail pelting the windows.  Now the wind had picked up and was rocking the walls.  “Recess,” the Judge said.  “Everyone follow the bailiff.”

A hundred or so of us sat for around thirty minutes in the auditorium of the old school building, expecting the roof to fly off at any minute.  Finally the tornado passed but the storm continued, rocking the old building with rain and wind.  Because of the continuing tornado watch, the Judge had little choice but to call for a continuance to the hearing.  Ron laughed as we headed back down the Turner Turnpike toward Oklahoma City.

“John, I should have listened to your advice.  We were getting our asses kicked in there.”

Talk of the hearing quickly changed to the tornado that barely missed us, and then to other things.  I’m a boxing fan and as John began regaling us with tales again, I learned that he was once the manager of Sean O’Grady, Oklahoma City’s former world champ.

To put a cap on this story, Mike the geologist returned from his honeymoon and corrected the minor bust on his map.  By the time the next hearing occurred, attorney Mike had lost all his explosive ammo and Ron and Irv prevailed easily.

Alas, Ron and John are no longer with us. Like my Dad, John suffered from Alzheimer’s and lived next door to him in Reminiscence before he died.

Seeing him there reminded me of the Tulsa tornado story.  It also reminded me that life is good at throwing curve balls, and sometimes when it does, the only thing you can do is ask for a recess.  If you don’t, Old Mother Nature may just request it for you.

Eric'sWeb

The little town where I grew up is located in the northwest corner of Louisiana, a part of the state not usually thought of as swampy.  Perception matters little because a very swamp-like body of water known as Black Bayou exists less than a mile from my parent’s house.

Southern summers are always hot, northwest Louisiana no exception.  I was a sophomore in college before my parents ever got an air conditioner and it always seemed more comfortable outside rather than in.  We often wore our swim trunks beneath our jeans so we could go swimming and cool off whenever we were near water, almost anytime because lakes, ponds, streams and bayous abound near Vivian.

Black Bayou is a shallow body of water, usually not much deeper than ten feet.  Like the name implies its surface is coffee-colored with visibility little more than a couple of inches.  Giant cypress trees with bloated trunks line the bayous perimeter - in the water that is - and they resemble old women draped in shawls because of the Spanish moss hanging from their outstretched branches.

With algae and aquatic plants growing abundantly in the water, Black Bayou would probably not qualify as a prime swimming spot for someone from California or Florida but to us Louisiana boys it was like a dip in a tropical oasis.  We would swim almost anywhere but it didn’t stop us from trying to frighten each other with tales of giant alligators and huge gars with rows of razor-sharp teeth.

One summer day my friends Billy and Ronnie and I went fishing on Black Bayou.  The hot Louisiana sun sat directly overhead, cooking down on us as we sat, cane poles in hand, on the bayou’s bank,.  Without even a nibble for the last hour, Billy suggested we quit fishing and go for a swim instead.  We had an old wooden paddle boat so we pushed it toward deeper water and piled in.

“I know you two are probably afraid but when we get out to the middle I’m going to jump in head first and go all the way to the bottom,” Billy said.

“Who’s afraid?” Ronnie asked.

Billy had big ears that protruded straight out from the short brown hair on his head.  Like Ronnie and me he was skinny as a rail, his face freckled from constant exposure to the sun.  He was grinning, obviously pleased with the concerned reaction elicited by his insinuation of our bravery, or lack thereof.

“If you’re not afraid, you should be.  There’s hollows down there twenty feet deep and that’s where the biggest gators and gars lurk.”

“Jump in,” I said.  “We’re right behind you.”

Billy did just that, holding his nose and tumbling backwards out of the boat like we’d seen Lloyd Bridges do on the TV show Sea Hunt.  Not wanting to step down into the water overgrown with aquatic vegetation, Ronnie and I followed his lead.

Billy was no braver than Ronnie and me but he was enjoying the macho display of daring he was trying to project.  He was ten feet from the boat when he ducked his head beneath the bayou’s inky water and dove toward the bottom.  Ronnie and I waited for him to surface, beginning to wonder as the seconds ticked away if he’d  perhaps become trapped beneath a waterlogged stump, or some other submerged debris.

Like most everyone that spends lots of time in the water, Billy had a good set of lungs and nearly two minutes had passed before his skinny face and big ears came splashing up out of the water.

“Come on, you two.  It’s great down there.  I think I even grabbed hold of a big gator’s tail.”

Billy’s smiling smirk indicated he was having a good laugh at our expense.  We weren’t worried about his daring-do behavior; we’d seen it all before.  I was more concerned about the slimy tentacles of lime-green algae meandering through my toes in the warm water.  It was then that Billy let out a bloodcurdling scream and began stroking toward the boat as fast as his skinny arms could move.

So absorbed at getting into the boat, he almost capsized it as he hurried out of the water.  Ronnie and I assumed that it was just another trick to scare us.  We’d both experienced his antics before and neither of us was going to bite this time around.  We both stayed put, treading water while trying mostly unsuccessfully to keep our toes away from the icky plants caressing them.  When Billy failed to stick his head up after five minutes, we decided to investigate.

Ronnie held one side of the boat as I crawled in, and I balanced the opposite side for him as he followed.  Billy was sitting in the bottom of the boat, white as a sheep and wielding a paddle.

“Quit your act,” Ronnie said.  “We’re not falling for it this time.”

Billy finally peeked up over the side of the boat and then dragged himself onto one of the plank-like seats.  Without speaking, he pointed to a spot about ten feet from the boat.  It took only a moment for Ronnie and me to see what he was pointing at.

A half-submerged tree protruded from the shallow water with two of the largest water moccasins I had ever seen were sunning on the branches.  As we watched, a third snake swam past them, his ugly head cutting a periscope-like path as he moved steadily toward us.  With no exchange of information other than our shared snake sighting, we grabbed our paddles and began stroking back toward shore.

Neither Ronnie nor I bothered smiling or razing Billy as we hiked down the lonely dirt road back to Vivian, our butts puckered, and the resultant tightening it caused making talking and any attempt at facial expressions virtually impossible.

Eric'sWeb

Several years ago, I sold a geologic prospect to a Dallas company. Much as it is now, times in the oil patch were tough. Part of the requirement for buying my prospect was that I had to help them “promote” it to the industry. They paid my airfare and expenses, and their engineer Don and I spent almost a year traveling all over the country trying to sell it. We never quite accomplished our goal.

After a day of showing the prospect to various Dallas companies, landman Charlie and I visited a dark Texas bar to unwind from the stressful day. He thought I was crazy when I heard a booming voice in the darkness and I said, “I know that voice.”

It was a friend of mine holding court at the bar. I hadn’t seen him in ten years, but no one on earth sounded like him. He was big, six four, three-hundred pounds and his voice was as deep and melodious as any television announcer was. His name was Big Bill Boorhem.

We renewed our friendship and he subsequently bought a prospect from me and drilled nine shallow wells on it. He and Kathy, his significant other, moved to Seattle on their sailboat, and then back to Texas. When Anne became ill with cancer, they would come up from Texas, cook for us and generally try to help us keep our spirits up.

Bill owned a restaurant for a time in Dallas called Suds and Duds. He knew many great southwestern recipes and loved “Austin” music.

