Crocuses and how it could keep getting better…

Posted on May 6, 2013 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

It’s officially crocus season, and that’s good news out here on the edge of the badlands where we’ve all been patiently waiting for them to arrive, as if the blooming of the first flower gives us permission to pack away our sweaters and pull out the short sleeves.

Well, that’s what I did anyway. I made a mountain out of the sweaters shoved in my closet. I pulled them out ceremoniously flinging them to the floor, purging my room of winter before I stood back and seriously contemplated throwing them out the window and lighting a match on the whole damn pile.

But that would have been crazy, and, well, let’s be honest, I’ll need them again in a few short months. Anyway, I didn’t have time for that. Little Sister was coming over and she had plans to soak up the sunshine and I had plans to procrastinate painting the bathroom.

So we grabbed our cameras and the herd of dogs…

One…

Two…

Three…

Four.

and went climbing around, scouring the ground for the purple flower.

Turns out we didn’t have to go far.

When you become familiar with a place in all of it’s seasons, you memorize where the crocuses bloom in the spring, where to go to pick chokecherries and raspberries in the summer, and to always, no matter the season, watch out for cactus.

We know these places because prairie people like us have vivid memories of hunting for crocuses with our grandmother, sisters, mothers or fathers, bending over to pull them from the tangle of brown grass while the warm spring wind picked up the loose hair that escaped from our ponytails.

I’ve been living back at the ranch for three springs and I will be here for the rest of the springs I am given. I will never forget what it felt like to climb to that hilltop and pick the first crocus of the year as I stood with my husband we looked down at our home.

And we were happy to be together, happy for summer to arrive and happy to stand on that hill for a moment that we were sure couldn’t get much better from here.

Then my Little Sister moved to our hometown and now the whole family is together and close and on Monday mornings I can expect a call asking me what I’m doing this weekend. Because my Little Sister plans ahead and I’m glad to be consulted on those plans.

So Saturday’s plans made room for crocus hunting in the warm sunshine next to a girl who used to follow me on my after school walks up the creek to my fort. I used to wish she would leave me alone then. I used to holler at her to stop following me and when we came in the house crying and fighting, our mom would promise us that someday, we would be best friends.

Funny how moms are usually, most likely, pretty much, always exactly right.

Funny how some things change, but I still haven’t mastered the art of convincing Little Sister to help me with my chores…like, oh, you know, painting the bathroom.

Funny how she still doesn’t listen to me.

Funny how the crocuses bloom on the same hill every year and someday we might have a chance to watch our own children run to the top and pick us a purple bloom.

Funny how it could possibly keep getting better.

This familiar place

Posted on October 22, 2012 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

Weekends out here can be bliss. Especially when it’s 50+ degrees and sunny and crisp and it’s autumn and your little sister comes over to spend the whole two days with you.

This happens sometimes–the weather cooperates perfectly with the plans you have. And our plans consisted of big breakfasts and coffee, a long walk through our favorite coulees,

a ride with Pops to our favorite spot in the trees

and a couple birthday parties for Little Big Sister and her Little Man.

Little Sister and I scheduled our weekend together and proceeded to tackle the checklist that ensured we got to everything from omelets to birthday cake. And we accomplished it all.

See, she’s been gone for a bit, out doing what we’ve been taught to do when we hit eighteen and graduate high school: get out, get going, see stuff, learn stuff, work and study and graduate and travel.

And come back if you want to.

Come back for a while.

And so Little Sister has come back. She’s come back with the same sort of remembered wonder that I experienced a few short years ago when I did the same thing. I’ve tried to explain it here a few times in these lines and photographs I share with you, how rediscovering those secret places I used to wander at the ranch as a child hold a sort of haunting nostalgia and comfort when visited as an adult.

But now that I have arrived and am here to stay my childhood secret spots have become familiar again. I visit them regularly either for a stroll to take photographs or to chase cattle along the trails. I am remembering and learning every day where all of these deer and cow paths wind and twist and turn, determined to be capable of navigating the place the way Pops does one day, without pause or back track.

And it’s an interesting and adventurous task I’ve set out to accomplish, one that, growing up, was always tackled with a shadow following a few yards behind me.

I swear just yesterday I was hollering at that little curly-haired six-year-old in the purple barn jacket to “go home and leave me alone!” Just yesterday, wasn’t I suggesting that if she really had to build a fort along the same creek bed, perhaps it should be a little further up the coulee and out of my sight.

And there we were last weekend walking side-by-side, adult women with our own fears and worries pushed back until Monday, tucked away so that we might enjoy and remember the time the tire swing broke sending Little Sister flailing into the creek, how we used to climb the old apple trees behind the house, and the hours we spent following Pops chasing a cow or a deer in the oak trees and brush that line the creek bottom.

