Category Archives: Musings

my philosophy I suppose

And then we sang “Home on the Range”

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Good Monday to you! It looks like the weekend brought with it some real summer weather that is likely to stick around for a while. Like 80+ weather and a few more pasty North Dakotans sporting a pink hue. The season’s in full force and I feel like soaking in the sun off of Lake Sakakawea and climbing the buttes in the evening and sitting on the deck with a burger and beans.

I do not feel like mowing the lawn again, which seems to have grown seven more feet toward that hot sun while I was away in Medora for the weekend.

But it was a great weekend of music and strolling through the streets of this historic tourist destination in the heart of the Magnificent Badlands. (I capitalize because it deserves capitalization, that’s how Magnificent it is). Singing in Medora has been one of my best gigs, and each visit I thank them over and over again for allowing me to put on my fancy boots and sing for my supper and for people from all over the country who pass through on their way to finish their life-long dream of visiting all 50 states, to spend a wholesome family weekend with their children, to bike the trails of this rugged country, or, you know, to sip wine and make requests of their local musicians…

And then take a walk around the the restaurant in an attempt to peddle my CDs as the other innocent patrons are trying to enjoy a quiet meal.

Oh, you’ve gotta have fans…super, small town, best friends, former english teacher, former agriculture teacher, mother and mother-in-law fans. They bring the party.

And I can’t over-emphasize that statement enough.

Thanks Roughriders for not kicking us out. I hope you’ll have us again.

But that’s the thing about places like Medora. It is truly an escape. A town on the edge of the South Unit of the Theodore Roosevelt National Park, home to the North Dakota Cowboy Hall of Fame and one of Theodore Roosevelt’s favorite places, it is town founded on preserving the adventure and spirit of the old west.

So on a stroll along the boardwalks and through the gift shops, you will see cowboy hats, you will see boots, you may see a horse and rider and you might happen upon a jewelry store on your way to a reenactment of an old shootout (complete with historic guns, a piano, some saloon girls and volunteers from the audience who are related to you) and promptly spend all of your singing money on turquoise and silver…and then on some coffee mugs, a blanket, a scarf and a witty plaque that says something about how the woman of the house is in charge…

Yes, I bought that.

And then promptly took husband’s advice that perhaps our rapidly draining bank account is a cue to step as far away from the temptations of retail as possible and out into the wild place on the edge of town that has been preserved with the wildflowers, grasses, rivers and wildlife that were here long before the train, barbed wire fences and, you know, jewelry stores.

So we hopped into in-law’s mini-van and drove the loop through the South Unit of the park. And we were not alone as cars with license plates from California, Washington, South Dakota, Texas and Wyoming drove slowly down the pavement, pulling over to catch a prairie dog squeaking at his neighbor with passion,

a lone antelope meandering through the sage brush,

a group of wild horses grazing on the flat

and of course, a herd of mighty bison rolling and panting and sunning themselves on the baked clay. 

I have lived on the north edge of these badlands nearly my entire life and am making plans to plant myself here for good, but each time I roll through what we call “the brakes” on my way home from a town somewhere or a vacation to the lakes or the mountains I always slow down.

I always hold my breath.

I always experience an overwhelming feeling of  awe and wonder, because there’s no place like this here on earth. And even though it’s right here in my backyard, I think I will always feel like a tourist.

I think I will always stop to take a photo of a bison kicking up dust, a reminder of a wilder time in our world.


I think I will always slow for that antelope and wonder if he might be headed for the river.

I think I will admire the wild horses and squint for the new colors blooming despite the rocky and hard clay of the landscape.

So as we rolled back into Medora and prepared for another evening of music, I took notice of how many songs I sing about the buttes and the wind out here. I recognized all of the cowboys that make their way through the lyrics, all of the old boots and saddles and guitars they carry with them.

I realized that the music, my music, paints for me a picture of this world I have sprouted from, this landscape that people have on their bucket lists of places to exist in and stop to photograph or hike to the top of.

So I sang with my eyes closed and then opened them to see the guests flushed from their hikes, re-hashing the day, cutting into their steaks or walleye and talking about that bison that crossed their trail, that trail ride on the back of a horse, the cliffs that have sluffed off of the buttes due to the wet seasons, the family photos they took and the muscles they got re-aquainted with out here…

And I sang more songs about cowboys and horses and standing in the prairie wind and falling in love out here and being pushed to leave but pulled to stay. Songs about eagles and dancing in the meadow and the cold North Dakota winters and at least one song about my dogs and mail order brides and a woman who took a moment to step off the road in an attempt to find herself.

