The Tree

August 22, 1977

The Tree

The branches of a sugar maple cradled me. The trunk supported my back, while my extremities dangled over branches midway up the tree. What put me up there?


Limbs below framed a drama that held me captive. Through smoke I identified my Chevy pickup, motionless, split around the maple I occupied. The truck’s roof quivered transparent—I was supposed to watch. Twigs and leaves added to the haze and shrouded the streetlights, but the occupants of the truck glowed before me.


Who sat in my truck?


Why did the crook of a tree hold me?


What happened?


Where should I be?


My buddy, Brian, slumped between the driver’s door and upturned steering column. The windshield, webbed from impact with his forehead, protruded from its seating. I studied my friend. Unconscious? Dead? I watched while eternity measured us. At last the rise and fall of Brian’s chest, stronger each time, made me happy. Brian lived!


My body lay still beside Brian. My scalp gaped and a smear down the seat flashed crimson when the light flickered. My arms were pinned under my chest and legs as a result of the motor block pushing into the cab to trap me in a fetal position.

Insulation, firewall, and crumbled windshield trashed the seat. My neck twisted so the side of my face could be seen from my perch. I failed to sense life in my body. Brian began to stir—my face stayed still.


"This is what dying feels like," I thought.


Motor oil and antifreeze crackled on the engine block. Paint thinner and polyurethane from the payload poured through the truck's back window to coat us on impact. The fumes waited for a spark, or somebody’s lit cigarette.


A fringe crowded around the truck as people from homes and pulled over cars looked at the melee. A lady left the circle to peek in Brian's window. The door latch gave for her, and the door opened a slit before jamming.


"They're so young," she sobbed, "their poor mothers."


A man tried my door. It wouldn't budge. He nodded at me, and said, “This one is dead, but that one’s moving. This truck's going to burn!"


The emotions of the witnesses, and the pain Brian felt, washed over me. I felt only calmness as I looked over the faces. How could calmness be in my best interest?


People in the circle prayed for us. More of them approached the truck, determined to do something for the lives inside. I knew the test left me one role: accept being powerless and see what happened.


A rescue squad’s light and sound cleared Brian’s head. The stories his Fire Chief Dad told echoed in his head while pain wracked his ribs. The fumes hit his nostrils and the sclera of his eyes flashed fear. He rolled onto his back and brought his legs to his chest to kick out. His head and shoulders braced against me as he exploded into the glass. After three kicks and outside help, he slid out.


Brian hacked and rubbed his eyes to rid them of paint thinner. The grass and cool earth soothed his face. Breathing came easier as Brian started healing.


I could feel the grass on my friend’s face. I wanted to be on that grass. A glance through the roof confirmed my body failed to understand my thoughts. Fighting for life didn’t feel important, or controllable. Lights, metallic, red, and blue, splashed on us as more squads came in. Paramedics and firemen tore at the truck to reach through windows. They dug in, determined to keep me.


I looked through the portal, humbled, unable to do more. My face didn't move. My lungs stayed still. Should I breathe?


Who decides?


A fireman reached across my face to push away glass. His cuff bumped my nose. A jolt shot through me. Snap! The tree evaporated.


My lungs screamed: "Breathe!"


My body and soul came together. I heaved then exhaled. With each breath, the serenity of the tree gave way to pain. I would know life and suffering.






Paramedics talked over me about their patient. My eyes focused through the chemicals to see the lifesavers looking back. The questions, thank God, seemed basic: Can you hear me, kid? Who is the President? What month is it?


The firemen straightened my limbs. Each time they counted: "One, two, three!" to let me know when to hurt.


They slid a backboard behind me, then wedged blocks around my head and neck. They strapped down my forehead and cinched my chest. The paramedics worked together to turn me over. Seeing the roof from inside the cab felt odd: what happened?


A paramedic riddled more questions: “What’s your name? What is today? Are you head injured, Pal?”


They counted three again, and pulled me from the wreck to lie beside Brian. Someone’s troubles left us silent.


Mine?


How?


My legs felt bent back under me. “Let me see my legs!”


“They’re straight out in front of you – perfect. Don’t worry,” the paramedic assured me.


“Let me see my legs.”


He seemed busy. I asked again.


He lifted them high to show me. They looked like my legs. Why couldn’t I feel his hands?


"Please, don't tie them down again," I said.






The week before the accident might have caused a smarter man to be careful. I worked nights refinishing a gym floor six hours from home. My job would pay for college; I busted my tail to make it go. After driving home, I grabbed three hours of sleep in Saturday's small hours before taking care of my blacksmith business. Mom scheduled three head while I worked out of town. The horses were shod by 2:00 p.m.


