sad story with this tourist gunfight on main street! conconully washington

in life •  7 years ago 

so i am from this little small town Washington state, in gold country, its called conconully, when i grew up there in the 1970's the main attraction was fishing, hunting, cattle drives, and it being both a summer and winter getaway for people from the coast (seattle area), one of my best friends who lived there was dan berney, his family were farmers and cattle ranchers and had several cattle drives through town when the time was appropriate for them to move the cattle to either the mountains or through town back to the ranch.
dan was usually one of the ranchhands that was on horseback, well when i was in high school (I think I was in tenth grade or so) dan was driving to school (he had a farmer flatbed truck, ford I think) he was going around the last turn at what we call the 7 devils, right at the top of the hill, I can still remember his overturned truck as we drove by it in the school bus, it sat in the field for a couple days until it could be retrieved.
my uncle was the paramedic during that time, dan was a big advocate against drunk driving, but when the tests came back he had alcohol in his system, now this happened the night before driving to town because it was at the top of the hill, his death left a lasting mark on all of us, now the reason I am saying this is because his father, buzz berney is one of the main characters in these shootouts that happen every 4th of july on the main street of conconully,... every year it is different, they go through a lot of work to make these plays out every year, they reload their blanks after every shootout, because they do it in more than just one place, every time I go to my hometown I stop by and see buzz, just to let him know that someone still remembers his son
drunk driving kills,.. and leaves a lasting impact on more than just the family, dan was a smart kid, had a lot of drive and was a great influence on a lot of people, but that all ended on that one day,.. the one day that he made a bad choice

each day we make lots of choices in our lives, any one of those choices can be our last choice, be careful out there,.. think,.. remember

this is a compilation of 2 separate shows 2010 and 2011

how much different this play would have been with my friend dan playing a part in the act?
how much more of an impact could he have had on someones life?
how much more does it have to happen? what can you do to be an active player in the game of life?

we all make rational and irrational decisions in life,.. please dont let the irrational ones be your last decision,.. be safe my friends,.. be loving,.. tell those you know that they are an important piece of your life before you cant tell them anymore, each day could be our last day here, only God knows when our name will be called to the kingdom of Heaven

please check out my youtube channel like and subscribe,.. be a part of my life,.. together we can gain knowledge and make this world a better place

https://www.youtube.com/user/thedesertartist/videos

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oh! so sad

thank you david! I still have faint memories of him, and I can only imagine what he could have become