I first saw her in a pho­to­graph post­ed on a web­site about hors­es for sale in South­ern Cal­i­for­nia. I had bought a lit­tle sor­rel mare, Marge, and I was in the mar­ket for a sta­ble­mate when my train­er and good friend, Janet, saw an adver­tise­ment on the inter­net and sent me the link.

“Gray Azteca mare. 8 years old. Ranch/trail horse. Sound. Takes her leads. Good with chil­dren. Loca­tion: Lan­cast­er.” In the pho­to­graph, she stared at the cam­era with big, soul­ful eyes, her ears pricked for­ward, a dark gray fore­lock falling over her face. 

Janet arranged a meet­ing with the sell­er. Lan­cast­er, pop­u­la­tion 170,000, sits sev­en­ty miles north of Los Ange­les at the hub of the Ante­lope Val­ley in the Cal­i­for­nia High Desert. On a hot dry Sun­day after­noon, I pulled off a paved street into a res­i­den­tial neigh­bor­hood with sandy dirt roads and small Span­ish-style hous­es on wind-blown, dusty lots. 

I parked in front of a pale yel­low, tile-roofed home. A short guy in his late thir­ties wear­ing a cow­boy hat, jeans, and boots, stood on the front stoop. We talked while we wait­ed for Janet. His name was Miguel. He worked as a lead­man on an assem­bly line in one of the aero­space fac­to­ries that form the back­bone of Lancaster’s econ­o­my. He bought the horse from a friend when she was two years old. He didn’t have time to work with her any­more because he was busy coach­ing his sons’ Lit­tle League teams. He seemed like a nice guy, a good father try­ing to raise his kids right.

When Janet got there, we walked around behind the house. A sad­dled and bri­dled gray horse stood under a big shady ash tree next to a cor­ral. A chain hooked to her hal­ter and tied to a branch high above her head was pulled taut, forc­ing her to hold her head tilt­ed upward. Her big eyes watched us as we approached. The look in her eyes and the ten­sion in her stance made me uneasy. 

Miguel unhooked the chain and led the horse to the cor­ral. When he placed his foot in the stir­rup, she crow-hopped and pulled away. The nice guy I’d met on the front stoop dis­ap­peared to be replaced by a harsh tyrant, indif­fer­ent to the feel­ings of the horse. He yanked her reins bru­tal­ly and man­han­dled her to a stand­still to climb in the sad­dle. In the cor­ral, he forced her through short chop­py zig-zag pat­terns, jerk­ing her head rough­ly back and forth.

“You don’t need to do that!” Janet shout­ed. “We’re only look­ing for a trail horse.”

Pay­ing no heed to her, Miguel spurred the horse into a top-speed gal­lop to the corral’s far end, pulled back on her reins so sav­age­ly she sat down on her haunch­es and slid over the sand to come to a stop, then whipped her around, sprint­ed her back toward us, and vicious­ly mus­cled her into anoth­er sit-down stop, almost rip­ping her head off in the process.

It was hard to watch.

“You shouldn’t buy this horse,” Janet said to me while Miguel was still out of earshot. “He’s ruined her. She won’t be a safe ride.”

When Miguel dis­mount­ed and walked over to us, the nice guy returned. “So, what do you think?” he said, smil­ing amiably.

The split per­son­al­i­ty con­fused me at the time, but since then, I’ve met many horse­men like Miguel, nice peo­ple in most aspects of their lives, but with a blind spot about hors­es. They treat them like inan­i­mate tools with no thoughts, feel­ings, or emo­tions, like a trac­tor or some oth­er type of farm machin­ery. They expect hors­es to fol­low the dic­tates of their will with­out the slight­est devi­a­tion. When a horse resists, they beat her into sub­mis­sion, and when she can no longer per­form, they don’t hes­i­tate to put her down.

Miguel was such a per­son. I looked at the horse stand­ing behind him, her head down, trem­bling, blow­ing hard. I felt bad for her. “I’d like you to test ride her,” I said to Janet.

Janet gave me a dou­ble-take, but she did as I asked, and after­ward, when she inspect­ed the horse for sound­ness, she found that Miguel had bri­dled her with a spade bit. A spade bit has a wide flat plate that goes over the horse’s tongue and pro­trudes way up inside its mouth. A skilled rid­er can use it for max­i­mum con­trol with­out inflict­ing pain, but in Miguel’s hands it was an instru­ment of torture.