Saturday nights belonged to Laura, my high school sweetie. We wanted to raise kids on a little farm after we learned to get along. My plans for college didn’t jibe with her Teller career at the Merchants and Farmers, or her church's dominion over her life. Traipsing off to college because I did, wouldn't be right.


We spent Sunday afternoon driving around the Hocking Hills. Age 18 is confusing. We didn't fight, but we didn't agree. We strained to understand our crossroads, saying each time was the last time, unless, or until, we married. When I walked her to her parent’s door, we kissed goodnight, or maybe, goodbye—telling the difference took too much energy.


My face hit the pillow as midnight revealed Monday, August 22, 1977. It would be the longest day of my life.


Brian worked with me. We left Logan, at 5:00 a.m. to be on the job refinishing the floor of a Marion warehouse. By 7:30, the electric system quit because our 220-volt floor sanders pulled too hard. Boxes and pallets cluttered the floor. Linoleum adhesives left from a corner office promised a day of delay. Body sized holes bore witness to a corrosive spill on two parts of the hardwood.


A day of coordinating electricians, maintenance people, and running to the breaker box produced no evidence of work.


“What’s going on?” our boss asked as he surprised us at 4:00 p.m.


His unhappiness attached to the owners of our project once he heard about our day. He shared advice and gave us keys to the Columbus warehouse. Brian winked at me while the boss talked. He knew Columbus from growing up there.


In Columbus, we collected nails, lumber, mineral spirits, and polyurethane finish. Loading the stuff took all of 20 minutes. Brian convinced me that college girls loved 18 year-old guys. We headed for High Street—Ohio State's strip—to find out.


We split a turkey sub and a pitcher of Budweiser at the Street Scene Restaurant. On a Monday night during finals' week of Summer Quarter, only the waitresses qualified as girls. They didn’t even smile back. Every club sat dark and quiet. We walked the strip and imagined Friday nights in September. At 10:00 p.m., we gave up and headed back to Marion.







I drove because Brian saw poorly after dark. When my chin hit my chest a second time 45 minutes out of Columbus, I snapped my head up. Coming to at the wheel of a moving truck—knowing grace alone kept us in the right lane—released adrenaline. The chemical is an invitation to tempt fate. I decided to finish the trip, and rolled down my window. The rush lasted a mile before the sick feeling of fighting sleep at 55 MPH came back. I thought about pulling over for a catnap. Instead, I turned up the radio. Not even Life in The Fast Lane could pull me out of the slump.


“Coffee,” I thought, as I looked at cornfields on both sides of the highway. A mug of corn wouldn’t do. Marion glowed on the horizon.


Brian slept nearly an hour by then. He looked too comfortable lying sprawled across the passenger seat. Marion, and our Budget Motel might be 10 miles away—15 minutes. No way I’d make 15 minutes. I decided to trade spots with Brian.


"Your turn," I said, while pulling over.


Brian and I tag-teamed sleep deprivation all summer. He groaned and stretched through a yawn, but he knew why I shook him.


“Ten miles, Dude," I answered before he could ask. We knew enough of each other to save sentences.


Brian grumbled out the door. While he walked around the front, squinting through the headlights reflecting off his faded jeans, my eyes closed on the passenger side.
Kids don't know about physical limits. Brian drove ten miles. He fell asleep, two blocks from our motel.


Our truck veered off the highway at 45 mph. It collided with one of the maples that lined the streets of Marion.


Nobody wore seatbelts in the 70's. Mine ended up stuffed between the bench and back of the seat months before the crash.







My head smashed into the dashboard at the same 45 mph the truck traveled before it stopped on the tree. The impact crushed my fifth cervical vertebra (C5) between the dash and my body. The blow didn't sever my spinal cord. It bowed over on impact to bruise. Central nervous tissue doesn't regenerate; a bruise lasts as scar tissue—forever. Life as a C5 quadriplegic began the instant the truck met the tree and I hit the dash.


I looked at a new world—ready or not.


Brian filled the stretcher beside me as we rode in the ambulance. It felt easier to give him grief about wrecking, than it did to focus swirling thoughts.


As I oriented, I remembered the tree. We aren’t alone. God spared me. Awareness of my trouble grew—along with my fears.



What did the good Lord have in mind?

_______________

Champions!

A high school football story to honor a friend!

Champions!

Training camp senior year began with my name atop the offensive center and defensive tackle positions. Nobody would keep me from being on the field every minute of every game.

Coach Richardson pulled me aside after two weeks. Through a grimace he explained the coaches fancied a sophomore named Jerry Crothers. Jerry bench pressed more than me, and outweighed me by 20 pounds. He merited a shot at one of my positions. Coach asked, “Do you want to play offense or defense?”

