Tag Archives: community

Dancing.

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Sometimes my job as a writer brings me to stories I am not looking for, but grateful to have found.

I visited a small town yesterday in the center of my state. In the middle of a freshly planted corn fields and along the railroad tracks cattle grazed, a construction crew pounded nails into a new roof on a sleepy Main Street building and a group of community members gathered in a small diner, opened especially for my visit to learn about their town.

We sat around a rectangle table on diner chairs in the back of the restaurant. The room was full of local men and women who were there to talk about dairy farming and population decreases, rural living and 4-H programs, the weather and how kids these days don’t understand that chickens don’t have nuggets.

I wrote down their names and got snippets of their stories: the retired school teacher, the cook, the woman from Wisconsin, the fifth generation dairy farmer.

I thanked them for their time as they dispersed after our visit to the t-ball game down the road, to check the cattle, to cook dinner or lead a 4-H group.

But as I was rushing toward the door, checking my watch and calculating what time I would land in bed if I left now and stopped quickly at the grocery store in the big town along the way, I heard a voice say, “And one more thing…”

I turned around to find that voice attached to a man in a clean pressed shirt and suspenders, holding his white feed store hat with green trim in front of him as he spoke. It was the man who sat across from me during our interview. The man with kind eyes and the daughter who was a dairy farmer.

He had something more to tell me.

And this is what it was:

My first train ride out of here was when I was nineteen. Boy was that a ride! You hear how the train moves along the tracks, squeaking and bumping along? That’s how it was on the inside, riding along like that for days.
In those days the train came through here often to pick up passengers. It took me to the service.
The Korean War.

I anticipated his next thought and he caught me off guard when I noticed a bit of a sparkle in his eyes. He gripped his cap a little tighter. I leaned in.

He smiled big and broad and looked young as he told me…

I was lucky. They sent me to Germany and, well, my family is German. It was my second language. So boy did I have a time! I think I wore out my first pair of boots dancing.
I was a cook see, and in the evenings I would go out and, well, the girls, they asked you to dance. They did! 

I was a little nervous at first, being there with all their men sitting along the bar. I asked them if they were sure, if there would be trouble, but they said go ahead and dance.
They wanted to sit and drink, see. The girls wanted to dance!  And I was young and fit and I would dance.

I was lost there in that memory with him. I wanted to be those girls, I wanted him to show me his dance steps. I wanted to know him when his eyes were young.

Young, but not any more full of life than they were at that moment.

Oh, I just I loved it. I would dance all night. 

With that he pulled his cap down over his gray hair.  I thanked him for the story and he thanked me for the time.  He held the door open for me and walked me to my car parked next to those railroad tracks, the steel lines disappearing in the distance a constant memory of the young man who took the train out of North Dakota and came home with boots worn from dancing.

 

The long way home.

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Sometimes in the middle of an ordinary weekday, one filled with spilled coffee, peanut butter toast on the run, meetings, missed phone calls and long-lost plans for supper, the world gives you a chance to throw it all out the window and just get lost.

Yesterday afternoon on my way out the office, heavy-overstuffed briefcase on my shoulder, water cup in my left hand, my list under my arm and a trail of papers flailing behind me,  I dialed Husband to remind him it was voting day and asked him if he wanted me to meet him at home so we could make the trek together.

Husband works a good thirty-plus miles away from the ranch. I work another good thirty miles away too…in the other direction.  And when you live in the middle of winding gravel roads, you do not vote in the town that you travel 30 miles to work in each day. No, you take the gravel to a smaller town sitting nice and neat  alongside the county road and cast your vote in a quaint community building as your neighbors from over the hill, across the creek and down the road filter in and ask you about your family, how the house is coming and what you think of the weather.

I thought about taking the fifteen mile detour to cast my vote on my own, but the idea of a little car ride with my husband and the opportunity to actually show up in public together sounded like a nice one. He agreed.

And so we met at home, dropped our piles of work at the door, and husband drove me north on the scoria road, past the substation, and our friends mailbox where the gravel turns to pavement,  right on the county road and into Keene, ND where we would greet the ladies who have been working the polls all day and follow their instructions to fill in the circles dark and complete, and for goodness sakes, don’t vote in more than one party column or you’ve gotta do it again.

I took their directions and my packet and followed Husband into the little gym where we played volleyball this winter and where I attended craft club last week. I waited for my neighbor to cast her vote and I took her place at the round table against the wall.

I read the directions thoroughly, wondered if Husband, who was at the table on the other side of the room, was canceling out my votes, finished my civic duty, closed the folder and fed my sheets through the fancy machine.

Husband followed close behind. I waited while he cracked a few jokes, said goodbye to the neighbors and then followed him to the door and back out into a beautiful summer evening in the hub of our little township: Keene, ND-Population 266?

We contemplated heading back home to grill some brats and finish up the laundry. We talked about how the lawn needed to be mowed and that fence that needed a good inspection. We thought we could maybe get some work done on the new house before it got too late.

We said we probably should go home…we really should…

But it was such a nice evening, the sun was shining through the fluffy clouds, the grass was green and fresh from the recent rain, the farmers were out and it smelled so sweet. We rolled down the windows and pointed our car north toward the lake where we heard the restaurant at the marina had just been renovated and is open for business. What’s another 30 miles when the lake is calling and you heard they might have walleye on the menu?

What’s another thirty miles along new green fields, under big prairie skies, next to a handsome man with lots of things to tell you with the windows open and your favorite songs in the speakers?

It’s nothing.

It’s everything.