How many mittens did we drop along the way? How many times did our boots fill with creek water?

How many wood ticks and burs and grass stains did we accumulate?

And in all of the lines and photographs I share in this space about the magic and adventure the ranch, our home, holds for me–all the ways I tell you it mystifies and heals, puts me in my place and brings me closer to the version of myself I like the most, I have to confess it is not the landscape alone that holds the responsibility.

I imagine I could fall in love with a number of creek beds, oak groves and rolling fields, marveling at the way the afternoon sun hits the leaves that have fallen into the water, getting to know how the trail winds up the embankments, coming to understand how it changes with the season.

I know I could fall in love with many places and landscapes throughout this world.

But it is this one, this one that holds my father’s footprints, my Little Sister’s laugh, my mother’s call to come in for supper. It is this one that promises Little Man a place to run and learn to ride horse and Big Little Sister a refuge if she needs it.

It is these hills, these paths, these coulees, these acorns, these fallen trees and fallen logs and this mud and these thorns and soft grasses that have bent under my growing feet and the feet of those who know me the best that gives this place a heartbeat and makes the sunrise brighter, the trees grow taller, the creek clearer, the horses more capable…

and me more grateful every day that through all these years we can be out in it, loving it and living in those familiar spaces on a days that were made to be together.

Under a Badlands Sky…

Posted on September 24, 2012 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

One of my favorite autumn rituals has become my now annual trip down the road to visit the North Unit of the Theodore Roosevelt National Park just outside the ever-expanding limits of my home town.

These days, more than ever, I believe this park to be a blessing and a gift, a reminder among the chaos of a bustling industry to slow down and remember the best things in life.

The sky…

The grass…

The quiet, wild things.

I like to visit those rugged buttes to be reminded that I am one of those quiet, wild things and last week I took my Little Sister along on a little hike so that she could remember that too.

See, Little Sister has just recently come into some major responsibilities after graduating from college last winter. And with her new teaching degree in health and physical education, she has found herself in a small school outside of our hometown writing lesson plans, leading jumping jack sessions, chasing around adorable kindergarteners and helping seniors prepare for college while working on getting a master’s degree in counseling and guidance.

I’m tired just thinking about it, but so proud of this woman who, in my mind, should still be 8 years old and following me up the creek to the forts we built behind the house.

I still find it a little disheartening that when we grow up that seems to be the first thing we give up…walks to nowhere.

And building forts.

But that’s what the ranch does for us, and places like this park. It provides us with a reason to walk to nowhere, to climb to the top of a hill and look down,

to notice how that jet leaves a white streak in the sky and to wonder where it’s going…

while we find we’re happy to be right where we are.

Happy to point out the small deer crossing the road or a chipmunk below our feet instead of worrying about deadlines and messy kitchens to clean.

Happy to notice how the sun shines through the changing autumn leaves on the river bottom instead of how the end tables need dusting and the windows need a wipe.

Happy to trip on a rock as we make our way down from the buttes, happy for a near-miss incident that we can laugh at together, thankful we made it in one piece.

Thankful that we’re not sweeping right now.

Or doing paperwork.

Or making dinner.

Thankful that someone set aside a place for us to go to get away from all of the things that seem to matter so little when it comes to a choice between watching the leaves change or watching a television screen.

Thankful that we can walk to the river and talk about the time Little Sister broke the tire swing as it flung her out over the coulee and dropped her in the creek. Thankful she survived the fall, though she was certain she was dying.

Thankful she has nearly forgiven my reaction of hysterical laughter.

Thankful that years later, though those jets could take us anywhere, we still chose to be out under this beautiful and familiar sky…

Together.

The sister situation…

Posted on August 3, 2012 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

I’m not sure I’ve mentioned this with as much enthusiasm as I feel in my heart about the news, but Little Sister has recently moved back to the area to work as a teacher in a neighboring town.

My built-in-best-friend is now my neighbor and I couldn’t be happier. And even though our lives are currently in two completely different states of chaos, when we get together it seems like we do a pretty good job of zoning out everything else in the world and concentrating on the things that matter.

Like the movie she watched last night, the new boots I’m thinking of buying, what we should drink for happy hour and how we are going to pull off the next waterballoon ambush on Husband. The first and second were not so successful.

I heard third time’s a charm and we’re counting on it.

Anyway, I’d like to take this opportunity to confess here the level of worthless we are when we get together. And nothing exemplifies our incapabilities more than when we so generously volunteer to help our father move cows in the early morning and then linger in the house just long enough over a cup of coffee, a piece of toast, Little Sister’s missing boot and the a.m. hairdo I can’t fit under my hat for Pops to get out the door, up the road and into the barnyard to locate our saddles, sort out our bridals, catch our horses and assume the position of waiting patiently while he listens to our jabbering as we finally make it out of the house and to the barn to meet him.

