MEMORIES OF GRANDPA

CLAYTON BULLER

Grandpa was a man after God’s heart! He loved his Heavenly Father more than anything, but his family was a close second. There are many memories that we have of this amazing man! A lot of them have made all of us laugh while spending time with him. We would like to share a few of them with you. 

Denise and Saundra vividly remember all the teasing and tickling that happened regularly as they were growing up, sometimes to the point of frustration. One day in church, Denise heard the preacher quote the verse from Ephesians that says, “Fathers, do not exasperate your children.” There is more to that verse, but that was all Denise heard and remembered that day. The next time that her daddy started tickling and teasing and wouldn’t stop, Denise proudly said, “Daddy, the Bible says that you are not supposed to exasperate your children.” Her father replied, “So don’t get exasperated” and continued with the tickle torture.

Denise and Saundra were your typical little girls and would get in trouble from time to time. Dad told them that they were going to get a spanking. We chose to argue with him a little (normally a very bad idea). He informed us that we were going to get the spanking as soon as he was done in the bathroom. As he went to the bathroom, Denise and Saundra ran, grabbed the paddle, and hid it under the bed in Denise’s room. Dad went to get the paddle, but, oh my, it was gone! He came into Denise’s room and saw 2 little girls sitting so innocently on Denise’s bed. Dad is quizzing us about where the paddle is. As the girls continue to deny any knowledge of where the paddle is, the whole situation starts to strike Dad as funny and those 2 little girls get out of their spanking. (Do not try this at home!)

The grandkids that lived close remember Grandpa and Grandma being at all their school events, loudly supporting and cheering them on, sometimes even yelling at the refs.

Grandpa took all of the grandkids golfing at one time or another.

One grandson fondly remembers when Grandpa would be at their house and he would get to get up early to go to breakfast at the airport and watch the planes land and take off. 

There was a lot of laughter with the grandparents. But we all remember watching Grandpa cry at sad commercials.

When they were first married, Clayton and Lenora would spend a lot of time playing checkers. Clayton, being the competitive man that he was, never let Lenora win and would always beat her. But then it happened one evening. Lenora won that game of checkers! The next day while he was at work, she burned the checkerboard. After he got home and they had eaten dinner, he asked Lenora if she wanted to play checkers. She succinctly replied, “We can’t.” “Why,” he wondered. “I burned the checkerboard,” was her reply.

Grandpa knew Southwest Kansas roads like the back of his hand. When he would draw a map for you to go somewhere (this was before GPS), he would draw every curve, hill, and bump. It was quite amazing!

It was always very interesting to ride in a vehicle with Clayton and Lenora. For example, if they were in Wichita, and he wasn’t sure which way to go, he would ask Lenora. She would respond, “Oh, you take that one road, and turn that way and then you’ll see that store on my side of the car and then you’ll turn on that street.” These directions would make absolutely no sense to anyone else in the car, but Clayton would respond, “Oh, yeah!” And then we would get to where we were going.

Sheldon Buller and Jay Buller had a few memories of their own. Back when they were 16 or 17 years old, Sheldon had an old Chevy that the starter had gone out on, and boys being boys, they wanted to go drive around in the blizzard that was blowing outside. Of course, with the starter out, they needed someone to give the car a push. Guess who they talked into it, Clayton, of course. The car wouldn’t start until they got to about 40 mph. Clayton was in his car pushing their car and they were almost to the speed they needed when both cars all of a sudden quit moving and they were both in the middle of the ditch because of white out  conditions. When they got back to the house, Lenora was very unhappy. They still can’t figure out why she was upset.

Something that Clayton taught the boys (Sheldon, Jay, and Milton) was how to do a 180 degree turn on ice or a gravel road. He took them out in his 1957 Plymouth and put the car in reverse and backwards they would go. Then he would hit the emergency brake and turn the wheel at the same time. Around they would go going in the same direction only now going forward. It took a considerable amount of practice, but they got almost as good as he was. 

The gang (Sheldon, Jay, & Milton) would hang out at Kansas Milling and help Clayton trap large rats. It seems those rats were feeding quite well. When they had some caught, they would take them to the top of the elevator and see if they could fly. They never did find one that could. When they got tired of that, they would find a board on the floor and throw pennies at it. Whoever got their penny closest to the line got all the pennies. It doesn’t seem that any of them got rich from this little game.

While Clayton was managing Kansas Milling, they would take the go cart over there and would race in teams. They would set up a track and there were 2 to a team. The first one of the team would have to go so many laps and then they would change drivers. They would have to stand up and get off without stopping because they were being timed. Things got pretty hairy at times as you can imagine. Usually the team that won was the team that didn’t fall down while changing drivers.

There were some hotly contested basketball games at Ervin’s gas station. Ervin had a basketball goal set up and they would all play until they just couldn’t play anymore. The younger guys think the older guys took advantage of them because they always won. It just never seemed to work out in the younger ones favor. 

