Mom says NO Picture........she has put on a few pounds....so have I...I am almost 71 and she is 68....but I can put my arms around her and close my eyes...and I can still see the first time I laid eyes on her.....we went to a neighboring ranch to help with their gathering....and as we were unloading the horses, she rode up on abig red gilding ......all of 16 years old and just 5 ft tall....long dark red hair...down to her waist ....and the sun made it flash like fire.....I think our fathers saw just as clear as we did that morning......we started the gather ..with her dad to the east and mine to the west maby a quarter mile from us...we worked back and forth at the rear....pushing as they gathered..........some time about mid afternoon we were close to the pins and her dad let out a holler and waved my dad over.......they didn't talk long and the cattle were in the gathering pens...dad said to load the horses and come talk!!! they mumbled for a minet and I heard her dad say go ahead Ray....and they told us that there were things we didn't know about our mothers and if they got wind that we were getting together there would be a range war and neither he or her dad needed that ....
he thought it best if I went on into the army and by the time I got out she would be in school some where and that was that.....Kind of a suden ending to a wonderful day for a young 18 yr old.......and the next morning I was in the army recruters office......that evening I was on a train to KC.......for induction.....
they said I could swear in at KC......Because of that one little fact of not being swarn in yet......I ended up in the navy!!!!
Just as boot camp ended I got a letter from her/telling me to contact a person in sandiago....and the rest of the story began!!!
two years later we were married and the start of a wonderful 51 years!!!
and she is still my most beautiful woman in my world.....