Rob and his brother John worked hard to help the family. All told there were four children, though their mother was forced to give up her youngest child on the day he was born — it was the same day her husband died. She eventually married Loren, a stern but fair man who provided for the family.

But stern? That’s not Robin, is it? Sure, he could bluff like he was a serious guy, but he was aching to tell a joke. He was aching to make things up to see if you’d believe them. Once, he told me the bobcat in there on the wall inside the cabin was his doing, that he turned it inside out with his bare hands, then put it on the wall. Who’d believe such a thing?!

As kids, Rob and his brother played as much golf as he could with sawed-off wooden-shafted clubs (he was too short). What he said we don’t know. When he couldn’t speak, those long afternoons and long and bony shadows of the trees spoke for him. It’s a game that’s saved him twice in his life, both as a child looking for a dad and then as an old man, wading through the fog of a stroke. It’s a game he and his son Jim played a thousand times, taking home filet-mignons from the Maryville Tournament. He witnessed my own dad’s first hole-in-one, and interviewed him afterward, swearing the ball never rose more than three feet off the ground.

His game changed after the stroke, but genius doesn’t leave us when we need it. Robin remained a steady golfer and a steady man. What did he think when he swung through a ball? What do any of us think when we disappear into ourselves? His last season of golf came last fall, with my other father, Von, alongside him. There wasn’t much left to say by then, but he still loved the walks. The day after he graduated from high school, Rob left home for this place, Estes Park. He landed a job as a dude-ranch cowboy. He spent days on horses and called out square dances, which he later referred to with an actual square and the word dance, when writing to Barb. He spent his free time with the Childers Family, who owns this piece of ground we all stand upon today, and grew even closer with them after his friend and their son, Jim Childers, was killed in a car accident. In Estes, he met Stan, a lifelong friend. Together they raced horses and told stories that probably weren’t true.

Grandpa enrolled in college after his years here as a cowboy, but was called to the Korean War, and off he went. He put in two tours of duty on the deck of an aircraft carrier. He wrote to barb often, and ultimately he proposed to her in a letter written while he was in the Navy. He was a beautiful writer. His penmanship is, was, too beautiful, too tight and too looping, to read easily well with a modern eye.

In his last moments on the deck of the aircraft carrier, on his trip home, dated Monday, April 26, 1954, he wrote: “The boys had eyes for only what was ahead, not overhead, or off the fantail. The morning we docked, we stood “High Deck Parade,” the tops of the towers of the Golden Gate were in fog. But it cleared before we docked at Carrier Pier. Many happy thoughts. The crowd was tremendous and joyous. Their men were home, and that’s where they belonged. This ends my personal log.

I have at times regretted my frequent slang, but at those times it was me talking, and I refused to change my mind for my pen’s sake. As I reflect, I am thankful for my and my shipmate’s many blessings.” Those blessings soon included Grandma Barb. In a mutual journal they shared, they watered the sapling that became this family tree.

In August of 1955, Grandma complained of heat, and a rugged summer in Oklahoma. She wrote of coming to Estes Park for a week and staying right here, at this cabin. “I wish rob would write in this thing once in a while. I find myself calling him Rob more and more often, as everyone here does…This may never get written in again. I’m going to be stubborn, and not write in it again until Robin does!”

Two weeks later, Rob took notice. “This is the Old Man at the quill. I just read my wife’s lengthy document, dated Aug. 11. I had no idea she was indignant about my not writing in this log. I shall henceforth attempt to do better… I, we, are looking forward to life, children. When you arrive, I hope we will continue to enjoy each other’s thoughts, and dreams. What we want of life changes with each hour of the sun. We will someday fasten ourselves to some spot, and there flame not smolder. We have dreams but don’t believe in fantasies. As usual, I’m looking for a phrase, or word, to mark our attitude this moment. And also, as usual, it won’t come. Let me say we are living, and progressing. Loving more, living more, each day.”

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