Bill, alas, didn’t live much longer than Anne, succumbing to lung disease. No, he wasn’t a smoker. Here is one of his recipes that I recited to my Mother over the phone and she returned to me sometime later in a letter.

Bill, like me, loved beer. I got him to drinking brewpub beer and he became somewhat of a “beer snob.” His favorite was Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. I’m telling you this because I know you will love his recipe. When you are having your first scrumptious bowl, pop the top on a Sierra Nevada Pale Ale and toast Big Billy for both of us.

Big Billy’s White Bean Chicken Chili

• 1 ½ lbs of breast, cut into bite sized pieces
• 2 Tbsp olive oil
• 3 large cloves, minced
• 1 tsp cumin
• ½ tsp cayenne pepper
• ½ tsp chili powder
• ½ tsp salt
• 3 cups chicken broth
• 1 lb white beans, cooked and drained
• 1 large onion, diced (about 1 ¾  cups)

Heat a large pot over medium-high heat. Add oil, onion, celery, chicken and salt. Sauté until the onion is transparent and chicken begins to brown. Add remaining ingredients.

Bring to a boil, lower heat and simmer, covered, for 45 minutes.

Top with a dollop of sour cream, a sprinkling of cheddar cheese, and sliced green onions just before serving.

Louisiana Mystery Writer

I began my walk earlier tonight than usual and it was not yet dark when I reached the place where I saw last night’s spirits. I nevertheless approached the bottom where the creek goes under the road with anticipation, and with caution.

I didn’t get a good look at the two beings last night but I think they were boys, about ten or eleven. The more I have thought about what I saw, the more my mind is playing tricks on my memory. I am now convinced that what I saw were two Edmond, Oklahoma ghost boys that use the creek as a conduit to move from place to place without detection.

I had my trusty digital Nikon in my pocket this evening and took a picture of the tree-covered low spot where the creek goes under the road. Even though darkness had yet to totally fall, the picture turned out completely black, except for a few spots of circular light.

What light remained, as I rounded the corner and began walking up the hill to my house, was disappearing fast. There was something sitting in the road in front of me - a large black cat that I had never before seen. The cat ambled into a culvert under the street.

Tomorrow, I will begin my walk a little earlier so I can capture a picture of the place where I saw the two ghosts, or later so that I might catch another glimpse of the spirit boys. Even if I don’t see them, maybe I’ll get a picture of the black cat that lives in the culvert.

Eric'sWeb

August in central Oklahoma began as a scorcher, with multiple days of one hundred plus temperatures. It ended with a whimper, days damp and cool, and the nights almost chilly.

Days have grown shorter, darkness falling before I finished my walk tonight. A creek courses through the area, cloaked on both sides by trees and thick vegetation. All manner of wildlife, including foxes, coyotes, raccoons, possums, and even an occasional deer, call the creek home and use it as a conduit for stealthy movement. Tonight, I saw something other than a wild animal.

About a half mile from my house, thick tree cover effectively blocks the moon and stars. As I walked down the gentle hill to the spot where the creek crosses the road, I saw the faint outline of two people walking toward me.  I couldn’t tell if they were male or female, young or old. As I strained to see whom it was, one of them darted into the trees.

I was walking at a fast clip down the hill, straining to get a better look at the person walking toward me. As I approached the creek, I realized that the person dressed in ephemeral white was actually moving away from me. The person had a light. At first, I thought it was a flashlight, but they held it over their head like a torch - a torch so faint that it cast only the dimmest of light. By now, I was wondering if the two people I saw were actually real, or perhaps spirits out for a walk.

The entity disappeared for a moment behind a slight bend in the road. I increased my pace, expecting to see two walkers, dressed in white, strolling ahead of me when I rounded the slight bend. Instead, I saw nothing but darkness. There was no place the two beings could easily have gone that I wouldn’t have seen them. I continued toward the house, looking back over my shoulder for the entities, but seeing only flickering fireflies.

The golden moon, nearly full, glowed as I exited the trees. A little voice inside my head told me that I either didn’t see what I thought I saw, or else there is a logical explanation to the mystery. I guess anything is possible.

Eric'sWeb

The recent weather in central Oklahoma has been gorgeous and unseasonably cool. Dad and I enjoyed the wonderful weather this past Sunday on the inside patio of the Lakeside Restaurant that abuts scenic LakeHefner. I was happy we went there, for more than one reason.

My Dad is ninety. Two Mondays ago, my brother Jack and I had to take him to the emergency room because he had fallen during the night. He had a big knot on his forehead and a cut on his nose that required three stitches.

Visiting him later, I noticed he was wearing a pair of shoes with the laces removed. He couldn’t get on his size eight shoes on to his swollen feet so I bought him a new pair, size eleven and a half.

“I’ll have the nurse look at his feet,” the friendly attendant told me.

Brother Jack called the next day. He’d had a lengthy phone conversation with Dad’s geriatric doctor and the prognosis sounded dire.

“He thinks he has congestive heart failure. We may have to hospitalize him. They can keep him alive with drugs but his quality of life will be almost nothing. We’ll have to decide if we want to keep giving him the drugs. We have an appointment at eleven thirty tomorrow.”

Following my conversation with Jack, I felt a horse had kicked me in the head.  The doctor’s visit turned out well. Dad’s heart is strong, as are all his vital signs. Doctor K prescribed compression hose for his swelling and told us to check back in six months.

At the Lakeside Sunday, I was happy that my Dad is a healthy ninety-year old. I was also happy because the mild weather had brought out more pretty females than I could shake a stick at. I don’t know if Dad noticed, but I did.

Eric'sWeb

Many types of people, both male and female, populate the domestic oil industry but none of them saints.  During my tenure in the business, I have met many of its denizens but the most colorful of all was a person named Harold - not his real name.

Harold, an OJT geophysicist that had found a billion (I'm not exaggerating!) barrel oil field in Nigeria for Mobil Oil.  He was quite seriously, one of smartest persons I have ever met.  Unfortunately, he had a larcenous side.

Anne and I had a company in bankruptcy when Harold showed up on our doorstep, his own oil Company and sixteen-hundred acre Texas ranch in foreclosure.  He parked his old Mercury (the only vehicle he had left) in our driveway and proceeded to move into our spare bedroom where he stayed for about two months.

During the time that he lived with us, Harold drank every drop of liquor in the house, became engaged to a woman he somehow met in the interim, and talked to our creditor's committee, telling them we were incompetent and needed replacing as debtors-in-possession.  When I heard what he had done, I hung him out the second story window by his heel, threatening to let go.

"I don't really care how you treat people that you don't know, but Anne and I are your friends.  You shouldn't treat us like marks."

My actions must have had an effect because Harold never again treated me, or Anne, like a mark.  He did talk the owner of an OKC mud company into starting an oil company and hiring him as president.  The long-time mud company owner died a pauper after Harold had sucked off every penny he had.

Anyway, I got to thinking about Harold after my story about the Carousel Lounge in Shreveport.  Harold, Anne and I had an adventure at the Carousel Lounge in New Orleans, at the Monteleone Hotel - an adventure instigated by Harold.  Never drink at a rotating bar, is a rule that I had lived by for years, only to violate it some twenty years later.

Eric'sWeb

Several years ago when my stepdaughter Shannon was living with Marilyn and me, she brought home a big black Rottweiler.  She is a sucker for animals and according to Marilyn, was always bringing home a stray dog or cat, or bird with a broken wing when she was young.

