My Grandfather, Claude Burnell Barber died today.  He was 84.

His birthday was in July, he was a WWII Navy Veteran, he liked to drink beer and eat chicken-fried steak; he was not, nor do I ever remember him being the picture of good health.  He grew up poor, he worked hard and died quietly.  I don’t recall him complaining about anything.

When he was a boy he and his family lived and moved around most the counties of Nebraska, Oklahoma and New Mexico.  He lived in a Gypsy Wagon once and had a pet monkey for a time.  As a fourth or fifth grader he came home from school one afternoon to find his parents had moved and didn’t think to tell him where to.  It took him all night walking around in shoes two sizes to small to find them.  His dad was a hard man.

Claude was a big man with big calloused hands and wore big brown moccasins; he took care of his wife and family, lived life on his terms and died that way too.  He did not enunciate, was not articulate or an open book.  He didn’t talk much and when he did it was rarely about his feelings.  I never heard him tell a war story.

Every one I knew liked him.  He was an honest, blue-collar man who often juggled two or three jobs and worked harder than anyone I ever saw.  He worked at hardware stores, lumber yards, gas stations and on the docks.  He taught a parakeet to talk and could tune a carburetor, shell walnuts and clean his fingernails and ears with the same pocket knife.

He had a good laugh, a sharp distinctive cough and his speech was nearly undecipherable.  It was often impossible to understand what he said through his mumbles.  Grandma did though, and she would translate.

He liked to nap listening to The Lawrence Welk Show; he loved westerns, hand-guns, a blue 1959 Chevy El Camino, Grand-ma’s baked chicken, his dogs, his three sons and above all his wife of over fifty years, Hazel Lou.  He looked like an old-school NASCAR driver and she a 60's country-western singer.

She left this earth years ago on a bright day in May and he’s been devastatingly lonely since.  I hope there’s something next and I hope they’re together now.  He lived the last years of his life in pain, blind and without the love of his life.  He was ready to go and said so this week.

Claude was a man of his word.


 

~
In Loving Memory

Claude Burnell Barber
July 20, 1925 - September 26, 2009

Hazel Lou Barber
December 8, 1925 - May 16, 2001
~

The Kentucky Derby was marred by a life ending injury by its second place finisher today.

Eight Belles crossed the wire and went down with her front two ankles broken.  An equine ambulance came around and put her down on the track.

“There was no possible way to save her,” on-call veterinarian Dr. Larry Bramlage said. “She broke both front ankles. That’s a bad injury.”

Last week in Alabama at the Talladega Super Speedway during the NASCAR Nationwide series race, Dario Franchitti broke both his ankles in a wreck, the ambulance didn’t come around and put him down on the track.

It causes me to ask, is there really no way to save a horse with a broken leg?  Is there no horse cast or hoist immobilizing system that can heal a broken leg injury?

If not, then I can do without horse racing, the dick-head owners and fan base, who as an industry and without apology on a national stage, would rather kill an animal that has given so much than to spend a few bucks on rehab.