And then we sang Home on the Range.

I picked myself some flowers and I’m ok.

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I’ve been away for a few days visiting with people about what makes their communities unique, the challenges they face, the best restaurants, who its people are and what the future might look like.

I have connected with some great ideas, some pertinent issues and some major rain storms. And the miles in between have helped me reflect on what it means to be out here on the ranch, the responsibility of it all and the importance of telling our story, each one of us, in our own way.

My head is full, my timeline crunched, my chest tight with deadlines and pressure to do the right thing, to say the right thing…

to be the best possible version of myself, knowing it is simply impossible to be her at all times.

The miles do that to me. The being away gets me all riled up and flustered and hopped up on margaritas and fast food …excited and stressed about possibilities and getting my butt back home to get things done.

I wind up…and up…and up in the spaces and pavement between here and there, the small towns and gas stations and hotels and little sister’s apartment, anxious about timing and getting to where I’m going and making the best use of my precious time away…making good time on the way back.

But I have a ritual when I hit the pink road in the spring and summer months that involves rolling down the windows and sucking in the air, taking notice of how things have changed, even in a mere five days.

Then I pick myself a wildflower bouquet…

recognize and accept my age inappropriate obsession with blue nailpolish…

and remind myself that no matter the expectations and the questions I simply cannot answer right now, the grass keeps growing, the sky keeps pouring, the horses keep grazing and the bluebells keep blooming.

Whether I’m here or not.

No matter what.

And damn, I’m glad I’m here.

Growing up North Dakotan

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This Sunday I will be in Fargo participating in a panel discussion for the Why Radio Show.

The subject?

Growing up North Dakotan.

I will take a seat next to individuals who have a handle on their identities, who may have wandered, explored their world and asked the questions that need to be asked. And one of those questions is “What does it really mean to be North Dakotan?”

As a woman whose heart has been planted solid here, but whose feet and mind have wandered with music and education and the winding road, I have been asked this question in many forms. It’s like asking what it means to you to hold your last name, or wear your grandmother’s ring, or to lay down next to the man you love every night.

How do you answer it?

Not everyone can speak about it. Not everyone can explain.

Not everyone needs to.

I was talking to my good friend  on the phone yesterday afternoon. As I stood right in the middle of our home state she was in Oregon, a place on the map she picked with her husband. She had been there for nearly three months after years of college and graduate school they were looking for adventure, new opportunities, valuable experience before they settled into their lives. She is loving the ocean and the coffee shops and the eclectic culture. She loves the rain and the flowers and the new scenery and the people.

But you know what she said to me between breaths about her plans and her new apartment and the photography show she is putting together?

She is missing something.

“I miss that prairie. I want to lay in my grass and smell my lilacs and plant my garden and breathe in that sky. I miss my home.”

Home.

Her home.

Who are these people who hold the scent of the dirt, the push of the wind, the endless winters, the wheat fields, the small town in such regard?

Who tends their grandmother’s garden, brings in the baby calves into the basement in the dead of a blizzard? Who works the teller line and serves your morning coffee? Who has owned the Implement Dealership for years?

And who roams all over the world for years on end, traveling over seas to live and work in foreign languages, who are leaders of cities and  major corporations? Who serves in the military,  climbs mountains and rafts raging rivers only to find themselves pulled back again, to be haunted by the memories of sunsets and 4th of July Celebrations no matter how how far they have traveled or how long they’ve been gone.

Who is North Dakota?

We are rural route roads, beat-up mailboxes and dusty school bus seats. We are rides in the combine, summer sausage sandwiches, a thermos of coffee washed down with warm lemonade and  faces black with dirt after a hot August day.

Two miles to a gravel road on the edge of town and we are freedom, our father’s truck, twelve years old behind the steering wheel.

We are first loves and last loves and forever loves found on those backroads at night, on front porches, in the backseats of cars and under a blanket shared in the stands at a football game.

We are the stars that light up the endless sky at night, family farms, four generations of the same recipe on Christmas Eve.

The barnyard light.

We are white wood prairie churches, our mother’s voice quietly singing the hymns, jello with suspended vegetables and mayonnaise casseroles waiting for us in the basement when the service is through.

We are wet clay caked to cowboy boots, the black soil of the valley, the stoplight in town.

High heels and business suits, running shoes and hoping things will stay the same…knowing that they need to change.

