Ruth Can Fix It

We celebrated Clara Ruth Bell last Saturday. Lots of good stories were shared and they only scratch the surface of her amazing life.

Ruth was a mountain girl who went to nursing school and became a single mother over 60 years ago in a time when it was difficult to do in a place with unkind people who are more interested in gossip than any other topic or pass-time. I doubt there were any government programs available to Ruth, but she’d have never taken them anyway. She just put her shoulder to the grind stone and worked. Never bowed her head or felt inferior to anyone. Ruth was one of the most capable and self-sufficient people I have ever met. Didn’t matter if she needed to change a tire, shoot a snake, saddle a horse, can green beans, sew most any item or run a concession stand – she was good for it.

She literally knew me all my life – I mean from birth.

In the last few years Ruth and I talked often on the phone. She was less mobile and her work, although still full, was done sitting more of the time. Even after her legs quit her, she still made the rounds on her scooter, kept driving and produced some of the most beautiful bead work you’ve ever seen.

What I learned from her was not to whine and not to waste time feeling sorry for yourself. You take the hand you are dealt and make that work. The last time I talked to her, she had fallen off her scooter and ended up in the hospital with a broken vertebra. She had been moved to rehab. I asked how she was and she said it was time for her therapy, but she was supposed to get a pain shot before the therapy started and evidently someone had forgotten. A few sentences later, she said, “there goes that little split-tail that’s supposed to give me the shot right there. HEY!!” I said I would talk to her later. I don’t know if she heard me, but I bet that nurse got an ear full. I bet Ruth got a shot, too. That’s the last time I talked to her. From then on, about a month, she didn’t answer.

Ruth was doctor, seamstress, driver and mother to many cowboys. Those boys thought she could do anything they needed and mostly, she could.

When I was teaching ag my students and the Treat family built an arena on the Treat ranch. We had all kinds of rodeos and jackpots there. My FFA got part of the gate and all the concessions. This story happened at an open rodeo. My brother Keith was in the bareback riding. I don’t remember how well the horse bucked. Keith rode him fine, but like so many jughead bareback horses, he turned into Secretariat when the whistle blew. The pickup men in no way had the horseflesh to catch him and neither had the revelation to cut the corner, so Keith was trying to loosen his bind at a high rate of speed. Somehow, for some reason, Keith came off the horse with his hand still bound in his riggin. I was concerned, but he was staying on his feet and that is what is important. Neither pickup man could get close enough to yank on Keith’s hand. Then the horse hit the pipe fence and Keith’s head hit the top rail. Keith lost his feet. For the first time in 15 years of Keith riding bareback horses, I sailed off the kickboard into the arena.

The pickup men horseback weren’t much, but two of the best pickup men ever to throw a leg over a horse were watching on the bucking chutes. When the horse passed close to them the next time, Joe Harraway and Eddie Claybrook landed on the horse’s head, finally getting him stopped. Keith was not completely knocked out, but his chaps were torn off, his right jean leg was shredded, and I could see his ankle had been stepped on. I said I would get the ambulance. Keith said, “you will not. You will get me out of the arena and you will get me Ruth. And don’t let them cut my boot off.”

So that’s what we did. I don’t know why Ruth was at that particular rodeo, but I am sure glad she was. Keith was still groggy and he told Ruth he knew she could just tape it up. She couldn’t. He had a break that made a goose egg above his ankle he had the rest of his life. He claimed he spurred better with that foot because of it, since turned out was the only way his toe could go.

Ruth surveyed the situation. “I don’t think I can fix this. You need to get your ass to the doctor.” With anyone else, Keith would have argued. But not with Ruth. That was the only time Keith was ever hurt bad (ok, that statement is relative, but…) riding bareback horses. When Keith died and we had his tribute, Ruth showed up, of course, and she gave me a keychain she beaded. That’s how she let me know how she felt.

Keith won’t get hurt riding bareback horses in heaven, but Ruth is there in case he needs to be told to get his ass somewhere. They are in a lot of good company until I see them again. Ruth will be able to beat me in a foot race, too!