Pops is patient. He’s had to be out here in the wild buttes of Western North Dakota surrounded by girls. Sometimes I wonder if his life on the ranch as a father would have been a little easier if he would have had a few boys tossed in the mix. But he’s never once complained and you gotta love him for it. Pops is just grateful for the help, even when his help is riding a half a mile behind him talking over how weird it would be if we rode cows instead of horses as he works to keep the herd from the black hole that is the brush patches in the hot 10 a.m. sun.

We were supposed to be out there much earlier you see, but we were a little late because Little Sister and I had to finish watching the story about Michael Phelps on the Today Show. By the time we made it to the barn to meet Pops he was deep in the middle of a nasty battle with Husband’s horse who decided over the summer to become wild and un-catchable. We sat in the tack room for a few minutes before we realized that perhaps the stampede of horses and Pops’ cursing coming from the other side of the hill indicated that perhaps he could use our assistance.

Because we really are a lot of help, with one of us ducking, swatting and screaming at anything that resembles a bee and the other one tripping over anything that resembles the ground.

A half-an-hour later we got the damn horses in and took a moment while Pops assessed the sweat dripping down his back and we assessed the bur situation tangling in the manes of our beautiful horses.

A girl cannot be seen on a horse with a bur situation.

Three gallons worth of Show Sheen, two curry combs, seven curse-word combinations and another half-hour later we had the hair situation under control.

And once we got past the missing reign situation, the stirrup situation and the fly spray situation we were finally on our way to moving some cows in the heat situation.

Little Sister hates the heat.

She’s also the one, if you didn’t guess it, who hates bees, or anything that looks like it might belong to the bee family.

Anyway, the rest of the roundup went something like this:

Girls: “Where are we chasing them? Which gate? That gate? Where are you going? What? I can’t hear you?”

Pops: “Just stay there, I’ll head up over the hill to look for more then we’ll move them nice and easy.”

Me: “I think we missed one. Should I go and get it?”

Little Sister: “Should I come with you? I should probably come with you. I’ll come with you…eeeek! A bee…I hate bees…eeeeeeeekkkkkk.”

Pops (as he races through the brush and up the hill): “Just stay there!!! Girls! Stay there! I’ve got it!!!”

Little Sister: “I’ve never really liked chasing cows…I mean, I like it when things go well, like we can just ease them along, but they start going the wrong way and it stresses me out.”

Me: “Ooo, chokecherries.”

Little Sister: “Where’s dad. Maybe we should go find him. Should we take these cows with us?”

Me: “Oh, yeah. We should get going.”

Little Sister: “I think my horse runs weird. Look at him. Does he look like he runs up hills weird?”

Me: “That horse is weird. Look at his hair. He reminds me of you.”

We finally catch up with Pops who is behind twenty-five head of cows and their calves.

Little Sister and I have brought along four, who are currently headed toward the wrong gate on the wrong side of the creek.

Me (hollering across the pasture to Pops): “Oh, there you are. We couldn’t find you. We’ve got these here…thought we were going to the other gate…”

Pops (hollering from behind the twenty-five head of cattle and their calves he’s just moved through a half-mile brush patch on his own): “No problem, actually you’re going to have to turn them or leave them because they’ll never make it across the creek and through the trees…”

Me (running toward my small, straying herd who are eyeing a brush patch) “Oh shit, oops. I’ve got em. Sorry. Wasn’t paying attention.

Little Sister: “Do you think my horse runs weird?”

Pops: “I think you’re horse is just fat…Jess, you’re never going to get them. Just leave them. I’ll get them later.”

Me, hollering to Little Sister: “Whhhattt? Whhhattt did hee sayyyy?!! Ask him? Should I leave them???”

Little Sister, hollering to Pops: “DAAAADDD, SHOULD SHE LEAVE THEM?”

Pops, hollering to Little Sister: “Yess, ssheeee ssshhoullld lleeave them!!”

Littile Sister, hollering to me: “HEEE SSAAAYSS LEEAAVEE THEM!”

I leave them and point my horse in the direction of Little Sister, who has now decided her stirrups are still too long.

We meet up behind Pops’ herd and discuss the matter while we walk with the cows toward the gate. But our conversation about leg length is interrupted as we hear Pops calling from the fence line and turn to notice our herd is heading toward the trees again.

“Girls, I need you to actually CHASE them.”

“Slap”, a branch hits me across the face as I manage to distract the lead cow from her destination and back toward the gate.

The rest of the herd follows and we proceed to do the same.

Pops informs us we’ll just push them over the next hill…

Five giant hills and three miles later we’re on the opposite end of the pasture where the stock dam is located and where Pops had intended to lead us all along.