I looked him in the eye, “Both.”

"That won't work."

"Defense," I muttered, "it is better to hit than to receive."

“Okay, be a hitter.”

As Coach turned, I resolved to win back my spot. Coach Biggers held final say. He’d play me at center if I made the choice obvious. Jerry’s days would become difficult.




When the offense practiced, I played scout team noseguard over Jerry. Each time he snapped the ball, I cracked him. Being faster and meaner than him put me inside his helmet before he could think. Jerry lost his wind when I found his ribs. When I zipped by him without a touch, he listened to me jeer when I broke up a play.

I heard the whispers of our younger teammates. They didn’t appreciate my attempts to dismember their buddy. The one time during camp Jerry came out shaken up, I stepped in to snap center. After a few plays, he nodded at Coach to rejoin the fray. The punishment only increased when I thought he backed down, but quitting and Jerry didn’t go together. He refused to engage my glare. After each whistle, he got up—workman like—and trotted back to the huddle. He aimed to keep the center’s job.

Jerry worked on his game. He snapped the ball faster to neutralize my rush. He shot up on pass blocks, and used chop blocks to drop my hands. It stopped being easy to beat him.

As summer ball closed, I upended him to scramble the offense and make the tackle. As the guys rolled off the pile, I started to gloat. Jerry stood over me to offer an outstretched hand.

"Good job," he said, as he pulled me to my feet.

I found myself tugging Jerry after that. He earned his spot as a starter.



We started out cocky—our roster held individual talent—but something went missing. We lost twice in our first three games, by a total of seven points. Turmoil brewed in the locker room.

League play would open at home against Ironton. The Tigers owned five successive league championships. They demoralized us the year before. Monday’s film session showed them loaded with speed and power on both sides of the ball.

We doubted our coaches. Why couldn’t we have a quarterback change? How could we get more from each other? We shared long faces as we passed in the hallways. Ironton scared us!

Tuesday before Ironton, Jerry developed a goose egg over his eye. If it came from my pounding, he wouldn't say. Coach sat him so he’d be ready Friday night. He stormed around, angry about sitting, even though his helmet wouldn’t go back on. The seniors whooped it up when Coach sent me in—I wanted the job.

Wednesday before Ironton, I cut last class to dress early. The day glowed in red sugar maples and football weather. Our cheerleaders practiced before the team took the field. I waited to watch, and owned a perfect moment alone in the stadium.

The cheerleaders came around the corner in tears.

"Is it true?"

One of the girls, a friend, leaned into me and cried. "Somebody on the team died," she sobbed.


My mind raced across the faces on our team picture.

"Who?" I asked.

They didn't know.

Coach Boynton came up. When I saw his red eyes, I surrendered all hopes that the girls might be wrong.

"Who, Coach?"

Coach put a big arm around me, and said, "We need to be inside with the team, Butch."

Coach Biggers walked to the front of the locker room. On his eye contact the whispers stopped:



"Men, we don't get to call all the plays in life. A few minutes ago, the good Lord took Jerry Crothers to be by his side.

"Jerry visited the doctor for that bump on his head. The Doc cleared him to play, but Jerry couldn’t practice because he missed school. He washed his motorcycle and took it for a spin to dry. A pickup turned in front of him. The accident killed him instantly.

"Pray about this. Answers won't come easily, but you’ll make sense of the pain in time. Go home to your families. They need your strength."



Nobody breathed as the silence mounted. Then a sniff, a sob, and a torrent of emotion flowed.

Coach Boynton stayed by me. As the Center and Guard Coach, he applauded my great plays, but he did the same exasperating thing when Jerry stuck me. Coach's arm around me felt good as I tried to rebound.

Part of me felt gone. Jerry pushed me on the field. He stood strong and quiet in the face of my rage—more mature than I. When pushed, he fought with heart and learned from me.

I held my breath, afraid to wail. After a minute, Coach Boynton let go of me to check on other guys. We milled around until quiet replaced the sobs. The coaches left us alone.

I crossed the room on numb feet to collapse on the bench by my locker. My helmet sat in my lap. If you play football fearlessly, your helmet shows contact. Most of the purple paint came from collisions with Jerry. Teammates dressed and filtered out while I sat dazed until the room thinned.

When Coach Boynton stuck his head in the locker room, the guys who waited around for me took off. I must have looked pitiful slumped in a practice uniform I never washed wearing a heavy heart. Coach pulled up a stool.

We sat a long time, saying nothing. I didn’t want to break down. It felt like Coach knew to be still. After a long time, he stood and helped me find the energy to pull my jersey over my head. He popped the clinch on my shoulder pads and gave them a tug. We didn't talk while I dressed into street clothes. Easy words didn’t matter. I’m glad he stayed for me.

