When my son first made it, he put heavy tar paper all on the outside. But a man had been keeping cattle up there which had chewed off the tar paper covering it, exposing gaps between the ties sometimes half an inch wide. Agustin and I stuffed up the cracks with paper and pieces of plastic and tried to recover it as best we could. Since it was handy for hunters, they would come and camp there in the old house. Of course, they'd be drinking and wanting to try out their guns. Trigger happy. So they would shoot holes through the top of the house. Bullets did not go through the ties so good, so they'd aim mostly at the top or roof.

It was a terrible place to move back to, and winter was near, and it was already getting cold. After living the months before in Arkansas visiting my daughter, Azalea, my eyes could hardly take the cold dry wind in this country, and my complexion suffered, too. Somehow I'd misplaced my cold cream. But I did have a can of fresh Crisco. So I used that, and it was good. But my eyes had to tough it out since I had no eye drops.

I'd brought my two German shepherds back from Arkansas with me, also my big feather quilts. Agustin put up an old iron wood heater. But we had no damper. So of course all the heat went up the stove pipes and did not even warm the old place up. And there was no wood. Just some sotol stumps down in the canyon. They were hard to carry up. I'd put them in the stove, and the sotol burned like paper. And some long posts someone had left there. I would nigger them in two (2) so I could get them inside the stove.

When Agustin helped me fix up all he could, he left me. And I was alone, just my two dogs and me. I had a few groceries and about ten gallons of water in glass jugs, as there was no water and no car to go bring water in. There was only an earthen tank that caught water when it rained for the animals-the horses, burros, cows, coyotes, and all the others that came by to drink. Bobcats, porcupines, and skunks. They all drank from this water. A few times I drank it myself. I'd strain it, then boil it and strain it again, then put a bucket full out in the sun and air, let it cool and use it. It was really pretty good. In the heat, I would put it in a deep container and wrap it up in rags to keep it cool. I only had a kerosene lamp, and sometimes, for days, no kerosene. That didn't bother me so much, because I usually went to bed at dark anyway. There were no pens for the animals that I was to have later. But there was an old open garage-like shed. The top of it was also shot full of bullet holes.

Since this old house was built up on a high hill, it was colder. High winds and rain were harder there, it seemed. The house was about two miles from Mexico and the Rio Grande. From one side and the front, you could look over into Mexico. Then north and back of the house, you could look down and across the famous Mayfield Canyon- famous, I'm told, for the ammonite fossils that are found there. Seems to me Mayfield was a mile deep. And it wasn't very far from my back door. There was only a rough trail going from the back of the house down into this canyon. Mexicans coming out of Mexico used this trail coming by burros or afoot from the Rio Grande. The trail was rough and dangerous.

Once in a while I went to different places to help take care of some sick people. And with part of the money I made, my daughter and son-in-law and I went down to a ranch near Presidio, Texas, where I bought an old nannie and six young kids. They were milk goats. I was really proud of them, and after that, I decided I'd just stay out there and try to make my living raising goats. I never did want to be a burden for my children or live with them and cause them trouble, like some mothers-in-law I'd seen. But, no, in the eight years I was there, I never did make real good, even when I raised several hundred. Varmints would catch them if the goats slept out in the mountains. Sometimes part of them would run off. And I'd never see them again. Rattlesnakes would bite and kill them, too, or leave them crippled. They would get bitten on the udders or legs. I'd put coal oil on the place, and in a few days yellow water would come out of the wound. Then maybe in a week or so they would be over it. Rattlesnakes were everywhere, even in the house I lived in.

And worst of all in this old country was the long, hard winter and spring. It would bring starvation, death, and sorrow. Death to the animals that were not fed. And sorrow to the ranchers that had to buy this high-priced feed.

