Larry Brody's "Live! From Paradise!"

The Old Billionaire’s been thinking about buying property near our mountain, and a few days ago I went with him while he looked the place over.

And what a place. Four hundred acres, mostly rolling pasture, with a mile of river frontage. Stock ponds, a humongous horse barn and two relatively new houses thrown in for good measure.

The Old Billionaire and I stood in a light rain near the smaller of the houses and took it all in. My thoughts were sharp and clear: What a beautiful place.

His words were just as sharp and even more clear: “It’ll do.”

“‘It’ll do?’ It’s sensational. I could be very happy here,” I said.

“You’re already happy where you are,” said the Old Billionaire. He walked over to the front porch. Pointed up the outside wall. “See where the flashing’s gone? That’s going to be a bad leak. Your house doesn’t leak, does it?”

“Not anymore,” I said. “We had some water coming in through the west wall of the cabin, but we finally got that fixed.”

He turned back to me. “When I look at you I see a man who’s got everything, Larry B. You saying I’m wrong? You saying you’re another victim of the curse of ‘I Want More?’”

I laughed. “I don’t think it’s a matter of wanting. I think it’s a matter of wishing I could afford to make a change to someplace like this if the time came when I did want to.”

“So it’s a money thing. Aha! Want to know the secret of making money? Big money? Very Big Money? I can give it to you in a word.

“Misery.”

The Old Billionaire’s face took on a haunted look.

“Or maybe it’s anger. Fury! Yep, that’s it. Misery and fury caused by living in the past instead of the present.

“Misery and fury closer to me than brothers because no matter what I do I can’t escape a time when I had nothing. When my daddy rode a neighbor’s fence line because we didn’t have any land of our own. And my momma took in mending from all the better off people in town. Which was everybody.

“The way I succeed is I find openings, and I push at ‘em and make things happen for me,” the Old Billionaire went on. “Because no matter how much money I’ve got, I’m still starving inside. Fighting with the dogs over pork rind.”

The rain stopped. We headed back to the Old Billionaire’s truck. “Now I want you to tell me your secret,” he said. “The secret of being content.”

I thought about it. “I think it’s living in the present. Not comparing what’s going on here and now to what was, or will be. It’s knowing who you really are and what you’re worth.”

The Old Billionaire didn’t say anything. We got into the truck and drove along the river, then out a back gate to the main road.

We were going at a pretty good clip until we rounded a curve and found ourselves behind a lumbering dump truck.

The truck was loaded with gravel and surrounded by a cloud of rock dust that billowed back at us and clung to the wet windshield. The Old Billionaire slowed and muttered what sounded like a curse. He saw my surprise.

“My daddy used to tell me there was no point in complaining about slow drivers,” he said. “He told me nobody could ever pass ‘em all because there’d always be somebody else in the way.

“He was 35 when he died. Couldn’t afford to go to the doctor, let alone the hospital he needed. So I keep complainin’.”

And then the Old Billionaire surprised me again. “What you said before, about knowing what you’re worth. Worth to who? To your neighbors?” He squinted at the road. “To God?”

“I don’t know what anyone else values,” I said. “And I leave it to the preachers to speak for God. I only know what I’m worth to myself.”

The Old Billionaire stayed quiet.

“You going to buy that property?” I said.

“What for?” He let out a long sigh. “I’ve already gotten everything I ever will out of being on that land. Got it from you.”

We dropped back farther behind the dump truck and drove on. The Old Billionaire looked … relaxed.

I didn’t have the courage to tell him how much I ached from wanting that farm.

Larry Brody is an author, veteran television writer and producer and creative director of Cloud Creek Institute for the Arts. He, his wife and their dogs, cats, horses and chickens live in Marion County. The other residents of the mythical town of Paradise reside in his imagination, however, and any resemblance to actual places or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Originally published March 28, 2007

When I first settled into Paradise, I thought about how good a place it would be for our horses, Huck the Spotless Appaloosa and Elaine the Not-So-Wild Mustang.