Coach Boynton finally allowed, "Someday, you will know how many lives you two touched. Competition like you and Jerry shared is a rare thing."

My eyes burned. Coach cried, too.

The administration decided to play Ironton as scheduled, so we practiced in full pads Thursday. When Coach called for the offense, I looked his way, "Who is snapping center?"

"You are, Butch!" Coach Boynton grinned, "You're ready!"

Our defense didn’t buckle, but our offense couldn’t answer Ironton’s thugs. The kid that played over me, confident in his ability to whip a second stringer, pounded my head. We ran out of time and got dumped, 8-0.

The Logan Daily News credited Ironton's noseguard with "getting in on the lion's share of the hits." I wasn’t ready. We weren't ready as a team, either. We lost three times in four games, looked heartbroken, and sailed without a rudder in a season nearly half over.




They buried Jerry Saturday. I couldn’t bring myself to go. I spent the day riding a horse deep in the Wayne National Forrest. None of my teammates asked why. Missing let me keep an image of Jerry pulling me up with a "you’re next" look on his face.

Jerry's equipment sat in his open-faced locker when we came back on Monday. We didn’t want it collected. I picked up his headgear to admire its battle scars. Jerry's number, "52" sat where he placed it to start the season. I wondered what gave me the right to do it, and then I peeled the numbers to stick them on the back of my helmet.

As I sat in the stadium waiting for practice, I ran my thumb over Jerry’s number. I committed to play the rest of the season as if Jerry and I played together.

Coach Biggers gathered us Tuesday and asked each of us in turn to pledge to be the last man standing. We adopted the attitude. Our season turned on immediate outcomes, beginning with 3 and 1 Jackson, and we knew it.

Jackson let us score early before our offense sputtered. Our defense shut them down. Momentum favored neither team as we headed to the halftime locker room, ahead 6-0. We needed to want to win—finish hard.

The Jackson quarterback we dominated in the first-half returned the second-half kickoff for a touchdown and a 7-6 lead. We staggered through three plays and a punt to answer.

With the pressure on, Coach Biggers replaced our senior quarterback with junior Scott Gasser. Scotty could throw a football through a rolling tire forty yards away. We liked his confidence because he wore it in a humble way. The huddle sizzled as he ducked in to call a play. Excitement surged as I bent over the ball for the center snap. “Hut!” he yelled.

I hiked the ball. The crowd screamed. I blew the snap. Jackson red fell on the fumble. Three plays later put us down 14-6, to a lesser team. With five minutes to go in the third-quarter, our history threatened to interfere with our destiny.



After we received the kickoff, Scotty barked at me about the snap, told his receivers the exact routes he wanted, and led us down the field to score. The quarter ended with us behind two points.

As we changed end zones for the last quarter, our place-kicker, Jeff Smith, stepped onto the field and stuck four fingers in the air. Our players on the sideline figured it out and joined him. Little Smitty peered at the Jackson Coach. He meant: “This is the fourth quarter, now you play our game.”

Our hands went up on the field to join our teammates. We stared at the Jackson bench. We closed with two unanswered touchdowns to win a tough game.

Jocks tend to remember playing better than they really played. Accepting that, I was all over Jackson. The coaches passed out hustle stickers at Monday's Kangaroo Court. They called me up front 10 times. The next guy back earned six stickers.

Coach asked me to speak to end recognition. My face flushed as tears welled up. I declined with a headshake. Coach bailed me out with a, "Let's go, men!"

Telling teammates that I’d earned five stickers, and Jerry the other five, would’ve been too hard.

Confidence described us after Jackson. When the other team sucked air as the third quarter ended, we waved four fingers and hit harder in the fourth. We swamped Waverly, Meigs, and Athens by a combined 128 to 10. Our attitudes said, "You don't have a chance!" to the guys in the wrong colored jerseys.

The swagger stopped when we watched Gallia’s game films.




Like us, Gallia’s Blue Devils absorbed an early league loss and ran the table after. Unlike us, they handled Ironton—beat them up!

Gallia built a power game around a man named Brian Mink. He weighed 69 pounds more than me, and he’d be in my face all night as noseguard and fullback for the Devils. Coach Boynton said the Ohio High School Athletic Association engraved Mink’s All-State plaque after his Ironton game.

I wanted Mink! Saying so, and convincing myself I believed it, let me bear up to the abuse I saw the animal hand out on game film.

