Despite the fact that I grew up dirt poor, and we moved around considerable due to my daddy's work in the oil fields....(they referred to us as "oil field trash" cept on payday, then they wanted us around........of course we were called worse things on occasion so, I guess the term "oil field trash" wasn't all that bad. Kinda like bein called "redneck"........I find no shame in that either.

Well, sometimes the whole family didn't get to make the move, sometimes just Momma and my baby sis would go........and my brother and I would stay with kin, usually our grandparents. Well, come to think about it I can't remember my brother Johnny staying more than overnight at the Warren side of the family. He was a little on the timid side and thinkin about it now brings a wide smile to my face, and I'll share why.......the Warren grandparents' house was no place for anyone timid......First of all, even though it was a huge house there was (at least until I reached early teens) on the average nine family members, not countin me lots of the time, and not counting Sally, a hard as nails lady who boarded in what had been a converted back porch 5 days a week. She had a real nice home about 60 miles away, but she had been transferred from the shoe factory in her hometown, to the one that my aunt worked at just 3 blocks from the Warren clan abode. She'd go home for the weekends (probably to regain her sanity lol). Lunchtime was a one ring circus, there were so many of us there that at least 4 people always had to eat standing at either the kitchen counter, or stand at the table in between the seated folks. I spect we looked like red tail hawks hovering over the table. Now, I had 4 uncles still livin at home then, and 3 of them were just a few years apart from me. People always thought we were brothers not uncles and nephew. A lot of folks in my hometown never did learn any different even today.

I had two aunts who lived at home as well, and they kept the place neat as a pin, despite the fact that all the furnishings couldn't have been any more wore out.......cleanliness was a must. Now that ya have a basic picture in your mind, let me be specific about grandma and grandpa Warren. I don't spect a more different couple could have ever been put together in God's big world. Grandma Warren was a large lady, loud voiced, and if given reason meaner than a badger. Grandpa was short, and lean, spoke quietly and moved in and out of the house like some Indian ninja.......oh yea ya'll gotta remember this is an American Indian household. Grandpa had worked the rodeo circuit in OK and the oilfields as well. Heck, only the girls in the family didn't end up working the oil patch. It's just what my family did.

Well, when the oil boom hit Illinois, grandpa was still young and a scrapper. In fact he stayed a scrapper till just before he died. He lived life on the edge, and he did everything to the maximum. Grandpa's only downfall was, he dearly loved the whiskey...Grandma hated the whiskey.......not that it made him mean, cause it didn't. But it took desperately needed money away from the family; that's what the problem was......and she couldn't find a passage in the Bible about whiskey bein ok with God. Wine maybe whiskey no!

Well, when I was age 12 fixin to turn 13, grandpa lost his drivers license. This was during one of the times I was stayin there....... and grandpa wanted to visit my aunt who lived just about 20 miles straight shot down the road. So when the opportunity arose grandpa said "come on boy you are driving me to Clay City". So, out the back door we went, I climbed behind the wheel of the 56 Ford, 6 cylinder, three on the tree shift, out of the driveway over the railroad tracks heading South till the paved streets turned to gravel, hung a right and then headed west on a 40 mile drive through the back roads to get to a town 20 miles away. It was great.....I had been racing go carts since I was 7 so driving was somethin that was no problem. I had also been 6 ft tall since the 6th grade, and I could have probably made the drive down highway 250 undetected, but I don't think that is what Grandpa Warren had in mind......I think he wanted to spend some time at a slower pace, sip some whiskey, and talk with me.

When we had gone about 5 miles he looked over at me and said, "so Slim, how's life treatin you?" I can remember it clear as a bell ringing. Like a kid I answered back, "things are pretty good for me grandpa considering the DR's. are treating me for leukemia, how's life treatin you?" He got a quiet smile on his face took another sip, and said somethin like "well right now, life's pretty good". He sat quiet for awhile sippin on that bottle, then he starts talkin to me like he never had before. Man, I mean he talked about everything from workin on oil derricks when they were still made of wood, how stinkin life on the reservations were, how going to the white man's school just never worked for him (if I remember he ran off at about age 10 or 11), on and on he went....... I just sat there takin it all in, and loving the fact that I was driving the backroads on a beautiful summer day with my grandpa. When we got to Clay City, the first person we ran into was my uncle Perry..........my momma's brother in law, and the town Marshal. Yep straight up.......we was busted....lol.......Perry said something like "John, you and Terry are up to no good, and if his daddy knew you had him driving it'd be real bad for both of you." Boy was that the truth, cause my daddy was one mean man. May God rest his soul.

Well, Grandpa looked at Uncle Perry and said "now Perry who is gonna tell him? We aint, and you aint neither.".....Perry just laughed out loud, and said "Nope I'm not, but you two be careful". He drove off, we drove off to my Aunt's, where we got our backsides chewed out again for us makin the trip.