The dog’s name was Chuckie.  He was big and black with white and tan markings.  He was around ten years old and had belonged to an old woman that was going to a nursing home.  There was no one else to take the dog and if Shannon hadn’t come along the only other option was the pound.  Shannon moved to other digs shortly after bringing Chuckie home.  Even though she dropped by regularly to take care of him, much of the feeding fell upon Marilyn and me.

Chuckie was old but he was an imposing animal, weighing in at well over one hundred pounds.  We have a large pen on the north side of our property and Chuckie took to it right away.  I was a little afraid of him and we got off on the wrong foot.  The first week that he was here, I went into his pen to fill his water bucket with the hose.  It was after dark and I’d had a few toddies.  After filling his bucket, I turned to leave the pen only to find my way blocked by the big dog, his teeth barred as he emitted a low-throated growl.

I thought that I was a goner but walked slowly toward him and said, “No Chuck, you sit,” as sternly as I could muster.

Chuck didn’t sit but he did stop growling and let me move past him without tearing my arm off.  I learned the next day that Rottweilers are territorial, and that before the old woman adopted him, Chuckie had lived with a man that often beat him when he got drunk.

“He doesn’t like men,” Shannon told me the next day as she arranged his food bowl and water bucket closer to the fence so that I didn’t have to go into his pen.

“Thanks for telling me,” I said.

From that point, I was determined to make friends with the giant dog.  Every morning when I went for my morning paper, I would stop by his pen and give him treats.  Every day when I got home from work, I would take him treats.  Soon, he would jump up on the fence and let me rub his ears

The first time it rained after he moved in with us, I looked out the window and saw him standing in his pen, getting soaked.  Considering the time that I had spent in the rain, in the boonies of Vietnam, I decided that he needed shelter – the sooner the better.  I had a six-foot length of wooden fence in the yard so I lifted it over the fence and made a quick and dirty lean-to.  I covered the structure with black plastic sheeting to shield it from the rain.  Within minutes, Chuckie got under the lean-to as if he had lived there all his life.

When Shannon visited, she would let him out of the pen and allow him to run around in the back yard.  During these times, I improved Chuckie’s lean-to by adding cedar chips.  Before winter arrived, I got him a big doghouse and he loved it.

Soon, I was comfortable enough with the big dog to let him out of his pen even when Shannon wasn’t there, and I was happy to learn that he was just a big overgrown puppy.  When I sat by the pool, he would rest his large head on my knees and let me rub his ears.  He also liked to swim in the pool.

Shannon often took him with her during the day.  He loved riding in the back of her truck, hiking with her and swimming in the nearby lake.  Chuckie had found a home but that is not the end of his story.

Chuck had lived with us a couple of years when we noticed that he had a tumor on his belly.  We watched it for a while and could tell that it was growing.  Shannon’s vet finally told her he needed to remove it.  He did and Chuckie was in horrible pain for what seemed like hours.  He wouldn’t lie down because of the pain in his belly, despite the efforts of Shannon and Marilyn to soothe him.  Finally the pain killers kicked in and he fell into an exhausted sleep.

The operation worked, at least for a while.  Chuckie was more energetic and responsive during this time and I have little doubt that it was the best days of his life.  The tumor stayed gone for around two years before recurring.  This time it was much worse, Chuckie had grown quite old for a Rottweiler and suffered from hip problems (a common genetic trait of Rottweilers).

Chuckie’s health soon began degenerating at a rapid pace and it was obvious that he was in constant pain.  One day, Shannon took him for his last ride in the back of her truck to their favorite hiking trail by the lake.  The old dog could barely walk but it enjoyed lying in the shallow water one last time.  Finally, she took him to the vet, gave him one last ear scratch and had him put to sleep.

My big Lab Lucky is also getting old, now eleven.  He lives in a large pen (quarter acre) on our property with Velvet and Patch.  Marilyn and I were considering putting him in Chuckie’s old pen so we had it cleaned out last week and reseeded with grass.  Yesterday, I strolled through the enclosure with my Pug Princess.

The pen is large – twenty by thirty feet, at least.  Several large trees provide plenty of shade, although there is enough sun to lie beneath on a chilly day.  One side faces the road and honeysuckle vines cover the chain link fence. 

What I found at the end of the pen was a very healthy clematis plant with eight purple blossoms growing amid the honeysuckle.  The essence of their beauty reminded me what a wonderful dog that Chuckie was and what a pleasure he was.

The big black dog was an abused castoff, neglected most of his life.  He was intelligent, had a wonderful personality and had probably dreamed doggie dreams of having a real friend someday.  I am so thankful for Shannon and her soft streak.  Because of her, he got his wish.

Even though Chuck and I got off to a rocky start, I came to love that big black scary-looking dog, and I miss him now.

Eric’sWeb

My paternal grandparents lived on a forty-acre east Texas farm.  Cass County is the most northeastern county in Texas and its border is only a few miles from where I lived in northwest Louisiana.

My real paternal grandfather abandoned Grandmother Dale before my dad was born.  Dad never met his father and I feel that he was extra protective of his mother because of this.  Living only about thirty miles from the Cass County farm, we visited almost every weekend.  Sitting around the farmhouse and chatting was usually too boring for me so I would often hike in the woods.  Grandma Rood always had a big friendly dog that would accompany me on my treks.

The east Texas countryside of Cass County rolls and is heavily wooded.  I would crawl through the barbwire fence surrounding the farmhouse, Grandma’s dog not far behind, and take off down the hill, into the woods.  One particular trip turned out more eventful than the others did.

It was summer, east Texas weather hot, humid and uncomfortable.  I crossed the little creek near the end of Grandma Dale’s forty and decided to explore the terrain over the back fence.  Even the big yellow dog was a little reluctant but he followed when he saw me disappear up the hill, into a thick stand of pines.

I learned later that it’s difficult maintaining your sense of direction when you are walking amid closely spaced trees.  At the time I didn’t know any better.  I was climbing a particularly high hill and anxious to discover what was on top.

Big Dog and I soon reached a clearing near the hilltop, many sandstone boulders protruding from the earth.  Seeing a particularly large boulder, I climbed up on it for a better look.

Pine trees in east Texas are thick and they hampered my view beyond fifty feet, or so.  I did see something else: an inscription carved in the boulder.  The initials E.W. and the year 1872 were still visible beneath the greenish lichen covering much of the boulder.

Big Dog and I spent the next hour exploring the hill and looking for more inscriptions on the other boulders.  We didn’t find any and finally took off down the hill, not realizing that we had gone in the wrong direction.  When we reached the base of the hill, I began following an indistinct trail that I found.  Big Dog wouldn’t follow and I soon learned why.

I found myself locked in the grasp of a large briar patch that jutted from the ground almost to my face.  Soon, I didn’t know which way I had come or where I should go, sweat beading down my arms and mingling with blood from briar scratches that were becoming increasingly more numerous.

Movement through the briar patch was slow and painful.  When I finally clawed my way to the edge of the patch, I emerged with a wild yelp of accomplishment.  My momentary elation ended quickly when I realized that I was alone, Big Dog no where around.