Janet explod­ed and bawled Miguel out. I thought he’d get mad, but his blind spot about hors­es left him puz­zled, rather than offend­ed. He shrugged off her anger and turned to me. “So how about it? Do you want to buy the horse?”

Janet took me aside. She feels even more strong­ly about hors­es than I do, but her job is to pro­tect me and my inter­ests. “He’s abused this horse,” she said. “She may have old injuries we can’t see that didn’t heal prop­er­ly, and she’s so fear­ful she won’t be a safe ride for you or your grandchildren.”

I looked over at the horse. Her soul­ful eyes stared back at me. Some­thing stirred inside my chest. I agreed with Janet’s assess­ment, but I couldn’t leave her there. “I’d pay dou­ble the ask­ing price,” I said, “just to get her away from this guy.”

I bought her. 

We named her Lily.

Janet was right about old injuries. There are deep scars on her legs. She favors her left shoul­der and walks with an incon­sis­tent gait. Janet thinks Miguel showed her in a char­rea­da, or Mex­i­can Rodeo. It’s com­prised of nine events, includ­ing the man­ganas, or horse trip­ping, where a rid­er on horse­back chas­es a horse around an are­na, las­soes her legs, and makes her trip and fall. 

Lily’s psy­cho­log­i­cal scars run deep, too. When she arrived in Hid­den Hills, she was afraid of me. She shrank from my raised hand and wouldn’t let me touch her. I kept try­ing, and after a few days, she calmed down enough to let me stroke her neck and rub her back.

On one of my vis­its with her, I found a small hard knot low on her shoul­der and anoth­er one high­er up. The vet found more of them under her tail. “She has melanoma,” he said. Melanoma tumors are com­mon among gray hors­es, he told me. Many of them live nor­mal lives with­out adverse effects, but the tumors can some­times be fatal, spread­ing to vital organs, swelling up, and burst­ing open. “There’s no cure,” he said, “but there’s a vac­cine that can slow the tumors’ growth. It’s expen­sive, and it often doesn’t work. Most peo­ple just ignore the con­di­tion and hope the horse out­lives it.”

We start­ed Lily on the vac­cine and sched­uled her for injec­tions every six months. 

Mean­while, Janet trained Lily in Hid­den Hills’ are­nas and on its trails to ease her fears and smooth out her skit­tish­ness. Six months passed before she gave me the green light to climb on Lily’s back, and even then, we had to be ponied off a calm, steady geld­ing for three more months before I could ride her independently.

After all the train­ing, she still gave me some good scares on solo rides. She calmed down over time and I feel safe now when I ride her, but I know fear was burned into her soul with a hot brand­ing iron leav­ing a scar that can’t ever heal entire­ly. So, I ride her with vig­i­lance and care, and I’ll nev­er put my grand­chil­dren on her back. 

Lily’s four­teen now. She’s been with me for six years. The vac­cine seems to have helped. Her tumors have grown, but not much, and they haven’t affect­ed her over­all health. Psy­cho­log­i­cal­ly, she’s much bet­ter. She accepts affec­tion and gives it in return. 

I love my hors­es and a lot of hors­es that aren’t mine. They all tug at my heart, but some­times Lily tugs a lit­tle hard­er. She still star­tles when I approach her too quick­ly or raise my hand too sud­den­ly. In those moments, she looks at me the way she did that first time I saw her tied to the tree in Miguel’s back­yard, and I know she still remem­bers Miguel, the char­rea­da, and the magnanas.

I wish I could purge the night­mares of Lily’s past from her mind, but I can not. All I can do is keep her safe. And when I see that fear­ful look in her eyes, I stay longer with her and touch her more gen­tly and try hard­er to make her feel what’s in my heart.

I wake up at 5 a.m. to feed the hors­es. Every day.

It start­ed dur­ing a hot spell. The mer­cury climbed into the 90’s by 10 each morn­ing, so we had to ride ear­ly to beat the heat. To give the hors­es time to eat their break­fast before we left the barn, they had to be fed by 6, but Mari­no, the man who feeds them for me, doesn’t show up until 8:30. My choic­es were to stay out of the sad­dle, force the hors­es to lug us around hun­gry and pissed off, or feed them myself.

