Green Eyed Woman

About the Book

This is a story that takes place shortly after the end of the Civil War. A small group if Missouri farmers give up their efforts to eke out an existence on their few acres. They form a wagon train to travel west to California. They are members of a close-knit, parochial cult. Rhoda, wife of the self-righteous leader of the group, is an outsider who has never been integrated into their clan. She copes with her situation primarily by remaining numb.

The pioneers meet and overcome many difficulties as they struggle across Missouri and into Kansas. After the death of her infant daughter, Rhoda becomes increasingly frustrated with her position. She considers abandoning her husband and leaving with a Civil War veteran whom they meet on their travels. She decides to remain with the group, in spite of her unhappiness, for the sake of her four-year-old son.

Her situation eventually becomes so intolerable that she runs away from the wagon train. She hopes to die of starvation.

He Comes in the Night, an Indian, finds her. His kindness and understanding are overwhelming, and she falls deeply in love. He takes her to his village, where she at last gains the acceptance for which she longed. She changes her name to Aura Lee. She is no longer numb. She finds herself and her worth as she participates in the life of the Indian village.

Many happy days follow, but the unrelenting wheels of the history of th. American Indian at that time grind on, and the village meets with heartache.

A surprise encounter with a reminder of her previous life ends the book.

About the Author

Sally-Alice Thompson was born in a rural area of Missouri on October 15, 1923. She was educated in public schools in farming areas of Kansas, Missouri, and Iowa during the Great Depression. On graduating from high school she taught in one room schools, then migrated to Davenport, Iowa to work in factories in the war effort.

A brief stint in the Navy WAVEs gave her the longed-for opportunity to attend college, a privilege for which she had only dreamed before the advent of the GI Bill of Rights. She obtained her bachelor's degree from the University of Iowa.

She met and married Don Thompson, also a Navy WWII veteran. They had two children, Sarita, who lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Delano, deceased. They also have "adopted" adult children and grandchildren: Tatiana Vetrinskaya, from Turkmenistan, founder of the New Mexico School of Music, and her husband Alexander Churilov; Yinke Lin, from China, and his wife, Anne and son, Thomas, living in Springfield, Massachusetts; Jeren Balaeva, from Turkmenistan, and her husband, Thurman, living in London, Ontario. Olga Home, from Turkmenistan and her husband Dirk Home, living in Albuquerque; and Selbi Akmuradova, attending college in Independence, Kansas.

She was one of the two women who were the first women members of the Albuquerque Police Department. She left the police position to return to school at the University of New Mexico to qualify for a teaching certificate. She taught in the Albuquerque Public Schools for twenty years.

She founded the Albuquerque-Ashgabat Sister Cities Committee, which she chaired for twelve years. During that time she traveled to Ashgabat, Turkmenistan over twenty times, with stopovers in Moscow or Istanbul.

She now spends much of her time caring for her husband and her dog, Puccini, doing volunteer work and writing.