I was late in the afternoon when I reached a dirt road with no idea which direction to take.  Deciding it didn’t really matter, I walked to the right.  Fifteen minutes later I heard the rumble of a car’s engine in the distance and I still remember how relieved I was when the hood of my parent’s blue and white Chevy finally appeared in front of me.  It was my Mother and Brother.  My Dad had taken my grandparent’s car and was looking for me in another direction.

My Brother Jack was a Boy Scout and used some obscure scouting rule to figure out where I was.  We weren’t far from the house as the crow flies, but more than five miles away by country road.  My Grandmother just shook her head when I told her about the carved inscription on the boulder.

“Maybe it was one of your long-lost relatives,” she said.

Big Dog had already made it home but sometime later he disappeared and never returned.  Grandma said that probably either a bobcat got him or else he fell in a hole.  I don’t think so and I always felt a little guilty about it.

Maybe I had instilled the wanderlust in him.  Maybe, but in the back of my mind I like to believe there was another place he needed to be and I just gave him the okay to go there.

Eric’sWeb

The Commander’s Palace is one of the finer restaurants in New Orleans. Here is one of their recipes from their website.

SHRIMP AND TASSO WITH FIVE-PEPPER JELLY

36 Jumbo shrimp (shelled and deveined)
6 oz. Spicy tasso (julienne into 1" strips)
36 Pickled okra
5 Pepper jelly (see below)
Crystal Hot Sauce (above)

Make a 1/4" incision down the back of each shrimp and place one stripe of tasso on each incision. Secure with a toothpick. Lightly dust each shrimp with seasoned flour and fry.

Placed cooked shrimp in a bowl with 4 oz. of Crystal hot butter sauce and toss until well coated.

Spread 5-pepper jelly on the bottom of a small dish and arrange shrimp on the plate alternating with the pickled okra.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

FIVE PEPPER JELLY

1 each Red, Yellow and Green peppers diced
1 Jalapeno
1/4 tsp. Pepper Flakes
6 oz. Karo Light Syrup
6 oz. White vinegar

Put light syrup and vinegar in a pot and reduce until sticky. Add remaining ingredients and cook until the peppers are soft. Add salt to taste.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

CRYSTAL HOT SAUCE BEURRE BLANC

5 oz. Crystal hot sauce
Pinch of garlic
Pinch of shallot
2 oz. Heavy Cream
1 1/2 lb. Butter

Sauté garlic and shallots in a pan with a little butter. Add Crystal Hot Sauce and reduce by 75%. Add cream and reduce again by 50%. Slowly whip in softened butter a little at a time.

Louisiana Mystery Writer

I love diamonds. Here is a PDF pamphlet from the Wyoming Geological Survey explaining how to find them.

http://www.wsgs.uwyo.edu/Publications/OnlinePubs/docs/IP-12new.pdf

Eric’sWeb

   I hate trying to imitate Will Rogers, always talking about politics and the weather, but as I keyboard this story, yet another rainstorm has passed the house. I’m not keeping score, but this is the rainiest August that I have experienced in central Oklahoma.

My backyard cants toward my back door. When it rains, water runs on to my porch. I have a drain, but when the drain is falling exceptionally hard, I have to operate a broom to prevent water from flooding into my living room as it did during the “Great Flood” of 2007.

I recently saw a lightning strike map of the United States and noticed that central Oklahoma has about as many air-to-ground strikes as any place in the Country. Tonight, I can attest to the number of lightning strikes that occurred near my house.

My two pugs, Princess and Scooter live on the back porch. Princess doesn’t like noisy storms but little Scooter is a warrior. Nothing scares him and he stood close to me, defiantly barking at the thunder as I used the broom to combat falling water.  Nothing much scares me either, but a nearby lightning strike caused me to yell, and scare both dogs, reminding me of my time in a Vietnamese free-fire zone, so many years ago.

This is the rainiest Oklahoma August that I can ever remember, but it finally abated tonight, moving east as it always does. Smiling before I returned to my computer, I petted Princess and Scooter, still marveling at my tiny dog with the heart of a lion.

Louisiana Mystery Writer

We all have benchmarks in our lives that we recognize as signs of our moving in a positive direction.  For me, it has always been owning, or at least leasing, a hot tub.  I bought my first redwood hot tub in 1979, just before marrying Anne.  Since then, I’ve had four more, including the one that I have now.

Following the oil bust in the early eighties, the fortunes of Anne and I took an abrupt downward turn.  We lost out house on SkiIsland and our three rent houses (yes, I know, we were over-consumers at the time).

The hardest part of curbing your lifestyle is finding a quick way of halting your monthly expenditures.  I’m talking about the house payment on your mansion and monthly car payments for your Mercedes and Jaguar (I know, I’m not eliciting much sympathy here!).

Anne and I reined in our lifestyle, still managing to maintain a comfortable existence until 1995.  The oil biz was hurting.  No one was buying prospects or drilling wells.  We found a little rent house and had just enough money left after the first month’s rent, deposits and everything to rent a U-Haul truck.

My nephew Kevin helped me move and we single-handedly transported years of our lives from a five thousand square foot house to a fifteen hundred foot house.  Well, not totally alone.  Later that night, I finally called my Brother Jack and Anne’s brother David to help us with the last load.  To say we were exhausted is an understatement.  To this day, I don’t think Kevin knows how much he helped me.

Anne and I lived in the rent house for two years - past the time we learned that she had lung cancer.  I finally sold a prospect and made a down payment with it on the house I still live in.  Anne died about six months later.

The house had a swimming pool but no hot tub.  The oil business dragged on for several more years and I scrapped by, making the house payments, buying groceries and little else.  I still wanted a hot tub and the entire time I plotted how I might acquire one.

Three years after Anne passed away, I saw an ad for an eight-foot octagonal hot tub in the Daily Oklahoman.  The party was asking two hundred and twenty five dollars.  I had the money, called and purchased the shell.  Three days later, the owner brought it to me and dumped it unceremoniously in my back yard.  It remained in the same spot, through more hard times in the oil biz, for three more years.

I did figure out where I wanted to put it and I began digging a hole in the ground, beside the oak tree where I had buried my nineteen-year-old cat Chani when she finally died.  The hole lay dug, half filled with rainwater, and I still didn’t have the money to set the hot tub, much less get it plumbed and ready to use.

Two years ago, my financial fortunes took a turn for the better and I finally got the hot tub plumbed and working.  I took my first dip on the night of my birthday and surely, it was a birthday present from someone that had gone before me.

My stepson Shane built a gazebo to enclose the outdoor hot tub and I mucked it out after a winter of non-use.  This house is my little piece of Eden, Marilyn and I its Adam and Eve.  If there’s a snake out there with an apple, well, hey, give me a bite.

Fiction South

When I was much younger and still married to Anne, we took a ski trip to Tahoe with our close friends Darryl and Mary.  Mary didn’t like to ski but she liked to gamble.  Anne, Darryl and I liked to do both.

Tahoe is a scenic little town near the banks of the world’s most gorgeous lake.  The gaming strip was also spectacular and we stayed in fancy suites at Caesar’s Palace.  Too late to ski the day we arrived, we began gambling instead.

The next morning Anne, Darryl and I took the bus to the Nevada side of the Heavenly Ski Resort, the largest ski resort in the United States.  Darryl was athletic and a born skier.  Anne was also good, at least better than me.  Anne and I were fair intermediate skiers, Darryl almost a pro.

