January 2004 Issue - Essay # 3
Where Were You, Roy Rogers?
By Cassandra Hussey
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All
heroes, whether they are on TV or not, eventually let you down. Roy let me
down in November 1963. It
was sometime after lunch time and I was back in my third grade classroom.
I can almost see me at my desk, head bent and scribbling furiously.
I was always writing some story.
The
principal broke in with an announcement that shocked us.
President Kennedy had been ambushed and shot in Dallas, Texas.
Almost
immediately, though, I began to play a movie in my mind to help me
understand what had happened. Dallas
was an old cowboy-and-horse town way out in the middle of the desert.
Some tumbleweeds rolled by. The
stagecoach driver flicked the reins rapidly, trying to get the horses to
gallop harder. The President
stuck his head out so he could see to aim his six-shooter.
The
bad guys, wearing black hats of course, drew closer.
Their thin cruel mouths shouted threats at the President.
One of them began to fire a rifle--one that looked just like the
Rifleman’s. Suddenly, the
President gave a cry and fell back. “Whoa,
whoa!” the driver shouted, pulling back on the reins now. “Heh
heh!” One of the bad guys
chuckled evilly. “Now we get
the gold!” Just
then, Roy's dog Bullet came streaking over the hill.
Right on his heels came Trigger, carrying Roy Rogers whooping and
hollering. “Let’s
get out of here!” Suddenly,
the rough tough bad guys had become sniveling crybabies.
They beat their horses’ flanks with their hats and galloped away
as fast as they could. Meanwhile,
the driver jumped down and yanked open the door.
Roy Rogers pulled up and jumped down from Trigger.
“Mr. President? Are
you all right?” he asked
worriedly. The
driver had given the President a kerchief to hold against the little
crease on his forehead. No one
shot in the head ever had anything worse than those little creases.
“I’m fine,” the President said valiantly.
“Go get them, Roy!” My
hero leaped agilely back onto Trigger’s back and off they went.
He would chase the bad guys, catch them, rope and hog-tie them and
drag them back for justice. And
at that moment, I heard my principal clear his throat to speak over the
P.A. again. He announced very
solemnly that the President was dead.
My teacher gasped, jumped up and ran from the room.
The rest of us looked at each other, scared. Not
only was I scared, I was also very confused.
This was not supposed to happen!
Roy Rogers was supposed to save the day.
What happened? Had he
gotten lost? Not ridden
Trigger hard enough? How could
the President die of a crease wound to the head? The
TV was not on at our house when I got home, shock and betrayal churning in
my tummy. My mother was deaf
and we only watched TV at night. I
told her that the President was dead.
She took one look at me and realized I wasn’t kidding.
I told her to turn on the TV. I
got my first look at what Dallas, Texas, looked like on November 22, 1963. Shoot.
This wasn’t some dusty cow town.
It was a city, with paved roads and grass and big buildings.
There wasn’t a stagecoach either, just a big long limo with its
top down. And watching the
clips from TV, it was pretty obvious that it was no crease that killed the
President. Still,
I felt like Roy Rogers had let us all down.
I didn’t watch his TV show ever again. |
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Author's Biography I was born December 1954 in Bay Shore, New York. I have always enjoyed writing. I am a remarried widow, now coping with a new marriage, new house, and new blended family.
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Essay
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