Small, small town

By any stretch of the imagination, Chloride is a small town. The last time I checked, there were about 200 permanent residents, and maybe another 200 'seasonals'. Yet it is a town that I remember fondly, simply because many of my happier moments were spent there. True, there were some very difficult times, which I have talked about in other blogs. But there were so many, many times that I was able to let my hair down, and just enjoy the moment.

Most of those moments occurred in Yesterdays, a converted 1800 carriage house. The new owners used the original floor, and many of the original beams when renovation work was being done, so it doesn't take much to feel the spirit of the place. At the time, Bill was the entertainer on Saturday nights, and the gunfighter group was unmerciful. I can't remember all of the tricks we played, but the most memorable follow.

Bill would almost always sing 'Ghost Riders in the Sky" at least once. When it was time for the chorus, the audience would chime in with animal sounds (cow, goat, sheep). It is always fun. On this particular night, Betty, Karen, Steve and I took leave of the main dining area, and changed into costume. We had asked someone to ask Bill to sing the song, and as soon as we heard the opening notes, we were ready. He got to the chorus, and out ran Betty, dressed in the now infamous cow costume, followed by Steve, Karen and I racing across the dining room floor riding stick ponies. All poor Bill could do was sing to the ceiling since he had no idea whether or not there was more to come. When things settled down, he referred to our table(s) as the 'clown table', and said that all we needed were the red noses. Sure enough, the following week we all wore red noses as we gave him a standing ovation for hitting the wrong note in a song.

The standing ovations became a tradition, and Bill would receive one for false starts, wrong notes, missed lyrics and, of course, for doing a great job singing.

At one Christmas Eve party, all of the people at the gunfighter table wore reindeer antlers, cleverly festooned with lights and tinsel. As I recall, there were 17 of us wearing headgear and, of course, poor Bill had to put up with our antics.

The last event that I recall clearly occurred the Saturday before Easter. Bill sings for tips, and collects them in a rather large, old fashioned milk cooler. Steve brought in three dozen plastic Easter eggs, and gave one to each of the diners in the restaurant, for their use in giving Bill his tip. It was a slow night at Yesterdays, and when the evening had just about ended, we still had 20 or so eggs -- empty. So we dug deep into our pockets and put all the loose change we had in the eggs, and when Bill left the dining area for a few minutes, we placed all of the eggs in the milk cooler. We just about filled the cooler, and you can imagine the look on poor Bill's face when he finally looked into the cooler and saw all the lovely pastel eggs. His lady told me it took him over an hour to empty the eggs, but he did see the humor in the prank and, of course, knew who was responsible. Not a single one of us, but the entire gunfighter table.

Those days are gone now. After just over two years of 'every Saturday night', I only go to Chloride on very special occasions. Karen has passed over, and is sorely missed. Steve is working hard to eek out a living, and the gunfighter group has pretty much been disbanded. But Chloride remains a strong small town. It's yards still bear 'yard art', the cemetary is still cleaned up every year by volunteer townspeople, Old Miner's Day is still celebrated, as is St. Patrick's Day, and the All-Town Yard Sale and Bake Sale are still held. Yesterdays still plays host to the soapbox derby and truck show, and life goes on. A gentle life for the most part, but a good life.

P.S. In case you hadn't guessed, Tumbleweed, this one is for you. My thanks in getting me started on this project. I never dreamed it could be so uplifting.