Little Sister has melted and seriously considers joining this cow for a swim while I scope out any signs of wild plums and wait for Pops’ next move.

It appears that it’s toward home, so we follow along as he thanks us for the help and stops to take our picture.

He said he couldn’t do this alone.

We argued that he probably could.

He argued that it wouldn’t be as much fun.

And we all had to agree as we moved slowly across the pastures turning gold in the late summer sun, happy to be together out here again with the burs, and the chokecherries, the sun and even the bees.

When I could break untamable horses and catch fish with a spear…

Posted on February 23, 2012 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

When I was younger, a little girl all wrapped up in the magic of this place, my favorite book of all time was “My Side of the Mountain.” I’m sure you’ve read it. It’s about a boy who finds himself living away from home in the wilderness of the mountains inside of a giant hollowed out tree. I can’t remember the exact story now or why he was alone out there, funny how those details escape me no matter how many times I went over the pages and marked my favorite parts. The parts where there were diagrams of how to build a fire with no supplies and something about a windmill and making a spear for fishing.

I still have the book buried somewhere deep in the rubble of the basement. It was one I could not give up to charity or to my younger sister. She just wouldn’t understand. She was a normal girl after all. A normal girl who read about horses and babysitting and a guy named Harry Potter.

Oh, I read about horses too. Horses that needed to be rescued from an island and a kid who became friends with a wolf, and another kid who overcame obstacles and won the Iditarod with a pack of misfit dogs and a whistle. I read about little girls growing up on the prairie during the homesteading days, riding in covered wagons, getting lost in blinding snow storms and making dolls out of corn cobs. I made one of those dolls myself.

I wanted to be these kids.

I wanted to be the free-spirited girl who broke the free-spirited horse. I wanted to live in a time where there was no “Garfield and Friends” on television, where we ate what we planted and went to school in a one room school-house. I wanted to be the girl who beat up the bully and wore pants when dresses were the rule.

I wanted to break the rules. I wanted to tame a wolf puppy, train a wild falcon to hunt, catch fish with a spear I sharpened out of a tree branch and exist in a far away time where those things were necessary for survival.

Screw microwave popcorn and Super Mario brothers, I wanted adventure!

And I wanted to live in the wilderness like the kid I came to love in “My Side of the Mountain.”

I am sure I wasn’t unlike most kids at 9 or 10 or 11 years old. We all wanted to prove our capabilities, stand out from the crowd, be the best at something. At that age most of us were lost in some sort of fantasy, whether it was flying to the moon, getting a puppy or discovering that elves really do live under mushrooms like in that book we just read. We all had a little more confidence than we had experience at the real world

So I’d like to think that it wasn’t that unusual that I, a 10-year-old girl who already lived about as far out in the middle of nowhere as anyone could live, had convinced myself that I could survive out in the wilderness alone. Without a house. Or a toilet. Or my momma’s cheeseburger chowder.

Yes, there was a time that was my plan. And let it be known that as a kid, I was pretty serious about these kinds of things. In the evenings I would step off of the bus from a day at country school, grab a snack, and head out up the creek behind our house. For months I would work on building what I called “secret forts” all along the creek that winds through our ranch. In the oaks and brush that grew along the bank I would identify just the right tree, one that was bent over just so, growing parallel to the ground, a perfect frame for which to create a sort of tent like structure out of fallen logs. And then I would begin the tedious process of locating and moving fallen branches, branches that took every ounce of muscle and try in my spindly little body to budge out of their place under overgrown vegetation and fallen leaves. But when it was dislodged from its space, I would drag it back to my tree and hoist it up to rest next to the last one I had managed to maneuver.

It would take a few days, but eventually I would have my secret fort enclosed with every moveable log and branch within a 100 foot radius. And when it was complete I would look around to make sure my little sister hadn’t followed me here like she did last time, identifying my plan and ruining the secrecy of the secret forts.

And then I would lay down inside of it. And under the flawed “shelter” of fifty logs leaning on a tree, providing nothing but a faulty wind break for the day dreaming girl laying on her back in the grass and leaves and twigs underneath, I would think about my next move. I would need a door. Yes. That would be necessary. I could make the door the way I imagined Huck Finn made his raft. I would need some rope. Some rope and a knife. I wonder if dad would let me carry a knife? I need some sort of blanket. Maybe there’s something in the barn. Oh, and a fire. Of course!