Scotty defrosted 65 yards of gridiron to start the game by making a quarterback draw go for a touchdown. Before we finished celebrating, Gallia manhandled us. We sulked and they capitalized. The halftime scoreboard said 16-12, them. We came out of the locker room flat. Gallia smacked us again to put us behind 22-12. We looked like quitters, even sniped at each other in the huddle.

Mink toyed with me during the first part of the contest. Between squeals and grunts, he detailed the hurt he promised to deliver. If I blocked him at all, I used speed to cut him, or his inertia to ride him out of the pocket. It made him furious. He didn't help me up after a good play; he stepped on me.

Midway through the third quarter, Gallia threatened at our 25-yard line. We’d be down 17 points if they scored—too many to overcome, even in our fourth quarter. Something needed to happen.

Mink took the ball on a fullback dive. I brought all 154 pounds to the line of scrimmage to meet him. He pancaked me. As he rumbled over, I reached up and grabbed his jersey. It stretched and I bobbed along for six yards before a planted foot wheeled the brute down.

The hometown announcer blurted, "Brian Mink for a six yard pick up… tackled by the entire Logan defense!"

Rage overwhelmed me. Tears streamed down my cheeks as we tried to collect ourselves in the defensive huddle. Gallia’s 4th down and 1 meant our season. The stadium rocked louder than any noise I’d known. Right before we broke, a hush went over the place—complete stillness. Somebody whispered: “Jerry.”

The surge started as Gallia’s center approached the ball. One big kid would make one yard, and it would happen at my expense. Or, maybe we’d well up to answer. I don’t remember the play. I do remember Spence, Byers, Tucker, Poling, and Peppers propping me up as the truck came.

We stopped the Devils.

Our offense took over on the 20. Scotty fired a pass, then another, then a long run by our halfback, and the heavens opened to a touchdown. Gallia limped through three plays and a fumbled punt snap. We scored again to go ahead.

Mink tried to rally his team, but they were done. He folded, exhausted and humiliated. I remembered to help him up. We scored every time we touched the ball to thump Gallia 43-22.

The Logan Daily News headline shouted about our fourth quarter. A front page 8 x 10 photo of me holding up my index finger while we sang our fight song at midfield captured the moment. The black band sewn to my left sleeve for Jerry can’t be missed in the picture.




We needed to finish Wellston to take the league crown. At our last practice, Coach Boynton grabbed my facemask and dragged me up front to lead warm-ups. Out of respect for Jobee, Pep, and Boomer, our captains, I resisted the recognition. When they made room for me, the team cheered. I loved those guys!

Wellston couldn’t hang with us. We led by four touchdowns early in the third quarter. Coach Biggers put in his second and third teams. We’d of let Wellston score to stay on the field if only we’d thought of it. We sat together on the bench and cheered next year’s Chieftains as they preserved our shut out, 33-0.

We earned our place as co-champs with Ironton. They beat us by a touchdown at our lowest point. We destroyed the team that beat them. The Chieftains are willing to play them again right now to break the tie. I hope they feel the same way.

Coach Biggers earned Coach of the Year Honors. Scotty took league MVP. Four more Chiefs made all-league. I earned "honorable mention" defensive lineman. Our Sport’s Editor said the writers considered me too small to represent the league’s best. Coach Biggers said it didn’t matter, “We know who played the game.”




Before our Spring Sport's banquet, I decided on a college that didn't have football. I missed it as I sat with my team in the Armory Hall listening to the coaches announce awards.

Mr. and Mrs. Crothers used Jerry’s life insurance proceeds on a college grant for the player that exemplified Jerry's way. Jobey played for the Dad he lost to a heart attack a year before. He never stopped being positive. Joe kissed his Mom when Coach Richardson called him up front.

Coach Biggers took the podium to award The Earl J. Valiquette Scholarship. Mr. Valiquette played professional football and led Logan’s business community before he passed away. Coach spoke of a champion’s attitude and how a handful of kids determine a team’s personality. He talked about resiliency, and then looked my way. Coach told of how I bugged him for a chance to play. How I recovered from the Ironton game to amass the highest blocking grade on the team. And, how I just missed nailing the most tackles. Coach finished, “Beginning with Jackson, he played like two men.”

My Mom balled. Dad beamed at me. Coach handed me the trophy that sits on my desk today, as handsome as the Heisman.




Coach Richardson chased me around until school ended before I agreed to find my helmet. Giving it up meant the end of my part in Logan football. Mom peeled off the numbers and stickers for the scrapbook. She put Jerry's "52" beside my "55."

There aren’t any rules about letting go. Mr. Crothers wore his boy's team warm-up around town for years. I can only begin to understand the depth of The Crothers’ loss. Lord, help all of us to never lose a child.

