~ ACCUSTOMED, CEREMONIOUS ~
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| Chetopa, Kansas |
Bissextile Day is here -- February 29th, the Leap Day of our Leap Year! A day for lords a leaping, and leaping lizards and leaping wizards, and leaping across the U.S.A.
My family slept those level miles
but like a bell rung deep till dawn
I drove down an aisle of sound,
nothing real but in the bell,
past the town where I was born.
Once you cross a land like that
you own your face more: what the light
struck told a self; every rock
denied all the rest of the world.
We stopped at Sharon Springs and ate—
My state still dark, my dream too long to tell.
by Kansas - born poet William Stafford
I wonder if Stafford and his family ever drove through Chetopa and stopped by Wizzard of Odds? I like the way that he concludes his poem with a reference to his "state" (of mind? or State of Kansas?) and also with a recollection of a "dream too long to tell."
Another connection:
Driving Through KansasThis poem takes place not in the dark of night but on a day of endless, distant blue. Like Stafford's "Kansas," it yields a dream. Driving past a roadside cemetery where a funeral is in progress, Barnes describes "mourners crying somebody's dream." Somebody else's, the deceased, the mourners, but not his own, or is it?
~for Garry Ritzky
One knoll:
a handful of mourners
crying somebody's dream.
Beyond:
a distance too blue to see.
The road slices wheat
stunned with crows
here for more than kill.
you know the crow
can caw his soul
into or out of any hell,
know too the tumbleweed
you bang into will roll
as long as mourners
bruise the hill.
The wind letters every mailbox,
and solid gray holds in trust
the farmer's good last name.
by Oklahoma - born poet Jim Barnes [more poems]
Like Stafford and Barnes, I too have driven and dreamed my way across Kansas.
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| Getting our Kicks on 166 |
My siblings and I remember this place, not from our childhood years, but from recent visits, although it seemed to be closed down the last time we passed through (May 2021). Not long after that, I had the strangest dream that I had to share with them. The store itself wasn't in the dream, but we kids were sitting all sitting around in a good mood (in some unspecified setting -- like maybe the outdoor lounge in my brother Dave's backyard. Our Grandpa Lindsey was there -- my mother's father -- and he was saying, "Aaron used to drive me over to Chetopa to the Wizard Store all the time to have my fortune told."
That was the whole dream, just the frame of us all sitting there and Grandpa making that one remark. A strange and interesting dream, but very un-Grandpa like! I had to ask my brother Aaron if it was true! Of course, I knew it wasn't because, in fact, the Wizzard of Odds didn't even exist (or contained some other business) until at least a decade after our grandfather had died.
I usually forget every single dream, but I think this one is going to stay with me! Oddly enough, this is not the first Wizard Store dream that I have had -- and been able to remember. Around the same time that we discoverd Wizzard of Odds in Kansas, my sister Peg and my nephew Dan used to take me to a gift store in Maryland that we called The Wizard Store, even though its proper name was Flights of Fancy. In the dream, I was distraught, trying to catch a bus on a dark rainy night and repeating over and over to anyone who would listen, "Im trying to get to the Wizard Store," where I knew that Peg and Dan were waiting for me. What is it about these Wizard Stores leading to such wacky dreams?
Talking about our many drives through Chetopa over the years led to a conversation about the various family station wagons. How accurately could we remember?
The Green Pontiac
The Silver Buick
Another Connection:
Our Grandma Lindsey's Map of Kansas Handkerchief
but Coffeyville and Independence made the map!
The Big Floor Map
at the State Line Rest Stop
Kit: Look! I'm standing in three states at once!
Four actually, since I'm also in a state of crippling despair . . .
Bruce: No fair counting Kansas twice!
Thursday, March 14th
Between now and then, read
THE QUOTIDIAN KIT
my shorter, almost daily blog posts
www.dailykitticarriker.blogspot.com
Looking for a good book? Try
KITTI'S LIST
my running list of recent reading
www.kittislist.blogsppot.com
Family Car Reminiscence
ReplyDeleteMy brother Bruce got us started:
The first cars I remember are from Idaho...the pink Dodge station wagon and the white Plymouth. When we moved to Neosho, Dad got the white Impala convertible and a couple of years later, Mom got the blue Pontiac Star Chief.
Here's what I remember:
Dad's cars - Dodge wagon, Impala convertible, white Catalina convertible, the Thunderbird, silver Buick wagon, the cream colored LeBaron, the silver Oldsmobile, the Dakota pickup.
Mom's cars - white Plymouth, blue Star Chief, green Pontiac wagon (actual color was called 'harvest gold' - don't know why I remember that), '64 Chrysler Newport, '68 Newport, blue Dart, red Buick, white Chevy, and I can't remember the last car she had.
More to follow . . .
Aaron: Bruce, you forgot Dad's two-tone cream & white GMC pickup he had before the Dakota. That's the truck he & Mom drove on that last long road trip to Washington state.
ReplyDeleteKit: Looking at Bruce's list, I remember that when we got to Neosho, Daddy traded the peach Dodge station wagon for a white Chevy Impala with black convertible top. I bet you guys never knew I had such a memory for cars!
Di: Lol, no I did not!
Peg: Wow! I have trouble remembering what I had for lunch yesterday 🤣🤣🤣
Bruce: It must be a guy thing. Or maybe just a thing for guys raised by Willard Carriker. I don't know if Dad did this with David and Aaron. I suspect David took it upon himself without much prompting from Dad. But, there was a list of things he taught me to do, that I had to check off, before he would let me get my drivers licenses. And it wasn't a short list.
I had to be able to:
Change all the fluids and filters.
Adjust or replace all the belts.
Tune-up the car, which in those days included gapping the plugs, setting the points, and setting the timing (yes, Dad had a timing light).
Change the shock.
Change the brakes.
I still remember the first time I had to do one of "big things" on that list BY MYSELF. I was terrified. We were at breakfast one morning at Clover Meadows, I was probably fourteen years old. And he said, "You're not doing anything today until you've put new brakes on your mother's car. Everything you need is on the work bench in the garage. Come get me when you're finished." The only thing I "failed" was the adjustment on the left-rear brake drums, and I wasn't off by much. He considered it a pass.
Di: I didn't know that, Bruce! I never learned any of that. I guess Dad just assumed there'd be a man to do the job.
Bruce: That would be Dad. He could be pretty old-fashioned when it came to the division of labor - a man's job and a woman's job. I'm sure he thought anything automotive was a man's job.
Di: Yes, Bruce. Dad wouldn't let me mow the lawn either.
Aaron: Yes, because that was a man's job. 😁
Aaron: Car maintenance -- dad taught me the very basics. Here's my theory. By the time I was old enough to start driving Dad could afford to pay to have his vehicles serviced. So he wasn't doing much of his own car maintenance.
In that respect, Tom Burrows was my teacher/guide. Right after I got out of the service in '83 Tom told me he'd help me change the brakes on my Camero. Well, his idea of "help" was to stand back and tell me what to do and make sure I did it right.
Di: Yes, Aaron. Tom was is a good teacher that way.
Aaron: Work assignments -- yes, Dad was very old fashioned. I remember complaining once about taking out the trash and asked why Kit or Di couldn't do it. I got a lecture on what was expected of boys/men and that taking out the trash was not a girl's job.
Di: Right!
Kit: But he did “allow” Di & me to feed the leaf mulcher!
I am pretty sure that is my dad’s old Pontiac!
ReplyDelete