Sunday Column: Showing love with rhubarb

Posted on June 23, 2013 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

It’s Sunday and I might get to it this afternoon. The row of canning jars lined up on my counter top, bags of frozen strawberries preserved in the freezer

and stalks of rhubarb waiting for me in Pops’ garden,

waiting for me to stay home long enough to cut, measure thaw and put together a few jars of strawberry rhubarb jam.

It’s Sunday so it’s possible, if the rain keeps falling, hiding the blue sky that means we should go out and work.

Ride my horse.

Chase some cows.

Cut some weeds.

Cut some wildflowers.

Cut some rhubarb…

Because in this weather where the planting was done late and the vegetable seeds are working to break through the ground, the presence and plethora of the ever hearty rhubarb plant sitting out there in the dirt or hiding under the berry bushes makes me feel guilty for failing to reap the benefits.

Rhubarb should be appreciated, made into something, tasted, tested and shared. And because I haven’t had a moment to pick and put some sugar on it, I wrote about it.

Coming Home: Showing love with rhubarb
by Jessie Veeder
6/23/13
Fargo Forum
www.inforum.com

So I think I’ll make time for the jelly today. I owe it to the plant and my Pops who keeps reminding me, there’s rhubarb growing out back…

It’s summer now…

Posted on June 21, 2013 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

It’s summer now and the days are long, the sun moving slowly across the sky and hanging at the edge of the earth for stretched out moments, giving us a chance to put our hands on our hips and say “what a perfect night.”

It’s summer now and before dark officially falls we ride to the hill tops and then down through the cool draws where the shade and the grass and the creek bed always keep a cool spot for us.

Because it’s summer now and things are warming up. The leaves are out and so are the wildflowers, stretching and blooming and taking in the fleeting weather.

It’s summer now and the cows are home…

and so is Husband, home before the sun sets. Home to get on a horse and find Pops and ride fence lines.

It’s summer now and the dogs’ tongues hang out while they make their way to the spot of shade on the gravel where the truck is parked. They are panting. They are smiling. They just got in from a swim.

Because it’s summer now and the water where the slick-backed horses drink, twitching and swiping their tails at flies, is warm and rippling behind the oars of the water bugs, the paddle of duck’s feet, the leap of a frog and the dunk of a beaver’s escape.

It’s summer now and we keep the windows open so even when we’re inside we’re not really inside.

We can’t be inside.

Because it’s summer now and there’s work to be done. We say this as we stand leaning up against a fence post, thinking maybe if we finish the chores we could squeeze in time for fishing.

Because it’s summer and we heard they’re biting.

Yes, it’s summer and we should mow the grass before the clouds bring the thunderstorm that will wake us in the early morning hours of the next day. And it’s summer so we will lay there with the windows open listening to it roll and crack, feeling how the electricity makes our hearts thump and the air damp on our skin. Maybe we will sleep again, maybe we’ll rise to stand by the window and watch the lightening strike and wonder where this beautiful and mysterious season comes from.

And why, like the storm, it’s always just passing through.

Listening.

Posted on June 19, 2013 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

I went to bed last night with the windows open in the loft where we built our master bedroom. It was our first night in our room we’ve been working for months to complete and when I returned home from a night away on a singing job I found that my bed was moved upstairs, made and waiting for us to snuggle down and reap the benefits of another step almost complete.

I don’t know how Husband got it up there without the help of my giant muscles, but he did. And I was glad.

And exhausted.

When we were making plans for this house two years ago my idea was that when it was all said and done we would feel like we were living in a tree house and with the installation of the railing a few weeks ago I felt like our vision was finally coming together.

It made me feel like all that time spent looking at Better Homes and Gardens magazines and Googling things like “rustic railings” and “vintage lighting” and “log cabins” and “how to get wood glue and green paint out of my favorite Steve Earl t-shirt” was finally paying off.

I snuggled down next to Husband up there in our bedroom and made note of how we were a little closer to the stars and I liked it that way, up there among the oak tree tops.