Phenomenal high school athletes like Jerry play in on 30 varsity football games. I played in 10. The years of scout team whippings I took shaped me more than 10 Friday nights under Logan’s lights. Jerry shaped me, too. When Coach Boynton comforted me, I didn’t know my life would be the one most touched by our competition.

___________

Farm Lives

Ten years ago, I wrote manaically. This bit about heritage, name, and family remains readable.

I've traced our clan back 350 years to Jorg Kaelor's migration from Germany. Jorg’s boys re-spelled Kellar to match its English pronunciation—before America's states united. My line, the part noted by genealogists, includes teachers, preachers, innkeepers, storekeepers, pioneers, and Revolutionary War Captains. No matter their day jobs, the Kellars farmed, and continued to farm after the population moved to town.

My roots became interesting after I saw the work of a frontier photographer commissioned by my Great Grandfather. The family photo celebrates the two-story house the Kellars built to finish their homestead obligation in 1909 Frederick, Oklahoma. There are hens scratching on the back porch. One of the boys sits astraddle a cow pony. Horse drawn equipment stands ready by the house. Some trim needs final painting, but the family lived well two years after the Oklahoma Indian Territory opened by statehood.

The men’s jaws, chins, and noses reflect back at me when I study the picture. The look is western—pressed shirts, tucked ties, boots, and brimmed hats. My Gramps, Price Clarence Kellar, Sr., or PC, wears a black suit that shows him older and smaller than his 12 years. Uncle Billy, a toddler dolled in ruffles, grins from a rocking chair. Great Grandma Matilda shines beside her slender girls in store-bought dresses. The girls look from under hats with a Sears & Roebuck’s stroller at the ready.

The picture emerged from a box Gramps opened when I visited on the way to Arizona. As my 90 year-old Grandfather dug through the memories, youth came to him while he shared stories.

William Joel Kellar

Great Grandpa took our Kellar name from his Mother, Mary. Illegitimacy for a proper lady, even at age 24, would tarnish chances in 1859. Mary and her Baptist Preacher father kept Joel learning through finishing school’s eighth grade. He used that credential to teach when few could read, write, or figure. Joel took our name across the frontier and left a traveling gene in our blood.

Joel lost his first wife soon after she bore him a son. An unsuspecting Matilda Berryman Smith fell for the widower, 10 years her senior. She raised eight children in Joel’s wake when he rode off to grow opportunities. He traded or lost school posts for grubstakes and stores from his birthplace in Scotland County, Missouri to the river basin of Oklahoma. The family followed by wagon to work Joel’s vision into reality. Joel stayed until his project took form, and then rode to next thing.

Gramps

PC’s birth on July 3, 1897, put him in an outfit that pushed on to possibilities. PC knew early how to drive an ox team and wagon. He turned ten in Southern Oklahoma where Joel held the Frederick Schoolmaster’s Position and homesteaded a half-section. The growing seasons cooperated and corn fed the family. Tillie loved her farmhouse. The Kellars prospered and enjoyed stability, for a while.

The wind blew trouble in 1909, PC’s 12th summer. Grandma Mary, who made Joel her life and never found a husband, died of “old age and cancer.” June blew too hot for corn in Tillman County. No rain saved the crops. They chopped the stalks for the milk cow. After a nine-month summer that cracked the ground and settled soil in drifts, winter turned mean. Tillie feared her family's failure—hunger does that.

Joel traded away the farm for a well-stocked store in Missouri’s Ozarks, sight unseen. The family loaded what they could on a flat and steamed to Rolla by train.

The stocked store shelved one sack of cornmeal and some molasses. The boys shot the squirrels and rabbits by November. Rolla sits high on the Plateau that defines the Ozarks and keeps the region cold in the winter. The Kellars struggled through another hungry winter.

Tillie’s boys plowed a corn patch and she set a garden when spring came. She refused to suffer another near miss and grounded Joel the next time possibility looked like opportunity. With Tillie dug in, a half-section in Rolla became the Kellar Farm.

Every town put together a baseball team during the sport’s heyday. Joel’s boys raked rocks and preened pasture into a ball diamond. Uncle Jean pitched and a Rolla team grew around his fastball. Gramps sparkled, “I couldn’t have had more fun as a teenager. Between baseball and barn dances, hardly a day went by without company. I don’t know how mother fed them all.”

The baseball team disintegrated when the World War enticed Jean to volunteer. The war straggled enough to draft PC three years later. The day before PC’s orders would march him to port for an overseas post, the war ended. PC came home by train wearing a new doughboy uniform. Jean came back by ship, carrying the medals, decorations, and nightmares of a hero who led troops over Germany.