After all, they’d been living for years in Southern California, where the only way to make grass grow is to spend more money watering it each month than people in most other places spend on their mortgages.

Cloud Creek Ranch has a fair-sized pasture complete with a spring-fed pond that my neighbors swear hasn’t gone dry once in the last 50 years. I envisioned the two horses grazing contentedly with me looking on instead of schlepping hay as I’d been doing back in L.A.

That dream, however, got blown out of the water early on. Because Huck’s been my equine brother since he was a foal, and as far as he’s concerned he should be living in the house, not outside. And certainly not as far outside as the pasture.

“I can’t see you from down here,” he told me. “Can’t hear your voice or Gwen’s. No way I’m staying that far away.”

And he backed up his talk with the kind of horse screaming that made it sound like he was going through the kind of torture that would put me smack dab behind bars.

So, instead of chomping their way through the pasture, Huck and Elaine inhabit a corral about 10 feet from the main house. Sure, grass was growing quite well there when we put up the fence, but by a week later it was gone. Eaten. Crushed. Burned out by horsepucky. Anyone who knows horses knows how that goes.

And anyone who knows horses also knows what corral life means.

Schlepping lots of hay.

And, in the late winter and early spring, trying to find enough of it to schlep.

Especially if the horses are totally devoted to alfalfa.

In California, Huck and Elaine dined on alfalfa that was moist and sweet and ribboned with little purple flowers. And why not? Alfalfa thrives there. But in Paradise, the ground is too hard and rocky for long alfalfa roots.The hay’s got to be imported, and as time slips further and further behind the last summer-cut alfalfa becomes more and more scarce.

Last year’s drought conditions have added to the problem, and, to cut to the chase, last week I started feeding the horses bales of Bermuda, orchard and Timothy grass, and the result has been one mighty battle of wills.

Huck hates the stuff. And let me know it from the beginning.

“Pfaugh! Yuck! You call this food?” His voice rose shrilly. “It’s not even soft enough to be bedding for a pig!”

He shook his head. Pawed the ground. Squealed and reared. Kicked the water trough.

And when Elaine came over, he wouldn’t let her touch it, either. He pushed her away, and when she returned hungrily he nipped her.

One of those horse authority bites that takes a smaller chunk out of whoever it’s directed at than an anger bite, but it still hurts a lot more than a bite filled with horse love.

“Don’t do that,” he said. “Don’t let Larry B see you eat this junk. We’ve got to stand firm. Hold out for what we deserve.”

Huck’s been standing firm since that first day. Making a bigger show of his disdain for what every other horse accepts without a problem with every meal.

He’s even taken to running at the flakes and scattering them or pushing them outside the fence.

Except that it’s all for show. Late at night, when he thinks Gwen the Beautiful and I are asleep, when he’s sure no one is watching — yes! — that’s when Huck saunters over to the strewn Bermuda and orchard and Timothy grass, like a street dude whistling and looking at the sky, and starts scarfing it down. Lets Elaine join him in the repast.

And in the morning, when most of the hay has “magically” vanished, he swivels his big eyes at me and screeches, “Alfalfa! Alfalfa now! You @#%$!” and turns up his nose at what I give him instead.

At first Huck’s attitude angered me. Now, though, I find myself watching and laughing at what I clearly hear as his refrain:

“Fight for what’s yours! Don’t let The Man see you bend!”

I couldn’t ask for a better horse brother.

Or one more like me.

Larry Brody is an author, veteran television writer and producer and creative director of Cloud Creek Institute for the Arts. He, his wife and their dogs, cats, horses and chickens live in Marion County. The other residents of the mythical town of Paradise reside in his imagination, however, and any resemblance to actual places or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Originally published March 21, 2007

Lately, it seems like Cloud Creek’s magic has been working overtime.

In addition to my face-to-face (well, OK, more like a face-to-the-top-of-his-fuzzy-back) meeting with Draco the Ghost Dog, Gwen the Beautiful and I have been dealing with some ghostly scents and a very specific ghost sound.

