text: Chuck encouraged us to walk up the trail to the Ceremonial Grounds, but time was passing, and we still planned to go to Deadwood. However, I felt the urging to walk up the trail to the upper parking lot, and we passed several trees with the colored cloth flying in the breeze, as we’d seen on the TV show. And the view of the surrounding mountains and valley were spectacular: the Black Hills with their forests in the distance, and a small lake with the State Park Campground below, and rolling green hills in between. And along the path, colorful flowers and drying yucca plants.
  By the time we reached the upper parking lot, the 90+ heat seemed too intense to hike to the top, but I still felt the need to climb further, so we wound around the path through a shaded area, passing more trees with colorful cloth prayer symbols; and below, in a clearing, we could see the tents of people who had come to participate in their Ceremonial Rituals. But we didn’t hike up to the Ceremonial Grounds. I’d offered my prayers along the way, and Van too, prayed for changing a long-standing pattern that had again surfaced.
  We passed a lady returning from her all-night ritual at the top of the mountain, and later talked with her in the shade at the upper parking lot. She told of placing 405 prayer offerings, as part of her ritual, and having a symbolic dream. And she admitted it was scary being alone up there with animals around, yet she felt safe and protected; and definitely exhilarated from her spiritual triumph of completing the hike and spending the night.
  I enjoyed her story, but felt complete and revitalized with our part in this sacred place. Now, it was time to return to Freedom, and drive on to Deadwood.
  We returned to the forest area of the Black Hills, along a four-lane highway, 7-miles south from I-90, and suddenly around a turn, there was Deadwood, in a narrow valley surrounded by trees, with a large, but inactive gold mine on one side of the hills.
  We parked Freedom in the free parking lot, and boarded a trolley that took us through town and around the loop back into town. This helped to get oriented with this gambling town, locate the casinos, and tourist attractions, and the alight by the same depot where Dad Freeland had worked and seen Calamity Jane in his youth.
  I looked at the buildings and wondered which one Dad had been sleeping in when the bullet went through the window, as he slept, and lodged above his bed. Of course, I didn’t have a clue, and many of them were built since that time. I tried to figure out what years he lived here, and felt angry with myself for not paying more attention, and not remembering what he had told me.
  However, between the depot memorabilia and pictures, and the Adams Museum, on the street behind it, I began to put together some of the pieces; assuming he lived here between the 1870’s and 1890, when the train came to town. All those years of history he lived here, and I didn’t know more than those several stories he had shared. I felt disgusted with myself, for not knowing more of his history. So I had to look at pictures, and a video, of other people’s history to get a feeling for Dad’s life in Deadwood. How I longed to talk with him again, and to ask questions, and hear his stories.
  All I know is that his dad, an Indian Agent, was bushwhacked for attempting to tell authorities about the white men who were rustling Indian cattle and horses. Was it here in Deadwood? I wanted to take time to go to the library and look up more of the family history, but I was already so overwhelmed with information and emotions, I didn’t feel I could handle more. But I definitely planned to return.
  In the meantime, we wandered along the streets, walking inside the antique display in old-time saloon, Deadwood Dick’s, and also Kevin Costner’s modern casino, Midnight Blue.
  But the highlight was Saloon #10, where Wild Bill Hickock had been shot playing poker. The chair he sat in, at the time, now hung high on the wall for display, and we came in at the end of the reenactment of the shooting, but still got to see another Wild Bill impersonator walking around the saloon, a dark, dingy, old, noisy place with sawdust on the floor, and antiques and memorabilia hanging from the ceiling and walls; a museum in its own rights.
  We wandered through the restored Bullock Hotel and Franklin Hotel, felt transported to those historical times. However, the main street was closed off for a free concert that night featuring Chubby Checkers, which definitely created a contrast of eras. And our primerib dinner at the modern Depot Mother Lode casino and restaurant, with all its conveniences, reminded me that I prefer now to then.
  Yet, as I looked beyond the defining features of buildings, sights and sounds, at the hills with patches of adobe and fascinating rock formations, and later, when driving west from Deadwood, I could sense why Dad Freeland loved Kah-nee-ta with its red adobe hillside and many rock formations; it reminded him of his boyhood home in Deadwood; and I too felt akin to his roots; and mine too.
  Yes, I could now understand why this dignified, sedate doctor loved his black cowboy attire, boots and hat, which I always referred to as his Hop-along-Cassidy image.
  As I’m writing, I recall his elderly mother, Anna, who obviously had lived here during those early days of Deadwood, and I remember him telling me the reason he went to medical school to become a doctor was to find a way to restore her hearing. “But, he said, “By the time I discovered nothing could be done, it was too late, so I became a doctor.”
  Mom Freeland used to tell a story about Anna, her mother-in-law, with whom she did not get along. Mom said that I as about four or five, at Kah-nee-ta, when I yelled to my death relative, “Where is me baving suit?” She didn’t understand, so I tried again, scratching my body to indicate the itchy wool material, shouting, “Me baving suit, me baving suit. Where the Hell is me baving suit?” Mother said she stayed out of sight so I wouldn’t see her laughing. I assumed she finally rescued me by finding my itchy “baving suit.”
  Thinking of this lady, I realize that she was probably widowed right here in Deadwood, and if I’d gone to the cemetery, I would have seen the grave of her husband, my great-grandfather. Now, I know I must return to Deadwood and complete my mission.