We soon settled into a comfortable, if very tiring routine and it went something like this: we would gamble until two or three in the morning, and then sleep until sixish.  Around seven, we would meet in the coffee shop, eat breakfast and play keno until the ski bus arrived.  Anne, Darryl and I would ski until around five and then return to Caesar’s.  After showering and donning clean duds, we would meet for dinner around seven or eight.  After dinner, we would begin gambling again until two or three in the morning.

The California side of Heavenly has a black diamond run called Gunbarrel.  It is steep, the moguls deep.  Every evening Anne and I would take the lift down the slope and meet Darryl at the bottom.  He always skied down Gunbarrel.

Every day when we met Darryl at the base of Gunbarrel he would say, “Eric, if you don’t ski down Gunbarrel at least once, you don’t have a hair on your ass.”

After the first day, we discovered that Caesar’s has an excellent exercise facility (not that we needed it) that included a huge hot spa that doubled as a hidden grotto.  Darryl and I soon learned that many of the showgirls participated in a dancercise class, dressed appropriately in skimpy exercise outfits.  We would relax in the hot water, soothing our tormented muscles as we watched two dozen or so gorgeous showgirls practice their steps – at least until Anne and Mary found out about our secret show.  Yes, they put the kibosh on our short-lived pastime.

Our last day on the mountain, I finally took Darryl’s dare.  Mary had ridden up the lift to join us and Anne rode down with her, but not before chiding me.

“You’re going to kill yourself,” she said.  “You better ride down with Mary and me.”

When I stared over the precipice, saw how steep it was and how deep the moguls were, I almost acquiesced.

“You can do it,” Darryl shouted from down the slope.  “Come on.  I’ll meet you in the bar.”

When I nosed my skis over the ledge there was no going back.  I was committed.  I finally made it to the base of the slope, bruised, beat up, sweating despite the cold, but feeling every bit like the king of the world.  I found Anne, Mary and Darryl waiting for me at the bar.

“You crazy SOB, you made it,” Darryl said, giving me a hug.

Anne and Mary weren’t as impressed, rolling their eyes and shaking their heads as if I had truly lost my mind.  It didn’t matter.  I ordered a whiskey and both Darryl and I got fairly lit by the time we took the bus back to Caesar’s.

Anne and Mary soon gave up the slot machines and went to their rooms but not before Anne reminded me that we had to pack and be ready to leave by seven the next morning.  I wasn’t listening and Darryl and I were still going strong at five the next morning.  I finally put all my money on the table, betting it all on one spin of the roulette wheel, praying that I would lose so that I could go to bed.  Thankfully (I guess) I did.

“If you go to sleep now you’ll never get up in time to make the bus,” he warned.

“Can’t help it,” I said.  “I’m done for.”

I stumbled back to our room and passed out on the bed, barely closing my eyes before Anne shook me to wake up.

“Get up,” she said.  “We have to pack.”

“I can’t move,” I said.  “You’ll have to leave me here.”

Anne and I never had many fights during our marriage, at least real fights.  This one had to be our worst.  Soon, she gave up and stalked out the door, slamming it on the way out.  She went straight to Darryl and Mary’s room, returning with Darryl.

I failed to mention that Darryl had been a drill sergeant in the Army.  He quickly rousted me out of bed in a command voice I remembered and still feared from my days at FortPolk in Louisiana.

“Wilder, roll out of that damn bed.  Now!”

As I dragged out of bed, he was throwing my suitcase on top of it.  Ripping my clothes out of the closet, he tossed them on the bed.  I don’t know how we did it but we all managed to make the bus headed to the RenoAirport.

As we waited for our plane to arrive, we played the slots, Mary hitting the dollar jackpot just as they announced the last boarding call.

“Dammit, Mary!  Come on.  We’re going to get left here,” Darryl admonished.

“I’m not leaving without this money,” she said.  “Get me something to put it in.”

Darryl rushed into the plane and found a couple of barf bags, the only thing he could think of.  The plane waited, just barely, until Mary and Darryl squeezed through, her windfall intact.

Except for the fact that I felt like pure hell, the flight home went well and Anne was once again speaking to me by the time we touched down in Oklahoma City.

It took me about two weeks to recuperate fully from that vacation.  Having forgotten most of the bad parts of the trip, we repeated it the following year.  This time I was a year older and a little bit wiser.  When it became time to leave, I was the first one packed.

Louisiana Mystery Writer

During the last oil boom, I did a lot of freelance geology work for a local company that was very active at the time.  Ray, an oil man I met had his own company that was closely associated with the one for which I was doing work.  My wife Anne and I became good friends with his wife Kathy and him.

Ray’s associate Larry also owned an infamous local night spot called Michael’s Plum that was the “in” place to frequent for many years.  Michael’s was sponsoring a trip to the Bahamas where Larry owned two yachts.  The trip included rooms at the Paradise Island Hotel along with round trip airfare.  Several spots came open at the last minute and the four of us headed toward the Caribbean.

We did lots of gambling, drinking, eating and sitting in the sun. One day, the girls were exhausted so Ray and I decided to hit the beach by ourselves. We had barely spread our towels in the sand when two good-looking women dressed in tiny bikinis joined us. They both had very proper English accents – at least they sounded proper to two Okie oilies.

The two young women were very friendly – overly friendly, it seemed to both of us. They were soon practically sitting in our laps before Ray and I realized they were “working girls.” As it turned out, we didn’t have a chance to get into trouble.

Our rooms were on the third floor of the resort with balconies that overlooked the sea. Anne and Kathy, it seemed, trusted neither of us very much and were keeping an eye out to see where we were. Espying the two scantily-clad British women sitting with us, they quickly sprinted across the hundred yards of sand, joining us and making it quite clear that Ray and I didn’t need extra company.

Dinner was a bit strained that night, even though Ray and I never did anything.

“Because we didn’t give you a chance,” Anne said, above our protests.

Kathy’s next comment caused us all to laugh and succeeded in breaking the tension – restoring the trip to near normalcy. Well, almost!

“Never trust a horny man on hot sand,” she said.

Louisiana Mystery Writer

Brennan’s in New Orleans is famous for many dishes, including their brunch, but their signature dessert is Bananas Foster. I found this recipe on their website and they explain that New Orleans was once the primary destination for Central and South American bananas. This is one of those desserts you need to put on your bucket list.

Brennan’s Bananas Foster

• ¼ cup (½ stick) butter
• 1 cup brown sugar
• ½ teaspoon cinnamon
• ¼ cup banana liqueur
• 4 bananas, cut in half 
  lengthwise, then halved
• ¼ cup dark rum
• 4 scoops vanilla ice cream

Combine the butter, sugar, and cinnamon in a flambé pan or skillet. Place the pan over low heat either on an alcohol burner or on top of the stove, and cook, stirring, until the sugar dissolves. Stir in the banana liqueur, and then place the bananas in the pan. When the banana sections soften and begin to brown, carefully add the rum.

Continue to cook the sauce until the rum is hot, and then tip the pan slightly to ignite the rum. When the flames subside, lift the bananas out of the pan and place four pieces over each portion of ice cream.

Generously spoon warm sauce over the top of the ice cream and serve immediately.