Well, after the tail chewin Aunt Phyl made us a snack, put it in a brown paper bag, and we was off again headed back home. Just outside of a little burg called "Passport" grandpa said "pull over". I was sure that I had done something wrong and he wasn't gonna let me drive anymore. That was not the case He went on to say "open the trunk, get them fishin poles out, we're gonna fish awhile". Well, I thought he had done flipped or something, there wasn't a sign of any water, just a fence row separating a bean field from a woods. I got the fishin poles and a coffee can full of worms he had put in the car unbeknownst to me before we left. He was already walking the fence row, and I came a runnin up after him. He shared a big ole chaw of "Red Man" chew with me (my first ever), and we walked on. When we had walked probably the length of a football field, there was a break in the woods, and a red dirt road mostly grown over in wild grasses. As we walked up the lane, I thought "this is a pretty cool place", then the lane took a sharp bend and emptied out of the woods to a clearing where an old home site had been......off to the side was a black wrought iron fence, and ya could see a couple of old once white now nearly black headstones. As we walked by, grandpa said, "in one of them graves is buried a Confederate soldier." I said something like "yea right grandpa, a Confederate in Illinois." He got this stern look on his face and come back with "if ya think I'm lying to you boy then just get your butt over there and look". Well I wanted to rush over there, but I knew if I did, he would think I was questioning him........I was smarter, and more respectful than that, even at age12 goin on 13. Years later, I would come across that little cemetery when I took a job in high school one summer indexing cemeteries in the county. I took Pammee by there just last year.

Just passed the cemetery plot, was a pond, the prettiest little ole pond I'd ever seen, green willows lined part of it, and sandstone rocks on other parts. We sat there fishin, gabbin, chewin, for a couple hours.....when the sun started to go down, grandpa piped up "slim, I reckon by now we both are in a heap of trouble, guess we best go face the music." I shuddered to myself, cause I knew if he was worried, then I really better be worried. We climbed back into the Ford headed for the last 10 miles to home. We both was pretty quiet, thinkin I guess of what was waitin for us.. Just before we got back to the town limits, grandpa, slapped me on the leg real hard like, and said "I've had one hell of a good day, how bout you?" I said "yep me too". He said, "well slim, pull this car over cause I'm gonna be the one driving it into the yard. I'm sure you are in enough trouble for being gone all day, without adding to your misery by driving me around." I did as he said, well knowing he was right. As he started off and we crossed over the railroad tracks, he said "son, remember this day, and remember no matter what kinda trash people might talk about us.........cause we're Indian and poor and different than most.......you just remember we come from good hard workin people, and we are good people and to hell with anyone who thinks otherwise." Well, 41 years later his words still hold tight in my mind, and I like to believe they still run true and straight. But, I guess that's really open to each individual's interpretation of my family though. When we pulled into the yard, there they all was, grandma, aunts, uncles, my daddy, and the sheriff......My heart went up into my mouth and about choked me to death......as we got out of the car, poor ole grandpa was catchin it from everyone and it seemed like they was all talkin at the same time, it was like that buzz of noise that ya hear at funeral visitations, know what I mean?

Well my dad motioned for me to come over, and I was sure I was gonna catch it, I walked real slow like to the back of the old Ford, opened the trunk, pulled out the empty coffee can, and a stringer of fish........I watched as that mad as hell look on my daddy's face turned to just the slightest of a smile, he looked over at his daddy and said "so ya'll been fishin huh?" Grandpa said "yea, what the hell did ya think we was doing... out robbin banks?" My daddy said "well it would have been a whole lot better if ya had told someone where ya was going." Grandpa said "we did, did any of ya even bother to look in the workshop?" The reply from Grandma was something like "well I didn't walk out there but I gave a hollar and nobody answered." Out in grandpa's little workshop, (what had been a summer kitchen long time back and where he kept his whiskey), was a chalkboard that he had scavaged from an old pool hall years before. Written on it plain for all to see was "me and slim have gone fishin. be back before dark....John.." My daddy said "get in the car boy, your momma is beside herself." I did as I was told, my daddy walked over to the sheriff, who I really believe had more to drink than grandpa had, and they spoke amongst themselves, shook hands, the sheriff said "John you drive anymore till you get your license back from the state, I'll arrest you, and see that you never get them back." Grandpa said "ok Jess, ya have my word, I won't"..........and he didn't till bout 10 months later when he got them back. Course ya'll know it wasn't the last time I drove grandpa long before I was of age to. There were at least a half dozen other Saturday excursions over that summer. As my daddy drove me home he said "Son did your grandpa let ya drive today?" I swallowed real hard like and said "yes sir he did", (I knew way better than to lie about). He said "that's good I was afraid he was drinkin and had ya in the car with him." I said " he was drinkin daddy, but he only drove the last 3 blocks home." Daddy said "well I reckon that ain't all that bad.... I'll smooth it over with your momma."

That's the way one of the best summer days of my life ended..... My grandpa Warren passed away 5 years later, after surviving rodeos, oil field accidents, car wrecks, and a less than healthy lifestyle, he bought a shetland pony for one of the gg grandkids.....the pony kicked him breaking his arm and shoulder, it never healed, and he died of bone cancer. I miss him to this day.