I would be scouring the creek bottom for granite rocks to arrange in a proper fire circle when the sun sink down below the banks and I would decide I wasn’t quite ready to spend the night. Besides, I forgot to bring a snack and the wild raspberries weren’t quite ripe yet. Taking one last look at my creation and deciding to reevaluate the next afternoon, I would turn my back to it and follow the cow trail back toward the house where my little sister was likely lurking in the shadows, having found out my secret again, begging me to let her help next time. Begging me to let her in the fort as the sun gave off its last light and we argued and grappled until we could smell dad’s steaks on the grill or mom’s soup on the stove.

This was my daily ritual for months and one of my signature childhood memories. Eventually I gave in and helped my little sister build her own fort. A much smaller fort. Across the creek. Out of site.

I thought I wanted to be alone out there, left to my own survival skills, but it turned out that having company was a nice addition, no matter how stubborn and annoyingly curious that company might be. So we built a tin-can telephone that stretched from my fort to hers and brought down old chair cushions from the shed, searched for wild berries, tried to catch frogs and minnows in the pond and spent our evenings planning our next move: spending the night.

But we never did it. We never spent the night. Summer gave way to fall and the leaves fell and covered the floor of our paradise. We would pull on our beanies, mittens and boots and trudge down the freezing creek to clear out the fire ring we weren’t yet brave enough to use. And then the cold set in and the snow came and the neighbor girls called us to go sledding and our dream of being wilderness women collected snow and waited on a warmer season.

I can’t help but think about those girls on days like these. Days when the cold sets in and the house seems smaller. Days when the toilet is doing the thing where it leaks, burnt casserole from the night before sits waiting for a clean-up on my countertop, the television’s blank and broken.

There’s no morning news today.

No one but me and the wind out here. The wind that seems to be calling me this morning to get out of the house. Come out of behind those curtains, from under the shelter of the shingles. Come have an adventure girl. Come dream about hollowed out trees, living on wild berries, building a fire for warmth and living a life like no one lives anymore.

I step outside and follow the trail to the creek bed, trying to remember where I set that first fort. Trying to remember what pulled me out here all of those years ago. Trying to remember the fantasy, the magic as the cold bites at my cheeks and the snow crunches under my feet.

I turn around and I miss my sister.

I turn around and I’m alone. Alone with a woman who used to be a girl I knew, a girl who thought she could tame wolves, fight off the bad guy, break untamable horses and live alone in the wild.

I follow the creek and look for her. I know she’s here somewhere. I hope she hasn’t given up.

I could really use her right now.

To always ride horses…

Posted on October 28, 2011 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

Last weekend Little Sister came home for the hustle and bustle and celebration of Little Man.

Have I mentioned that I love it when Little Sister comes home? Well if I haven’t said it sixty-thousand times already, I am saying it again and singing it softly to myself in a little tune I made up while I work on building her a quaint house in the oak trees next to mine, complete with a tin-can phone stretched across the yard and a couple of reclaimed lawn chairs from mom and dad’s junk pile.

It’s going to be just like old times.

Because here’s the thing. Everyone has people in their lives that they would like to keep wrapped up in a pretty little box in their pockets so they can carry them along and take them out whenever they need a good laugh, a smile, someone who really understands where you’re coming from, and who will, well you know, tell it to you straight.

My Little Sister is one of those people for me. I wanna wear her as a locket and show her off to friends. I want her confidence and quick wit at my fingertips. I want someone to drink margarita’s with and who will consume bowls and bowls of tortilla chips and cheese dip with me in the middle of the day in sweatpants without judgement…whenever I feel like it.

I know this is weird. I tested the theory out on Husband and he said I was a dork. Especially after I told him I wanted to wear him as a scarf around my neck so I would always have him there to protect me and provide for me better judgment wherever I go.

Well, it sounded good in my head, so I’m sharing it here. I imagine a few of you will be able to relate to my desire to be able to morph my favorite people into accessories and then un-morph (?) them back into people again whenever I feel the need…

Anyone?

Well, anyway, since I have yet to find that Genie to grant me my three wishes, I will just have to take what I can get of Little Sister when she comes around. And one of my favorite things to do when she shows up is to grab her and Pops and Husband and the horses and take a long ride out in the buttes. Because really, there’s nothing better than the smell of horses, crisp air, quiet trails, two of my favorite cowboys chatting about plans and my favorite high strung best friend on a high strung horse snorting and laughing and prancing along the prairie beside me.

So that’s what we did last Saturday as our chatter around morning pancake breakfast brought us too quickly into the afternoon It was a little chilly out there when we stepped out into the farmyard and Little Sister was dressed just a bit too fashionably for this type of activity, so I promptly dug out my dorkiest hat, gloves and fur-lined vest and we were on our way under the big gray sky that hadn’t made up its mind whether it wanted to rain on us or shine.

When taking a ride is my idea my posse generally agrees that we will have no particular agenda but to enjoy ourselves out here, to explore and tell some stories, check things out or just be quiet. And so that’s what we did. We strolled through golden grasses, and crunched through fallen leaves in the coulees, the two black cowboy hats in the lead and the frizzy haired women trailing behind.