PC sewed seed on the railways after his army hitch. Mary Jane Harvey, a girl he liked from over by Camp Creek, didn’t appreciate his absence or understand why he ran. Mary Jane loved PC, but her Pa, Judge Harvey, held the Kellars in low regard, “They live too well, prefer fun to work, and waste little time following the Lord on his day.”

Mary Jane challenged her Pa; “Your jealousy of Mr. Kellar’s education, business sense, and pack of hardworking young people is showing.”

The insolence pushed Judge Harvey to forbid the coupling. Mary Jane snuck out to court PC and play at the Kellar place. She broke an ankle at a barn dance and walked it well rather than face her Pa.

PC trifled with skipping to California, stuck between the Judge’s resistance and Mary Jane’s promise that she’d not wait around if he hopped another train. He stayed in Rolla, resolved that, “Mr. Harvey was a turd. He told Mary no good would come from me. I worked hard to prove him wrong, and rub his nose in it.”

Gramps laughed at his story, “Mary and I hitched without Harvey’s blessing. He set it up so he won either way—I took good care of Mary.”

We'd moved on in the tale when Gramps came back to Harvey, “He wasn’t a lawyer, either. Just nosey and elected.”

Why I relate to great-grandfather Kellar over great-grandfather Harvey is curious. The Judge preceded me in law, though I knew nothing of him when I chose law school. Without the Judge’s influence on PC and Mary Jane, I’d have a different biology. Well, if my Gramps called him a turd, he must’ve been one.

The 1920’s economy exploded and Gramps followed it to St. Louis. He drove a streetcar and remodeled houses to rake it in. PC went by Price in the city. He and Mary Jane moved to parlay better housing. Eventually, the home place became a tree-story Victorian on Emily Avenue, hard by the tracks separating Maplewood from St. Louis.

Dad

Price C. Kellar, Jr. first breathed on March 3, 1931, the youngest, and only male of three children. Gramps nicknamed him Sonny-boy. Emily Avenue developed the Victorian home’s estate, but two acres remained for the Kellar’s use. Mary Jane raised poultry for market in a four-car garage she converted to agriculture. At age nine, Sonny rebelled against poultry chores.

When forced to catch a goose, he traipsed the honker through his sister’s kitchen to share his misery. If he scraped manure, he wiped his feet on the carpets of the Victorian’s stair treads. His folks sent him to find a work ethic on Uncle Jean’s farm in Rolla. When Uncle Jean sent him back, he promised to be good if he could have a pony. Sonny rode along the railroad tracks to throw rocks at the house and passing trains to slack his anger.

Gramps took a third job and worked 20 hours a day to fight the great depression. Grandma became ill with diabetes and sick headaches. Aunt Kathern, the middle child, never advanced beyond age three after fever damaged her brain. Sonny’s older sister, Helen, raised them because nobody else was there. It couldn’t have been easy—Aunt Helen's stories center on trying to make Sonny happy during an unhappy time.

Sonny first ran away from home at age 10. He ran so much they should have let him go. He braved it to New Mexico at 14, before he burned up the motor in the family Pontiac. Gramps bailed him out with bus fare when he called. At 15, he changed the year on his birth certificate, and convinced a girlfriend’s mother to pose as his when he needed parental approval to volunteer him at the Marine Corps recruiting office. By the time the USMC discovered the fraud, Sonny’s age qualified him to stay.

The Marine Corps fit “Kel’s” personality. He pulled easy duty boxing and playing football on base teams. He found harder times fighting in cold-ass Korea. He learned to smoke four packs a day and wash down evening mess with a twelve pack during his four tours. Navy doctors stripped his varicose veins to keep him in sickbay, and set him up for a lifetime battle with phlebitis.

Kel came back from policing Guam with leg pain. Doctors parked him at Camp Lejeune Hospitals in North Carolina. His charge nurse, Navy Lieutenant Patsy Jane Humphrey, graduated from nursing school and received her officer’s commission three months before they met. He ignored her brass and flexed his muscle as a Master Sergeant with 12 years done to a career of 20. He pushed until she agreed to go on “just one picnic” with him.

Price and Patsy married August 23, 1958, three months after they met. The Navy drummed Mom out for fraternizing with enlisted and getting in a family way. Her discharge says “honorable” because pregnancy wouldn’t let her fight a war.

Dad tired of the night duty the Marines assigned to him for breaking ranks. He used his legs for a medical discharge. They left Mom’s birth state of North Carolina for Missouri. When Gramps moved closer to the hotel he built, owned, and operated, it made room for my folks to move into the Victorian on Emily. My birth followed on May 13, 1959. Everyone counted the months, but Dad swore Mom said, “No,” until he said, “I do.”