This morning I woke up to Husband sneaking out to work. I rolled over to catch a few more blinks, noticing how the sky was beginning to turn pink with the touch of the first moments of sun. I thought I should get up, rise with it, drink my coffee and start on my writing project, but I slipped back to sleep for a moment while the world lit up.

And I woke again to the sound of a pissed off squirrel in the tree tops next to my head reading another critter its rights over something like trespassing on his side of oak or a stolen acorn.

At least that’s what I imagined as I woke from a dream about nothing in particular that I can remember.

I laid on my back and listened to that squirrel chatter, his obnoxious, angry squawk rising above the hundreds of bird species singing their morning song, the breeze rustling the full grown leaves and a truck kicking up dust on the pink road.

And although I couldn’t hear it, I thought about the swish of the horses’ tails in the pasture, the buzz the flies make around their ears and the soft nicker in their throats when I approach with a grain bucket.

I thought about the cattle pulling dew covered green grass from the ground, munching and chewing and bellowing low for their calves.

I thought about the croak of the frogs in the dam, the familiar sound I fall asleep to each night we let the windows open and the air in.

I thought about the plop of the turtle leaving his rock for a swim in that dam. I thought about the howl of the coyote and the sound of the dogs crying back.

I thought about my fingers squeaking across the strings of my guitar, sitting out on the chair under the small oaks, working to make a melody.

I thought about the sound of my husband’s breathing and the words he says out loud at night when the world is sleeping and so is he. I thought about what he might dream about.

And then I thought about the silence in this house as I lie listening to the world I was letting in through open windows. Silence between walls that have absorbed the noise of saw blades spinning, voices discussing dinner, crying over tiling projects and laughing at the memory of the stupid kids we used to be. It will be quiet in here today with the exception of my fingers moving over the computer keys, the coffee pot beep and the ice cubes dropping in the refrigerator. I will run the shower and get ready for a trip to sing outside in a different town this evening.

When I get home it will be late and Husband will be sleeping on the couch, the television reflecting the light of other peoples’ stories off his scruffy face. I will switch it off and walk up the steps to our bedroom to get closer to the stars and fall asleep to the sound of the frogs, thinking about the mornings to come in this house, the sounds of Christmases and birthday parties, failed dinners and dancing in the living room, conversations with friends, fights about bills and schedules and time, sobs about missing someone and laughter about having just what we need in a tree house with the windows open to the sounds of our wild world.

Sunday Column: Rooted

Posted on June 16, 2013 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

My dad is a man who is rooted.

He knows what he loves and he loves it wholeheartedly. He showed us how to stay planted while finding our wings. He taught us how to sing and how to ride a horse.

He taught us that sometimes the best idea is to take a moment to sit on the hilltop, look around and say “wow, isn’t this something.”

His outlook on life has been his greatest gift to me. His love for place flows through our blood.

Happy Father’s Day to a man who worked hard to make this my home.

Coming Home: Discovering history, past and future
by Jessie Veeder
6/16/13
Fargo Forum
www.inforum.com

Little Man, right before our eyes…

Posted on June 14, 2013 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

This is what Little Man does when he comes out to the ranch.

Little Man is my nephew, for those of you who just got on board here at Meanwhile. He’s my little big sister’s first and only son, our first and only nephew and the first and only grandkid, so, well, you know, his life’s rough.

This is what he used to look like before he grew up into a little boy who thinks he’s big enough to drive 4-wheelers.

Right before our very eyes! How did that happen?

Anyway, see that there? That’s him looking for the key to start up the machine. He knows we hid it from him.

We hid it from him because we knew if found it he would surely drive off over the hill with the puppy on his tail, flying fast, shifting gears, ramping rocks and cliffs and screaming through creeks and puddles.

He’s got an adventurous and mechanical mind.

He’s got overachieving coordination, just the kind you need to manage things like computers and iPads and lawnmowers and 4-wheelers.

He’s got an obsession.