The scents have been good, actually. Otherwise I would’ve called them “smells.” Or “odors.” Said the right way, the word “odor” means something most foul.

But these scents have been “aromas.” Or “fragrances,” if you will. The first one is in what we call our Great Room, the big downstairs area of our log house. The minute you walk in the door it hits you like tobacco smoke from a well-worn pipe.

And not just any pipe, either. It’s the warm, soothing scent of a medicine man’s ceremonial pipe, passed around by Indian People gathered in a sweat lodge, or at a healing. This makes our whole house smell like a kind of healing. Warm and comforting. Whenever I’m at my desk, I inhale and think of the times I spent with good friends on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, and the Santa Clara Pueblo in New Mexico.

Can a house be tender? Ours now is.

Over in the Annex, where Burl Jr. the New Groundskeeper sleeps, we’ve got another new scent as well. Not food, although the trailer was busy for about a year cycling through food faves in an attempt to find one we’d love. No, this time it’s what some snobs might call “cheap” perfume, but I’ll characterize as — oh, how about “inexpensive?”

I’ve got to keep my response positive because this scent too is familiar.

It’s my late mother-in-law’s perfume.

Entering the Annex has become just like walking into Gwen’s mother’s house when she was alive. The first time Gwen sniffed it, she couldn’t help herself. Immediately, she called out, “Mom?”

I was more formal. I said, “Laverne?”

Miraculously, both of us were answered immediately. By the sound from the wall clock that’s the only one of my mother-in-law’s belongings we brought back here after she died. It’s a QVC collectible thingie that strikes the hour with four bars of any one of several Disney songs in its repertoire. On this particular occasion it played Laverne’s favorite: “When You Wish Upon a Star.” “It’s Mom all right,” Gwen said.

“The magic of Cloud Creek strikes again,” I said. “It brought your mother here to live with Burl Jr.”

“His girlfriend’s not going to like that,” said Gwen.

“Hmm … come to think of it,” I said, “he may not like it, either.”

Regardless of how Burl Jr. feels about Laverne’s presence (and he’s too smart a kid to say), I can tell you how I feel about another magical occurrence centered in our house.

It’s a sound and, like the tobacco “smoke,” it emanates from the Great Room. But from a specific place in that room.

The northwest corner.

My desk.

And, even more than the scents, the sound is of something Gwen and I know.

Quite possibly, we know it better than any other sound in the world.

That’s right. It’s the sound of typing. Except louder than any computer keyboard should ever be.

Click. Clack. Clickity clack …

In the wee hours of the morning. Like 3 a.m.

Clickity clackity click …

While we’re sleeping, and no other human is in the house, and nothing — absolutely nothing — is anywhere near the computer, which is powered down and still.

Clackity click clack …

Has there ever been a film called “The Attack of the Ghost Writer?”

Well, someone should get on it. Maybe I’ll call one of my old Hollywood writer friends and invite him to stay here awhile.

Better yet, I’ll call and invite him to switch houses for a spell. A spell long enough for Gwen and me to sleep straight through just one night without —

Click. Clack. Click-clack!

I know I sound like I’m complaining. But regular readers here know that’s not the case. I’m bedazzled by the magic that pervades the mountaintop property we call Cloud Creek Ranch.

And I’m curious. So curious. Achingly curious, you might say.

I want to know:

What in the universe is causing all this?

What does it mean?

And, more than anything else, I want to know: Why?

As usual, if you’ve got answers I’d love to hear ‘em. Drop me an e-mail any time. Meanwhile, I’m on the case as well.

Larry Brody is an author, veteran television writer and producer and creative director of Cloud Creek Institute for the Arts. He, his wife and their dogs, cats, horses and chickens live in Marion County. The other residents of the mythical town of Paradise reside in his imagination, however, and any resemblance to actual places or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Originally published March 14, 2007

When Gwen the Beautiful and I first arrived on our mountaintop, we were the proud but clueless inheritors of a dozen chickens left behind by the original owners. The brood consisted of three roosters and nine hens.