Number crunchers, songs that must be sung, books that must be written.

Snake bitten.

We scream for sun and pray for rain and push the river from our doors. We’ve been here before.

Chokecherry jam, misquote bites, country fairs, one station on the radio, too young for our first beer, FFA and 4-H steers. Too young to leave here.

We are race car tracks and power lines, hockey rinks and barbed fence wire.

Drilling rigs and endless fields of wheat…September heat.

We are bicycle tires in the middle of Main Street, fireworks in May, popsicles and swimming pools and a stop at the Tastee Freeze please. Rodeos and American Legion, football heroes, lead singers in the band, the ferris wheel in town.

Pow wows, three legged races, familiar faces, dances in the street.

Fishing in the creek.

We are “Pete’s kid,” “Edie’s granddaughter,” and  “Your mother wants you home right away!”

We are pushed to go and pulled to stay, we are leaving this place as soon as we’re grown.

And we are the sky we can’t explain, predictably unpredictable, colorful and full of rage and gentle hope that it’s all ok.

We’re the wind, relentless.

The snow, endless.

Sharp and hard and steadfast and certain like the winter and the change in weather.

We are the dirt under our nails, our wind tangled hair, the cattails and bluebells and big white tail deer.

We are all of these things that make up a home, but home is not ours to take.

It is in us and we have been claimed.

Join me for:

“Growing Up North Dakotan”

A panel discussion featuring Joshua Boschee, Kathryn Joyce, Jessie Veeder Scofield, and others. Moderated by WHY? host Jack Russell Weinstein

Prairie Public Television Studio
5-7 pm
207 5th Street North
Fargo, ND
Facebook Event 

The event is free. Come be a part of the audience, ask questions, make comments, and engage philosophically with this most important issue.

If you can’t be in Fargo, please share with me here how North Dakota has claimed you.

Accident Prone (Prize Alert!)

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In honor of Friday the 13th I would like to take a moment to embrace a side of me that I have not appropriately opened up about. And I am ashamed of this, because anyone who knows me personally will know that this part of me is worth mentioning, if for no other reason than to protect the innocent souls around me.

Deep breath in….now let it out….sigh…

Some days life is tough for me.

Yes.

And by tough, I mean literally painful.

Because I am a klutz.

Accident prone.

A magnet for small disasters.

A target for falling things.

like bird poop...

This is a quality that is so much a part of me I have began to embrace it and use it when asked to describe myself:

“Who am I? Well I am so glad you asked: I am a wild haired, overly friendly over sharer spaz of a woman who is inclined to burst out in song when simply regular talking would do just fine. I often have big ideas that require more muscles than I currently posses attached to arms and legs that are more often that not, flailing. I lack the attention to detail needed to glide through this ranch-world unscathed by stomping horse hooves, alarmingly uneven ground, muddy creek beds, giant bulls and rodents with wings that prefer to fly right for my head when there are a million miles of open sky available to them. Oh, and chips and salsa are still my favorite food groups even though the food group almost choked me to death in a public space known as a restaurant, just to make sure I was good and embarrassed (Sweet Martha thank goodness for Mr. Heimlic and his maneuver). Oh, and I got my big nose from my dad…and a flying sled and an unruly beer bottle in case you were wondering….thanks so much for asking, I think l’ll go inside now.”

I mean, let’s get real here. How many women have been smacked in the head by a 15 foot 2×6 board that came screaming at 30 mph out of what appeared to be thin air one day…only to fall through the floor of a barn the next?

Danger, lurking around every corner

How many people have actually bent over to pick up a napkin off of the floor only to smoke their head so hard on a kitchen table (a table that has been in the same place for 15 + years so there should be no surprises) that guests fell silent and actually witnessed those little cartoon bluebirds circling around her head?

Do you know any proper lady who has dolled up, put on her big girl shoes and attempted a few hours in a dress only to step out of the dining booth and fall directly on her face, flashing her entire rear-end to a bar full of strange men?

How many best friends have to regularly say “Really? Did that just happen? Are you ok?”

How many times can a dad rush his young daughter to the emergency room for a crushed foot from jumping the wrong way off of a horse, a snapped ligament for landing the wrong way while jumping, er, falling off a small cliff, a smashed finger from getting her limb stuck between a 2,000 pound bull and a metal post, or a disjointed wrist from a unfortunate decision to heroically save herself from a runaway horse?

Note to self...bridal necessary.

How many times can a husband shake his head at his wife before his head actually falls off and he turns from bystander to victim?

