Bonnie Leon - Where Eagles Soar

Where Eagles Soar

A Memoir

Written by

Bonnie Leon

2014 by Bonnie Leon

Smashwords Edition

Published by Leon Press

P.O. Box 774, Glide, OR

Also available in print

Printed in the United States ofAmerica

All rights reserved. No part of thispublication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, ortransmitted in any form or by any means without the prior writtenpermission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotationsin printed reviews.

ISBN978-1-4951-2058-9

Cover design by Miller MediaSolutions

Scripture used in this book, whetherquoted or paraphrased by the characters, is taken from the KingJames Version and The New International Version of theBible.

This is a true story. Namesof people and places have been changed out of respect forfamily.

DEDICATED

to

The Brokenhearted

I will bind up the injuredand strengthen the weak.

Ezekiel 34:16

Table of Contents

My People are storytellers. My dad wasa story teller. And Im a story teller too. But more than that, Iam a truth teller. I know about life and death, hope anddesperation, riches and bankruptcy. A bankruptcy of the soul, andthe beauty of God and his truthhow it shines when it is held upalongside the twisted, ugly lies of the Evil One.

Sometimes the way we begin our lifehas little to do with where we end up or who we become along theway.

And sometimes it has everything to dowith it.

There are people in this world whowalk around all scarred up insideangry and never able to findtheir way. But for some, scars make them stronger and show them abetter way to live.

Im one of those. And I want to tellyou my story.

Most of my life I lived in a muddle oflove and brutality, raging inside. Mama was good and kind and herlife was one of sacrifice. Daddy didnt know how to love. He onlyknew how to get what he wanted. And no one had better ever get inhis way, not even family.

Living with ruthlessness can turn aperson sour, like milk left out in the heat too long. That was me.I learned I could be better, only it took a great God, a lot ofyears, and a miracle to show me the way.

I discovered that a wounded heart doesnot mean an end to goodness, but can be like the rocks that sit ina riverbed. Week upon week, month upon month, year upon year waterwashes over those stones, so hard, so fast, and for so long thatthe jagged edges gradually and steadily are chipped away until thestones become smooth.

Some even turn shiny and one daybecome a treasure to someone who sees them glittering in a creekbed and picks them up.

When I was a girl, I used to gatherstones. They were all special, some even valuable. And so pretty Icould never decide which I liked best.

No matter what a persons life hasbeen like, it can change. Sometimes change is subtle like the quietrustle of leaves on a tree and other times it charges at us,demanding we be made new.

I started out a jagged old rock, but Imet a Man who changed me. Because of Him, I became special justlike a stone resting on the bottom of a riverbeda livingstone.

Growing up, I never gave much thoughtto being thankful. I didnt figure I had much to be thankful for.Life was hard without things like running water or electricity. Andthere was a lot of days I went hungry. I couldnt even imagine thatin most places people could walk into a grocery store and have achance to buy most anything they wanted. And I didnt know aboutthings like baby dolls, toys, and pretty clothes.

What I did know was how tosurvive.

By the time I was eight years old, Iknew how to work hard and how to lead a string of pack horses andmules over a high mountain trail. I understood the tricks needed tobring down a caribou or a moose, and I ran my own trap line. Irecognized which wild berries and plants to eat or leave alone. AndI could catch fish without a pole or a net.

I was also well acquainted withmeanness, rage and hatred. Back then, I figured all that uglinesswas just the way things was meant to be.

And I was only nine when I learnedwhat happens between men and women.

Daddy was half Shoshone, and Mama wasmostly Cherokee. They met through the mail and got married young.They lived in Wyoming where Daddy grew up fierce and wild. Hismama said he was always that way.

He was born on a Shoshone reservationback when the Shoshone were in a land dispute with some of thewhite folks in the territory up there. The Shoshone stole two boysfrom Charles Sanders so Charles Sanders stole one of the Shoshoneboysmy dad. They named him Carl.

He wasnt very old when he got taken.And although his new parents were the religious type and dideverything they could to raise him right, he was always trouble. Hewouldnt stay in school, no matter what kind of punishment he got.Hed take off first chance he got, to some wild place where hewould hunt or trap.

When he married my mama, they lived inRiverton, Wyoming. Often as he could he took her with him into themountains to help out at the hunting camp.

One day Daddy came home all fired up.Were moving to Alaska, he said. Its time I made some realmoney and Alaskas the place to do it. Mark Lowman told me they gotfree land up there160 acres for people like us.

We moved that year, in 1947, when Iwas just one year old.

Mama packed up our things, whichwerent much, and we all piled into an old pickup truck and headedacross the north of the country. We followed what they called TheALCAN Highway all the way to Alaska.

I think Mama was pregnant with mysister Jeannie then. Seems like Mama was always pregnant. She hadfourteen kids in alleveryone of them girls except for one boy whodied and my younger brother, Johnny.

Sometimes shed talk about that tripand her dark eyes would turn warm as if she was remembering thehope shed felthope for a better life and enough food for herfamily. Maybe even dream that Daddy would be happy in a wild placelike Alaska.

He wasnt, though, not most of thetime. The only time I saw any joy in his eyes was when hed tellstories. He used to talk about our trips into the wilderness, backwhen we lived in Wyoming. Lily, hed say. When you were just ababy wed head out on a hunting trip or do some trapping, and yourmama would lay you in one of the pannier boxes we slung over thehorses. Off wed go and youd be happy as could be, almost nevercried.

When he talked about it, Id think hownice it must have been, all cozy like that and swaying as the horsemoved along a trail. Id wish I was still that little baby snug ina box, feeling safe and warm, rocking like when Mama used to holdme.

Mama lived hard, but her heart wassoft with us kids. When I lay in her arms she always smelled good,like baking and wood smoke. I was probably happy then when I wasa baby.

Mark Lowman told Daddy that a placecalled Dead Horse Creek was supposed to have some fine homesteadingland and it was close to the Talkeetna Mountains where thered begood hunting and trapping. It was near an Athabaskan village in themountains outside a place called Palmer and was bordered by theMatanuska River.

Daddy fell in love with Dead HorseCreek and never got tired of telling us about how it was when hefirst found our homestead. Didnt take long, he would say everytime. We moved through the village and then I saw this real finepiece of ground at the edge of town. Behind it was a big olmountain standing tall and proud. I knew its where we belonged.The blue in Daddys eyes would turn almost warm like a summer skywhen he talked about those days.

Dead Horse Creek was the right placefor Daddy, but Mama wanted a house for her and us kids. Instead,Daddy stuck her in a tent. The house didnt matter to himhe hadwhat he wanted.

It was real easy to homestead backthen. All Daddy had to do was fill out papers and then prove it up,which meant he had to work real hard to turn it into a farm. Daddyknew how to work hardso did us kids. We worked most every day, allday, all of our lives.