Eric’sWeb

While growing up in Louisiana, I came face-to-face with water moccasins on several occasions.  My closest encounter remains vivid in my memory.

My friend Barry lived near a pond that resided deep in the woods behind his house.  Jones Pond had the best visibility in north Louisiana - about six feet.  This is significant because the water in nearby Caddo Lake is so opaque that you can barely see your hand in front of your facemask.

Barry and I, both snorkeling enthusiasts, would often trek through the thickly forested area to go swimming.  The pond was small, covering no more than an acre or so.  It was also shallow - less than twelve deep.

Thick vegetation grew all the way to the pond's edge and fallen branches and brush littered its bottom.  We often saw snakes, squirrels, armadillos, etc., that lived near the pond.  It didn't stop us from swimming there because the water was clear - oh so very clear.

One warm summer day, I was swimming in the pond.  After taking a deep breath, I dove to the bottom of the pool and began swimming through felled branches - north Louisiana's version of a coral reef, at least in my imagination.  Many fish lived in the pond and I was nose to nose with a small bream.

Suddenly, out of the submerged brush, a large viperous head, complete with slanted eyes and large fangs set against a white background, appeared, the head attached to the heavy body of a reptile.  I knew in a moment that it was a cottonmouth.

Thankfully, the snake wasn't interested in me and I saw him grab the bream in his mouth.  I didn't wait around to watch him swallow it, flipping around and stroking as fast as I could for shore.

I didn't wait for Barry to come up for air.  "What's the matter with you?" he asked when he came out of the woods and found me in his back yard.

"You wouldn't believe it if I told you," I said, barely mustering a grin.

Louisiana Mystery Writer

An interesting story for you numerologists out there.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20090908/sc_livescience/why090909issospecial

Eric’sWeb

As I walked to the swimming pool last night, a spider web caught in my hair and shoulders. It didn’t scare me but it reminded me of a section in my novel Ghost of a Chance.  Buck McDivit is lost on eerie Caddo Lake at night near the place where he has recently seen a ghost. Here is a short excerpt from Ghost of a Chance.

Ghost Excerpt

The friendliest of country roads can become creepy as a carnival ghost house after dark.  The road to Deception proved no exception.  Thick fog wisped up from hot blacktop and danced across the roadway as Buck swerved to miss a darting rabbit.  The frightened animal scurried into the forest, oblivious to its near demise.

Buck bypassed downtown Deception and found the boat waiting where he’d left it.  The motor cranked on the first pull and sent a swirl of vapor curling up from the surface of the lake.  Foggy haze continued to thicken as he adjusted the bow light and motored away from shore.

Heavy fog began rolling in as Buck neared the center of the lake.  The boat's tiny light provided scant illumination, even on a clear night.  Now it was all but useless.  He quickly lost sight of land but, thanks to the continued effects of Richardson's brandy, wasn't immediately bothered by the lack of visibility.  His blithe oblivion didn't last long.

Within minutes, he'd lost all notion of direction and rocked the fuel tank to reassure him that he had plenty of gas.  The heft of a half-empty tank only added to his growing concern.  As marauding mosquitoes buzzed his head, a distant rumble interrupted the chorus of crickets and frogs - a non-muffled engine.  Another boat was on the lake and Buck couldn't tell if it was approaching him or moving away.

"Hello out there," he called, his cry eliciting no response except for silence in the creatures of the lake.

As Buck listened for a reply his boat struck something in the darkness.  The collision sent him sprawling.  As he pulled himself off the bottom of the boat, he realized he'd rammed one of the old wood-framed drilling platforms.  Luckily, he'd struck it at an angle.  When he grabbed for a plank, a sharp splinter pierced his hand causing him to recoil and bang his head against the platform.  Worse yet, red eyes glared up from the darkness beneath the platform.

When Buck gunned the throttle the motor raced, along with his heart, but the boat remained in place.  The impact had thrown the engine out of gear, sticking the boat in brush trapped beneath the musty old platform.  Now the boat rocked precariously amid dank odor of stagnate water and dry rot.

As Buck's little craft floated in a circle beneath the platform, it passed through elastic strands of a large spider web.  Claustrophobia chilled his neck as the web encircled his face.  Forgetting the racing engine, he grabbed the platform and yanked the boat out from under the planking.  With hand and head throbbing he slammed the boat into gear, motoring blindly into what he hoped was open water.  Again he heard the high-pitched whine of another boat.

Buck threw the engine into neutral, fear of striking a cypress tree or another platform in the thick fog fresh in his mind.  After raking the spider web from his face he called for help again and listened for an answer.  No help arrived as he felt something crawling down his shirt.

"Hey out there!  Can anyone hear me?"

Buck's cry faded as a powerful light penetrated milky fog.  It was attached to a fast boat powering straight toward him.  Standing, he began waving and yelling.

"Here I am!"

The boat's approaching wail sounded vaguely familiar to Buck but it was too late to worry about it.  As it streaked past, its wake lifted his boat almost out of the water.  The little craft remained afloat but rocked dangerously.  Then he heard the other boat turning for another pass.

Buck held on, waiting for the swell to subside.  The wake had swamped the motor, stalling it.  When the boat stopped rocking he yanked the starter cord but the motor only sputtered and died with a sick sounding thump.  He had little time to worry about the stalled engine.

The marauding boat's headlight blazed through the fog, powering directly toward him.  With little time to react he abandoned ship, diving overboard before the speeding boat plowed into his own craft with a tremendous crash and an ensuing explosion of wood.  The wake of the collision sucked him to the bottom of the shallow lake, pinioning him in the murky ooze for a long, terrifying moment.  When the wake passed, releasing the suction, he tried to kick toward the surface, his arms flailing against swirling muck and slimy vegetation.  Something had his foot in its clammy grasp and refused to let go.

The crooked branch of a submerged tree, part of the rotting mass of vegetation at the bottom of the lake, had trapped Buck's foot.  He struggled but his futile attempt served only to deplete what little oxygen was left in his lungs.  Despite his efforts, he gained no advantage against the algae-covered stump.

Buck's eyes bulged, his head threatening to explode, his lungs desperate to gasp something, even blood-warm water, into them.  Just before losing consciousness he felt icy fingers encircle his ankle.  Ephemeral hands freed his ankle from the sunken tree and pushed him toward the lake’s surface.  Stroking upward in near panic, he belched foul liquid from his lungs as he burst from the black water.

The first cognizant sound Buck recognized was the boat returning at high speed for another pass.  Ducking beneath the water, he plunged back to the bottom of the lake just as the boat passed directly overhead.  This time no sunken vegetation entrapped him and he bobbed to the surface, coughing up water but in no imminent danger of drowning.

Fog cloaking the lake showed signs of lifting and moonlight illuminated the silky sheath with a pulsating glow.  It left Buck with the sensation of being trapped in a giant Lava Lamp.  Having no better plan, he dog-paddled toward what he hoped was the shore.  It wasn't, only rotting vegetation impeded his forward motion, tangling him in scummy tentacles.  Tearing loose, he backstroked into open water.

A dozen or so strokes brought him to the edge of the lake where his feet finally touched shallow bottom.  Neck deep in lily pads, he remained in stagnate water until he'd caught his breath, his thoughts turning to poisonous snakes and prehistoric fish with mouths full of razor-sharp teeth swimming around him.