How many people do you know who have actually hit themselves in the head with a hammer, measure the time they have spent in casts in years and were nicknamed “Tuck and Roll” in seventh grade by those who are supposed to love them most?

How many?

Well, I know one who happens to share my name and the same bruise on my left knee and permanent and distinct bump on my nose.

"Hhiiiyaaa gguuyyyssaaa!!"

Um, I just need one moment here….

“Bwwwaaaaa ahhh  ahhhh…sob…sniff…sniff…whimper…”

Sigh.

Ok, enough of this confession. Life is tough out here for animals and humans like me. Come to think of it I have a couple dozen stories I could tell you about witnessing my pops in similar life-threatening situations (i.e.: welding his polyester shirt to to his arm, getting clotheslined by a barbed wire fence and one or two cow trampling incidents) so perhaps his giant nose and frizzy hair weren’t the only qualities he passed down to me.

Thanks a million pops.

"Why you're welcome dear daughter..."

But I decided a long time ago that I can’t live in fear about the next mishap, bruise, concussion, bloody nose or knee. Life’s too short and there’s too much to do…

So I took the pug’s lead and invested in some safety glasses:

Because we can’t afford to lose another eye on this place.

And in honor of this cryptic type holiday, the one straight out of those horror movies I refuse to subject myself to for fear of bed wetting, I want to hear from you.

Tell me about an embarrassing blunder or injury. Give me your best accident prone tale and the one that makes me feel better about myself and the fact that I am gracefully challenged can chose from the following 8×10 matted metallic prints to be sent to your door.

Photo #1:

Photo #2

Photo #3

Because I like to celebrate our shortcomings 🙂

Oh, and don’t forget to visit the “Meanwhile, back at the ranch…” Facebook page and hit “like” for more ranch updates, contests and photos.

Love you and happy accidents everyone!

A promise of summer

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It’s been raining at the ranch for the last few days.

Raining, and thundering, and pouring and flooding and rushing the creekbeds.

And smelling so sweet.

So although I’m an outspoken fan of the sun, I know this is necessary. I know this is what spring does.

So I say bring it on. Let the heavens pour down and wash that winter away. Wash it clean and squeaky. We’ve been frozen and thirsty and our hair needs washing…

the worms need air…

the lilacs need watering…

the horses need waking up.

Rain sky. Cry it out. Turn the brown neon and make the flowers hunch over under the weight of your necessary presence.

I don’t mind. Really. I will stand in it all day.

I’ll splash in your puddles, let it soak in my skin, slide down the clay buttes, jump over the rushing streams. Because I forgot what this feels like, being soaked to the core and warm in spite of it.

I forgot what it looks like when the lighting breaks apart the sky. 

I forgot how the thunder shakes the foundation of this little house, how it startles me from sleep and fills my heart with a rush of loneliness, a reminder that the night carries on while I’m sleeping.

I forgot how clean it smells, how green the grass can be, how many colors are in a rainbow.

So go on. Rain.

Rain all you want.

Rain forever on this hard ground and turn this pink road red..

This brown ground green

Let your drops encourage the fragile stuff, the quiet beauty that has been sleeping for so long to wake up and show her face to the sky.

I’ll be there waiting to gasp over it, to gush and smile and stick my nose in the sweet scents and return home to track your mud into my house where the soup is on.
Rain. Rain. Rain. You tap at my windows…
and promise me summer.

Dear Brown Dog…

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Dear big brown dog with the fat tail that sweeps objects off of the coffee table with one swish,

I  know you don’t remember this, but at one time your nose didn’t even reach to that table in the center of our small living room, not even to grab the last of a sandwich or a piece of leftover popcorn on movie night. I know you don’t recall how I used to take you along in my car when you were so small I had to lift you onto the seat.

Because you’re a dog, and you live for the day, your memory doesn’t reach to the place where it first began, the first month into my marriage to a man I’ve known since I was a little girl. I wanted you to have him. I wanted you to be there at his side for hunting trips, drives to the big lake with a fishing pole, evening walks to the dam with a stick and nights when I was hundreds of miles away singing for my supper.

I wanted him to be yours, so I found you and brought you home to him and he gave you a name and something to chew on. And somewhere in between the pounds and pounds of kibble, the ever expanding collars, the jogs with your long pink tongue drooping out of your jowls, paws that slapped the earth with increasing force on your way to greet me at the car, you scooched on into my heart and became an essential part of a small family that only existed for one month without you.

