That’s right Folks…a couple shots in the distance, the dog growlin’ low, my fella sickly & tired from working too hard; I live in a country & western song. The summer is gone again, as I knew it would be, and it never got here this year anyway. We sure are thankful for all our little blessings though. Everyday they add up like  pieces of a great puzzle, soon to reveal the splendor of something grand. Let’s see if we can’t get one of these “so called forthcoming stories” out tonight… Sometimes writing takes a certain schtuff to get it going, and I s’pose that shots in the night will do…Recently, I had to drive through a wee town in Alberta called Cremona. It’s one of those tiny villages that has a single main street, an old AND a new( 1980’s) hotel/restaurant/tavern, a post office, the laundromat that’s been there forever, a few stores and side streets, the obligatory fancy house on the hill, no more grain elevator or train tracks, great, strong people, and, I’d imagine, a few dogs. I spent quite a bit of time there in my western days; the youth of my horses and old pickup trucks, cowboys- REAL cowboys, and the first place I ever saw that colour you sometimes see in the sunset that you most wish you could have a dress made from a fabric of even a remotely similar hue. In the cemetery just outside of town a dear friend and great man lies. As the usual pace of my life often dictates, I had to drive past, unable to stop in for a moment to see the grave. I am going back soon. It will be part of my timeline to stop and see Jim Burton’s grave. Many folks believe that another gentleman holds Alberta’s oldest Class A Guides licence, but it was Jim. The structuring of guiding & outfitting licences changed at some point in the 1940’s, and Jim held the title for one year previous to the current title holder, but he’s long gone and that’s just what it is. He knew horses and kids, and horses for kids. He cut many of the trails through Banff National Park, alone, with a head and tail string of some ridiculous number like 17 head, on a green-broke horse, and could roll a smoke as he went down the trail. Really. He had hands that were hard to believe. They were HUGE. Only people that work with their hands and leather and dirt and years get hands like his. Gnarly beautiful like an ancient oak tree they were. In the last season of his life he was still catching wild horses, and he had the brilliant idea to take ready made pens up to the bush on a homemade wagon with the team. He wasn’t so much for riding on the wagon by now. It rumbled his guts. He rode his saddle horse up behind us, as he had to get off and lie in the trail ’til he could take the pain enough to ride again. This slowed him down a little, but the team & wagon went pretty slow, so we set out ahead to get a start on the long ride into Angel Camp. This was the base for Jim’s outfit as mostly a kids’ camp, and some wild horse catchin’ too. Ike, Jim’s son, drove the team. We were going along fine for a while; it’s rough and rambling with the big metal pen panels and a few pack boxes for a seat. Everything was boomered to the rig with chains and come alongs. It was a pretty heavy load. The team was an older solid Belgian and a young Percheron. The old boy had won pulls with the stoneboat at heavy horse competitions, and the young one was learning from him.I think their names were Prince and Doc, but it’s been 25 years… We reached a creek crossing that had a really steep, rutted bank on the other side. These trails were meant to be accessed by saddle horses or dirtbikes, and it was quite challenging to take the team & wagon up there. I don’t remember who all was there, but competent horsemen they were. For an hour the boys tried to get the team to pull the load up that stretch of hill, and they were about to start taking apart the load to split it into two. Just then, Jim rode up, got off his horse( which he rarely did-he had bunions so bad that he could barely walk, only ride) and took the lines beside the team. In the gentlest, yet most intense whisper kinda cooing sound , he started those horses up that bank. They gathered themselves and gave their all while Jim walked slowly coaxing beside them. I can’t really describe the magnificence of witnessing an incredible feat of strength and faith like that which I saw take place between Jim and his horses. They would have split themselves in half to pull that load up the hill if he asked them to. As it was, they required only Jim’s presence and a concerted effort to get up the bank and on our way again. Unloading the racks would have taken hours and left us travelling well into the night. I sure learned a lot about horses from old Jim. I sure learned a lot. Blessings!  RPS

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