I swear, he could sit on this thing for hours, and that says something, you know, for a two year old with an attention span of, well, a two year old.

That damn 4-wheeler, it’s one of a thousand tools Papa has to win his spot as Little Man’s favorite. It also helps that he has horses, a garden full of dirt, a really loud and funny monster impression, patience and a general willingness to allow Little Man to do whatever he wants.

Good thing Gram has fruit snacks or she wouldn’t stand a chance.

I know how she feels. I mean, Papa and Little Man are downright inseparable. When they’re together not one other thing exists in the whole entire world.

Except maybe the movie Despicable Me. Little Man loves Despicable Me, so I guess Gramma has that going for her too. It’s possible Papa could be ignored if she were to turn on Despicable Me.

But say the words “4-wheeler” or “horses” and all bets are off.

And that’s that.

So you see, if I don’t steal Little Man away from Papa when he comes out to the ranch, if I don’t bribe him with pug kisses and string cheese we wouldn’t get to bond over reading books, throwing the stick for the lab and playing “Hook” with the kitchen utensils.

Playing “Hook” means playing “Captain Hook” and that means playing swords.

Turns out my hamburger masher is a perfect sword.

So is my ladle.

I love Little Man. He’s such a cute little weirdo.

Now, if only Papa would go on vacation and his mom would let me keep him, I’d have everything I ever need 🙂

Just a short vacation Pops, you know, take that 4-wheeler and go fishing or something…

A neighborhood tradition.

Posted on June 12, 2013 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

We helped our neighbors brand calves this Sunday. The sun was finally shining enough to give us hope the corrals might dry up by the time the day was over, so it seemed like the perfect day to get some work done.

Branding calves is a traditional chore that happens once a year. And whether your herd is 50 or 500, branding is always a great and necessary excuse to get neighbors, friends and family together to get some work done under the big prairie sky.

Branding, for those of you who are not familiar with ranching operations, is what cowboys do to identify their calves a month or two after they are born in the spring. Each ranch has a certain symbol associated with its operation and that symbol is placed on the cattle by using grey-hot irons that have been heated up in a fire and placing those irons momentarily on the calf’s hide.

At one time cowboys ran their cattle in open range on land not divided or sectioned off by fences. Branding your cattle meant that each ranches’ herd could graze freely on the open range and could easily be identified come roundup time when the calves were taken to market. Today in Western North Dakota ranch land is split up and sectioned off into pastures. If a neighbor’s cattle break down a fence and get into a field or an adjacent pasture, they are easily identified. In addition, branding cattle has traditionally been a way to deter cattle thieves, as brands are registered and inspected when taken to market.

With most calves born in March and April, ideally a rancher would want to get their branding done in May, but with the snowy and wet weather that occurred during calving and on into the late spring, things have been delayed a bit this year.

Now every operation has their own traditions and ways they like to work their calves. Around here a typical branding day would start early in the morning with a ride out into the pastures to roundup all of the mommas and babies and gather them into a corral where the crew then sorts the calves off from the cows into a smaller pen.

There’s a lot of mooing at this point, which will not cease until the mommas are back with their babies, the end goal the crew will work to accomplish as quickly, safely and efficiently as possible.

Once the calves are sorted the real work begins. Typically, if the calves were younger, a crew of able bodied cowboys and cowgirls would work to catch and “wrestle,” or hold the calves in place on the ground while another crew works quickly to vaccinate, fly tag, brand and, if it’s a bull calf, castrate. If all goes well the calf is only down for a few short minutes before the crew releases the baby back into the pen to find his momma.

At the neighbor’s last weekend the process was the same, but because the calves were a little older and a little bigger, Cowboy Kelly decided it would be easier on all of us, calves included, if we used the chute.

And because, as I have mentioned earlier, I was out a little late the night before, drinking some adult beverages, I was ok with missing the opportunity to brush up on my calf wrestling skills. But my desire to be involved was completely selfish anyway, because around this neighborhood it seems you always find you have plenty of help.