I know you loved the ranch and the wide open spaces, the endless mud that the creek supplies and the water in the dam that never lets you down–all the smells and trails to follow, all the poop to roll in. I know you love it out here. And I know I’ve never properly thanked you, big brown dog, for giving all that up to sit in the passenger seat of the car on my 24th birthday as I drove us hundreds of miles away from the only home you ever knew, leaving my new husband behind to pack up the rest of our things. I needed you as we searched for a place to call home.  I needed you there as I drove into the mountain town late at night and unlocked the door to a lonely apartment, unpacked my bags and rolled out my sleeping bag to lay on the floor.

I needed you to sleep right next to me. To calm my nerves.

And you did.

You always do.

Thank you for your enthusiasm and companionship we found on new trails and sidewalks, you attached to the leash, attached to my arm.

Thank you for waiting patiently in the small backyard, sprawling out in the sunshine or hunkering down in the snow and rain until I returned home from work and husband from school. 

Thanks for wagging your tail and helping turn a bad day a bit better.

Thank you for showing remorse and regret when we left you in that apartment on a rainy night only to come home to find that you had shredded my favorite feather pillow to the point of no return.

It’s three years later and I think I still have feathers in my hair, but I forgive you.

I forgive you because you destroyed my pillow, but you have never touched my shoes.

I forgive you because you follow me, blindly faithful, even when I beg not to be followed…you follow.

And you are always eager to sit down next to me in the passenger seat–you do so time and time again. When I loaded you up and drove you back toward home, so close you could smell it, you didn’t run the rest of the way when we stopped to repair an old house, to work, to think on how we might get there in the end….

You waited as we worked it out. You nudged my dirty hands as I held my head and helped soak some of those tears up on your snout.

You cleaned up the pieces of burnt chicken that fell on the floor and went outside to wait with a stick, just in case I had the time today. Just in case I felt better. Just in case you could convince me that a little fetch fixes most things.

Thank you big brown dog for being right. Thank you for your perseverance.

And thank you for holding on to hope that someday we would bring you back here for good, back to the land of porcupines and wood ticks and water tanks and every specimen of bird just waiting to be chased.

But most of all, thank you for not running away, disowning me, howling in protest or indulging in a late night snack when I wasn’t looking, after, to your horror and in a complete moment of weakness, hubby brought this home to be mine.

And he began taking over.

And chewing on the shoes you always stayed away from. And eating your food, laying in your bed, hiding your bones in between the couch cushions and worst of all, stealing your sticks after biting your hocks during a game of fetch.

Thanks for not eating him when he does that.

I really appreciate it.

Because big brown dog with the fat tail that clears the coffee table with one swoop, you were meant to come into my life to take care of the man I love, to be his and he yours and walk off into the sunsets on hunting trips like a scene in one of those sportsman calendars.

But you could not be fooled, not by your name, not by your breeding, not by a small, black, one eyed monster biting your heals…

No matter what they say, from the very beginning,

on into the middle…

and until the end…

I’m yours.

With love,

The woman who feeds you

Momentum

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Momentum. Forward motion. Moving.

I have been thinking about the act quite a bit lately as I have been guiding my car through back roads and highways, my feet along cattle trails and off to cut my own path.  The act of moving forward, in any capacity, whether it’s walking, riding or driving, is what I envision the stream of consciousness to look like: sweaty, breathing, flushed, meandering or running in a straight line following a bird, a path, a rainbow or nothing in particular.

Because there is something about covering ground that propels not only your body, but your mind. It frees it up a bit, opens it. And even when there is somewhere else to be, a dot at the end of the map, a destination, there is something about the space between point A and point B that takes on a life of its own entirely–the space where you can’t go anywhere but forward. Where time ticks away with the miles.

I drove across the state on Tuesday. 350 or so miles from the northeast corner to west. It was a beautiful day, the sun was shining and the wind was blowing across the flat landscape. The road I was following was completely unfamiliar to me as I headed in the direction of home. I had my radio blaring familiar music, music that I could sing along with and softly  I mumbled through words I have forgotten only to crescendo as I was reminded of the ones I always knew. I rolled down the windows. I sipped coffee. I adjusted and readjusted my visor and my sunglasses. I put a stick of gum in my mouth.