When I got the seven goats, I had no pens, so I'd tie the old momma goat close to the house, and the younger ones would stay close to her and not run off. Later on, my son bought five more. A rancher also brought a few more. Then I had seventeen. And no pens, or shelter for them. One day, my daughter came, and the two of us built a small pen. A man from Mexico came over and built a shed for shelter, since it was wintertime. My son Wayne went to Dell City and bought a load of milo maize, heads and all. So I just kept these goats in the pen and fed them all winter and spring. Carried water from the tank for them (a goat doesn't drink too much water) or I melted the snow. And they'd drink that water. During all this time, I had no car and no way of going anywhere. I just depended on three people to bring in the things I needed groceries, mail, and water. And I'll always be thankful to my son Wayne, Agustin, and a woman friend, Mrs. Susie Fields of Oklahoma City. I could never have stayed there had they not helped me. Of course, my neighbors from Mexico would come and help me now and then, too. They were good neighbors. But they lived a long ways off.

I did not have enough bedding. So my friend from Oklahoma City would come with a pick-up load of clothes that could be made into quilts, and some old dresses that could be worn around the house. And also feather beds- big ones. I would sleep on them and cover with heavy feather quilts, and I'd be warm. Even though the gallons of water would freeze and break at night at the foot of my bed. I would heat up rocks, too, and put my feet on them to keep warm. The cold of a morning was terrible. Then when summer did come, I only had an arbor frame with only a little cover left on top of it for shade. During the day it would be hot, and I was glad for a little shade. I think the weather is still pretty much the same, but over the years I have gotten used to it.

There were no locks at any time on my doors, and when summer came, I moved my bed outside and slept out of the house. Each night as I lay in bed, I could hear the coyotes calling close by. Then a fox now and then. Also the night birds singing. The old hoot owl would tune in now and then with the other birds. Then there was the tiny elf owl. I loved its song best of all, and each springtime I looked forward to their coming. By the seventeenth of each March they were there and always used the same old posts or tree trunks they'd used for years. I'd finally go to sleep hearing all these wonderful sounds.

I'd always get up early in the morning to do what I had to for the day. One morning, though, I was awakened just at daylight. I was sleeping outside, and somewhere I heard a rattlesnake buzzing. I could tell it was mad by the way it rattled. So I raised my head and looked all around. Someone had brought two hens several days before, and one of them was black. And this old black hen was jumping up and trying to get something off the old screen door. A big rattler had been asleep right inside of the door in the house. The hen had woke the snake up, and it was mad. But it couldn't get to the hen to bite her. The snake was rattling extra loud. I got up when I saw where the snake was, found a short pole, and run the old hen away. Then I stood back away from the screen door, opening it up a tiny bit at a time until I could see this big snake all coiled there waiting to bite me if I were to step inside. Then I killed it with the pole, and it was a big one. I was very thankful to that old hen for saving me.

Another time I'd gone to town for the night, and Wayne was staying at the tie camp alone. He said he'd gone to bed, and the night was very dark, when one of the shepherds began to bark. He called to her and tried to stop her from barking. But she kept on. Finally, he thought he'd better go see what she was barking at. So he got out of bed and went outside barefooted. She was still barking, and he was looking toward the mountain there close by, thinking she was barking at a coyote there. But, no. When he was nearly to the dog, he saw she was barking at something nearly at his foot. Then he looked down, too. Another step and he would have stepped on a big rattlesnake.

That same summer, I needed to drive my goats to the dirt tank a half-mile away. Since they were thirsty, I had no trouble taking them to the water. But I was close behind them when they got to the tank and was drinking. I started down the big tank dump. Close to the water I slipped and fell down. When I looked down I saw a horse had left its track there in the mud about three inches deep. And there, coiled up in the track, was a rattlesnake. He was asleep in the warm sun. It did not even raise its head up or rattle. When I could get up and away from it, I got a stick and killed it. That was the first time in my life I'd ever seen a snake act like that. But I was always on the lookout for snakes because they were everywhere. I'd get up early in the morning in the summertime and go outside. I always found one to kill.