It felt like I’d been asleep about ten min­utes when my iPhone’s night owl ring­tone woke me that first morn­ing. I crawled out of bed in the dark, dressed, and stag­gered down­stairs to the truck.

I stall five hors­es in two barns, which I named Olive and Her­bert for short­hand ref­er­ence. Olive is locat­ed across Long Val­ley Road from the Hid­den Hills Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­ter, a two-minute dri­ve from my house. Dawn broke as I parked in the lot next to the center’s swim­ming pool. A slim elder­ly woman wear­ing black gog­gles swam laps in a lane marked with a float­ing blue and red rope line. Grog­gy from the ear­ly rise, I sat comatose in the truck, watch­ing her slide through the water, slow and steady, up and back.

A shrill neigh broke the trance. Across the street, Jack­son, Lily, and Dol­ly stood in their turn-out cor­rals star­ing at my truck with their ears pricked for­ward, won­der­ing what Car­rot Man was doing there at 5:30. They watched me intent­ly as I climbed out of the truck and walked through the gate. When I head­ed to their stalls with an arm­load of hay, they began to cel­e­brate, pranc­ing and toss­ing their heads.

Jack­son is a sol­id chest­nut with a white blaze on his face and three white socks. He’s smart, well-trained, and a pro­fes­sion­al, reli­able ride. A big, beau­ti­ful paint with a white face and white splotch­es on her body, Dol­ly lives up to the name on her reg­is­tra­tion papers, ShesATotalDiva.

Drawn to Lily that morn­ing, I stood at her stall door and watched her eat. A gray flea-bit­ten (black speck­les) Azteca mare with a pret­ty mane and lush white tail, she bears deep phys­i­cal and psy­cho­log­i­cal scars from her pre­vi­ous owner’s abuse. Because of injuries that didn’t heal right, she favors her left shoul­der and strug­gles on down­hill grades.

Lily raised her head and looked at me. She was afraid of me when I bought her. Now, her soul­ful eyes look at me with hard-won trust and a touch of love. All my hors­es tug at my heart, but some­times, like that morn­ing, Lily tugs a lit­tle harder.

I pulled myself away from Lily and drove to Her­bert. It sits on a hill­top a cou­ple hun­dred yards from Olive. Marge and Wil­son stood at the fence beside the road and watched Car­rot Man’s truck climb the steep dri­ve­way to the barn. When I opened the door to the feed room, they real­ized why I was there and gal­loped up the hill to their stalls.

Wil­son is a bay thor­ough­bred in his twen­ties, a good soul who tries his best to do what­ev­er you ask of him. I retired him from rid­ing when arthri­tis attacked his spine. In Jan­u­ary prob­lems with his front hooves got so bad I thought I’d have to put him down, but he res­cued me from that heart­break­ing deci­sion, mirac­u­lous­ly fight­ing his way back to good health under the care of a smart, inno­v­a­tive vet. I’ve writ­ten often in these pages about my friend­ship with Wil­son. See Rid­ing Wil­son, Stay with Me, and For the Love of Hors­es.

Wilson’s sta­ble­mate, Marge, is a lit­tle sor­rel quar­ter horse mare, perky, mis­chie­vous, and fun­ny. Despite her size, she tries to dom­i­nate oth­er hors­es, for­ev­er lay­ing back her ears and bar­ing her teeth at them, but her aggres­sive­ness doesn’t car­ry over to peo­ple. She loves my grand­chil­dren. And Car­rot Man, when he remem­bers to bring the carrots.

In the coop behind Her­bert, the roost­er crowed a greet­ing to the sun­rise and tall pines cast long blue shad­ows across my path as I walked back to the truck to go home.

The ride went well that day, and the ear­ly rise put me to sleep at 9 that night, which made the next morning’s 5 a.m. ring­tone less jarring.

I fed the hors­es every morn­ing dur­ing the hot spell. The morn­ing after it sub­sided, I didn’t set the alarm, but my body clock woke me at 5 any­way. I lay in the dark star­ing at moon-shad­ows, think­ing about the hors­es. Their body clocks had adjust­ed to the ear­ly feed­ing, too, I thought. They’d be dis­ap­point­ed when I didn’t show up. It didn’t sit well with me. I got up and drove to the barns. The next morn­ing, I fed them again. And the next.

