20210227 THE GREAT EVENT
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I enjoyed reading at a very early age. I do not remember others 
reading to me all that often. However, I was aware of the time 
that my parents dedicated to reading. Of course, we were taught to 
"read" in primary school. In other words, we were taught to glean 
information from the writings of others. Gleaning was not my goal. 
Living imaginatively was.

At the time of the great event, we were living in a log cabin near 
Desert Mountain. The US Department of Agriculture owned both the 
cabin and the workcenter of which it was a part. Both were located 
near Coram, Montana. The cabin was one of the units that provided 
a home for those members of the Forest Service who worked at the 
center throughout the year.

There was a hand pump in the sink for drawing water and a wood 
furnace for keeping warm. A wood stove was provided for cooking 
meals. Kerosene lamps backed up the illumination provided by a 
fitful electricity supply. The old fashioned telephone was housed 
in a wooden box on the wall. You would turn a crank on the side of 
the box for the required number of turns to alert the party with 
whom you wished to speak. To go beyond the small round of party 
line members, you needed to ring for the switchboard operator in 
town.

My grandfather was one of the men who had ensured that folks 
living in that region had access to the larger world. His crew, 
and others like them, had spliced and hung the miles of cable that 
were woven throughout the mountains. I have pictures of him 
relaxing near his truck. There are also pictures of him working 
aloft on a pole. With climbing spikes strapped onto his engineer's 
boots, he could literally run up a telephone pole hoisting along 
his safety belt in time with his strides. Few people reflect on 
what has been required for them to communicate across the miles 
and the years.

I digress.

There were actually two great events. The first was the arrival at 
the railhead of an upright piano for my mother. Her parents had 
bought it in Williston, North Dakota where they lived. My 
grandfather and his family were wheat farmers. They also ran the 
grain elevators and worked in the local shops during winter. My 
grandmother's ancestors had discovered oil in North Dakota. They 
lived on their farms, but they received most of their income from 
their oils leases. 

My grandparents shipped the piano via the Great Northern Railroad 
as far as the branch line would go into the mountains. That was a 
550 mile trip. From the station platform, workers lifted the 
instrument onto a flatbed truck and strapped it down. The truck 
driver wended his way up the back country roads before driving the 
last mile on a washboard of a dirt track. Upon arrival, the piano 
sorely needed the loving care of a tuner. Fortunately, there was 
one to be found in the valley below. He had quite the time getting 
that upright righteous again.

The second great event, was my great event. It came by the same 
means and from the same source. My grandparents bought the family 
a set Collier's Encyclopedia. With the subscription came a large 
selection of books designed for young people. These multicoloured 
volumes provided access to the great stories that had captured the 
imagination of generations of youth in Europe and the Americas.

I too was enthralled. I often smuggled a book into bed with me at 
night. I would read a story or two by the gleam of a flashlight. I 
did so under the covers so as not to waken my two brothers who 
slept nearby in the same small bedroom. My concern was practical 
and not altruistic. If I kept my brothers from sleeping, they 
would complain to my parents. The latter would, in turn, end my 
nocturn adventures.

I soon learned that perusing the encyclopedia regularly aided my 
school work. All these years later, my friends often jokingly 
introduce me to others as Mr Wikipedia. But, that was just a side 
effect. While I made a concerted effort to improve my 
comprehension skills in that schoolroom warehousing three grades 
of students back then, I read at night for the delight of easing 
into and out of whole other worlds.

I still do, six decades later.