My Times

Farm meant Gramp’s 300 acres in Rolla by the time I recognized Butch as my nickname. Rolla fields taught me the difference between a copperhead and a black snake. I caught my first bass at Grandma’s pond by the farmhouse. We skinny-dipped at Camp Creek, where I learned to avoid Water Moccasins. The creek’s crawdads tasted great. The snapping turtle I wrestled in on a crawdad line tasted better.

Dad taught me to find Indian flints like Gramps showed him. My "Daniel Boone" Mom took me hunting for red squirrels that weighed in like tomcats. We ate them with dumplings and dandelion greens. Aunt Helen and Uncle Fran’s horse, “Spades” became the first horse I ever rode when I hung on to Dad in front of me.

When Dad took us from St. Louis to pursue opportunity in Ohio, we left behind Rolla. They chose farm lives in New Albany, and then Logan. Dad coached my little league teams. Mom and I shot squirrels and rabbits on frosty mornings. We started Horseman’s Hideaway, a dude ranch, and horses became my love. Every day from age eight to 18 started fun, and stayed that way.

Horses fell off my list of worries while I coped with spinal cord injury. My siblings rode while we grew, but horsemanship never became their religion. When they went to college, keeping horses at Horsemen’s Hideaway couldn’t be justified.

My contest pony, Jeep, wore a gray muzzle by the time he needed a home. I hoped to find someone to love him and feed him to horse heaven. A teenager named Cheryl called me. She made promises, and gave me a dollar for Jeep’s bill of sale. Jeepers found a 4-H buddy he could make into a barrel racer.

Farm life ended for me.

As I worked through college and gutted out law school, I knew the life I wanted back. I earned a farm life—10 acres, critters, beautiful Becky and three kids—in Republic, a flat place in the Ozark Mountains.

Bob’s World

When Becky married me, nine-year-old Amanda and five-year-old Courtney didn’t know what to expect from their step-Dad’s farm. Two-year-old Austin climbed up in my lap and pointed which direction to explore. For six years, my boy has asked about frogs, bugs, stars, and hunting. He sees the shotgun I grew up using and asks how long until it’s his. He riffles through my Dad’s tackle box and lets me coach him on fishing. Bob will understand how nature works as he grows up being part of it.

Amanda and Courtney came to appreciate farm life—the quiet, if not the chores. Keeping the three kids after it put me as close to passing on the Kellar way as I’ll get. Close enough!

The second Christmas with the kids, we added horses to our farm to become parents like my Mom and Dad. A week later, Cheryl surprised me with a call. Jeep nickered at her as she fed on a winter night, like he did when I carried his grain twenty years earlier. As Cheryl walked up, the horse screamed and slammed his stall. She watched him flail the air and headed him as his eyes rolled back. The vet said a heart attack took Jeep. Remembering the horse was born in 1959, same as me, gave pause to appreciate my 36 years and life’s brevity. Traditions comfort because they live on—the best reason to keep them.

Bobcat will be a horseman. Our mare foaled a filly built like her name: Rocket. They should be able to do anything when he is 12 to her six. I can’t wait to see what happens. The boy says he’ll never leave our farm. If he stays, we hope he’ll do chores. I can tell him how, but he's our hands until the job gets done.

The kids might all grow up to seek farm lives. They know how to plant a garden, saddle a horse, and midwife a nanny goat. They can spot wild turkey, deer, and coyotes. They know the difference between a red fox’s yip and a barn owl’s screech. They know how to catch frogs and play a bass to shore. My people know when the Spring Peepers holler, winter is all done.

Peeper frogs helped me answer questions on a February home visit from the rehab center in 1978. I felt sorry for myself, sitting in a wheelchair, facing a move back to my Mom and Dad’s farm as a quadriplegic. It was a freak hot day after a warm week—the puddle ponds hit 45° and the boy frogs came out singing. Mom smiled when I noticed. I realized if a dime-sized frog could survive winter, I’d do all right.

I told that story to the kids to explain why nobody should hurt God’s creatures on our farm.

There is tradition behind me. I want to teach like Joel, love work like PC, and handle Sonny’s charm with a Judge’s reason. I want to love my wife and raise great children. I want grandkids to come and see us because it’s fun.

Farm life holds us together.
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As this is my first entry, an update is appropriate, or maybe mandatory.

My law practice did well. In 2005, I settled a few big cases. We made a family decision to buy a well appointed cafe and convert it to a sports pub. All the why's will emerge, but today, I don't have my farm, family, booming practice, or pub. I salvaged 30 horses and saddled up enough debt to ride awhile. I now live in a small town close to gramps' 300 acres.

I'm starting over.