The Day After THE Days

There have been bad days in Mudville. The last days I've been down with a recurring health problem and the "Great American War Novel" has suffered. No research to speak of and no writing. I've left the Doughboys stranded in the Argonne. Maybe today will be the day to get the troops moving. This is not a time of year that is conducive to doing much other than the holiday stuff anyway.

Tiger the Office Cat has been a pain in the butt the last week or so. Her favorite rubbing spots have been my hand as I attempt to move the mouse and the keyboard as I try to write or read. She is getting good at kitty-keyboarding. She can cause more moves on the screen than I can. I will be reading and Tiger will lower her head and rub on the keyboard and take me pages down the item. I think at night when all is quiet she slips up here and tries different things to do to agitate me. She has the annoying habit of pushing her rear into the air, usually in my face. I push her down and she pushes up again. This goes on until she tires of the game. She's sleeping now, resting up for the next attack.

KOGT.com is a website that has local information from my hometown, Orange, Texas. One of the columns is called "Looking Back". It is about things that happened years ago or places we went to years ago. It brings back a lot of memories of events and places and people gone by. From time to time something will pop up and hit me right between the eyes. When you approach Old Geezerdom and reflect back it is amazing to look back. Thankfully most of the memories are good ones.

On the national news yesterday, December 21, was a report that another WWI veteran has died. He was 109 years old. The report said that there are only two WWI vets still alive. The doors are closing fast on these men. I firmly believe that the history needs to be kept alive and I'm glad to find so many websites that relate histories and other information about the war. Maybe there will be a place for "the Great American War Novel".

World War I was the war that began to advance technology in war. A lot of "improvements" to war came about from that conflict. The two allied tanks in use were the big lumbering British tank that was slow, heavy, and cumbersome and the French Renault. The Renault was 35 horsepower with a crew of two and either a machine gun or a 37mm cannon. Top speed was 6 mph. Compare that with what we have today! Airplanes were slow, wooden and fabric covered. One Allied order to airmen was never to leave the airplane unattended. Livestock had a taste for the glue and fabric and would chew a plane useless if they were given the time and opportunity. World War II was more deadly as the technology advanced. Civilization in general became more advanced. The world got smaller. But I don't think it got any smarter.

Putting on my thinking cap I wonder who reads blogs? How do readers find a blog that they are interested in? Do writers write a blog to be read or is it a journal type project? Either way it works for me, it's an outlet.

I haven't decided what today's research will center on, maybe rations. The Doughboys ate "monkey meat" it was some sort of canned meat, corned probably, that came from Madagascar of all places. I'll check it out, hang around.....

Today is the Tomorrow I was Worried About Yesterday!

Geeze Louise -- Today has been one of those days. My wheels spun all day. No work at all done on the "Great American War Novel." Roy Bedichek published his first novel at age 70, maybe there is hope.

I've got the details on the Doughboys but not too much on the Doughboys themselves. Finding out personal information without having files to draw on is a somewhat daunting task. I can find unit histories but personal histories are not around for the specific areas I'm digging into. The 36th Division was only in combat for twenty eight days, but there was some heavy fighting with losses of men and material. It is an interesting history but histories have been written about the 36th. I feel it is time to tell the stories of the men. the last American combat veteran of World War I died in February, 2007 at the age of 108. There are seven surviving WWI veterans but they did not serve in combat. (As of December, 2007) I guess I will have to dig deep and delve into the land of make believe for the individual stories. Fiction has not been my forte but I can learn.....

In my world today is the honky-tonk music of the 1940's and 1950's. Hank Snow is singing about having been everywhere and The Golden Rocket has rolled. Ernest Tubb is waiting in the wings to walk the floor over whoever, don't know who will come next. I discovered a treasure of my kind of music at cheap prices. The old music has been redone digitally and sounds great. I even got a copy of the only video of Brother Dave Gardner -- Rejoice Dear Hearts! All is well with the world.

The last few days, weeks, and months I have had the feeling that I'm regressing. I have dug into the past trying to put the "Great American War Novel" together and I've been going back into the music "of my youth." It is the sort of stuff I listened to when I was in college on the big 331/3 rd LP albums. I still have a stack of those and a turntable to play them on.

