Slight Detour: Bye, Bootsie

I learned some sad news yesterday from my friend Trish. Our mutual friend Boots had died, after battling cancer for the past couple of years.

Boots was a famous man in Western circles---every month a full-page cartoon in the Western Horseman magazine and a regular among the Leanin' Tree greeting card gang of artists.

In the past several years, Boots decided that he could use the pen as well as the paintbrush----well, maybe not quite as well. With a paintbrush, you don't really need to know how to spell.

With a pen, you do. So, like any gifted writer with great ideas but a few rough edges, Boots relied on a few good friends to "clean up his work."

That didn't always mean that they cleaned up his mind.

He wrote columns for The River Journal, authored a few pieces for the Chicken Soup books and even published his own beautifully illustrated hardback cookbook, featuring bean recipes from a few more of his friends.

Bill and I knew Boots and his wonderful wife Becky on a personal level. Through that friendship I saw many dimensions to this talented goof-off.

He loved animals and took good care of any that wandered his way. He loved fishing. He loved being out in the woods---we laughed through an afternoon of huckleberry picking one day up above Trestle Creek.

He really loved his friends and stuck with them. He also loved a good meal, and I recall sharing several with him out at Hope and, of course, at the Hoot Owl. I know the checkers at Yoke's loved Boots as much as he loved them---he brought them all flowers on one special day.

I don't know how many women squealed with delight when Boots would lightheartedly dub them as "his other wife." My mother was one of them. Oh, how she loved Bootsie!

In my case, he called me "Kid," and whenever he'd call, it was "Uncle Bootsie" at the other end.

My memories of Boots Reynolds will always elicit a smile and a good feeling about the raucous, slap-my-thigh laughter that dominated every single visit.

Right now, I can't help but shed a tear or two cuz, to me, Boots was like an obnoxious but lovable brother who left a special place in my heart.