When I was out of feed for my goats, each day I'd start out with them. I'd herd them up to eight miles from the ranch, just going here and there up on the high mountains, then down in the little valleys. Any place where the goats could find something to eat, as when we had a dry spell there was no vegetation. I always carried a little bottle of water. And sometimes the days were so hot, I put a wet towel on top of my head under my head scarf. Each summer I had to wear towels like this, even after Wayne built a porch on this old house. Setting on the porch sometimes was like setting in an oven.

Several times while herding the goats, I'd set on a high point of a mountain, and I'd see six or eight deer, young ones and their mommas, grazing along with the goats. I'd watch and see if the deer and goats fought. But, no, they were friendly. And each was busy eating. The deer would not run off until I walked down close to them. Sometimes they came right on home with the goats. Black-tailed deer. And I could raise them right with the goats. I never had any goats stolen. And I didn't brand them either. I had one of my boys come out there one time, and no brand, no gun, no rope. And he says, "My mother thinks nobody else has any goats. She doesn't have a brand on them." But I don't like branding. I don't believe in it unless you have to. I used to have to do it when I was married and living on the ranch, but I never liked to. Cut the ears off, that's awful. But that's the way the ranchers made their mark. Cut off one eat, cut a big slice out of the other. But my own goats were every color you can imagine, and they didn't have a mark on them. I never knew sometimes how many I had, but I think I got up to 350 at one time.

In those days, Indians from Mexico would come across hunting medicine plants and, above all, the cactus peyote (3). Six or seven of these men would walk up to the house wanting something to eat or water. The Indians were great beggars and always wanted you to give them anything that they could carry off. Sometimes they'd show me the different medicine plants they'd gathered and what each plant was for in curing. I learned lots from them and also from the old men and women that were my neighbors living in Mexico that came to see me at different times. One bunch of Indians came to see me from Oklahoma. They were looking for the cactus peyote. And as we talked, one said, "If you have faith, an ordinary rock could cure you."

Before I was at the tie camp, I was living at Indian Hot Springs. But I knew I was going to have to leave. And I was scared. I had learned in the eight years that I was there how to heal with the water, mosses, and mud. And in all the eight years there, I had needed no doctor or medicine. So I thought, when I leave this place, what will I do! No money for doctors nor hospitals. So one day a man came to the springs. He was helping the sick by massaging the pressure points in the feet and the points that are all over the body. He called it zone therapy. He was working with the people across in Mexico, and just anybody that would let him massage their feet. After seeing this way of healing, I knew I had to learn that way of curing the sick, my family, myself, and friends. He stayed at the springs nearly two weeks. He showed me all the points in the feet and how to massage them. I knew then that this way of massaging could be used when I could no longer use the mineral waters and the muds and mosses. He also sent me a book of instruction on zone therapy. I'd had a good start, and everything was easy for me. Also, I had experience as I went along, too. Through all these years, before and after living at the tie house, I kept studying. And then I was learning to heal with my mind. Even at a distance.

So. I would tell these Indian doctors and old men from Mexico, herbs and such is good. But you have to buy or gather them. Sometimes maybe you can't get the healing plants that you want. But the hands and mind you have right with you at all times. Of course, it's good to know about the medicine plants. There were so many good plants around the place, and I've always used them. But in these years, I've found my hands are better. These Indian men were very smart in their way of healing with plants, and they went all through the border country gathering the plants on both sides of the Rio Grande. But some of the best plants are starting to disappear.

And people would still come to the tie camp to see me. Even with everything run down and hard to get to. One man came driving up with his wife in a station wagon. He had an obstruction and had been told he should go to a surgeon. Well, his wife was snotty about this dirty house and this dirty old woman. She looked out into the sky while her husband talked to me. I looked just awful. My hem shredded up from the goats. So I told them to wait in the car until I swept the floor. Then they came on in. And the obstruction was released in just five seconds with stomach massage. After that, his wife acted like she was my best friend.