And so was the case on Sunday as one by one under a sun that turned my fair skinned friend’s skin pink, even under her cowboy hat, the crew pushed the babies through the chute and Cowboy Kelly marked them with a brand that has been attached to his family’s ranch and cattle for over 100 years.

I stood by Kelly’s daughter, my best friend and neighbor when we were growing up, as she tagged the calves to help keep the summer flies away and counted and inspected each and every one for her father.

My best friend is a mother now. I watched her carry one of her babies piggyback as she trudged through the mud to shut the gate and I wondered when it was exactly that we grew up.

She just had her first son, her third child, a little red headed boy, a few months ago. He was likely sleeping in his great grandmother’s arms in the house as his grandma set out the dishes, turned on the oven and put ice in the cooler for the crew.

His two blonde and freckled sisters were hanging on the fence in their pink boots and ponytails, watching the action, counting the calves and asking questions next to their cousins and aunts who stood just close enough to make sure they didn’t fall and hurt themselves.

I look at those girls and it’s like I’m looking at my friend, new freckles appearing with each hour those little noses see the sun. I used to stand next to her on that very fence, watching our dads, asking questions, wearing holes in the toes of our red boots, happy with the business of being friends.

And so I stood next to her again on Sunday and we were ourselves, older versions of the children who used to ride their bikes up on the highway between our two ranches, weaving in and out of the yellow center line, our feet off the pedals, the wind tossing our hair, making plans to grow up and get married and work and be cowgirls and mommas out here on our ranches, the only place we knew, the only place on earth for us.

So I guess we are grown up now. And so are those boys we brought home to help with branding back when we were sixteen or seventeen and hoping they could pull it off.

Hoping our dads approved.

When the last calf got his brand, the crew gathered for a Bud and to lean on fences and find some shade. I snapped a few more pictures as my friend tallied up the ratio of bull calves to heifers.

She’s always been good with numbers.

I’ve always liked words.

And so I’ll tell you the most important part about branding. Everyone will agree.

While we were standing in the sun and the smoke of the branding irons, inside the house our mothers were cuddling the babies and cooking up a casserole meant to stick to a hungry man’s ribs.

Because the number one promise after a successful day of work in this neighborhood is a hearty meal and the chance to catch up, to visit a bit after a busy calving season. It’s why you can always get a crew, because the work load is eased by friendship and comradery and the spirit that still lives out here on 100 year old ranches, the spirt that holds hope that it could carry on like this through the generations in the faces of the children we used to be.

Sunday Column: More misadventures.

Posted on June 10, 2013 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

My goodness it’s absolutely gorgeous out here these days. The rain has turned to sun and everything’s green and fresh, I want to soak it all in so badly that not even the “little hangover” I caught from the Miranda Lambert concert last night was going to deter me from showing up a “little late” to get in on the action of at our neighbor’s branding.

Now I’m smelly and sweaty and sunburned and just kinda, still a little hungover.

Ah well, as you’ll read in this week’s column, I always seem to find a way to make life a little more difficult.

But mostly, really truly, seriously, pretty much I most definitely, almost always have fun. And I don’t care what you say, you can never have too much of that.

Too much to drink? Well, that’s another issue…

Coming Home: Mishaps provide plenty of stories
By Jessie Veeder
June 9, 2013
Fargo Forum
www.inforum.com

Hope your weekend was free of mishaps.

Or full of them, you know, depending on your definition of the word.

Change the channel.

Posted on June 5, 2013 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

Husband and I have knack for making life complicated. We’re accident prone, the two of us, together and separately. We both like to take the long way, the back roads, with the windows rolled down even if it’s raining a little.

We like to make things from scratch, like noodles and pies and soup, even if we don’t have a recipe or a professional at hand. We like to mix our drinks strong. We like to make big plans and then take our time getting there.

We like to do things ourselves. Like, you know, finishing houses.

I think we drive our families crazy.