Weeks passed. Sep­tem­ber brought short­er days. It remained pitch dark all the way through the feed­ing. I had to car­ry a flash­light to find the hay. The morn­ings grew cold in Octo­ber. I donned a heavy coat, gloves, and a muffler.

Six months into it now, my morn­ings have tak­en on a con­sis­tent rhythm. I rise at 5 and climb in the truck. My head­lights wash over Pedro feed­ing Tom­my and Zig­gy in a cor­ral on Round Mead­ow. He grins and waves to the crazy old man who feeds his own hors­es. I wave back. Steam ris­es from the heat­ed pool at the com­mu­ni­ty cen­ter. The gray-haired swim­ming lady slides through the water, up and back. She glances at me through her gog­gles and rais­es an arm mid-stroke in greet­ing. I tip my hat. I cross the street to the haystack. Jack­son nick­ers. Lily and Dol­ly prance. Manuel walks a tall roan down Long Val­ley Road in the moon­light. “Good morn­ing!” he shouts. I shout back. Marge and Wil­son stam­pede up the hill to Her­bert, plumes of vapor jet­ting from their nos­trils. The roost­er crows. I walk through pine-shad­ows to the truck and dri­ve home.

I nev­er miss a morn­ing. Even in the bit­ter cold, rain, or high winds, and once dur­ing a rare thun­der­storm, I feed the hors­es. I don’t have to do it. I still pay Mari­no for the ear­ly feed, but I don’t let him do his job. Some­times, espe­cial­ly on those rough weath­er days or when I’m not feel­ing well, I won­der why I’m out there.

Part of the rea­son may be a throw­back to my youth. When I was a teenag­er in White Hall, I helped a friend spread hay in the field for his cat­tle before dawn on cold win­ter morn­ings. He drove a truck pulling a trail­er into the pas­ture. A hun­dred cat­tle lum­bered toward us, low­ing, a dust­ing of snow rid­ing their backs, the lead cow, Horn, in front, the oth­ers string­ing out behind her. I stood in the trail­er-bed kick­ing hay­bales off the back end. One by one the cat­tle dropped out of line to feed. Some­thing about it – the low­ing cat­tle, the dis­ci­pline of the work, the seren­i­ty of the cold snowy dawn – cen­tered me and eased my ado­les­cent inse­cu­ri­ties, at least while I was there. The ghost of that old feel­ing some­times swirls around me before dawn at Her­bert and Olive.

Anoth­er rea­son I’m there may be a need to feel use­ful. In big law and big busi­ness, I worked long hours con­fronting myr­i­ad chal­lenges. Retire­ment was like drop­ping out of exis­tence. Sud­den­ly, no one need­ed me to do any­thing. I was lost for a while. I found a pur­pose in writ­ing, but it’s a soli­tary voca­tion. You live inside your head; you work because you want to; and no one real­ly needs you to tell your sto­ries. The hors­es need me. They depend on me to show up, and they’re glad to see me when I arrive.

Susan, who boards two paints in a barn off Round Mead­ow and the only oth­er own­er I know who feeds her own hors­es before dawn in Hid­den Hills, offered anoth­er rea­son. “It’s qui­et ear­ly in the morn­ing when no one’s around. It’s the best time to bond with your horses.”

These things all play a role in my ear­ly morn­ing reg­i­men, I guess, but I tend to over­think things. Cindy usu­al­ly cuts to the chase.

“I don’t under­stand why I get up every morn­ing to feed the hors­es,” I told her. “It’s Marino’s job. It makes no sense for me to do it.”

“It makes per­fect sense,” she said. “You love the hors­es. It makes you hap­py to start your day with them. That’s why you do it.”

I would nev­er have pre­dict­ed I’d be ris­ing at dawn every day with­out fail in my 76^th year to feed hors­es, but this is where I find myself today, and my auburn-haired blind date is right about why. I’m in a good place; it’s where I want to be; and it makes me happy.

On a cold win­ter day, our Hud­son pitched and rolled over a rut­ted red-clay road and stopped in front of giant box­wood bush­es flank­ing a brick walk­way. Dad cut the engine and we sat star­ing at a big old two-sto­ry farmhouse.

“How bad off is he?” Mom said.

“They had to move his bed down to the par­lor,” Dad said. “He’s too weak to climb the stairs to the bedroom.”

“You think he’ll get well this time?”

“I don’t know.”