And the food was good, the water was crystal clear and the sun was hitting the horizon with a promise of a show as colorful as the rainbow that had just appeared in the clouds to south.

Husband pulled out of the parking lot and back onto the county road. He headed toward that rainbow, toward the ranch and our chores…but then, without a word between us, he ignored the turn that would take us there and chose the long way home instead.

I didn’t object. I didn’t ask why. I didn’t say a thing unless it was to ask him to stop so I could take a photo of the clouds reflecting off the glass-like pond in a rancher’s pasture.

The country church reaching up toward the sky.

A family of ducks swimming in reeds.

The sun sinking below the horizon.

We drove this way for hours, tourists exploring the landscape we knew so well, seeing it again with eyes wider.

Hearts more open.

I was exploring our homeland and my husband was my guide, a man who just wanted a little more time to move through the world he loves…

patient with the clicking of the camera and my need to let the cooling air blow through the crack of the window in the passenger seat…

humored by my theory on coming back after my death as a duck…

happy to hear his tires hum along familiar roads…

content to sit next to me and hum along with the songs we love.

And relieved to forget about the things we should do…


and just live in the moments, under the sky, moving quietly and slowly along the landscape that made us…

Inside Old Houses

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We live on gravel roads that stretch like ribbons along pasture land dotted with black cattle and a patchwork quilt of grasses and crops. As we kick up dust beneath our pickup tires heading out to a chore or to meet up with a neighbor, we take for granted how these roads were built. Why there are here in the first place.

These days we are in a rush aren’t we? Aren’t we headed somewhere on a deadline?  So we drive faster than we should on these roads beat up from years of wear by our rubber tires, and now, by the new-found rush of a booming industry.

I remember a time when these roads were quiet. It was where my cousins and I could skip like characters from “The Wizard of Oz” down the middle of the pink road without a care in the world. The only vehicle that was certain to meet us was carrying our great uncle driving with his windows down, checking fences and out for coffee with the neighbors; or my mother  looking to borrow some sugar. If we were lucky it would be the Schwann’s Man hauling the promise of orange push-up pops in the back of his truck and we would put the game on time-out and sit on the front porch trying to get to the bottom of the treat before it melted and dripped down our fingers.

We didn’t know that  there would ever be anything here at the end of this road besides imagination and our grandmother’s cookies. We didn’t know that anything but our  boots and agriculture would kick up dust on the road.

I spent Friday afternoon with a reporter from the cities. He came to visit me on the ranch to talk about the landscape, ranch life, my music and what’s happening here in the booming oil field we have in Western North Dakota. I agreed to have the conversation and then gave him the requested directions he needed to find me.

  • Head east out-of-town until you hit the school.
  • Turn right and follow the pavement.
  • Cross a cattle guard, but only one. If you hit the second  you’ve gone too far.
  • Turn left on the red scoria road until you see the small red barn.

Because we’re in the middle of all of this activity, all of this national press, the #3 oil-producing state in the nation, but we are not on the GPS.

I am not sure if it was my very rural directions or the wrong number provided for the county road, but my reporter friend didn’t quite make it to me, so he found the top of a hill (because we don’t have cell service either) and called.

I got in my pickup and found him on the pink road where I used to pretend I was Dorothy, waiting with his hazard lights on for me to show up and tell him what I do, what I think and what it means to me to live here right now.

What I do is ride horses and chase the pug and take pictures and sing and tell stories.

What I think is that every day we work  to live a good and true life as we build a house on my family’s land that once was the middle of  nowhere and has now suddenly become the middle of something that is so much bigger than the sound of Pops’ tractor coming over the hill.

What it means?

The truth is I haven’t put my thumb on the black or the white, because between the past and the future there are so many colors here.

So I sent him on his way with a story and a new-found love for the pug and grabbed my camera to follow that pink road to meet my neighbor, a friend who is absolutely intrigued by the idea of what this place was in another time. We had plans to take our country roads and explore the little pieces left behind by the generations that came before us. My friend knows where every buried treasure lies. Her eyes are open to it, our history and tumbling down memories that scatter across our landscape in the form of old houses and churches and schools.

My friend moved to this area from Montana with her husband almost two years ago, but you would never know she is new to the place. Ask her about the stone house across from her approach or the old Sandstone school and she will tell you a story about it. She will tell you who built the house and what he did for a living, who taught in the school and where you can find photos of the students. My roots are planted here and I’m sure I have heard bits and pieces of these stories as I grew up, but hearing her tell about the families who homesteaded near her new home, watching her put the pieces together as she peers inside the windows of old houses, seeing her wonder and excitement as she unearths an old book from an abandoned house or admires the green paint on an antique table, makes me wonder too.

It makes me wonder what memories were held in the hearts of those prairie people who have long ago returned to the earth. What would they think if they saw us driving down this road in our fancy cars to get to houses for two that quadruple the size of where they raised 12 children?

How far away I feel from that life some days…

And then I talk with my friend I am reminded that our goals were the same.

To make a living, to raise our families. To have a good life.

Just as the family that inhabited that old house with the broken windows and remnants of a life I will never lead, we are existing in a changing landscape where trees grow and fall, baby calves are born and sold, ground is tilled for crops and minds are inventing ways to make the living easier.

Inside those old houses they ate, they prayed, they laughed and worried, just as we do in our own homes with too many television screens and not enough vegetables.

So what does this mean?

The washed out fences and boarded up school-house doors remind us, like the newly paved roads and constant wind that blows across our prairie, tangling our hair and knocking on our windows, that this place, this land, is not ours solely and rightfully and individually. One day we will abandon these houses in decision or death and there will be a new generations searching these roads for our story.

So we should tell it now, honest and true and leave to them what they will need.

Community in a time of change…

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I interrupt the regular programming of walking the hills, chasing Little Man, scolding the pug and cooking with my husband to  talk for a moment about community. I want to talk about belonging somewhere, calling it home, embracing its flaws and standing up for a place…taking care of it.

No matter where you live in this country you’ve probably caught bits and pieces about the changes that are occurring in Western North Dakota due to new technology that allows us to extract oil from the Bakken and other large reservoirs that lay 10,000 feet below the surface of the land…the land where our roads wind, our children run, our farmers cultivate, our schools and shops sit. The land we call community. The land we call home.

For the people who exist here oil is not a new word. Neither is the Bakken. My county is celebrating its 60th year of oil discovery soon and its county seat isn’t even 100 years old. So you can imagine many long time residents of the small “boomtowns” you’re hearing about have had their hand in the industry at one point or another in their lifetime. Some have stories about finishing high school or returning home from college and working in the oil fields in the 1970s, moving up in industry, making their place, seeing it through the rough times and coming out on the other side as leaders and veterans of the industry.

Veterans of the industry like the ranchers and farmers in this area working to exist and tend to their land while the search for oil below their wheat fields and pastures carries on around them. During rough times, times when cattle prices were low, or the rain didn’t fall, some of those landowners have taken a second job driving truck or pumping for oil to make ends meet, to pay off some debt, to get their kids through college.

These people have served as members of the school board, city council, 4-H leaders and musicians in local bands. They have helped build up their main streets, keeping small businesses in business and the doors of the schools struggling with declining enrollment open. They’ve coached volleyball and cheered on their hometown football teams. They’ve helped a neighbor with his fencing, brought their kids along on cattle drives, drove the school bus to town and back every weekday, filled the collection plate at church and then helped rebuild its steeple.

These people continue this way to this day and I expect many in this generation, my generation, will be telling similar stories when it’s all said and done…stories that start with back breaking, 80 hour a week job and end in a life made.

A kind of life we are all living out here surrounded right now by oil derricks and pumping units and wheat fields and new stop lights and cattle and badlands. And I know you’re hearing about it. It’s big news in a tough economy–an oasis of jobs,  opportunity and money in what some have come to refer to as “The Wild West” or “The Black Gold Rush.” It’s a story of hope, yes, but what we really like is the drama don’t we? We like to hear about the guy who came to North Dakota on a prayer only to live in his car in the Wal-Mart parking lot while he hunted for a job that allowed him to send money home to his wife and kids, or build a house, or a booming business. We like to talk over the dinner table about how the bars are full and the lines are long at the post office, about how a new building is going up and how the new stop lights and three lane highway is not doing enough to control the traffic.

We talk about how our lives are changing. I have been trying to wrap my mind around what this means for the place I have and always will call home. But the bottom line is that without this change, I probably wouldn’t be here to contemplate it at all.

Yesterday I worked with a small group of elementary children who are full of life and love and energy and ideas…and nearly all of them have moved with their parents to this town within the last couple years. They come from all different backgrounds, from several states away. They come with ideas and insight into a world that extends outside this small and growing town where they now live.  Some of them have left the only house they have known behind, some have left pets and horses they used to ride, wide open space and friends to live in a new place, a place much different from where they came from. A place that has work, but doesn’t have an abundance of houses their parents can chose from with big back yards where they can play.

When asked where they are from they will tell you Wyoming, California, Montana or Washington.

When asked about their home, they say it is here.

Change? Compared to these children, we know nothing of it.

Because last night I returned to the ranch after dropping off the last student only to pull on my tennis shoes and drive down the road with Husband to meet up with neighbors to play a few games of volleyball. And there we were at a small, rural recreation center surrounded by some of the community members who raised funds to build the place nearly fifteen years ago. Fifteen years ago when the pace was slower, but the most important values were there.

The value of having a space to get together to play a game, to craft, to hold meetings and New Years Eve parties and baby showers. In that very gym where I skidded across the floor last night to hit a volleyball my neighbor passed to me was the very gym I served pancakes in as part of a youth group fundraiser when I was twelve years old. It was where I gathered with friends and family after a community member’s funeral. It was where I attended 4-H meetings and put on talent shows with my friends. And it’s where I’m going to craft club next Tuesday. Yes, nearly fifteen years after that talent show this is still my meeting place and I still get to call all of the teachers, ranchers, accountants, stay at home moms, business owners and yes, oil industry professionals who are running after fly volleyballs, laughing and joking and skidding across the floor, my neighbors. 

But you know what I need to remember? Those students and their families and the people who are on their way here to look for a better life?  They are my neighbors too. And they have a lot to teach us.

So if you ask me how life has changed, I might tell you about the traffic. I might tell you how there are a couple oil wells behind my house and how that was hard to get used to. I will tell you about the new business coming to the area and how we now have stop lights in town. I will tell you about the challenges. And then I will tell you about the people who are keeping their fingers on the pulse of this development and discovery. I will tell you about those who are asking the right questions about our environment and making the tough decisions about our infrastructure in order to better accommodate new students in our schools and new residents of our towns so that they feel they belong here the same way I belong.

They are on the front lines welcoming visitors to the museum, taking the time to ask questions at the grocery store, spending their retirement as County Commissioners, City Council and Chamber of Commerce members. I will tell you about the people who are not only sticking it out during these growing pains, but who are working every day to make their home a better home for the next generation.

Yes, right now our community is overwhelmed. Whether or not we saw this coming, whether or not we thought we were prepared, many days for many people it feels like the phone calls, the needs that can’t be met, the questions that don’t have answers yet, are overwhelming…and it’s tempting for many to pack up and leave a place they don’t feel they recognize anymore.

But here’s what I’m proposing to those living in the middle of the Wild West and to those in any community really:

Stand up for it. Go to meetings. Ask questions. Play Volleyball together. Exist in it. Don’t be afraid to be frustrated, but then do something. Anything. Invite a new person to your quilting club. Put on a talent show. Volunteer. Attend a basketball game. Mentor a student. Instead of complaining about the trash in the ditches, get your friends together to pick it up. Set a good example. Set your standards and then be prepared to put your muscles into it.


If it’s your community, make it your priority. Because it’s your community and it’s worth loving and fighting to take the frustrations and turn them into solutions. To turn the complaining into action. To shift from fear and uncertainty to a place of positive energy and open-mindedness.

It isn’t  easy, but those who have seen this through, those who have walked the main streets when the stores are full only to turn around to see them empty, those who built that school, owned that store, lived in that house for 50 years, they will tell you, not only is it worth the effort, it’s our responsibility.

Want to keep up with what’s happening in Western North Dakota and my hometown?
Visit: mckenziecounty.net for the latest in news and progress and the North Dakota Petroleum Council for information on North Dakota’s oil industry.


And then we sang Red River Valley…

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Sometimes in the middle of a life in the middle of America, you are handed a couple of days, or moments, where you are graciously reminded of what is so good and wholesome about a community that exists on the end of a two lane highway with no stoplight, no Walmart, no mall and no place else you’d rather be on a Friday afternoon.

And so I had a weekend filled with small town, mid-west, rural, main street, wholesomeness that began with the execution of an event I helped to plan on Main Street Watford City, ND–my hometown’s Best of the West Ribfest–where I manned the entertainment stage while community members milled around the vendor booths, ate lunch on picnic tables outside Main Street stores, breathed in the scents of barbecues warming and turning their rib suppers and enjoyed games, music and other entertainment on the big stage…

entertainment that included watching me attempt to help call bingo by turning on the bingo blower machine thingy and launching the numbered balls all over the damn street.

Lord, I just wasn’t meant for some things.

Anyway, husband, along with seventeen other businesses, vendors and crazy grillers, participated in the rib cooking contest. And at 5:30, after the judging was done, Bingo was mercifully over, my big sister’s dancers showed us their Michael Jackson Thriller moves, the kids were all settled in for the rest of the evening on those crazy, sweaty, inflatable jumper things, and Lonesome Willy and I sang for our supper, it was time to eat already.

I had a great view from the stage and watched as people emerged from their businesses, ready for the weekend, and began filling the street, up and down, waiting for the smokey, spicy, barbecue tastes of the grilled ribs. The street flooded with neighbors, tourists, new comers, children and pets.


And from my post it became apparent that this was the most people I’ve ever seen on Main Street Watford City at one time. I was proud of our town as I rested my blistered feet that were shoved in my fancy boots for the day and listened to some of the best local musicians around pick a banjo, a dobro, an acoustic guitar, and sing songs about their North Dakota home.

And the music filled the street, the ribs sold out, I announced the world’s longest chicken dance, signed an autograph for a couple of confused guys who thought I was a famous D.J. and then wondered who the hell’s name was on the back of their shirt as they walked away, the big band showed up, the full moon rose, I found myself a beer and watched my community laugh, relax, dance, shake hands, meet one another and enjoy themselves in the middle of the street, in the middle of America, in the middle of an oil boom, in the middle of a season that passes all too quickly around here.

It was necessary. It was appreciated. It was hometown as hometown needs to be…

I loaded up in husband’s pickup and he drove me home, pulled off my red boots, poked at my blisters and then I got up to do it all over again the next day. Because as wholesome as Friday night was, I got another dose as I put on a dress and headed back to town to sing at a wedding at our hometown church and then pointed my car north to meet the guys out at a farmstead near Hazen, ND.

Because we were scheduled to play a community barn dance and, so, when you’re at a barn dance you need the proper footwear. I did a quick outfit change, squeezed on my fancy boots again and followed the highway out of oil country, down a gravel road and into a perfectly mowed, perfectly beautiful, perfectly placed farmyard on the edge of Lake Sakakawea.

And in the middle of the yard stood a white and green barn that reached up the prairie sky and was spilling out people and children laughing and chatting and singing in cowboy hats and boots. The smell of burgers on the grill greeted me as lugged my guitar towards the band milling around outside, waiting for 8:00 to get behind their guitars, behind their microphones and behind their music.

We climbed the steps to the hay loft where the festivities took place and instantly I was transported to another place, another time, where the world still had barn dances, where the table cloths were still checkered red and white, where people danced the two step and sang along with old time country music, where they still wore cowboy boots.

I was on a movie set, you know, like the one where Sandra Bullock wears a beat up hat and jeans and takes photos and drives around a classic old pickup. The one where the small town band sounds straight out of Nashville. The one where she falls in love at the end after Harry Connick Jr. swings her around the wood floor of the barn as the lead singer taps his foot to Peaceful Easy Feeling and the crowd sings along.

Seriously.

But I wasn’t Sandra Bullock. Sandra Bullock was that beautiful blond in the black hat dancing with her boyfriend. No, I was the band.

And the guys playing next to me, some of the best musicians around, picked all the right songs and played all the right beats. Their grins spread wide as the family crowd requested songs the guys knew and then danced and cheered when they played them. The lead part drifted out through the hay loft window behind me and on over the prairie and to the lake as I sang harmony to my dad’s chorus and then a song I wrote and then Red River Valley and oh my, there they were, singing along.

So we all sang together. That family, that community. We sang Red River Valley and then Home on the Range and stomped our feet and clapped our hands as our voices joined together…

“May the circle, be unbroken, by and by Lord by and by…there’s a better home awaiting in the sky Lord in the sky…”

We sang it again…

and again…

and so did they, the crowd, our hosts for the evening. They sang with us too as they bounced their sleepy children, swung around their grandma, slapped their cousin and uncles on the shoulders, and just genuinely enjoyed themselves.

Genuinely.

I headed home into the dark sky, the guys with the band trailer pushing through the early hours of the morning in front of me, with a renewed hope that the world maybe hasn’t changed much.

That maybe in the hustle and bustle of progress, politics, and technology even the fancy cell phones that can tell you what road your on when you’re on it still can’t tell you where you really might be headed…

to a place where people still wear cowboy boots, where time has been preserved in the wood floors of a nearly hundred year old barn, where the only agenda is to laugh and dance with one another for goodness sake…

where the music really matters and so do the friendships.

A place on the end of a paved street with no stoplight, a place on the edge of a wheat field under the moon under the roof of a green and white barn that the GPS would never find…

but that we should never forget still exists…

4-H, the broken bean and why I may never sleep again..

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It was a partially-cloudy, partially-sunny, partially-windy, partially-calm, partially-cool, partially-warm day in the North Dakota badlands and I sat at a small lunch table in the school cafeteria in the middle of a little cowboy town. I had a name tag attached to my floral shirt. It said “Judge.” I had a binder, a pencil, a stack of papers, a sweat bead beginning to form on one of my eyebrows…and fifty kids’ hope of the grand champion ribbon hanging on my “expert” opinion.

The hand of the clock moved to indicate it was 8:00 am in this cowboy town on the edge of the buttes. It was 8:00 and it was time to get serious. Because this was the moment every country, crafty, green thumbed, talented kid in the county had been getting ready for all summer.

The cafeteria began to buzz, a little more energy walking through the double doors with each passing hour. Kids in white shirts and boots that squeaked on the tile floor rushed around carrying homemade quilts, photos, plants, and bugs pinned to foam board while the the white and green clover patch hung proudly above their hearts.

The hearts they have pledged to greater loyalty.

Meanwhile, my loyal heart was breaking.

Don’t be alarmed though. That’s just what happens when I am face to face with a young man in a button up shirt and glasses who has lugged a ten pound pot filled with petunias from his family’s farm thirty miles away only to plop it down in front of me on that cafeteria table, the top of his head barely peeking over the red, leafy plants, and begin to explain the method he followed to make the plant grow so lusciously large…all the while poking at the dirt and trying to put the chunk of plastic that had fallen off of the pot on the long journey back in its proper place.

“Don’t worry,” I told him. “This is about the plant not the pot…and the plant looks great!”

He instantly relaxed and went on about how he made sure to keep an eye out for his plants because they have some dogs full of mischief at their farm, and how he used Miracle Grow soil this time, soil that absorbs water if you accidentally give the plant too much. And that is what he learned.

That and to be careful in the transport.

It was a blue ribbon plant, a blue ribbon interview, a blue ribbon kid…it was going to be a blue ribbon day.

Ahhh, this was 4-H at its finest. One of the last truly wholesome things in the world and I got to be a part of it.

Although, I’m not so sure that I was their best choice, you know, given my soft spot for children who have put their loyal hearts, clear-thinking heads, service-oriented hands, and health to work all summer on giant latch hooking projects, wildflower collections, a terrarium in an aquarium, a leather tooled pouch, and a cross for their father’s grave.

How do I chose a favorite?

How do I chose a best when I am dealing with the best–the kids who dedicate their summer to learning, to doing, to accomplishing something meaningful to showcase, to pass along and share?

What do I say to the young lady smack dab in the middle of teenage-dom who presented me with a photo of her perfectly posed red border collie and smiled with pure innocence and delight as she talked about his puppy antics, his cow-dog capabilities, his big, loving personality and why she likes to photograph him? How do I tell her that while she was explaining all of the different scenes she photographed before choosing this, her favorite, a photo of her pet that will go on her wall, she was single handedly restoring my hope for the future of her generation?

Blue ribbon. That’s what I say. Blue, blue, blue.

And how do I tell the lankly, shy fifteen-year-old that the story he was telling me about walking the ditches with his dad to capture a photo of a perfectly constructed, perfectly vibrant, perfectly lovely wild sunflower with the old camera he was given was giving me a lump in my throat? How do I tell him that, from now on, every patch of wild sunflowers I see will tempt me to look for the most symmetrical and most pristine plant out there…and it will reminded of him?

Blue. Blue. Blue ribbon for you.

And what to I say to the little girl in glasses who had been waiting in line for a half an hour to proudly show me her purple flowers in a purple flower pot? How do I tell her that yes, her flowers are lovely, but her personality and manners and respectful and lovely nature will take her far in gardening and in life? How do I tell her that she’s going to grow up and it’s going to get a little hard sometimes, but to always remember this moment and that her favorite part about gardening was getting to play in the dirt?

Blue I say. Blue ribbon!

And what about the sixteen-year-old girl who showed an amazingly artistic photo of a trip she took to the big city while also showing me a zest, love and excitement for adventure and new experiences along the way. How do I ask her to send me a postcard from Paris when she gets there,  a shout out when she’s barrel racing at the National High School Rodeo Finals, a photo from the top of Mt. Everest?

Well, I guess I tell her to take more pictures, take all the pictures she can…and she’s got herself a blue ribbon.

Oh, I am hopeless. Absolutely hopeless. And apparently with a little experience it doesn’t get better. See, I judged 4-H for the first time a few weeks ago at my home county’s fair. Pre-teen photography. I was blown away. I don’t know if it is the new digital camera technology or the eye for detail these kids have because, you know, they are a little closer to the ground and everything, but there were photos in this group that I would hang on my wall with pride, that I would submit to contests, that I would put in a calendar. I wanted to stand up and cheer.

Needless to say, there was enough blue ribbons to go around. And they were all deserving.

And I slept good that night.

Which brings me to this.

Sigh.

In the middle of the buzz and chaos yesterday a little girl with a Beezus haircut and a froggy voice stood in line for a good fifteen minutes to meet with me. She was holding a long tub filled with dirt and a few leafy plants on skinny stems that waved and bowed as she shifted her weight from one foot to the other. Barely big enough to wrap her arms around her pot she carefully set her project down in front of her and cleared her throat. And while she was explaining to me how she found these beans and planted them and placed them next to the window in her house to get some sunlight, I examined the beans, wiped the sweat from my eyebrow and whimpered silently to myself.

Because this girl was adorable.

Lovely.

A specimen of a 4-H kid with the white shirt, the blue pants, the clover patch, the bubbly spirit, the perfect posture…

But her beans lacked the same grand champion outfit and stature, in fact, one of her beans was broken, held up by masking tape.

But this girl, this adorable little girl loved her beans. Who was I to tell her they aren’t perfect? And did it really matter anyway? But what would it say to the other blue ribbon winners if a broken bean got a blue ribbon too? What type of standard would that set? How was I to be taken seriously as a judge ever again? I liked this gig. I loved the kids. I want to be invited back but the bean is broken!!!? Where is the manual that explains what to do in a situation like this: cute kid, perfectly dressed, perfectly passionate about gardening, and a broken bean!

What’s a softy former 4-H nerd to do, ask her when the bean broke? April? August? Did it matter? Can a taped bean plant even continue to grow? I should Google that….

The ppprrreesssuuuurrreeeee…

The ggguiiilllltttt….

Eeekkk, I crumbled.

I crumbled and wrote her a note about all of the things she did right, all of the wonderful things she was made of and all of the things she could do to improve her bean’s future…and then I gave her a red ribbon.

She smiled as I handed her the note, put her tiny arms around the bean pot and skipped over to her mother.

I melted in a big puddle on the ground and told myself it was for the best. A learning experience. She will come back next year with blue ribbon beans for sure…

but I may never sleep again.

I imagine you have never given much thought to the inside pressures of the average 4-H judge have you?

Well now you know.

And if you’ll excuse me, I need to go find my medication…

To the kids

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It’s 11 pm on Tuesday and tomorrow I am traveling 65 miles to teach a class at an event for youth called  Marketplace for Kids held in a neighboring college town.

Marketplace for Kids is something I may or may not have attended in my youth as an ambitious 8 or 9 or 10 year old– an educational program offered to students from around the state to help encourage young entrepreneurs and give them a chance to present and explain their projects–which are no doubt brilliant and creative and inspiring.

I will be a part of their opening ceremony. I will be singing a song. I will be teaching five, twenty-five minute classes about how I got from ranch kid, to singer/songwriter, to college student, to career woman and, then back to the ranch–this time as a grown woman.

I will be up all night.

Yes, I have known about this gig since January, but three months later and nine hours until the event itself, I still have no idea why they want me there. I spent all day today going over my class notes, trying to find the best way to explain myself.  Trying to figure out how to communicate my goals and ambitions and minor successes to a room full of 7 or 8 0r 9 or 10 year olds.

Trying to figure out really, how I got here.

I don’t know if I’m the right woman for the job…I just don’t know if I have what it takes. The thing that gives me hope is my one redeeming quality: I can still remember, vaguely, what it was like to be their age–so full of creativity and life and love for the things around me.

I can still remember, vaguely…

And you know, since I have been doing all this thinking, here’s what I think–I think that’s what has saved me and got me here today, doing something I love in a place I love the most in the world.

So now it’s 11:10 pm and having been at this quest, this journey about what to say to a crowd of children who are no doubt smarter than I am, unofficially since I was asked to do the gig in January and officially since 8 am this morning. And I think I might have finally got it.

I’m still nervous. But I think I got it. Or something that resembles it.

I guess I’ll find out tomorrow…

To the kids

Hello! I was so excited to talk to you all today. I’ve been thinking about what to say to you for months. I worry about things like this.  It’s such a fun opportunity to talk to you about what I’ve learned in my 27 short years….I didn’t want to mess it up!

I wanted to tell you a little about myself, about how I have been playing guitar and writing poetry and music about the ranch I grew up on since I was 12 years old and how I recorded a couple CDs and how I traveled the country for years singing songs, like the one I just sang for you today.


I wanted to tell you about how, after all of the miles I traveled and all of the songs I sang along the way, I have moved back to the ranch and am now working on opening it up to guests so they can come and visit, take photos, hike and bike and ride horses and learn about ranching and cattle.

I wanted to tell you all about how I got to where I am and how, with enough drive and ambition, you can grow up to be anything you want to be…


But the thing is, as I look out at you I remember myself at your age. And I remember that you already know that. Someone has already told you this a time or two haven’t they?

Because when I was your age I knew it. I knew what I loved—horses and music and wildflowers and lizards and my friends and family and pet dogs—I knew I loved all of the space around me and the adventure and freedom of growing up and living in the country.  I knew who I was.

Jessie Veeder. Brown Hair. Brown Eyes. Tomboy. Nature Lover. Animal Lover. Singer. Cowgirl.


And I look at you out here and I see blond hair and black hair and boys and girls, big sisters, little brothers, inventors and authors and movie stars and firefighters and business owners. You all have your interests and your hobbies and your talents. They are being developed right in front of my eyes. I can see it happening as I speak.

So instead of telling you that you can be anything you want to be, what I really want to tell you is to just, please…

Be You.


Do the things you love. Explore and make friends and travel and learn about what makes you happy and what you do best. And go out and do it. Every day.

And as you grow up you will find it will be hard sometimes, and sometimes you will be pulled in unexpected directions, sometimes you will be lonely and sometimes you will fail…


But when that happens, remember yourself here, at 7 or 10 or 13 years old. It will be easy to do if you stay true to yourself, the one who is sitting in these chairs with all of your plans and talents and goals and spirit.…

Remember you.

Be You. The very best version.

And I promise you will succeed.

Well, it should go something like this, depending on my level of panic or the fact that I realize when I get to the event that this isn’t what they had in mind when they called me at all.

I’ll let you know how it goes…and if they Slushie me Glee Style.

A Monday report

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Happy Monday everyone. I hope all of you North Dakotans made it home safe and warm after the crazy weather that hit our great state on Friday. Because as I was telling my dramatic story about the mis-adventures of a potentially one-eyed pug while safe in the walls of this little house, the wind was whipping snow across a landscape freshly coated with ice, shaking the trees and making me bite my nails thinking about husband out on the road.

I couldn’t see my barn, blinded by the wall of white in what I am sure, now that we are out of it, was the worst storm of the season. Friends and neighbors who had braved the much calmer morning weather to get to work, events, the grocery store, meetings and neighboring towns, were blindsided by how quickly the wind picked up leaving  many of them stranded in office buildings, interstates, county roads, gravel roads, churches, welcoming strangers’ homes, hotels, restaurants, gas stations and community buildings.

As the wind screamed over the prairie, over 800 people were being rescued off of the roads by the National Guard and rescue workers with big trucks and snow machines. But miraculously and thankfully, when all was said and done, according the Bismarck Tribune, there were no related deaths from cold or traffic accidents, husband and pops made it home safely and we were greeted the next morning with sunshine and a promise of warmer weather.

In true North Dakota fashion.

And while I was thinking about my stranded friends who were updating friends and family about the low-visability and utter amazement about the conditions with light-hearted Facebook postings, texts, video clips and phone calls, my thoughts were with them out there amid that adventure…

and those suffering from the devastating results of the earthquakes and Tsunami in Japan as I watched the heart wrenching events play out before me on the news.

Because it’s times like these you are slammed in the face with how little control humans have over the world. We can build our bridges and sky-scrapers, update our technology, drive the fastest car and continue the advancement of medicine, but Mother Nature, in all of her awe and glory can bring us the highest highs only to slam us with the most desperate of situations. And over everything else humans are capable of accomplishing– building, inventing, developing, progress–  in the end our most invaluable traits continue to be human kindness, generosity, resilience and our ability to heal and help and believe in times like these.

So that being said, in honor of this beautiful day given to us in the calm after the storm,  I would like to share with you some exciting news. Because this great state, with the people who brave the storm to help weary travelers and welcome strangers into their homes during a blizzard, have welcomed me and my stories into their homes as well through the radio waves. Yup, excerpts from “Meanwhile, back at the ranch…,” read by Yours Truly in all of my northern accent glory, will be featured on Prairie Public Radio a few times a month.

You can listen in your car, or on your radio at home if you are in the area. But you can also listen online at www.prairiepublic.org

My first reading, “The ghosts of winters past”, aired last week. And despite my re-recording it approximately six-thousand times to accommodate for the swearing and “uuugggghhhss and oooohhhhsss” each time I slipped up while holding on to hope that my voice would change from a thirteen-year-old with an uncontrollable northern accent to that of a sophisticated female radio commentator, I think it turned out ok…at least that is what my relatives told me.

Because that’s what relatives have to tell you about things like this.

I wouldn’t know because I can’t bring myself to listen to it even one more time.

Anyway, you can judge for yourself by listening to it here at “Hear it Now”.

And now that my voice is back, I am prepared to return to the ruthless radio voice recording ring once again and I would love your feedback and suggestions on what stories you would like to hear me read on the radio. Any favorites in the archives? Anything you would like me to talk about that I haven’t yet? Send me an email or leave a comment and let me know.

What a great little adventure, thanks Prairie Public for the opportunity. And thank you all for your support. I feel so fortunate to be from an area that encourages its people and welcomes their thoughts and art and music into their lives. And I am feeling blessed that I am here, safe and warm, surrounded by the people I love in all of this dramatic, unpredictable, beauty…

…with a voice to tell you I love you, feeling like that needs to be said today…

Ice, rocks, slippery shoes and a sweeper thing.

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Little known fact: Curling is a sport.

An Olympic one.

Another little known fact: I have curled. Once.

Not so little known fact: I am not an Olympian.

And I have no idea what these people are doing.

But curling is a part of my life. Well, at least it is once a year.

Because husband and I have on our life schedule, you know, the one that we all keep with the holidays and birthdays and big events penciled in, a weekend titled “Curling Extravaganza.” And it is a weekend that hasn’t been missed for a good four to five years.

See, my sister in-law married a Canadian, a great man who grew up in the friendly, neighboring country to the north. And if you were ever wondering how people up in the north country keep themselves entertained during the winter months without mountains to ski down, I have two words that I believe to be quite accurate considering my experience and close proximity to Canadians and their fine country:

Ice Slabs.

And up here in North Dakota we are practically Canadians anyway (and proud to display the maple leaf flag) so the art of ice hockey and curling has trickled down a bit to the U.S.–well at least a few miles anyway.

And so with the merging of our fine families, curling entered my life.

But before I go any further, I suppose I better attempt to describe to you, if you aren’t already enlightened, what curling actually involves. And because there is nobody around to help coach me through it, you will have to hear it in my own words. Ok.

Curling is:

  • One ice slab, painted with red and blue lines and circles
  • Sixteen (8 to each team) red and blue 42 lb rocks or “stones” made out of solid, polished granite.

Two teams of four decked out in thermal type clothing and something I like to call a slippery shoe  holding a broom-sweeper looking thing. I suggested helmets, but apparently that isn’t part of the dress code.

The sweeper thing...

The slippery shoe. Typically worn on the right or left foot. Shown here on the shoulder. Although I didn't ask, I am assuming that is where they put it when not in use...or just to confuse people like me

The team...no helmets.

  • Some hollering

    Yes, it is a spectator sport...

  • Lots of  laughing and quite a bit of beer

Beer, mixed drinks...whatever. That's what cup holders are for.

Ok, got it?

So you take all of the above ingredients and combine them to get to the object of the game, which appears to me to be a bit like shuffleboard on ice, although I have no idea how to play shuffleboard either.

But the point is that each team takes turns sliding the rocks across the slab of ice to land them as close as they can to the “house,” which is somewhere in the blue and red target on either end of the slab.

They use the broom looking thing to sweep the space in front of the rock in order to melt the bumpy ice and keep the rock moving where they prefer the rock go.

And they want to rock to go to the center of the target. Because that’s how you accumulate points–the team with the rocks resting closest to the center of the target at the conclusion of the round, or “end,” gets points (how many points is something I have yet to figure out).

An “end” is completed when each team is finished throwing their rocks.

And the team with the most points at the conclusion of the game wins.

They tell me there are eight or ten ends in each game…but maybe there are more…

They tell me it’s easy.

I tell them I’ll be at the bar.

Yeah, there's a bar at the curling club...

Anyway, I am confused just trying to briefly explain the logistics to you, so I can’t imagine that you have continued reading….

But if you’re still with me and feel like you might really want to learn how to play, I’ll give you my father-in-law’s phone number and he will be more than happy to explain. Just make sure you have a good three to eight hours to spare. Or you can click here to learn more than I will ever know about the great sport.

But there is one thing I do know: A curling tournament is called a bonspiel. And that is where we were this weekend. At a bonspiel where spirited northerners gather to curl–Canadians, North Dakotans, young, old, men, women, experts, athletically challenged and everyone in between. Some of the teams that attend have been together for years and traveled to enough bonspiels together to justify purchasing matching shirts. Some teams only curl together once a year. Some teams consist of relatives and best friends. Some relatives are friendly rivals because there is no way they can exist on the same team. But all teams compete with one thing in mind–the love of the strategy and friendly competition and camaraderie.

And that’s my favorite part about the sport. Because even at its highest level, this attitude prevails.

So here is where I share with you one more little known fact: The USA Curling National Championships were held in my college town of Grand Forks, ND in 2004 and I was asked to sing the National Anthem. I did and I am pretty sure it aired on like ESPN 24 and that is as close to famous as I’ll ever come.

Anyway, that was also my first experience with the sport. As a public relations student at the time of the tournament we took the bonspiel on as part of a professional PR project. I remember asking the competitors at this insanely successful level, what was so special about curling, and every competitor, young and old,  replied: “it’s the people.”

An action shot of one of my favorite people...my sister-in-law...

And that is my favorite part about the sport–it just doesn’t matter who you are because at the end of the day all the competitors really want to do is get together, get out of the house and laugh over beer and friendly competition.

They don’t care if you just rolled in off of the ranch in your dorky boots and wool cap. They are so friendly and make it look so easy that you actually believe this is a sport you could be good at. And they convince you to put on the slippery shoe and grab a broom thing and give it a try.

A bin of sweeper things...

So you do. And you fling that 42 lb rock across the ice slab sending it off into the wild blue yonder or over into the other lane while you try to gain your balance on the ice that you didn’t believe to be so slippery just a moment ago. And so you do it again, with coaching from both teams, concentrating so hard on staying standing that you have no idea what the score is or how many “ends” you’ve played or why you chose to wear these ridiculous snow boots today or who is on your team and why is everyone walking towards the door and shaking hands leaving you standing on the far side of the slab yelling “Hey guys, is it over? Hheeeyyya gguuuyyyyaaasss!’

And when you finally make it to the other end of the rink (rink, is it called a rink?) they hand you beer to take the edge off while they tell you that you have just curled (for your first time ever) against the World Junior Champions and assisted your new-found team in losing so bad they decided to quit early.

Then you laugh and go upstairs and a have a few more beers in preparation to redeem yourself at a couple of sports you actually know something about.

Karaoke.

And dancing.

I never fail to kill them with the dancing.

That may or may not have happened to someone I know at some point in time.

Thanks for another successful curling extravaganza Williston Basin Curling Club.

Until next year, I’ll be on the frozen dam out back practicing with my broom and prairie rock, preparing to blow those Junior World American Canadian Champions of the Universe curlers out of the frozen water.

I guess I better get shoveling.