We must. We drive ourselves crazy. I mean, we’ve only moved six times in the last six years of marriage. We’re only on our third major home renovation/construction.

We’re only, almost, almost, almost done.

But not quite, despite the fact that it’s all we’ve been doing for the last two months: get up, clean up the dishes from the night before, get dressed, go to work, come home, put on work clothes, find a project, tile something, varnish something, sweep something, move something, put carpet on something, saw something, paint something, look at the clock and say “damn, it’s 10 already,” and then wonder out loud what to have for supper while you pour a bowl of cereal and pull the popsicles from the freezer.

Needless to say, we’re kind of tired. And between the dreary weather, our less than adequate diet, all the mud being tracked in on the floor and the saw dust in the air, I’m not surprised to find we’re slipping a bit.

A few weeks ago Husband called me while I was on the road to a photo shoot. He had to tell me he just got out of the bathroom to discover that he had been walking around all day with a pair of my pink underwear shoved up the sleeve of his shirt, a result of a quick attempt at finishing the laundry.

I wondered out loud if they were my pretty pink underwear or my raggedy, embarrassing pink underwear.

He said it didn’t matter, his wife’s underwear up his sleeve at work was embarrassing, pretty or not.

And now I’ve gone and put it on the internet, which I guess, is probably even more embarrassing.

But whatever. It’s funny. I laughed hysterically at the thought. So did my friend in the passenger seat of the car as I relayed the sad story of what our lives have become.

Now, I don’t know if I’ve shared this here or not, but in the time we’ve been living back at the ranch we’ve been approached by a few different production companies about following us around for a reality show. One in particular wanted to fly Husband to Georgia to try out for a deep fat frying cooking competition. They said they like how he looks and like what he deep fat fries.

What?

I guess that’s what happens when you put your life on the internet, but a reality show on the two of us is a ridiculous idea. We’re not as pretty as the Kardashians and we don’t have enough free time to manage as many redneck adventures as the guys on Duck Dynasty. The only thing that would be entertaining about following us around with a camera would be watching all the ways I manage to screw up during the day and hearing all of the one-liners Husband manages to deliver at my expense.

Cut to last Friday where a late and very sick Jessie attempts to make it to a doctors appointment in the pouring rain only to find that her way is blocked by a semi jack-knifed and stuck across her parents’ approach and the road leading to the highway, forcing her to turn around and brave the monsoon on ten miles of muddy, deteriorating, pot-holey, all around shitty road.

Listen to her cuss as she drives a little too fast and defies the ditch and her death.

See her wave her arms at the sky and plead for the rain to stop.

Watch as she explains the situation to the receptionist at the clinic right before she gets diagnosed with bronchitis and a sinus infection and heads out to the pharmacy to load up on $150 worth of medication. Notice that she didn’t pick up her inhaler thingy, but she won’t realize it until she gets home in the monsoon.

But before she can get home Jessie needs gas. Now watch her overflow her gas tank at the local Cenex in the pouring rain while a trucker at the neighboring pump munches on a candy bar and declares it six gallons of environmental hazard.

Watch her face clench as she contemplates calling him an environmental hazard.

Cut to Jessie at home attempting to make a rhubarb cake without a cake pan for a party starting in approximately 35 minutes. Listen as she sweetly asks her husband to go borrow one from her momma.

Now watch as she puts together a dip she’s made for years with cream cheese instead of sour cream. Now look at that, she just dropped an entire container of cherry tomatoes on the floor. She’s cleaning them up now as her husband walks in, but it looks like she missed a few hanging out in the bottom of the fridge. Hope she doesn’t close the…oh, look at that, she closed the door.

See the tomatoes squish.

Watch her fling her body face first on the bed as her husband tells her she needs to pay attention.

So that would be one episode.

Seriously.

I mean, if I had a dollar for every time my dearly beloved stood above me as I am sprawled out on the floor, shaking his head and wishing out loud that I would just “pay attention”, I would be rich enough to hire someone to finish building this house for crying out loud.