Sit­ting in the back seat, I hung on every word. One of my ear­li­est mem­o­ries is walk­ing with Dad and Great-grand­dad­dy through a mowed corn­field on a sun­ny fall day, dried corn husks crunch­ing under our tread. In his late twen­ties wear­ing a mus­tard-col­ored hunt­ing jack­et, Dad car­ried a shot­gun for bird hunt­ing. Great-grand­dad­dy was five-eight with a full head of snow-white hair and a han­dle­bar mous­tache, his back straight, his stom­ach flat. When we came to a three-rail fence, Dad climbed over it and reached back to lift me across. When he set me down, I looked up to see Great-grand­dad­dy jump off the top rail, land on his feet, and stride on ahead of us. Dad smiled. “Your Great-grand­dad­dy is one tough old boy,” he said to me. “Eighty-eight and strong as a horse.”

My great-grand­par­ents owned a tobac­co farm out­side Appo­mat­tox a cou­ple miles from Lee’s sur­ren­der to Grant at the home of Wilmer McLean, who had moved his fam­i­ly south to escape the Civ­il War when the Union Army shelled his farm in north­ern Vir­ginia in 1861 at the begin­ning of the con­flict, only to have the Yan­kees seize his Appo­mat­tox home for Gen­er­al Grant’s head­quar­ters in 1865 at the end of it.

Snap­shot mem­o­ries of our vis­its to my great-grand­par­ents’ farm have stayed with me through the years. Sleep­ing in a big feath­er bed, feed­ing chick­ens and gath­er­ing eggs with Great-grand­ma, a bro­ken-down Mod­el A Ford squat­ting in a spi­der-webbed cor­ner of a shed, a snake’s skin nailed to the weath­ered planks of an old barn, ele­phant-ear-sized tobac­co leaves hang­ing from its rafters, a tall coal-black horse feed­ing on hay in his stall.

In my mind’s eye, I can still see Great-grand­dad­dy dressed in a three-piece black suit sit­ting tall in the sad­dle on that big roan. I remem­ber him walk­ing me up the porch steps, his cal­loused hand grip­ping my hand so tight­ly it was all I could do not to cry out in pain. Also embla­zoned in my mem­o­ry is the time he met us at the foot of the steps when we arrived, picked me up like I weighed noth­ing, held me in his arms, and looked at me grave­ly. “Ken­neth William Oder,” he said in a grav­el­ly voice.

In a pho­to­graph Mom took in 1947 when I was four months old, Dad is seat­ed in a chair hold­ing me. Behind him stand my Grand­dad­dy and my Great-grand­dad­dy. Dad and Grand­dad­dy are smil­ing. Great-granddaddy’s expres­sion is stern, the same grave look he gave me a few years lat­er when he picked me up and said my full name. On the back of the pho­to Mom wrote, “Oder fam­i­ly, 4 gen­er­a­tions.” Look­ing back on it now with the per­spec­tive of age, I think his expres­sion con­veyed pride, pride in head­ing up the family’s four gen­er­a­tions and pride in me, not because of any­thing I’d done, but sim­ply because I exist­ed, a great-grand­son he’d lived long enough to hold in his arms.

We lived near York­town in those days. The trip from our house to Appo­mat­tox trav­eled over wind­ing coun­try back roads. The rides were long and bor­ing for me, but when Dad talked to Mom about Great-grand­dad­dy, I perked up.

He had lived on the Appo­mat­tox farm all his life, Dad said. His father was a wheel­wright in Lynch­burg when he met Ari­an­na Cheatham. They mar­ried, bought the nine­ty-acre farm, and raised six sons on it. Great-grand­dad­dy was the third son, born in 1862 dur­ing the Civ­il War. His broth­ers left the farm when they grew up, but he stayed on. After his father’s death, he bought out their inher­it­ed inter­ests, mar­ried Lizzie Cole­man, a daugh­ter of the Coun­ty Sher­iff, and they farmed the land for the next half-century.

Dad told sto­ries about Great-granddaddy’s strength and fear­less­ness. He once killed a cop­per­head by pick­ing it up by its tail and crack­ing it like a whip. He walked tire­less­ly behind a horse plow­ing fields from sunup to sun­down. He tossed around bales of hay like they were match­box­es and lift­ed stalks of tobac­co like they were lit­tle twigs. He nev­er drank a drop of liquor; he nev­er smoked a cig­a­rette; and he went to church every Sunday.