My mind wandered and I found myself back on all of the unfamiliar roads I have traveled during the time I was on the road with work and music. In pieces those moments flashed in and out of my memory–the toll booths on my way from Fargo to Chicago in the early daylight hours, my eyes heavy from the unexpected miles.  The long stretches of yellow lines on the interstate in Kansas. The blacktop backroads on my way to a small Wisconsin college town. The bridges that confused me in Green Bay. The antelope infested stretch in South Dakota. The mountains that unexpectedly jutted out as I hit Boise. The white-out road that welcomed me home to North Dakota and forced me to spend one spring night in my car along the interstate.

While I remembered parts of my life that weren’t significant enough to make it out of my mouth and into stories to friends and family, the miles carried me forward and turned me onto a highway I have taken home hundreds of times. And while I sped between its straight lines it was as if someone was playing DJ and handpicking the soundtrack that came through the car speakers and into my conscious to help me replay the events I moved away from and back into during the time I spent on the pavement that stretched out in front of me. Pavement I haven’t been on for years. The songs and the road and the setting sun bounced off of my aviator glasses as I thought of beer, coffeehouse gigs, sidewalks in my college town, movie theatre trips to pass the time, crying from pure loneliness, a future naively hopeful and wanting so bad to be somewhere else.

My tires hummed along as I watched the sun dip down a little further, changing from gold to pink to red and I thought about the idea of wishing to be gone. How I used to exist in that thought, in that wish, so passionately. Driving toward the horizon I suddenly felt a little uneasy, like I needed to begin constructing plans for what was next. That I couldn’t just move through the miles thinking about what could have been, but concentrate on what is now and what could be so great.

I started constructing plans for what was next. Ideas passed through my mind like a slide show, progressing with each mile marker, playing themselves out as the sky turned from red to black and headlights flashed in my eyes. But by the time the landscape started to roll a bit, after I crossed the big lake and the road began to wind the unease calmed and I settled into my thoughts, sorted them out in my head, planted some and let others fly away when I flung open the doors of my car to breathe in the familiar air of the ranch–wet grass and dirt and horse hair.

When my husband and I moved to the ranch when we were first married, we weren’t ready to be here. We weren’t ready to plant our lives. We had more to see, more to do and be. We didn’t understand yet that we did not have to hang up our wings to exist on this landscape.

And the best thing we could do for ourselves make the decision to leave. Because time was always something we understood. Time and the knowledge that only we have the power to change the way we feel, the way we live.

So we left. That dream we had since we were twelve or thirteen was staring us in the face, but our  arms weren’t open, so we left it there, alone.

To know that you can always move, to know that you have an option of a road, an option of your feet to take you where you don’t even know you need to go is one of the greatest freedoms.  That is what my husband taught me.

That is what we taught each other.

That we can always move. That we have hands to hold and feet and roads that are there to lead us anywhere we want to go.

And those hands, those feet, that longing to fly, those same roads brought us back here. When we were ready. When we understood that sometimes freedom isn’t always about leaving…

sometimes freedom is choosing to stay.

How do the crocuses know?

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It’s official.

Deep breath in and out.

Whew.

After a winter that dug its frozen fingers in, ate us out of house and home, turned our skin pasty and soft and all in all outstayed his welcome, peaking up from the once frozen ground is the first genuine promise of warmer days to come.

And when I say genuine I mean it, because this little signal that comes to us quietly on the hilltops has never failed to lift the dreary spirits of country people in the northern states.

Yes, the crocuses are here.

And if there was anything I needed to do upon returning to the ranch yesterday evening after a lovely day with family sitting out in the 60 degree sunshine–if there were chores or phone calls or words that needed to be said to you about Easter and family and the sweet memories this holiday stirs inside of me, all of that was trumped by husband’s and my deep desire to fling open the doors of the car, pull off our town clothes, change into our muck boots and climb the hills to find springtime treasures.

For anyone who grew up in a northern state or in the countryside where your world turns white for months you will understand this. You will understand what the crocus means to us here in rural North Dakota.

You will understand the sweet smell of dirt that accompanies the search and anticipation of spotting that first vivid purple petal emerging from the cold, damp, brown earth. And if you have patiently watched the snow drifts disappear and reappear outside your front porch as the months drag on, you will not laugh when I say at that moment you feel as though you have never seen a purple that deep, a petal as soft, a color so vibrant. Beauty has arrived.

And if you are from the prairie you will smile as you think of that first breeze catching your hair and the sunshine warming your shoulders as you fling off your spring jacket,  let the warm soak in your skin and fall down to your knees to inspect the new arrival.