Today is one day that I remember well. I know exactly where I was and what I was doing December 17, 1964. I did not realize how much my life would change from that day forward. It was not a bomb blast, just an erosion and a slide into silt, deep silt, that just covers slowly and erodes the past. However, memories remain and the last few weeks have brought a lot back. Hank Thompson said it in song, "He's In The Jailhouse Now." "Ramblin' Bob" could be any of a multitude of us. Blue collar, work for a paycheck, pay taxes until the clock winds down. BUT no one can take away the memories!

My world is not crowded, just me and the dogs and the honky-tonk music. Wanna come in?

How The Day Goes By (By)

The mornings start early, usually around daybreak. I either make coffee or pour a cup of coffee depending on who gets up first, me or my daughter. The next move is to go into the office and turn on the light. Tiger the office cat greets me with one of several levels of "meow". The low meow means she is glad to see me. The louder meow means that she is low on food and wants the food bowl filled -- NOW! Tiger's next move is to come in my direction and either jump on the back of my chair (not likely) or on the desk. Once on the desk she begins to rub on the paper tray on the printer, on my hand as it is on the mouse, or on the keyboard. Tiger the office cat can change things around with her cat-style rubbing on the keys. Then we play the "get out of the way game". I move her and she comes back again and again and again. Finally she gets tired of me and goes away to perch near my left shoulder if I'm lucky,or on the mouse pad if I'm not. By the time I've checked my email Tiger and I have come to a stand-off and I can get down to work.

I'm researching the service of the 141st Infantry Regiment, 71st Brigade, 36th Division in World War I. My grandfather was in Company H of the 141st Infantry. My project started in 1999 as a thread off of genealogy that I was researching. We have no family records, his discharge papers were misplaced years ago. Military records from 1912 to 1960 were burned in a fire in the records center in 1973, over 80 percent were lost. There is not much hope of finding his individual service record but the history of his division is interesting.

I go from link to link on the WWI websites and dig and find things that I can use. I am attempting to organize my notes into a novel. It will turn out to be a historical fiction or something along that line. I belong to the Golden Triangle Writer's Guild in Beaumont, Texas and we guide each other along in our endeavors. There is a lot to be said for a few people sharing ideas -- it works. At the rate my work is progressing I should be ready to publish about two weeks after the second coming of Christ, or later.

Usually about the time I'm deep into some website it becomes time to walk the dog (s). In addition to Tiger the Office Cat, we have Yogi Bear, a mutt from the Humane Shelter in Beaumont and Clutch the Cocker Spaniel from the East Texas Cocker Spaniel Rescue in Houston. Yogi is a 66 pound Chow-Rottweiler cross breed. He is a bundle of love that lives to be petted, eat and sleep. Yogi is hands down the most lovable dog that I have ever had. Clutch is 26 pounds of yet-to-be-determined whatever. He runs and guns and plays but he has a nervous side. He will bark at anything out of the ordinary and will let any sound outside interrupt his attempt at doing his business.

Once the animals are settled down I can usually get a little more work done. I juggle my wife in and out of my research/writing as time requires. About "noonish" I quit to eat a bite and read a little. When 2:00 rolls around I dive into the Jeep and go to pickup the first grandkid, Brooke. After I pick up Brooke at the Intermediate School I go to the High School and grab Jason. I either drop him off at work or bring him home as his schedule requires. When I get home it is time to start supper. In addition to the cat and two dogs we also have two kids and two grandkids that live with us.

Whenever possible I retreat into my world. It's not crowded in my world. It is a quiet place filled with "my things". I may put on my earphones and listen to the old country music from the 1940's and 1950's. I may read. I may do both at the same time. Mostly I just go to my world and lay back and try to let things go by. There is so much that we cannot control because they are the things of other people. I can only deal with my problems and the things of the world that jump into my face and confront me directly. They are varied and range from simple to complex. They would destroy me if I let them. I refuse to let them! I go to my world with my memories, it's not crowded there.

Come along with me and learn about World War I, old country music, and if you behave yourself I may let you have a glimpse of my world.