Some­where along the way, the old man became an icon­ic hero in my tod­dler mind. He was invin­ci­ble, I thought. He’d live to be 100. Maybe even older.

So, when we sat in our Hud­son star­ing at the old farm­house that cold morn­ing, I knew Great-grand­dad­dy would get well, despite what Dad said.

When we walked in the par­lor, Great-grand­dad­dy sat in a rock­er in front of a big bed, wear­ing long-john under­wear and mud­dy black work boots with a shawl draped across his shoul­ders. His face was pale; his eyes rheumy.

Dad leaned over and hugged him. “You look good, Granddaddy!”

Mom kissed him on the fore­head and laughed. “You look mighty fine. I bet you been actin’ like you’re sick just to get attention!”

He didn’t respond to Mom and Dad. He didn’t smile. He didn’t return their hugs. I touched his knee, but he didn’t look at me.

Mom and Dad sat in straight-backed cane chairs near the wood­stove. I sat in a lit­tle rock­ing chair between them. Great-grand­ma sat next to the old man. She apol­o­gized for his appear­ance. She said he’d want­ed to put on his Sun­day go-to-church suit before we came, but he wasn’t strong enough to pull on his pants and she couldn’t man­age dress­ing him by her­self. It took all her strength just to help him out of bed to the rock­ing chair.

While she talked, I stared hard at Great-grand­dad­dy. He wheezed with every labored breath, his shoul­ders slumped, his eyes downcast.

“He tries to get up on his feet,” Great-grand­ma said, “but he can’t do no good. He can’t walk. Can’t take a step.”

As she spoke, Great-grand­dad­dy raised his head and looked at me. A slight smile lift­ed the cor­ners of his snow-white moustache.

I recall only dis­joint­ed images of what hap­pened after that, but Mom remem­bered every detail and told the sto­ry every chance she got.

I walked over to the old man. “It’s not true you can’t walk. You’re my Great-grand­dad­dy. You can do any­thing.” I grabbed the fin­gers of his big rough hand with both my hands and pulled on him. “Come on, Great-grand­dad­dy! Get up! You can walk! I know you can!”

Grunt­ing and strain­ing against his weight, I pulled as hard as I could. “Stand up, Great-grand­dad­dy!” He leaned for­ward uncer­tain­ly, tried to stand, but fell back. I pulled hard­er. He rocked his chair for­ward, swung his head out over his knees, and stood up slow­ly and unsteadily.

I tugged him toward the oppo­site wall. He took a fal­ter­ing step, right­ed him­self, and took anoth­er. And anoth­er. We made it across the room. I turned and pulled him back toward Great-grand­ma. He stag­gered along behind me. When we got to her, I turned and pulled him toward the oppo­site wall again. Halfway across I broke into a run. He shuf­fled along to keep up with me, his boots clomp­ing on the plank floor. We ran back and forth three or four times before I final­ly tired out and let go of him.

He col­lapsed in the rock­er, gasp­ing for air, every breath rat­tling in his chest like mar­bles bang­ing around inside a tin can.

I jumped up and down in front of him, cheer­ing. “I knew you could do it, Great-grand­dad­dy! I knew you could do it!”

He looked at me with big tears rolling down his cheeks and that slight smile fight­ing its way through.

He got well short­ly after our visit.

It wasn’t part of Mom’s sto­ry, but I remem­ber Great-grand­ma star­ing at me wide-eyed that day. She was a woman of faith. She believed God had worked a heal­ing mir­a­cle through me. Mom thought so, too.

When I was a lit­tle boy, I didn’t think it was a mir­a­cle. I believed Great-grandad­dy could do any­thing, so I wasn’t sur­prised when he stood and walked, but as I lis­tened to Mom tell the sto­ry over the years, I came to real­ize it was, at a min­i­mum, a mir­a­cle of courage, rock-hard grit, and indomitabil­i­ty. Run­ning across that room almost killed him, but he refused to let me down no mat­ter what it cost him.

He wasn’t invin­ci­ble. He didn’t make it to 100. He died of heart fail­ure at 92. No one can beat time for­ev­er, but he sure-to-God gave old age a good long hard fight.

Thomas William Oder (1862–1954). My Great-grand­dad­dy. A strong man of good char­ac­ter and iron will. A role mod­el for a wor­ship­ful tod­dler. One tough old boy.