A breeze began blowing fog off the lake and the moon soon poked a small hole in its gossamer shroud.  What he saw frightened him more than the thought of an alligator swimming between his legs.  Through the underbrush, not more than twenty feet from where he stood, were Humpback and Deacon John floating silently in their boat.  Both carried automatic weapons.

Louisiana Fiction Writer

I retired early last night because I need to be in Dallas before ten this morning. A noisy storm fraught with booming thunder and flashes of lightning that lit my bedroom, awakened me at midnight. Fearing a flood in the living room such that occurred in 2007, I took a broom to the drain hole on my back porch.

The thunder and lightning had frightened my two pugs, Princess and Scooter. Princess had her back against the door, wanting to get into the house. Brave little Scooter, on the other hand, stood beside me, barking defiantly every time thunder boomed or lightning flashed.

My backyard slopes dramatically from the fence to the back of my house. Heavy rain tends to pour down the slope, and off the back roof, flooding the porch if the drain isn’t cleared of leaves, dog hair, etc. Last night’s rain was hard but not of the same epic proportions of 2007. Using my push broom, Scooter and I quickly got the best of the racing water.

There was still water on the porch so I moved the dog’s big bed to the spot by the backdoor that usually stays dry. When I picked it up, I got a surprise. Not only did it contain several of their toys, but also about a half-dozen rocks.

I had noticed rocks by the door and even found some in my bedroom when I let the dogs in to play when I dress in the mornings. I had not connected the fact that Scooter, or Princess was collecting them. I have never, for that matter, known a dog that collects rocks, but these two do – well-rounded rocks that make up more than a mouthful for such a small animals.

The rain slowed to a steady rate so I gave the pups a chicken strip, turned off the lights and returned to bed, hoping to get a few more hours of sleep before my early bird partner knocks on the door at six-thirty. I’ll keep a better eye on the two from now on and try to learn which one of them is the rock hound. I will bet it is Scooter but perhaps it is both.

I don’t know but whichever, all you other geologists out there can eat your hearts out!

Eric’sWeb

Here is a recipe I found on the web. The author (unknown) suggests that you serve it in a flower pot complete with gummy worms and artificial flowers. Sounds gummy, I mean yummy!

KANSAS DIRT CAKE

• 2 pkgs. vanilla instant pudding
• 2 ½ cups milk
• 1 8 oz package of cream cheese
• ½ stick of butter
• ¾ cup powdered sugar
• 12 oz. Cool Whip
• 1 pkg. Oreo Cookies

Mix the vanilla pudding and milk in a medium size-mixing bowl. Refrigerate until ready to use.

Mix cream cheese, butter and powdered sugar together in a large mixing bowl. Mix in the vanilla pudding and mix until thoroughly blended. Add the carton of Cool Whip and mix until blended.

Line 9 x 13 in. pan with Oreo cookie crumbs. (I use 2 Oreo crusts and mash the crusts up with a fork. You need one crust for the bottom of the pan and one to put over the pudding mixture.) Pour pudding mixture into the pan and spread the rest of the Oreo crumbs on top. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

Eric’sWeb

While rummaging through my closet, I found a tee shirt that evoked a treasure of old memories. The tee sported a poorly drawn picture of a scorpion and bore the name of the establishment from where I purchased it – Scorpio. Under the name were the words - dancers, pool and cold beer, 3416 N. May, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

The original Scorpio was an old two-storied building located at Villa and N.W. 23^rd, across the street from the Shepherd Mall. The bottom floor had a bar, several pool tables and a dance floor – a wooden structure raised about three feet off the floor. Music played while the mostly male customers shot pool, drank beer and watched the dancers perform on the raised structure.

The female dancers all wore the equivalent of a bikini with no exposed nipples, buttocks or pubic hair. That was downstairs, the action upstairs quite different – at least I had heard. Not everyone was allowed to go there. Nudity in Oklahoma City, at the time, was banned and rule breakers treated harshly by the authorities.

Most of the young men frequenting the bar were baby-boomers. Many had survived the dirty war in Southeast Asia, partaken of the many illegal drugs so readily available there, and had visited the nightlife of Saigon and the brothels of Bangkok. Oil exploration was turning the City into a boom town, the young men of Oklahoma, and those pouring into the State because of the boomtown prosperity, an adventurous bunch and ready for a change from the ways their fathers did things. The Scorpio was there to provide that change.

I remember the first time the stairway guard allowed me and my friend Mick to go upstairs. I tingled with excitement and to say that electricity filled the darkened room would be stating a stale cliché that didn’t come close to expressing the pure sexual exhilaration constricting my chest and shortening my breath. A Bob Seger ballad wailed through the darkness as a pretty blonde girl gyrated, totally naked on the stage, both exposed and swathed by the reds, blues and greens of a dancing strobe.

Upstairs was a clone to the downstairs with one essential difference – the dancers performed totally nude. Each young woman danced to the music of three songs. They performed their first song, like the downstairs dancers, in bikini-like costume. They would remove their top toward the beginning of the second song, and their bottoms during the beginning of the third song to the captivated attention of every young man in the place.

About this time, the Supreme Court ruled that nude dancing is not pornographic. After having their hands rapped by several adverse court decisions, the City removed its ban on nudity. Nude dancing soon became common in clubs around Oklahoma City, the Scorpio moving to a new location on north May.

Totally nude dancing continued in Oklahoma City until the Supreme Court ruled that cities could regulate activities that the majority of the people did not approve of. I don’t think a vote to regulate nudity ever occurred but the local police began operating as if it had. Oil prices had begun to collapse, ending the oil boom and Oklahoma City’s boomtown mentality. Baby boomers were older and most, by this time had their own children. No one much protested the end of an era.

The Scorpio no longer exists, but the building that housed it remains. Ironically, it is now the home of a Vietnamese pool hall and domino parlor. I smiled as I pulled on the old tee shirt, a little too small for me now, but still in good shape. Yes, an era has ended but I still have my memory of the first time I climbed the stairs at the old Scorpio, not knowing what to expect, but spellbound with youthful anticipation.

Eric’sWeb

When I worked for Cities Service Oil Company my primary duty was sitting (staying on location, describing samples and calling for drill stem tests) drilling wells, mostly in Kansas.  After months of learning from other geologists, I was allowed to sit a well in Comanche County, Kansas all alone.  My first solo experience was quite traumatic.

The well was a wildcat (more than a mile from established production) scheduled to drill into the Arbuckle Dolomite, a very old carbonate that sometimes produces lots of oil and gas.  At Cities, the technique for describing and drilling a prospect was well defined but had many flaws.

The powers-that-be considered Cities a technologically advanced company and would not drill a wildcat without seismic control.  The geologist would locate an anomaly by doing subsurface mapping.  He would then propose a well and management would either agree or can the prospect.  If they agreed, the geophysicists would get involved and have a seismic survey conducted over the prospect.  If the geophysics agreed with the geology, then Cities would drill a well there.

When I started working for Cities, the Mid-continent Division had not had a discovery in more than ten years.  Part of the reason, I soon learned, is that seismic surveys never work perfectly.  My opinion is that they rarely work, at least in Kansas.  There are many reasons for this, most too technical to delve into in the space of a few hundred words.  I had an inkling of this fact the first well that I sat alone because I had already had discussions with other disillusioned company geologists.