You will understand how, at that moment, you are eight years old again and you have your grandmother’s hand and you can hear her voice through the breeze. You can hear her exclaim “Oh, now look at that…” as your eyes move from the first flower and across the hill to notice that there are purple dots are everywhere. Scattered.

And if your world has been white and you have been restless you will appreciate the challenge you face just then where your enthusiasm for the change of season begs you to grab the flowers up, collect them for your pockets, pluck them for your basket or your bucket and bring them home to proudly display on windowsills and kitchen tables and countertops.

But instead you pause as your fingers run over the fuzz of the fragile flowers that reach for the sky in groups, holding hands with a promise to face this uncertain sky together.

Yes, if you are from the windswept buttes, the wheat fields, the quiet streams that cut through small cow pastures you will nod your head when I tell you that yesterday, when I finally found what I was after, I made sure I only picked one crocus from each group, careful to not leave any alone out there, certain not to pluck the hilltop clean of this precious flower that enters this world so confident, the first bud of prairie spring…

because life is short and a little piece of me felt like, for all this flower has given me, there should be some left out there to live it.

Yes, if you are from the once frozen Dakotas, you will nod your head because you have done the same thing and returned to your home with a modest bundle of furry purple flowers, shaking off the tiny bugs that have made their home inside the petals before setting the bouquet on your table with pride.

This is the ritual, these are the emotions conveyed by such a small and simple gift from nature. And we repeat this ceremony year after year, our excitement builds, our childhood reinvented, our hope for a new season renewed.

We anticipate, we make time, we know it’s coming every year…

But how do the crocuses know?

How do they know the ground is ready and the sky won’t forsake them?

How do they know that momma’s desperately need flowers just as much as papas desperately need to pick them for her?

How do they know when children need a treasure hunt and grammas need to lead the way?

How do they know just when to make a quiet and brilliant entrance to come and finish thawing us out?

How do they know just exactly when we need them?

The 105 pound heart

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If you were the lab with your sleek coat and paws that make tracks like a wolf in the mud, your tail would clear a coffee-table with one sweep while running to the door to enthusiastically welcome the neighbors with an accidentally and completely oblivious swat to the groin.

And you would be confused as to why you didn’t fit on the couch, or on a lap, or in the arms of your favorite human, but nothing could keep you from trying.

Because if you were the lab your self perception would be slightly off. In your mind you would be fluff, weightless and wishing to fit in the palm of a hand, or in a pocket, or on the soft cushion of a chair all the while working to squeeze your body between the small spaces of this house, taking up the limited carpeting available for walking.

But if you were the lab you would be polite and move out of the way when prompted, not recognizing that perhaps you are indeed fluff after all…and the rest of the 105 pounds is taken up by your heart.

Because if you were the lab your heart would have to be big enough to fit in the one-eyed pug who came into your life as a little black, squishy blob with two eyes that couldn’t climb the stairs and quickly took over the house and the walks and the yard and the lap that used to belong only to you.

And your sticks. He would always be taking your sticks…

while biting at your back legs.

And yes, if you were the lab your 105 pound heart would give a nice growl, but never a snap, after the 330th time the cat bit your tail and you would attempt to protect the barnyard with enthusiastic barking, only to follow it up with head rubs and giant licks and tail wags and all of the things dogs that love their world do when approached by good humans.


And you would chase deer and pheasants and cows when told a million times to back off to go home, but you would avoid porcupines at all costs, forever remembering the single quill you once had barely dangling from your snout from the first and last encounter with the prickly demons. 

And in the depths of your slumber when you’re drooling from your floppy lips and your droopy eyes are closed up tight for the night, you would have nightmares about this, squealing and whining and moving your legs as you lay on your side.

If you were the lab you would drag out garbage, and bring home dead things and roll in poop and bark up trees and almost spontaneously combust at the site of your person putting on tennis shoes or boots or grabbing a gun or hitching up the boat for a trip to the lake.

You would be four years old with a gray beard and the softest ears and joints that seemed to ache when your old soul arose and you would howl at my harmonica with the same vigor you use to howl back at the coyotes at night…

and during the course of a day your 105 pound heart would fill up, combust and be broken 175 times.

Yes, if you were the lab all of that love and life and adventure you made room for in the 105 pound heart of yours—the pug, the tolerance and acceptance of the cats, the cow poop, the neighbors, the sticks and the fear of the sting of the porcupine would be incomparable, thrown to the wind, forgotten and completely and utterly abandoned at the first site of water….

…water, the only place you, the lab, is truly weightless…

…105 pound heart and all.