That’s one way I could avoid falling into bucket of grout water.

Uff. Da. Our reality show would make you all feel better about your organized, saw dustless, home renovation-less, mud-free, squished-tomato-free,underwear-up-your-sleeve-free life.

Some days I wish I could change the channel.

Sunday Column (on Monday): When the chokecherry trees bloom

Posted on June 3, 2013 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

Well, my favorite day of the week, Sunday, got hijacked yesterday for an impromptu trip to the big town to get new tires for Husband’s pickup. And a funny thing happened on the way. He got a flat tire.

So the quick trip turned into a long trip and while we were at it we thought we might as well load up on supplies to finish up the master bedroom, and, most importantly the closest.

I’m going to have an entire shelf for my shoes people.

An entire shelf.

It only took a good hour or so of discussion, planning and negotiation in the closet organizing section of Menards to come up with that plan, but it’s happening.

My life will never be the same.

And so that’s what I was doing yesterday. I was closet planning and waiting for tires and checking off the last of our supply list and sitting next to Husband as we drove home into the sunset and into the evening to unload doors and shelves and trim boards and laundry detergent and a little gift for Little Man and tools and screws and the rest of the things we need into the house in the middle of the pitch black night.

And that’s why you didn’t get my Sunday post. I know you were worried. I even got a worried email, so thanks for that.

But it was a good weekend all in all, one that kicked off with a birthday party for Pops and rolled on into Saturday where I played music for a beer festival in a neighboring college town and ended with my dream of an organized closet one step closer to realized.

And now it’s Monday and the rain is pouring down again, filling up the stock dams, sending the river out past its banks and women running from their cars to the nearest building with newspapers and magazines and jackets and briefcases covering their hairdos.

In the last month we’ve had all the rain we can handle. The grass is green and the chokecherry blossoms are in full bloom.
Everything is alive and another day more beautiful.

Another day older.

Pops turned fiftysomethingorother last Friday and this week’s column celebrates him and how fitting it is that he was born in during the best of the seasons.

Coming Home: Chokecherry blooms signal special time
by Jessie Veeder
6/1/13
Fargo Forum

Enjoy your week. Enjoy the rain, the smell of the chokecherry blossoms, and God willing, let’s enjoy some sun too.

If you need me, I’ll be picking wildflowers and organizing my boot collection…

The evolution of a season.

Posted on May 30, 2013 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

It’s another rainy, windy afternoon at the ranch. It seems like once the sky decided to open up it just can’t stop. It feels like March when the sky wouldn’t stop snowing. It feels like this spring has been finicky and harsh and extreme and it has enjoyed every minute it has kept me waiting.

Waiting for the snow to stop.

Waiting for the sun to shine.

Waiting for the rain to come.

Waiting for it to stop raining.

Waiting on the sun to shine.

I know there will be a time this summer where the dust will blow again and we will pray for a bit of relief from the heat and the dry, but where I come from there is not a balance.

There is only extreme.

Extremely cold.

Extremely windy.

Extremely hot.

Extremely green.

Extremely wet.

Extremely dry.

Extremely perfectly beautiful.

Some days I feel like the weather. These days especially. The windows have been streaked with rain for a few weeks and I have been suffering from a weird sort of lingering head cold that refuses to break up and leave like the damn rain.

I’ve been working hard to ignore it, to say the rain will clear and I will feel better, but today I submitted. I stayed home under a blanket to watch it fall.

I’ll feel better tomorrow.

Head cold or no head cold, it seems I’m always so affected by the seasons and how they change, like the weather and my mood hold hands to greet the day accordingly.

Which makes me wonder how annoyingly bright-sided I’d be if I lived in the sunny, 70 degree climate of southern California.

It sounds nice right now, the sun.

But I think the constant change of seasons help me and what my husband refers to as my “restless spirit.” He says it’s hard for me to sit in one place. It’s hard for me to be comfortable in routine.

He says it’s good for me to have all this space to wander out here.