Every well is different and only a trained wellsite specialist can tell you exactly where you are in the hole, and if you are running structurally high (very good) or structurally low (very bad).  There is a marker zone, the Heebner Shale, in Kansas that is almost always used to determine how you are running.  When we reached the Heebner, I knew exactly where I was in the hole and called my boss to report the information.

“You must be mistaken,” Don W. told me.  “If what you say is true you would be running fifty feet low.  The seismic map says you should be running fifty feet high so you obviously have a hundred foot error.”

I tried to argue with him, explain that I knew where we were and that we really were running fifty feet low.

“You’ve missed a correlation point.  Go up the hole a hundred feet and try again.  You’ll find your mistake.”

From that point, my daily report was in La La Land.  I knew where we were but my boss was becoming increasing confused to the point that he called me an idiot and threatened to send out a more experienced geologist to correct my obvious mistake.  At one point, he almost had me convinced that I didn’t know what I was doing.

We finally reached total depth and when I looked at the electric log I knew that I had been correct all along.  By this time we were almost seventy feet low to the nearest correlation point.  There was no email in those days or any way to quickly transmit the logs to Oklahoma City for the honchos to view.  It was four in the morning when I looked at the last log and realized that we had a dry hole.  In a near state of despair, I called Don, my boss.

“Calm down, Eric.  Everything will be okay.  Is there any possibility that you are miscorrelating the log?”

There wasn’t, but it hurt my feelings that he was still blaming the failure of the well on me – at least that’s the way I felt at the time.

“What do you want me to do?” I asked.

“Bring the logs to the office.  We’ll have a meeting first thing in the morning.”

Management cared little about their minions.  Another geologist, a close friend of mine, had rear-ended a parked semi on the side of the road as he headed for a remote well site in the wee hours of the morning.  He didn’t survive.  It didn’t matter that I had been awake for almost twenty-four hours.  I had my orders – drive all night and present the logs for management’s inspection the following morning.

I drove into Oklahoma as the sun was arising and made it to the corporate offices before nine the next morning.  Three of my bosses studied the logs, frowned and scratched their heads, finally dismissing me without so much as a thank you or well done.  Later that day, Fred, the older geologist that had taught me almost everything I knew, came to my office.

“Don’t worry about it.  It’s not even your prospect.”

“I just can’t believe that management trusts a tool that almost never works over the word of their geologists.”

A big grin spread over Fred’s face.  “Welcome to life as a geologist,” he said.  “When you drill a discovery, someone else takes the credit but you get all the blame for every dry hole.”

“But Fred, seismic sucks.  How can management continue to believe in it?”

“Eric, a geologist is nothing but a justifier, someone or something that gives the okay for a company to dump millions of dollars into the ground.  You don’t really know any more than the seismic tool whether or not there is oil where you are planning to drill.  We use the best science we have but once you are a foot below the surface of the earth - and you can take this to the bank - it’s all Mother Nature, and she doesn’t give up her secrets easily.”

Fred was correct.  I have drilled many dry holes in my career and I’ve worked with lots of people and many companies that have had their discoveries.  And sometimes when I wake up at night and stare into the darkness, I can hear old Mother Nature giggling to herself.

Eric’sWeb

When I first started writing I didn’t know any other writers and I was eager to meet some and learn their secrets.  I don’t know if this is true, but I’ve heard it more than once that Oklahoma has more romance writers than any other state.   For the experience of meeting other writers, I signed up for a Saturday romance writer’s conference announced in the Sunday Oklahoman.

The conference was held at a hotel on Meridian Avenue near Will Rogers Airport and I had no idea what to expect when I arrived.  Romance writers are mostly females, but not all.  Of the two hundred or so attendees, I was one of less than a half dozen males.

My sex didn’t seem to matter and I had a great time listening to the speakers and seeing the displays.  Romance writers, I learned, are masters (mistresses?) at self promotion.  They all had slick, professionally designed postcards, bookmarks and business cards promoting their latest novel.  Promotion is vital in the romance writer’s ranks because the average shelf life (time on a super market’s magazine rack, etc.) is much less than thirty days.

All these women knew each other and they all were extremely supportive, plugging their friends books as well as their own.  This is only one reason why romance novels are the most popular genre in writing.

As most of you know, long-haired, bare-chested handsome men grace the covers of many romance novels.  Some of the cover models are celebrities, like Fabio, and have a following of their own fans.  Five of these professional models had flown in for the conference and the highlight was a male model beauty contest.

I was frankly blown away when the event began.  The women writers whooped and hollered like roughnecks or long-haul truckers at the Red Dog, a nearby strip club.  I even witnessed a few well timed butt pinches as the men paraded through the crowd of ladies from the back of the auditorium to the little stage in front.

The conference was my first experience meeting actual writers, a few quite famous.  I learned a lot about plotting, pace and promotion.  That was my first writer’s conference.  I’ve attended many others since then but I’ve never met another group that knew as much about the four Ps of writing (with this group I had to include pinching) or that had as much fun while doing it.

Eric’sWeb

Harvey, my first father-in-law, was a fur buyer.  I was just back from Vietnam, scheduled to start graduate school the next spring.  Still, Harvey apparently mistrusted my intentions and assumed that I intended to be a perennial student, and somehow on the dole – his dole.  The thought was the furthest from my mind, but it seems to be the opinion he and all my other relatives had at the time.  He was worried about it enough that he even tried to teach me how to grade fur.

Harvey had a shed where he kept his furs before transporting them downtown to the French Market where he ultimately sold them.

“This is a rat fur,” he said, pointing to a muskrat skin.  “I pay a dollar for a regular pelt and a little more for a grade A pelt.  Know how I tell the difference?”

I didn’t have a clue.  The pelts were turned inside out and he stuck his hand inside one, showing me what to do.

“I pass my hand over the fur to see if there are any bald or thin spots.  If there are, the fur isn’t worth as much.  I always give at least a dollar a pelt or else the trappers would take their furs some place else.  If they bring me a hundred rats, I give them at least a hundred dollars.  Everything over that amount is a bonus.  You understand?”

I nodded to indicate that I did, but I really didn’t have a clue what he was talking about.

Gail and I had intended to live with Harvey and Lilly for three months, and then three months with my parents before moving to Fayetteville just before the beginning spring semester.  It didn’t happen that way.  After about a week, they began treating us like bad breath.  My sister-in-law even called and offered to pay my way through a real estate course so that Gail and I would stop sponging off their parents.  I’m fairly dense, but I was starting to get the hint.  That night I had a talk with Gail.

“I can’t take much more of this,” I said.  “Your parents obviously don’t want us here.”

“But what will we do?”

“Leave here and spend the rest of the time with my parents.  I think they are more understanding.”

Next day we packed and drove to Vivian, Lillie crying but not begging us to stay.  After a week at my parent’s house, we got another rude awakening.  They too began treating us like, well like blood-sucking leeches.  After just a few days, we packed our bags again and left for Fayetteville.

For the first time in my life I learned that families are strange, really strange.  The may love you but they don’t want you living with them, or for you to give the rest of the family the impression that you are living off of them.

It was a good lesson but it leaves me with one question – why can’t I get rid of my own kids as easily?

Eric’sWeb