We’re like the water

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We’ve got mud here people. It’s official.

And never has a girl been so happy to see this slop and slush and muck. I’ve have enthusiastically switched from snowshoes and boots with three inch insulation to those of a muck variety and I have no intention of dodging or jumping or leaping over any puddles or rushing streams.

I have every intention of stepping in as much of the stuff as I can.

Because we have mud people.

We have mud and blue skies

and a bug on my backpack

and magic sunshine that is turning those white drifts into rivers in places rivers only exist for a few short days during this time of year.

The time between winter and the full on sprouting, buzzing heat wave of spring. The time where the snow still peeks through the trees, the wind still puts a flush in your cheeks, birds are still planning their flights back home and the crocuses haven’t quite popped through the dirt.

My favorite time of year.

When I was a little girl I lived for the big meltdown. My parent’s home is located in a coulee surrounded by cliffs of bur oak and brush where a creek winds and babbles and bubbles and cuts through the banks. And that creek absolutely mystified me. It changed all the time, depending on rainfall, sunshine and the presence of beavers or cattle.

In the summer it was lively enough, home to bugs that rowed and darted on the surface of the water and rocks worn smooth by the constant movement of the stream flowing up to the big beaver dam I would hike to daily. In the typical North Dakota fall it became a ribbon carrying on and pushing through oak leaves and acorns that had fallen in its path. In winter it slowed down and slept while I shoveled it’s surface to make room for twists and turns on my ice skates.

But in the meltdown it was magical. It rushed. It raged. It widened in the flat spaces and cut deep ravines where it was forced to squeeze on through. It showed no mercy. It had to get somewhere. It had to open up. It had to move and jump and soak up the sun and wave to the animals waking up.

And I would follow it. I would become obsessed. I would step out on the back deck and at the first sound of water moving in the silence of our backyard I would pull on my boots and get out there to meet it, to walk with it, to search for the biggest waterfalls and gawk at how it would scream out of its banks and marvel at how it changed.

I would be out there for hours.  Around every bend was something a little more amazing–a fallen log to cross, a narrow cut to jump over, a place to test the water-proof capacity of my green boots. The creek runs through multiple pastures on the place and as long as the daylight would allow I would move right along with it for the miles it skipped along and then return home soaked and flushed and refreshed and completely and utterly exhausted.

And then I would do the same thing the next day. Because even as a kid I knew this magical time was fleeting. I knew the creek wouldn’t always act this outrageously marvelous so I had to get out there…because someone had to see this. And at that time, and still to this day, there are places on that creek that very few people have ever been.

But I was one of them. I was one of them and that creek was performing for me.  Oh, I remember feeling so secret. So special and lucky to have this show in my backyard. And although I loved summer and all the warmth and sunshine and green grass it brought with it, I never wanted this early spring witching hour to end.

I vividly remember a dream I had about the creek when I was about 10 or 11. I dreamed the creek behind my house was huge, like a river you would find in the mountains–a river I had yet to discover at that time. The landscape the creek wound through was the same in real life as it was in my dream–the oaks and the raspberries existed there–but the water was warmer and crystal clear and it pooled up at the bottom of huge and gentile waterfalls that rolled over miles of smooth rocks and fluffy grass. And I was out in it with friends I had never met before as an adult woman with long legs and arms and we were swimming in its water and letting the current push us over the waterfalls and along the bottom of the creek bed until we landed  in the deep water where we would float for a while and then launch ourselves out for another run. And we were laughing and screaming with anticipation for where that water was going to take us. But we were never afraid. We were never cold or worrying about getting home for dinner or what our bodies looked like in our bathing suits.

We were free. I was free. And the water was rushing.

We may never know if there is a heaven while we are here on this very volatile and fragile earth, but that there could be that much water and that much power and change rolling through our backyards and then one day we wake up to find that it has just quietly moved on and out and along still mystifies me to this day.

That there are snowbanks that fly in with the burning chill of winter’s wind and reach up over my head and stay for months on end only to  disappear in one day with the quiet strength of the sun is extraordinary for lack of a more powerful word.

That the water in my creek is made from the snow that fell from the sky in early November and is currently rushing around the trees, settling in hoof prints, being lapped up by coyotes and splashed in by geese and sinking in the earth and changing it forever is something that makes me believe in something.

…like perhaps we are like that drop that fell from above,  afraid of the mystery that was waiting for us as we hurtled through the atmosphere only to find when we finally hit the earth that we are not one drop alone in this world…

…we are the water.