" 'Who owns this horse?'.......
His nose was blue-veined and bigger than I'd remembered, and his eyes were even smaller and more piggish. He was a wide an, the sleeve of his dirty
white shirt rolled halfway to his elbows, his big boots scuffed and worn. His hat was too small for his big head and he was unshaved and dirty.

'It's me,' I said, and suddenly I knew I hated this man.
I was wondering, too, if he realized Mary Tatum was in town. Or that she was married to Logan Pollard.

'It was you made all that trouble ,' he said. 'I ain't had no luck since. You an' that
skirt your pap played with.'

Right then I hit him. I hit him on the mouth and he staggered back two steps and almost fell. Blood started to come and he grabbed for his gun. Then something bucked in my hand and he stepped back and sat down as my gun bucked again, and he was settin' there dead almost half a minute before he rolled over on his face and stretched out, but in that last split second of life I saw shocked surprise on his face. And there I stood with that old Shawk & McLanahan in my hand and Big Jack McGarry dead at my feet."

I love a good book.

I love a really good western.

I love that as I sat there on that new shiny red bench with the slight breeze blowing my hair, listening to the birds chirp as cars drove behind me that I felt like I was there on that western street with them. That L'Amour can make almost smell the dirty horse and choke on the dust from the street as I watch the scene unfold. That I am nearly as surprised as Rye about the murder he just committed.

It makes me feel as if I am almost there. The Bible says that heaven is unimaginable and sometimes I would like to think that just for a moment I could be a part of the west when I got there. That I could put myself into all the hard work women had to do and have a sweaty Jeff come home to me at dark. To watch my children grow up learning new things about the land everyday. But, I know that wasn't all the west was about and since the west wouldn't have really been the west without a man having to make his own justice I guess, of course, that I will never get to experience it in heaven either. Maybe ol' Louis will be there and make up new stories for me to listen to.

**excerpt from To Tame A Land by Louis L'Amour