Why we made that first visit to the state school’s abandoned train and tracks, I don’t recall, but I do remember that we made several visits, the kids would ride on the train, be passengers and engineers, while Diana and I pushed the train. I really had no idea that what we were doing was forbidden. Someone who was not acting in any official capacity may have even Ok'd the visits. I’m sure we’d been seen on those occasions, but on one occasion, a conscientious afternoon shift supervisor told Rick who told us that we were not to do that again

I remember sleeping out under the stars when she was very young, and talking about life’s large questions, like where did we come from? And what are we doing here? She remembers making cakes and cookies in the sand box, and eating bites of them. And she chose me to brush and braid her hair. Eager and hopeful as a young child, she learned to tie her shoes at age three. Then came the devastating divorce, announced by her mother to us all on the night of Julia’s 9th birthday. I lost 15 pounds in 3 days. And Julia became my chief confidant and advisor. It still angers me when I remember a neighbor’s advice. They’ll grow up and move away anyway, let them go. My children were my life, and her choice felt like an assault on all of us. We were hardy and our love for each other stayed alive despite all her mother’s contrary efforts.

Increasingly she stepped away into making a life for herself, she ran cross-country, cut her hair, made friends beyond me, shaped a future on the edge of danger. It seemed that all I could do was say, "Please be careful!" Just before she left for college, we had the lead parts in a Rodeo Talent Show Play and shared one last story together.

Then she was gone, off on adventures and misadventures. She shared later. I remember talking during a 700-mile trip together. She shared emotions, but still did not tell all that angered, frustrated, and confused her during those college days. But we watched the Northern Lights, saw a North Dakota high rise – six stories high, one room wide. It was a small town landmark. Please be careful, and please write.

And on that walk to Judd, we chased tumbleweeds, loved feeling the wind, just being alive. Her brothers and I had driven all night to see her with the lead female part in a college play, and we drove much of the night on the return trip. And later in the dead of winter when I went to get her, it was so cold that the gas line froze, and we just made it to a safe place, and were able to buy heat for the gas line. She chose not to go back after that winter break, was it the winter of the measles for her brothers? It wasn’t till much later that she told me of distresses and misuse that she’d suffered at that school in Jamestown to which she’d been lured by that cross-country running scholarship. Many more adventures came her way before the move to Bozeman.

She got married at the end of a regular church service. I played a song on the piano that I used to play for the children as I told stories. It was the only time I’d ever played the song without an error.

She makes her home now in Philadelphia with her husband, Jason, and their three children, Wyndham Ravi, Zoe Uma Rye, and Xia Wynona – whom she and Jason have very ably guided into life, and who learn how to defend themselves, make friends, play a violin, paint with watercolors, write stories, and make movies. Many details of her story remain for her to tell, but you can see in her art, in her husband, and in children that an energetic love of living guides her.

In the meantime stepping beyond heredity and environment, let’s see one story my daughter has written.