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This is a collection of events, words, picture places, ideas and what all else that led to and fell out of the the stories I used to tell to my children
when they were small and more gullible than they are now. Now is Nov. 7, 1992.
THIS IS A STORY ABOUT THREE FRIENDS AND THINGS ABOUT THEM
BUCKY, a beaver, who eats willow, almost exclusively.
DRAGGY. a dragon, mostly friendly, who eats minerals, almost exclusively.
ALLY, an alligator, who eats fish, almost exclusively.
These are the three friends; most of the time they just play together and hardly ever get into trouble. They each have their own mannerisms but once you
get used to them they are pretty cool.
They live in the country of FARWAY, between Mineral Mountain and the sea.
Almost to the top of Mineral Mountain is a litte opening, like a cave entrance, that leads to and opens out into a broad flat area which is the bottom of
the crater inside the mountain. All around the inside wall of the crater are openings that disappear into the side of the mountain. This flat area is where
the old dragons gather to visit, and rest, and meet, and do all the things old dragons do when they are out in the sunlight. One of the openings that
disappears into the side of the mountain leads into the area where Draggy lives, with his Mom and Dad. There is a whole bunch of openings for quite a few
dragons, including some relatives.
These dragons are quite normal for the most part, as dragons go, but they do have one peculiarity, and that is, when they get wet, they shrink and it
takes quite a while to unshrink.
That is not quite as bad as it may sound because as you may know, in FARWAY, the dragons are in charge of the weather. It's up to them to decide
when it will rain, and where and how much, and stuff like that. Every once in awhile they have a rain meeting and the Old Ones decide about the rain
business. Sometimes some of the younger ones start toying around with the weather when no one is looking and they generally mess it up. That's when
floods happen and trees fall and mud slides.
When Marybell the Ancient One in charge of the Old Ones who are in charge of the weather, catches anybody tinkering around with Rain or Snow or Fog or
Wind or Dry or Cold or Threatening or Barometer or whatever, she sits them down in her pincer chair for a little sprinkle; if they are into big stuff like
Heavy Storm, Typhoon, Hurricane, overmoderate Lightning and Thunder and Torrentials then it is another matter, quite serious, this gets into splashing and
quick soaking and the like. It all depends.
Early in their friendship they formed a new society, which was The Perpetual Recreation Society. But it was quite a awhile before this society was
really formed; because at first they did not know there was anyone else around to play with at all. Draggy was the only one who had any relatives and he had
a bunch of them; both Bucky and Ally were orphans and none of them knew that it was alright for them to play with other animals or beings and if it
wasn't for an accident or two none of them would have even known about the other two.
Bucky lived on the West-South side of Mineral Mountain, on Willows creek which ran down Flatts plain to the foot of the mountain where it turned south
and in a little while ran into a river just below a mudflat that had a pile of old logs and trees that had accumulated there from a number of bygone floods.
His house was a scrambled looking beaver dam on the creek that took him one whole season to build. And as it turned out, Ally's home was under the brush
pile at the edge of the mudflat that was just above the mouth of Willows creek.
Most of the time Bucky roamed around in the woods upstream from the dam because that's where the tastiest willows were, but he spent a lot of time
being lonesome, just like Ally did, and like Draggy did, so it was a good thing for each of them that they became friends.
One day Ally was swimming around under the log jam scouting for a meal when he spied a fish tail wagging back and forth under a small log end. He eased
himself over to it then and quickly grabbed it in his mouth; the fish tried to shake itself loose but the only thing that happened was the small log got
shook loose from its jammed end which in turn caused the bigger logs over it to settle down pinning the alligator between another log and a small pile of
brush sticking out of an underwater sand bank. He was stuck but he was too stubborn to let go of the fish, so he just thrashed around making the water all
muddy, getting madder and madder not yet realizing how badly he was stuck.
Bucky rescued him without even knowing who it was. Bucky had been cruising down his creek where it dumped into the big river when he noticed the roiling
water over by the brush pile.
Some of the brush had gotten loose from the sand bank and it looked like some delicious willow branches. He was a strong swimmer so he dove down to the sand
bank and with his sharp teeh cut the brush pile loose from the sand. He floated back up to the surface pulling the brush with him and was surprised to find
the brush pile was thrashing around. Well, it turned out to be Ally who was still stuck in it; the two of them got over to the shore and Ally got loose from
the brush at the same time Bucky
noticed who and what it was who was doing all that thrashing.
He was kind of scared as he had never seen any beaver like this one before, He took a bite of the willow brush and said:
"You sure are a funny looking beaver, and why are you holding that big salmon in your mouth?"
"I am not a beaver," said Ally, "I am an alligator and I eat fish all the time , like this one, and thank you for saving me from being
stuck under that brush pile, and why are you eating that brush?"
"This is a delicious snack," Bucky replied, "It is willow bush which all beavers like and what is your name?"
. Between mouthfuls of fish Ally told Bucky his name was Ally and then he asked
"Would you like to play, or do you have to go home and where do you live?"
Well, that is how Bucky and Ally met, quite by accident, and the two of them one day met Draggy, also quite by accident, only this time it was a loud
accident!
Ally and Bucky were playing chasies around the foot of Mineral Mountain when all of a sudden some rocks started falling down the mountain and some little
ones bounced over and hit both Bucky and Ally. They ran out onto the plain, farther away, and looked back to watch the rocks falling. This made a lot of
noise and clouds of dust, but quit pretty soon, and a light wind blew the dust away. They went over to look at the rock pile and when they got to the edge
of the pile they heard some funny sounding groanings come out of it.
They climbed up a little way onto the pile right over where the noise was coming from. They picked away at the rocks and uncovered what looked like an
alligator tail which they pulled on but it started to wriggle and more grunts and groans came out from below. They moved more rocks away and all of a sudden
a young dragon jumped up and out of the pile and he growled at them:
"Quit pulling my tail, will you? And thank you for saving me from that lunch pile, and who are you?"
Ally laughed. "That is a rock pile and my name is Ally and his name is Bucky, and we were playing and we saw this bunch of rocks sliding down the
mountain, and you must have been mixed up in those rocks somewhere, and are you hurt and what is your name?
"No I'm not hurt, my name is Draggy and I live toward the top of this mountain with my family and I was up on the side of the mountain looking
for some tasty minerals when the rock I was on got loose so I scrambled away but it was too late the rocks started falling and so did the place I was
standing on and all of a sudden I was rolling down the side of the mountain with piles and piles of dirt and rocks and some mineral rocks and I got rolled
under a little pile and the next thing I knew someone was pulling on my tail and I thought it was my cousin, but it was you two, so thanks again."
Ally told him he looked a little bit like an alligator so he was probably OK, and did he know how to play chasies?
Draggy told them he did not know what chasies was but he did do a lot of chasing
??
I think this story might be a little cut off but I am not sure.