The End of My Book Reviews

 Here's how I ended my time as a book reviewer.

RANDOM THOUGHTS - Friday, April 17, 2026

Mn Twins off to a good start … A few more days of wintry weather ahead … It’s hard to make a friend if you blow up his house … On this day in 1964 the Ford Mustang appeared … Robert Frost says "In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on” … Personally, I would never argue matters of religion with the Pope … Enjoying the streaming of “The West Wing” … The Artemis II crew make great role models for youth … 75 years ago inhabitants of Elbowoods community had to vacate because Lake Sacajawea started trising behind Garrison Dam … Mary busies herself researching and writing another phase of family history … Scenic landscape pictured, Cannonball River flows below …

One of My Favorite Stories

This is one of my favorite stories. Published nine years ago already.

 

The Road Patrol

 Yesterday I saw a picture on facebook that Tom Isern posted here of a road patrol grader displayed near Forman, I think. It brought memories, and one time I wrote a poem with seven syllable lines about my days working with one. It might not be very good, but here it is along with his picture plus one I took at a museum in Georgia.

The Road Patrol

The Greene Township road patrol,

scaled small enough for horses

to pull, sat rusting in trees

until someone searched it out

and hooked a tractor to it.

Here’s where I enter the scene:

driver, pulling straight away

while Dad stood on rear platform

working blade angle and depth

to smooth the washboard bumps

that banged and chattered a car’s

chassis so hard your teeth shook

and made you wish for a rain

to fall and soften the road bed

so that the little grader

blade could grab some bite and cut

the rough grade to a smooth shave.

The times cried, “Do-it-yourself

if you want to change your world,

no one will do it for you!”

The Promise of the Future

 I picked up a book from my shelf and a notice fell from it, one forgotten about. It told me that my poem “The Promise of the Future” received an Editor’s Choice Award. The date isn’t on it, but it must have been forty years ago. The poem’s lines are each seven syllables in length. I used that style in several poems, others use five syllable lines, and still others use eight syllable lines. Syllable-count is just another way of doing it, and it is fun making it work. Here it is.

The Promise of the Future

By Lynn Bueling

Dates carved on his monument

indicate a shorter life

span than my own. Fortunate,

my birthdays accumulate,

but my granite inscription

will be read sometime by one

who has lived longer than I.

He will laugh until the day

his tombstone scribes his demise.

Together, then, we three can

watch deep roots search for water

and think of the prevailing

common denominator.

RANDOM THOUGHTS - Saturday, April 4, 2026

History told me that going into Iran would be a ‘tough slog’ … Hoping for the moon shot to be very successful … I hope to post a poem video in a few days … In 1960 the movie Ben Hur won 11 Academy Awards … The 57 on Heinz ketchup bottles represents the number of pickles the company once had … Hoping to find an Easter egg or two tomorrow … Happy Easter everyone … The picture was taken at 7:30 a.m. today … 

A. H. Laughlin

A. H. Laughlin, pictured here, wrote a good deal of the early history of the county. The picture appeared in the January 11, 1895 edition of the BISMARCK WEEKLY TRIBUNE. An article found in THE SHELDON PROGRESS dated April 23, 1909 interested me a good deal, and I quote it here: “A. H. Laughlin and son Leigh, of Lisbon autoed up from the county capital on Tuesday, but before reaching town the machine began to buck and they had quite a time reaching their destination. After their arrival the machine was put under the care of auto doctor Geo. Severson, who finally got it in shape to resume its travels but not till the shades of night had fallen, so the return trip was postponed till the following day. Mr. Laughlin is accumulating material for a history of the early days of this portion of the state and is full of reminiscent stories of that period. THE PROGRESS man acknowledges a pleasant call and an addition to his stock of historical knowledge.”

Much more to come re Laughlin, but a question arises: what make of car was he driving? If memory serves, a brand of car make, Queen, was sold in Lisbon about 1907-08. The Queen was an American automobile manufactured between 1904 and 1907 in Detroit, Michigan. Built by the C.H. Blomstrom Motor Company, Queens were chain-driven, and were one-, two-, or four-cylinder cars. The 1906 Queen was available as a 14 hp and 18 hp twin or as a 26/28 hp four. Was it one of these?