I MOVED THE WHOLE TOWN of Paisley, Kansas, to Maureen Balderson's new subdivision in Kansas City, but to my credit, I hope you realize, I did not move the plastics factory.
Neither, for that matter, did I bother to erect a statue to the town's founder and first mayor, the vagabond bandit Colonel Daschell Potts.
Instead, I commissioned a bigger-than-life bronze reproduction of an Indian chief leaning against a tree and whittling a talisman. My only regret is that through some hugely embarrassing mix-up, it got installed on a marble pedestal in front of the cigar store.
The hardest part in all of this was saying goodbye to the subject of the statue.
Chief Leopard Frog had not stood by me through thick and thin, but he'd certainly been with me through thin, which was when I'd needed him the most.
Without his native strength, his optimism, his wisdom, his creative gifts, his presence, and his confidence in me, I surely would have withered away like the once doomed town of Paisley.
We all owe so much to the native peoples who have gone before us.
"Won't you come with me?" I asked him as we stood side by side in a blustery wind on the vacant ground of Old Paisley.
"You know I can't," he replied. "You're merely being considerate of my feelings."
"Is that bad?" I asked. "Being considerate, I mean."
But already he was gone.
My mother somehow managed to keep her job delivering mail to the residents of Paisley now reestablished in its new location.
Who can fathom the collective bureaucratic mind of the United States government? Do they even have a clue? If so, does anybody care?
Today Paisley is filled with young couples and little kids and packs of odd-size, strange-behaving pedigreed dogs, teenagers with brand-new used cars, and a few slow strolling people in their twilight years who wear big smiles and wave to everyone whether they know them or not, some using canes and aluminum walkers.
Every year when the weather turns cold, I send a special pumpkin to Milton Swartzman. The last one looked just like President Franklin D. Roosevelt, glasses and all, I swear.
Oh, and guess who, at the tender age of nineteen, wound up becoming the fourth wife of Milton's brother Howard, the rich genius Palm Beach lawyer?
If you were about to say Merilee Rowling, you'd be absolutely right. But I wouldn't worry about him. He can afford her. The question is, how long can he stand her?
To my way of thinking, what Howard should have done is gotten himself a dog, like I did: a little chestnut-colored miniature dachshund with short legs and a bobbed tail, full of frolic and kisses.
I named him Chief. We go everywhere together.