We stopped on hill tops to catch up, to take a look around at how some of the leaves are desperate to hang on the oak trees, to check out the fences, to listen to one of Little Sister’s stories about school or one of my long stories that usually ends with me embarrassing the shit out of myself.

And as the words between sisters bounced off the hill tops and blew away with the wind and the guys talked hunting and horses, Little Sister’s horse, as he generally does, began to warm up enough to show his personality and the wild whites of his eyes. Here I will tell you that unless that horse and I are chasing after something that is running away from us, I prefer to avoid the Red Fury and stick to the Paint Mare, but Little Sister barely notices the animal beneath her snorting and prancing and all around making sure the other animals know that he needs to be in the lead.

So in the lead she went. That’s the funny thing about horses, while you are on their backs living your own little life, having your own conversations, thinking your own thoughts, they are underneath you, carrying you along on strong and quick feet and, if they are allowed, they are doing the same damn thing. And it was quite apparent that the Red Fury had only one thing on his mind that day and that was to be ahead of the mare I was riding.

It was driving him nuts.

And it was hilarious. Each time Little Sister’s horse would find himself a step behind he would snort and lift his head a bit higher and work on his rider to allow him at least one more step ahead. And so naturally I was tempted to see what would happen if I took off up the hill to catch a snapshot of my favorite people riding toward me. So I did. I rode up the hill ahead of the gang and turned around at the top to find Little Sister and the Red Fury flying up the hill behind me.

Apparently the Red Fury wasn’t about to allow this, and Little Sister didn’t care. She was along for the ride. The ride which I tried to document up until the part where the space between her ass and the saddle measured about a mile and I was almost certain she was going to be launched.

I think I yelled something like “Hang On!”…which is always so helpful in times like these…

but Little Sister just squealed and laughed and said she was a bit rusty after sitting in classrooms.

Which brings me to the point of my story, I do have one (besides embarrassing my sister.) I remember growing up here and taking these rides in the fall air, smelling the same smells, and feeling the same blessed. I remember making a promise to myself not to grow out of this. Not to ever say no to a ride with my father, to a chance to really live out here on these trails. I remember knowing, even at 10 or 12 years old, that I was lucky to have this experience under my belt, even when I had just hit the hard clay ground so hard I couldn’t feel my left arm after being bucked off of my gray mare yet again.

I remember telling myself that until I was old and gray I will always ride horses. No matter the agenda, no matter the responsibilities, no matter the fear of falling. I will always ride.

So seeing my Little Sister fly up that hill on a horse that has just as much attitude and free spirit as the woman on his back, I was reminded of that little girl with wild curls on a white pony named Jerry trailing behind me, singing songs to herself, telling me to wait up, getting her beanie hooked on a branch while riding through a trail in the trees, smelling those same smells, feeling the same breeze and promising herself the same things.

An hour before in the house over pancakes that memory was another life. It was other people in another time with different agendas and thoughts and outfits. But in that moment when Little Sister reached the top of that hill having recovered her balance and her breath, out of my mouth came laughter that was so familiar to me, and out of hers came the same. We were those children again, tucked snug in our puffy coats, cheeks rosy, chattering and riding with Pops in our own little world, promising one another, if such a promise can be made, not to grow up. Promising to stay out here just a few moments longer, to run just a little bit faster.

To stay together.

To remember we are blessed.

And so we rode. We rode with our father, with our other best friend, side by side or tail to nose, or spread out wide over the flat, under a sky that had decided to shine its sun on us after all.

So if I can’t have a locket at my fingertips to hold these moments with my sister, or a scarf around my neck that is Husband’s strong arms keeping me safe from the world’s worries,

or my Pops on a horse forever riding beside me telling me I’m doing fine…

…at least I will always have that promise. The promise to make more moments like these.

and to always ride horses.

The Red Guitar

Posted on March 2, 2011 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

I love guitars. I love the way they look sitting in the corner of a house, laid out on the bed, placed carefully in their cases or on display in a music store.

I love how they feel in my hands. The new ones shiny with promise of the music that is to come, the stories it might help you tell, and the places it could take you. The old guitars worn from years of picking, dinged up from bar bands and campfires and teaching a child to play.

And I love how they sound, each one a little unique, a little brighter, a little lower, a little cheaper, a little more rich and full. I love how they transport me, no matter if I am behind the sound or sitting in front of it swaying to the rhythm it creates, to a place so full of heart and passion and loneliness and fulfillment and family and home and leaving and heartache. A place I’ve always had in me.