We had a big black rooster with a Rastafarian “hairdo.” A bigger yellow rooster who ruled the roost. A tiny banty rooster who got pecked any time he so much as looked at a hen.

And the hens he barely got to see were something indeed. Three big yellow hens who looked like divas from the Metropolitan Opera. Three plump red hens like dowagers in a Victorian novel. Three striped hens who would’ve made perfect throw pillows exactly as they were.

We gave all the chickens names and took care of them as best we could. But time and attrition and our ignorance thinned out the group.

Maybe the fact that we named them all after food had something to do with it. Although we didn’t eat them, it could be that the universe developed a hungering of its own for Chicken Cacciatore, Lemon Chicken, Chicken ala King, Cajun Chicken, Chicken Teriyaki, Orange Chicken, and — alas! — the big guy known as Stir Fry.

In a few years, the banty rooster, McNugget, was the only guy left, and his harem was down to two yellow hens and two striped.

A young writer in the area came to the rescue, trading five Leghorn hens from his grandfather’s coop for some lessons in television writing. The Leghorn Girls — Lulu, Lola, Layla, Lila, and Trixie — were instant favorites with McNugget, and also with me.

Ah, what wonderful times we had together!

They clucked.

I sang back. “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik” in the most chicken-like voice I could muster.

They ran all around the chicken yard.

I cleaned up what they left behind.

They ate delicious, nutritious meals of chicken scratch and egg pellets and the cheapest white bread I could find.

I tossed out the scratch and the pellets and the pieces of bread.

It was fun, actually, even if we ended up with more eggs than any two people ever could eat. I thought it would never end.

Then came our two blazing summers. The soaring temperatures and a disease the county agent couldn’t identify took two of the remaining original hens and all but one of the Leghorn Girls, one by one.

“Bye, Lulu.”

“So long, Lola.”

“Hasta la vista, Layla, and Lila, too.”

I tried my best to keep them alive, including antibiotics and a trip to the bird vet in Springfield, Mo. But nothing worked.

I failed.

I cried.

Well, why not? They were like people to me. Friends. Every bit as individually distinguishable as our dogs and horses. More, even, than our cats.

After we said good-bye to Lila, Gwen said, “That’s it. No more chickens. We’re done.”

“Right,” I said. “We’ve still got McNugget and Chicken Vesuvius and Trixie. Let’s leave it at that.”

But that big, empty chicken yard sure looked forlorn. And feeding a measly three chickens just didn’t give me that Farmer Brody buzz.

So, when Karen the Post Lady said, “My neighbor has Silkie hens he doesn’t have room for,” I said, “Put me down for 12.”

At which point Gwen said, “Twelve hens?! What are you thinking?!”

And I said, “OK, make that six.”

So, for the last few months, we’ve had nine chickens. Eight hens and their very happy banty man. The Silkies are small and fluffy and cute. They run to greet me like toddlers when I come in to feed them and take their eggs. They stay close, and they join in the chorus when I do my “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik” concert.

How long will they live? Got me. But I’ve learned a lot over the years. I know more about chicken diets. Their need for ventilation. Meds to give. And I’ll be watching them more closely than before.

There’s one thing I won’t do, though, and that’s name them. I’ll keep my emotional distance by letting them be just “the chickens.” No personal feelings involved.

But they do make me smile. Like they’re my little girls.

And, as I think about it, the little one that makes friends so fast — she kind of looks like a Gertrude to me. No, make that Gertie. And that one there in the back — if I ever saw an Ethel, she’s the one …

Larry Brody is an author, veteran television writer and producer and creative director of Cloud Creek Institute for the Arts. He, his wife and their dogs, cats, horses and chickens live in Marion County. The other residents of the mythical town of Paradise reside in his imagination, however, and any resemblance to actual places or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Originally published March 7, 2007