The boys remember Clayton deciding to earn a little extra money during pheasant season in Montezuma. He sure did some smooth talking because before they knew it, he had talked them into helping clean pheasants that the “out of towners” had shot and wanted cleaned. “How did we get talked into this,” they wondered. They did help with the processing and pheasant cleaning when they had the time. You know, those young boys had school, and work, and basketball, etc… Way too much as far as Clayton was concerned, we’re sure.

The following is written by Clayton’s youngest brother, Milton Buller.

First, I want to say, Clayton was a man of God, not perfect, but perfect in the perfection of Jesus Christ. He wasn’t religious, but he was a spiritual man. He knew where he was going and he knew how to get there…Jesus Christ the high priest.

Over the years Clayton and I worked together, hunted together, fished together, and yeah, goofed off together.

One day we were out pheasant hunting. Clayton was driving his old Plymouth (the kind with big fins for rear fenders) and we were going down a country road at a pretty good lick. All of a sudden, in the ditch we see a pheasant. Clayton slams on the brakes (you had better be holding on) and the tires on that old Plymouth slid to a halt. I threw open my door to run back to shoot at that pheasant. However, Clayton threw the gearshift into reverse and hammered the accelerator. My door is now wide open and gravel is flying everywhere. We are now going real fast backward and all I’m trying to do is hold on to the seat and my gun. The car door is out of reach and out of mind. I look over and Clayton’s in serious back up mode when all of a sudden the front tire catches that ridge of gravel that the road graders leave on the side of the road. Lo and behold, we’re heading down this steep ditch backwards at warp speed with my door wide open. Needless to say when we got to the bottom of the ditch, the corner of my door catches the other side of the ditch and bends my door wide open, clear around against the front fender. When he finally got his Plymouth stopped in that ditch, we were both shook up.  We looked at each other and all he said was, “Well, guess we’ll have to go home and bend that door back.”

One time Clayton and I were working together and we decided to go to lunch at a café just east of Greeley, Co. As we got to the café something funny was said and the spirit of laughter moved on us and we couldn’t stop laughing. We climbed out of the pickup laughing. We laughed and laughed all the way into the restaurant that was full of people. We plopped ourselves down in a booth and continued to laugh like a couple of school kids. Somehow we did get our order placed. The waitress looked at us like we were weirdos. The food finally arrived. People were looking at us seriously now. Clayton said, “People are going to think we’re drunk.” That did it. Off we went laughing again. We kept telling each other that we have to stop, only to hear one of us making snorting noises as we tried to hold back the laughter. We finally wouldn’t even look at each other so we could try to stop laughing only to happen to sneak a peek at each other and start laughing again. Finally I decided enough was enough. I got up and went to the restroom. I thought about crawling out the window, but in that old building the window was small and at the top of the wall. What made matters worse was, I knew Clayton could see the restroom door from the booth he was sitting in. I thought, I’m going to open the door real slow and just peek out and see if he is still laughing. So I started to open that old door real slow. Just as I got the door open far enough to see Clayton, we made eye contact. At that moment, those old door hinges let out the biggest squeak you’ve ever heard. (The same kind of squeak you hear in a scary movie – squeeeeek!) I closed the door real fast knowing he was cracking up laughing again. Me? I’m in the restroom laughing, laughing, and laughing. I finally thought, I know what I’m going to do. I opened the door real fast, I walked straight out of the restaurant, making sure not to look at Clayton, leaving him to pay the bill.

We had some wonderful times together!

For the last number of years when Clayton called me, he always said, “Hey, Bro, how are you doing?” or “Hey, Bro, what’s up?” Well, it’s my turn, Bro. I know you’re now enjoying worshiping the King of Kings. One of these days I’m going to worship Him with you. Love you, Bro, and thanks! Your Bro, Milton

We lived on a farm most of our lives and we always had outside cats due to the fact that mom didn’t want mice around. The cats would be fed on the sidewalk outside the back door. One night, after dark, dad happened to look outside and see a skunk eating the cat food. Dad grabbed his gun, handed mom the flashlight and told her to keep the flashlight on the skunk so he could shoot it. Dad headed out the door with his gun pointed. Mom firmly shut the door and stayed inside shining the flashlight on that skunk through the window because she did not want to get sprayed. Dad successfully shot that skunk in the dark with very little help from mom.

And for the final story, our daddy knew that his little girls loved kitties. So, one day he got home from work with a surprise for his 2 little girls – Siamese kitties, 2 of them! We loved those kitties, but Dad didn’t enjoy them near as much as we did. One morning when he was ready to leave, he went to put on his boots, but to his horror, one of the kittens had mistaken that boot for a litter box. My mom went straight to work cleaning up that stinky mess. Well, he put on the other boot, and lo and behold, that boot had been used for a litter box. Dad was very angry and as much as he loved his little girls, his anger was too great and those 2 kitties found their new home being outside.

He was a great man! He taught us lots of lessons in how to handle life and how to look at the bright side! We will miss him, but we will always carry him in our hearts and keep moving forward because that’s what he would want.