Because you know how everyone has a first memory? That moment you look back on where you were the youngest version of yourself you knew. Maybe it’s only a few moments in time, but it was so powerful that you hang onto it hard and forever, whether you want to or not.

That memory is a guitar to me…

…dancing in the basement of our old house while my dad played his red Guild and sang. I don’t remember the song, or maybe I do, it doesn’t matter. But I remember the brown shag carpet. I remember how he wore his hair a little long. I remember how his wide, leathery fingers eclipsed the strings at the neck of that guitar. I remember how he swayed back and forth and tapped his foot, just a little bit off of the rhythm of the song he was singing and picking—the same way he does to this day. And I remember wanting to play. Wanting him to let me pluck the strings on my own, wanting my hands to grow a little bigger so I could make the music come from that mysterious instrument. That beautiful, red guitar.

And the instrument, the guitar, still remains a mystery to me. Even though I have been playing in one form or another since I was twelve years old, it still perplexes me that six strings touched the right way can produce sounds that make you laugh and cry and tap your toes or sing words you didn’t even know you had in you out to the world. It’s amazing to me that the sounds that come out of the body made of wood and metal and shine can be so different depending on who is touching it, who is sitting behind the instrument. I am in awe that a guitar can transform a campfire or a living room or a makeshift stage into a world where where love is lost and found, real cowboys still exist, babies fall asleep peacefully, summer always stays….

Yes, the guitar remains elusive to me even though every person in my family, as a sort of right of passage, owns their own version of the instrument and tucks it away in their basement or in their bedroom closet or props it up next to the piano or next to the living room couch. It is a necessity, whether or not you ever learn to play it, you need it there next to you in case you are ever so inclined—because the music is so unpredictable.

I have had in my possession a number of guitars in my short 27 years. All given to me by my dad based on his judgment on what would be the best fit for me. My first was a small guitar made for beginners that came in a box and wound up in my little sister’s room after I graduated to the next level: a cheap guitar with soft strings upon which I practiced strumming and singing “Amarillo by Morning” until my little fingers and voice were raw.

When I proved that I had an interest in the instrument that wasn’t going to waver anytime soon, I consulted with my dad and we agreed to trade my saxophone, the one I would pretend to play in band class, for a real guitar (because it was quite apparent that I lacked any Kenny G style skills and probably never would). And so I acquired the green Takamine and started writing songs, thinking maybe I could be a real musician behind this guitar. Maybe.

And I kept playing that Takamine in my bedroom. And then that guitar and I had our first real gig playing songs that I wrote and songs that I loved. Then we did it again and again until it was time to record them and time for a new guitar. Because I had outgrown the instrument in sound and purpose.

So another Takamine with a sunburst on its body took me on through high school and into my first year of university where I played in coffeehouses and bars around the small college town. And when the call came about traveling and working on another album I was set to go. I had my big girl guitar, it would work just fine.

I was excited and nervous and anxious about the whole thing….

Then one day after a few of my first on-the-road gigs, I came back home and my dad placed into my hands his Taylor, the guitar I had coveted and loved and snuck to the back room to play by the moonlight whenever I had a chance. He loved that guitar, and he placed it in my hands.

I took it with me.

And if there is ever anything I go back into a burning building for, it will be that guitar.

But if there is anything I love more than that Taylor it is that red Guild. And for a while I thought I would never see it again, you know, because a musician like my dad is known to trade guitars for amps and other guitars. And that red Guild was out of our lives for a while, during the time I was falling for the Taylor.

But damned if dad didn’t get it back in the last few years and pass it along through his hands again to my little sister when she went off to college.

And that red guitar is irreplaceable to her, allowing her to play and sing out loud the words to songs that mean something to her. And when she’s sitting behind that guitar so far away from the buttes of the ranch, maybe a little lost and frustrated some days with life and the pursuit of finding herself, she can close her eyes and strum and take a deep breath and hear the sounds of home.

And so l’ll tell you, all of the guitars I have ever possessed have given me something–confidence, my first song, a stronger voice. But I watch my little sister behind that red Guild, the very same guitar that took my dad on the road in bar bands and coffeehouses, that let loose the music inside my heart when he played it for me so long ago, that brings two sisters together in song, voices blending, toes tapping, and I am overwhelmed with the spirt of that instrument.

And I realize that red guitar, the one that played the first chord I have ever heard, the one that found us again strumming the music of home, the one that I never even called mine, has been my greatest gift.

A quick Christmas recap (with some humiliation splashed in)

Posted on December 28, 2010 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

Outside the Christmas window

And now, a quick recap of a Very Veeder Christmas so you can all move on with your lives and wait, with bated breath, for the next dramatic adventure of the ranch pug in bad outfits, or weather report that involves more snow, or photos of tiny birds far away because I lack the appropriate sneaking skills.

