Apache turkey hunting

Please VOTE!
Time is getting short!

Galoshes and IKE
(A comment about growing up in Oklahoma)
Janelle Meraz Hooper

I woke up this morning thinking about the first election I can remember. I was about twelve and we had moved into a new development outside the gates of Fort Sill, Oklahoma, where there was an Indian reservation. The Kiowas weren’t happy because the developers had cut a road through the new houses that went straight through the middle of the clay deposit they used for their pots. I walked that road to school every morning and didn’t see any difference between that unpaved road than any other except that the clay was a deep red. Then the rains came and I saw that clay with a new perspective. Before I went out the door that morning, my mother made me put on my new red galoshes. She’d bought them several sizes too big so they’d last a long time. Everything I wore was too big, even the hand-me-downs from my cousins. The boots looked dumb and I knew the kids would laugh at me. I was glad I had that I LIKE IKE button someone had given me to balance things out. I was the only one in my class who had one and it made me the subject of envy among all my classmates. I wore it every day. On my way to school the new road looked fine but, when I stepped on it, I sank into thick red clay that was deeper than the tops of my galoshes. About halfway to school I noticed that one of my galoshes was missing and the sock on the bootless foot was as red as the road and was half off. I clomped into school with one cold, wet and muddy bootless foot that stayed that way all day. I was sure glad I hadn’t lost my new sock (not realizing that it would never be white again) and I still had my I LIKE IKE button, so I thought I was in good shape. And I was–until I got home and mom noticed I’d lost a brand new boot and one of my socks. Not even IKE could help me then.

____________________Please share!_______________________

The author, Janelle Meraz Hooper, grew up in Oklahoma and is the author of The Turtle Trilogy (A Three-Turtle Summer, As Brown As I Want, and Custer & His Naked Ladies). See all of my books on Amazon. PB & Kindle.

Note: Geronimo, Life on the Reservation, is a one-man show I wrote for Rudy Ramos (Now on Kevin Costner’s Yellowstone (Paramount Channel).

My Newest novel
Buy now on Amazon

Thanks for stopping by! Janelle

Rudy Ramos, star of Geronimo, Life on the Reservation, a live traveling show. See him this spring on Kevin Costner’s TV series, Yellowstone, now in production.

Happy Thanksgiving Eve. From my research file: I’ve read that Apache women could run so fast they could chase down a wild turkey. Then, they’d tuck the still gobbling bird under their arm and walk to the post to sell it to the soldiers. The first time it happened, the soldiers thought it might be stolen. But no, the women really were that fast.

The Apache women were hard workers. After their arrival on the reservation, they quickly learned the soldiers would pay for turkeys, firewood, and grass for their horses that the women gathered on the prairie.

They spent the money they made in the trading post. Things that were common to white women were luxuries to them. Geronimo commented that, each time they went to the trading post, they came back a little less Apache and a little more like white women. It made him sad, but he understood.

This year, I might try turkey hunting, Apache style. I can see a crow out in my pasture–maybe I’ll practice with him…

I caught him! (:

Oh! he got away! ):

This is the kind of thing writers do when
they’re waiting for a download…(:

Janelle Meraz Hooper is the playwright for Geronimo, Life on the Reservation. She’s a multi-genre indie-writer. See her books and stories here:

See what else I’ve written!

Janelle Meraz Hooper, author

Literary blog

Category Archives: Apache turkey hunting

Galoshes and IKE, a comment about growing up in Oklahoma

Related posts:

Related posts: