The hay is baled up and waiting to be moved out of the fields.
he hot sun is starting to turn the leaves on the trees a little bit lighter.
The cattails are bending and swaying in the warm breeze.
The water in the stock damns is getting low and covered in moss.
The tomatoes are ripe.
The school busses are kicking up dust on the back roads.
The days are getting shorter.
Coming Home: Summer can’t last as life goes on
By Jessie Veeder
9/1/13
Fargo Forum
www.inforum.com
Summer’s almost over.
Western North Dakota grows wild plums. In the patches of brush where the poison ivy sneaks and the cows go to get away from the flies, they start as blossoms on the thorny branches and, under the hot sun, turn from green in early July to red to a dark purple bite-sized berry just waiting to be picked in the beginning of autumn.
Wild plums mean summer is almost over. They mean roundup is on its way. They mean sucking on pits and spitting them at your little sister. They mean scratches from branches on a detour for a snack on the way to get the bull out of the trees.
They mean Pops’ stories of grampa sitting at the table in the winter dipping into a jar of canned wild plums , drenching them in cream and stacking the pits neatly on the table.
They mean memories of grandma’s jelly on peanut butter toast.
They mean reassurance that sweet things can grow in brutal places.
They mean a passing surprize on our way through a pasture and coming back later with the farm pickup to fill up a bucket, me squished in the middle seat between my husband and my dad, the Twins playing on the radio as we bump along on prairie trails that haven’t been under a tire in months looking for that magical patch of fruit, wondering out loud if we could of dreamed it.
Laughing at the thought.
Wild plums mean listening to the two men banter as they pick and reach and gather like little boys, making plans for the best way to fill our bucket.
“Shake the tree, we can get the ones on top.”
“Keep ’em out of the cow poop…poop plums are no good.”
“Are you eating them Jess. Hey, no eating!”
“I’ve never seen a patch like this. Jessie, you can make so much jelly!”
Yes. I could. With the 6 gallons of plums we picked last night standing in the bed of the pickup, ducked down in the clearing where the cows lay, scaling along the edges of the trees, I could make jars of jelly, pies, pastries and syrups to last until next plum picking season.
But even if I didn’t. Even if we did nothing more than feed those wild plums to the birds, it wouldn’t matter. The magic of wild and pure things is in their discovery and the sweet reminder that happiness can be as simple as a wild plum patch.
It’s birthday day today! It’s hot and muggy without even the slightest hope of a breeze and I’m eating popsicles and contemplating a birthday afternoon nap. Sounds about right for every August 25th I can remember.
And so I’m happy to report the deck was a hit, and so were the margaritas and the thirty-seven salads, the beans, the chips and dip, the roast beef and the sweet Super Mario birthday cake my friend made.
Did you know that the first Nintendo was released in 1983?
Yes.
I share a birthday with Mario.
And the moonwalk.
And Hooters.
It was a good year.
And it was a good day.
And I am grateful.
Coming Home: Whether it poured or sprinkled, birth story holds truth
By Jessie Veeder
8/25/13
Fargo Forum
www.inforum.com
Happy Friday to you. I hope you get off work early and have plans to sip cold drink on a summery deck somewhere.
I’m spending mine under a blanket on my cozy couch dosed up on pain pills after partaking in a little surgery (nothing major…and no, not a nose job) yesterday.
Yes, full disclosure, I’m on drugs.
Word is I’ll be feeling better tomorrow. That’s what I’m telling myself anyway as I’ve been enduring daytime television programming and small attempts at sounding coherent on work calls I decided to return since I am home and not supposed to go anywhere.
And now for your lesson of the day: you shouldn’t return work calls when you’re on hyrdocodone.
You probably shouldn’t respond to emails either. Or write a blog.
But I could be worse. I could be Little Sister. She got her wisdom teeth removed on Wednesday.
She looks like a chipmunk and can’t eat Doritos.
So there’s that.
At least I can eat Doritos. If we had Doritos.
I could really go for some Doritos…
Yup, we’re a pathetic lot out here at the ranch. But while we’ve been resting Husband and Little Sister’s man have been working on putting up the deck in time for my birthday party because, besides world peace, my one birthday wish is that I will be able to celebrate 30 by toasting to old age with tequila on the beautiful deck attached to our house.
And my husband, bless his handyman soul, is doing what he can.
I’ll keep you posted.
But for now, in honor of Friday, mandatory couch time and my drug induced loss for words, I would like to give you a little update on what’s been going on around the old homestead these days.
To sum it up, it’s August and it’s been raining, which is not common for this month. Our ranch missed the recent devastating hail storm that rolled in across the country side, wiping out large wheat fields and leaving farmers to shake their heads at the loss. We are shaking ours at the thought.
The cows have been finding a new hole in the fence to crawl through every day because the grass is apparently greener.
The horses are sleek and are spending the warm days swishing their tails, nodding their heads and running from the flies,
the chokecherries are ripe, the plums will soon follow,
the clover is tall, the late summer wildflowers are in bloom,
the oil is still pumping,
The badlands are at their best,
LIttle Man keeps growing up,
the dogs have decided it’s their duty to protect us from the squirrels in the trees, so that’s why they never stop barking if you’re wondering…
The dragonflies are back for their fill of mosquitos. So are the bats. And we don’t mind at all.
The thunderheads roll in at night,
and the sunsets are spectacular.
There’s even been some rainbow sightings.
And we’re pretty happy around here, even when we’re not on the painkillers…
So you should come for a visit. You can stay in the cabin. That came this month too.
And God willing, in a week I’ll have a deck and I’ll pour you a cold one and we can cheers to good friends and good weather and good health.
But for a little while, I’ll be here, under this blanket, eating Doritos and watching that deck go up from the cool side of the window…
Peace, Love and pain medication,
Jessie
Husband’s gramma is in the hospital a few towns away. Yesterday we went to visit her.
I don’t normally talk about things like this, but I think I should because there are people in our life that we just adore and maybe we don’t tell them as much as we should.
And there are things in this life that just hurt too bad and maybe we don’t just let them hurt like we should.
And there are times you just need to sit with somebody when they are probably going to be ok, I mean, you’re optomistic, but nobody can make any promises and all you can say is, “Oh, good to see you. You are strong. We love you. Everything’s going to be alright.”
So that’s what Husband and I did yesterday. We went to say “Hello, good to see you, we love you,” to Gramma L., a spunky, straight-up lady who has a life story I always promised myself I’d get out of her one day.
She’s in the hospital. She’s going to be ok. There’s never a guarantee, but I believe it.
I adore her. I adore how she gets right to it. I adore how she can always find the best bargain. I adore her beautiful collection of vintage pins and the cap she always wears camping with us in the summer. I like how she writes thank-you and birthday notes and makes sure to mention she got the card on sale.
I adore her spirit.
I’ve probably never told her.
So we sat with her and talked to her about the weather and the chokecherries coming.
We talked about wood ticks and Juneberry pie. We talked about how technology is moving too fast and how she used to ride a sleigh to school with her feet on the hot coals. We talked about the house and how she’ll come and see it when she feels better.
We ordered her lunch and helped her eat it and worried when she only had a few bites.
We visited with family and caught up and got in the car and drove the three hours back to the ranch the two of us sort of quiet about it all.
And when we got home it was raining a little, but the sun was shining and so there was a faint rainbow over the hill outside the house, sneaking up on us while we were warming up some soup for a late supper.
The rainbow turned to clouds and the clouds to the most beautiful pink sunset. Everything was fresh and washed from the rain. I pulled on my boots and climbed the hill to watch the sun go down.
And while I walked I remembered what Gramma L., said about family.
Thank God for family. Thank God they love me. Thank God they come to visit. I have a lot of prayers.
I got to the top of the hill and felt a little tug of loneliness that sort of bloomed into that feeling you get when something exciting is about to happen. I imagined myself taking this walk with my child one day. A walk to go watch the sunset.
I think that would be a nice thing to do with a daughter or son.
I sat up there and watched then, I watched the sun turn the clouds orange and pink and blue and then disappear below the horizon to turn things gray.
All days end. But I loved this one and how it reminded me to slow down as it went out in a beautiful show.
To breathe.
To just love someone.
Then I remembered what Gramma L. said as we were leaving.
She told us to go and have fun. That’s what makes life great.
So I lifted my head and howled at the sky, knowing that the dogs would join in and that would make me laugh.
And it did.
The windows were open at the house below. I knew Husband could hear us.
I knew he would be laughing too.
Then I sent a little prayer up for Gramma L. and made my way inside before dark.
I’ve had some pretty great adventures in the name of music. This summer almost every weekend has been filled with some sort of gig that takes me away from this place for a bit.
I’ve loaded and unloaded my car and pickup dozens of times.
It’s been months since I’ve completely unpacked my bag.
Please don’t look in my closet. I don’t even want to look in my closet.
Anyway when you live in the middle of nowhere, pretty much everywhere you need to go involves a road trip. So it’s a good thing I’ve had years to master hours of car time. Sunflower seeds. Coffee. An updated play list on my iPod. A mental list of the most convenient places to stop for fuel. Not a bit of hesitation about singing at the top of my lungs, even when pulling up next to you at a stoplight. Windows open when the weather’s nice and the time is right.
The road to and from this place is early mornings, peaceful and dewy, running-late afternoons and evening sunsets where I don’t really feel like it but I’m going.
Some of my most creative times have been behind the wheel of my car, alone out there somewhere on a road in the midwest.
Some of my scariest have been out there too. Blizzard and tornado watches, black ice, flooding and miles and miles of antelope and sagebrush fields with an emptying tank and not a gas station for miles.
In the last few weeks my road trips have involved the men from my hometown band. It’s nice to have a pickup full of voices and stories about the old days playing in bar bands and bowling alleys. I welcome the company in the car and beside me playing guitar.
And it’s nice to have a crew that understands the life of a musician is mostly just an absurd train of events that involves setting up on flatbed trailers as a thunderstorm rolls through town, hauling around and hooking up sound system after sound system, laughing off requests to play “Smoke on the Water, ” to turn it up, to turn it down, to play something faster, or slower or something we don’t know. It’s good to know that this group won’t mind if a gig doesn’t quite turn out the way we planned, or the night drags on into morning, or we have to haul our guitars through a foot of mud to the stage. It’s alright. Because sometimes it’s great, and the harmonies are on and the audience is swaying and singing along and you know that they know that there’s more to music than the miles we’ve put on to get here and home in one piece.
So when you get back to the ranch at 3:30 in the morning only to wake to a call that the cows are in the neighbor’s wheat field, you don’t complain, you just take a swig of coffee, pull on your snap shirt and boots and head out the door to saddle a horse and bring them home.
Because it’s the life I chose. The one I write about and sing about and bring with me when I go.
Coming Home: Freedom sometimes means settling down
By Jessie Veeder
August 4, 2013
Fargo Forum
www.inforum.com
Music and miles, late nights and cows with terrible timing…
And it’s good.
Well party people, we’re officially the second day into my birthday month. Flip your calendars to the photo that features a sunflower or a golden wheat field. It’s August.
It’s August and in 23 days I will no longer be allowed to use the excuse “well, that was in my 20s…” for any and every one of my poor choices.
i.e.: The pug…
In 23 days I will seriously consider just letting my hair go gray, pour myself a glass of tequila and wave at 29 as it slips on out the back door and out into the home pasture, taking my youth with it as it goes on its merry way.
Goodbye youth. Perhaps it was always meant to be…
Bwahhhhh…..
So, yes, it’s official, I couldn’t stay 26 forever.
26 was my ideal age. Have I told you that? I don’t even know what I was doing then, probably broke in Missoula, MT climbing a mountain or contemplating just letting my hair turn to dreadlocks on its own. I thought 26 was good because I was old enough to have finished school, found someone who would marry me and continue my quest for a respectable job, but young enough that if none of those things worked out there would still be time.
I could take that trip to Europe or cross the country in an old Winnebego. There was no rush to settle down.
I was 26. I could pierce my nose and it would be cool. Because I was 26 and I was still young.
But turns out 26 turns to 27 and then 28 and pretty soon you’re on the back side of your twenties knee-deep in a complete home renovation project that keeps you from the buying that Winnebego and following dots on the map.
And you forgot to get your nose pierced.
I have 23 days. I could still do it.
But seriously folks. I’ve got 23 days before I’m 30 and I’m feeling a little wistful about the whole thing. I mean, I have to be honest, these last ten to twelve years of adulthood have been pretty great. I can’t complain. I’ve spent them traveling the country singing for my supper, dating and marrying my high school crush,
testing out different towns and different jobs, buying concert tickets, planning ski trips, raising two misfits dogs, updating my resume, tiling bathrooms, painting new bedrooms, writing my story and singing it out loud and moving all my earthly and hand-me-down possessions six times in six years.
I’ve learned what it takes to be married. I’ve learned what it feels like to be truly disappointed and truly happy. I’ve killed pretty much all of my house plants.
I’ve put on a million miles, grew a few muscles and found my way home.
And now here I am, looking out the window of our new house, our forever home, at a dirt pile that will someday be a lawn and I’m a little bit exhausted, a little bit satisfied, and little bit nervous, a little bit hungry (I’m always a little bit hungry) and a little like, oh, I don’t know what I’m doing…except I think I know exactly what I’m doing. I think…
My friends tell me my thirties will be the best years. They say you know who you are. They say you’re settled in. They say you’re more sure. More confident.
Older.
I guess I’ll find out.
Lately I’ve been staying up late, the windows open to the sounds of a stray truck rolling by on the pink road, the breeze pushing through the trees, the howl of a coyote. In that time when the house is quiet and so is the world, I allow myself the sense to feel that tightening lump in my chest, the one that makes you wonder what the hell you’re doing out here, wonder if you’re cut out for it all, wonder how long you have, what you’re missing, wonder what’s next, wishing for more time to think, to do, to sleep…
And then I close my eyes and listen to the sound of my husband’s breathing and convince myself to think about it all tomorrow in the light of day. Because the night is for sleeping and turning you one day older.
One day wiser.
But here’s the thing. I joke about turning another year older, but the truth is I’ve never been afraid of aging. I’ve always admired the women who let their hair grow long and gray, the ones who wear their clothes the way they like and how to change a tire, change a diaper and change the world.
I’ve always looked forward to becoming one of those women.
I remember being a little girl who couldn’t sleep. I would close my eyes and try to visualize what I might look like when I got older. Would my butt get big? Would I cut my hair short? Would I get my nails done on Saturday?
And then I would busy my imagination with making plans for my life, to be a veterinarian, then maybe a teacher, a wilderness woman, a horse trainer, a writer or maybe just a singer…like I don’t have to be famous or anything, just make enough money to sing for a living…
I would marry a handsome boy with brown hair and strong arms and we would ride horses and live in a cabin.
I would have a garden and a baby and dramatic adventures that always turned out ok in the end.
I wonder what that girl would think of us now, married with no baby and no garden in a house we make dirty with sawdust on the weekends and sweep up a little on Monday.
We always hated to sweep.
And we always hated the way the frizz of our curls escaped our ponytail. I think she’d be happy to know my hair is long.
Think she’d be glad that I married this boy.
And that I’m still singing, just enough to make a little bit of a living…that’s alright…
Yes, I think she’d be glad there’s still so much I want to do. She’d understand that’s those thoughts, the thoughts of what I want to be, are the same ones that keep me up late while I plan on growing up.
I think she’d tell me it’s gonna be fun…
On Friday evening we took a ride through the east pasture checking cows. The sky turned from blue to pink in front of our eyes and a small storm pushed through.We caught the breeze but didn’t get caught in the rain.
We caught the juneberries and the raspberries before the birds.
We caught Pops over the hill filling his mouth and his pocket and we were caught in one of the greatest things about living on this place.
Today I will attempt Juneberry pie because Husband packed his saddlebags and the breeze is blowing nice through the kitchen windows and it’s Sunday.
This is the kind of life I like to talk about. The kind of things I moved back here for. Sunsets and wildflowers and the sleek back of horses and fat happy cattle and Sundays and family.
These are all part of my reality.
But so is the dust kicked up by trucks tending to the oil well a mile down the road and the slick mud they make when it rains.
Sometimes I get stuck on my way out of this place.
Sometimes my car breaks down and so does our pickup on the way to get it all fixed. Sometimes the price of progress means you won’t possibly make it to your appointment on time.
And sometimes, after all that, one of those big trucks kicks up a big rock and you get another big chip to add to the 27 you already have in your windshield.
Sometimes I use my middle finger and think, hell, it’d be easier to just ride my horse out of here.
Sometimes it rains like hell and I’m reminded that I’m not perfect and neither is this place.
Sunday Column: Some days the Bakken ain’t so rockin’
By Jessie Veeder
7/21/13
Fargo Forum
I’m not perfect and neither is this place.
There’s not much I don’t like about July in North Dakota. It’s like 1,000 degrees out today, and I’m still gonna say it.
Because there’s a breeze. There’s always a breeze.
If I could hold on to this month for another I would. I would take the horseflies if it meant another thirty days of thundershowers in the evening…
Wild sunflowers in the road ditches…
Haybales lined up nice and neat in the fields…
Chasing cattle in the cool draws…
and windows open at night.
I’d take the pissed off squirrel chattering in the tree by my head if it meant I could sleep with the cool breeze tickling the curtains for another few days.
It’s kind of a funny way to wake up.
Kind of like I’m sleeping in a tree house.
Which is a pretty perfect place to be in July.
The best part of summer is the back of a horse on top of a hill when the sun is slowly sinking down below the horizon leaving a gold sort of sparkle in its wake. And the cows are in their place, grazing in the pasture with the big dam and the tall grass that tickles their belly.
And that guy you love is finished arguing with you about how to get them there, so you can relax now and just love each other and take the long way home to notice how the coneflowers are out in full bloom and the frogs are croaking like they’re trying to tell us something urgent. Something like, “Hey, stop worrying about trivial things. Stop working so hard to make more money to buy more stuff. Stop moving so fast. This is it right here guys. This is the stuff.”
Who knew frogs had such insight.
Around this ranch moving cattle is a sort of therapeutic chore. With everyone working a day job, taking care of the cattle is a priority that gets us home in the evening and out of the confines of the office, the checklists, the phone calls and the stress of the highway miles full of big oil trucks we pass by with white knuckles to get back home.
If our office could be the back of a horse all day, I think it’d be better for our blood pressure.
Maybe someday it will. Maybe not.
This is my third summer back at the ranch and every day I’m gaining more insight into what it takes to keep a place like this up and running. I’m beginning to understand that there are things in my life I need to weed out to make space for the time I want and need to spend out here on the back of a horse.
It’s funny coming from a woman who, three summers ago, started writing again because she had more time on her hands.
Because she didn’t know how to sit still.
Because she needed to work through what coming home for good means.
You’d think I’d have it figured out by now, but I’m not sure I’m there yet. For months our minds have been set on the bricks and mortar that hold us and all of the stuff we’ve picked up along the way.
That’s the step we are standing on.
But every day I look out the window, step outside to feed the dogs or pull at a weed or get in the pickup to move down the highway and I’m so overwhelmingly grateful that the summer came as promised.
And then I get a little lonesome.
And I haven’t figured it out quite yet, but I have a theory.
I have responsibilities. I have burdens I’ve placed on myself to move forward, to achieve goals. I have deadlines I’ve committed to and jobs to complete, people who have questions and dates marked on my calendar to leave.
And when I’m leaving I want to stay. When I stay I think I’m missing a chance.
What chance? I don’t know. Aren’t I where I want to be?
But I’m not eleven anymore. No one is buying my milk so I can play outside all day.
All I want to do is play outside all day.
All I want to do is sing.
All I want to do is write.
All I want to do is take photographs.
All I want to do is ride.
All I want to do is drink cocktails and sit on the deck that we need to build and catch up with my friends and family and take in the sunset.
All I want to do is everything.
Is this a battle we all fight, the battle of balance? I feel I’ve been fighting it my entire adult life, with a list of so many things I want to be, so many places I want to see, and only one body, one life to achieve it.
No frogs, I don’t want stuff. I want more time.
More time to sit for a bit on the back of a horse and watch the sun go down on a place I love with a man I love and watch the cows graze.
But no one is selling time, turns out it is homemade.
I just need to find the right recipe.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch... 