She said, "You can't make a livin' dreamin'"

 Times were hard, but the young boy couldn't help but dream his dreams. The Great Depression seemed to make everyone he knew poor and somehow mad at the world. But he wasn't thinking about money or people. He was thinking about a horse. Someday he would own a horse. He knew if he worked hard enough he would, he just knew it. His mom had gotten him and his brother each a new shirt. They were cautioned to keep them clean because the money she spent on them would be the last until she could find another job doing laundry or cleaning another house. If she was lucky enough to find another job she'd have to add it to the already long list of chores she had signed on to do for the townsfolks. She was a single mom with two boys that seemed like were always hungry. She ignored her own belly growling and set to fixing a meal of potatoes and tomatoes. That was all that was left in the cellar. When she had canned and preserved all the vegetables from her tiny garden that she could she knew that the years' long drought had left her with little to feed her boys. She looked out her kitchen window and saw them sitting on the fence. "Dreamin' their dreams again. Lands, I don't understand them. They are so much like their father was and his father. Dreamers! You can't make a livin' dreamin'. It takes work and lots of it. How can I make them boys understand. A hungry belly should do it, but I can't take away their only pleasure; food. What little I got, I'll give 'em. I do so love those boys, dreamers or not."

"What ya thinkin' about Jay? Ma said we shouldn't be dreamin' about stuff. She said no good would come of it. 'member? I know you want a horse, but you know doggone well there isn't hardly enough food for the three of us let alone a horse. You and me gonna have to help ma with the food. I'm gonna see if the neighbor will hire me on to work with his cattle. Me and cattle seem to get along good. Come on let's cut some wood for ma. Maybe we could even wash up after supper. She's lookin' kind of tired lately."

                                                                          &&&&&

After supper Marlee went to her room to look at the old book that seemed to always make her happy. She couldn't understand it, but looking at the old pictures made her smile. When she picked it up she saw some things drop onto the floor. She picked them up and saw that one was a red ribbon. "Hmm, this looks like a prize ribbon I've seen at fairs and carnivals. I wonder who got this. What is this? It looks like some kind of an old paper. I can't wait until I can read good. I'm going to have to ask mom or dad to read this to me. Wait. This is a really big acorn. Weird. Who would save an acorn? I don't think it would have been in the book. I wonder where it came from."

When Marlee picked it up she saw tiny little sprinkles of lights and could smell the smell of animals and smoke and cooking meat. She felt herself grinning and she felt so very happy. She almost felt like a queen or a princess. She laid down on her bed and looked through her precious book. Soon Marlee was dreaming that she was at some kind of  fair.  A Royal fair with horses and cattle and really good barbeque like her daddy makes. She couldn't wait to see the horses. She needed to go see the horses! She knew that there was a boy waiting for her. It's in the book. I know it's in the book," she thought as she closed her eyes and joined the crowd at the American Royal in Kansas City in 1932.