And also because I promised you I’d let you know how the cheese ball turned out.

Ok, here we go:

This was the tree. My momma’s famous tree. A tree that only tipped over once during the season due to that one last bulb that set it over the edge. Yeah, surprisingly it wasn’t the evil cat.

Because the devil cat was too busy hanging out in this bag…

This is utter humiliation and annoyance and all of the things that are so awkward and wonderful about the holidays. Please note and oooh and aahhh over my holiday vest.

And these are the gifts, sure to provide hours of entertainment and complete happiness:

For little sister, a shiny new ukulele. To which she exclaimed with glee: “What? A ukulele? Oh my, oh my, oh my I had no idea! I will never put it down. Ever. I’ll prove it to you. All. Christmas. Day.”

“So many possibilities! We should put on a Christmas Ukulele Concert! And this will be our album cover when we take it to the streets.”

“But first I better learn a chord…oh man…I need to Google this shit…”

And a gift for Cowboy:

…now get your butt back in the kitchen.

Yes, the kitchen, where we feasted on prime rib, mashed potatoes, cranberries, smoked turkey, broccoli salad, sweet potatoes, and Cowboy’s famous cookie salad.

This is the table:

And upon this table a reindeer shaped cheese ball was born…

…and about one second after this photo was snapped, his head fell off.

But don’t worry, it was promptly reattached and relocated to the fridge…

…where it fell off again.

And so did his nose.

And for a moment I thought Christmas was ruined.

Until this came traipsing through the kitchen.

Bwahahahahhaahahaahaha! (Oh, and I’m in so much trouble)

Ok. Sorry. Moving on.

So after an uncooperative, but delicious reindeer shaped cheese ball was consumed, a beautiful feast with friends and family, a couple glasses of Santa’s Surprise (my famous cocktail…which was actually a Sex on the Beach, but that was deemed an inappropriate title for a Christmas drink) we headed outside to burn off some calories before the inevitable pie and cookie gorge.

The posse: My mother in law, father in law, pops and little sister…

Oh and don’t be alarmed, that is not Freddy Kruger on the snowmobile. That is husband.

He didn’t want to get cold.

Ok, this is the beginning of a sledding race between Freddy, I mean, husband and little sister…

…and this is how it ended…

This is pops demonstrating the depth of the snow…a severe situation…

…and this is what happens when you lose your sled at the bottom of the hill in these circumstances…

..turns out you also lose your arms and the bottom part of your legs. Poor pops, how’s he gonna eat pie now?

This is more holiday humiliation:

I think I heard him whisper “sweet mercy…” but I can’t be sure…

Oh Christmas. There is no better season…

…for love crashing down a snow covered hill…

…wearing sparkling bows as fashionable hair accessories…

…crowd pleasing performances…

…torture…

…and humiliation…

Speaking of, let’s see that ukulele performance one more time!

Hope you had a great one!

Love you all.

A very non-Martha tradition

Posted on December 24, 2010 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

This skiing hippo has nothing to do with anything, but he's cute so I thought I would give him some face time...

Merry Christmas! It’s here I suppose. All signs point that way. The Christmas tree is up, the snow is on the ground, the lights are on the fence, the pug is hiding out in his Santa suit and my little sister came home yesterday.

Complete with holiday sweater and jingle bell earrings.

So we kicked off the weekend and broke in the holiday like it was meant. While husband was at work (bless is little heart) we lounged it out like only a tried and true college student knows how to do.

It didn’t take me too long to snap right back to those days. We filled our snowman mugs with coffee and shuffled around in our wool socks and sweatpants as we fried up some bacon and eggs and I told her all my troubles in like, three breaths (I don’t have too many these days) and then we moved on to her life plans really quick, and her latest boyfriend, and then some embarrassing little tidbits–like how I fell on my face in a restaurant and unintentionally bared my floral underwears to the entire occupancy and how she dropped a bottle of bread oil while out with her friends trying to be fancy, shattering the entire thing all over the floor and splashing oil on her fellow diners, sending them packing and saying things like “someone doesn’t get out much.”

And then we plopped down on the couch and watched a movie that involved a love story and inner conflict and cute boys while the pug made his way to a new lap….and so did the lab…and the cats…little sister was in heaven.

So were the pets.

When the movie concluded, we stretched and contemplated doing something constructive, so we took two steps to the kitchen and whipped up a batch or two of hard candy…because I found a candy thermometer somewhere and I was going to learn how to use it….

…then I painted white snowflakes on her tiny, nubby fingernails….

…and then we melted some cheese and salsa and dipped half a bag or tortilla chips in it and got back on the couch to refresh our memory of how the Grizwalds spent their holiday.

Then Momma called.

She wanted to make Christmas cookies.

So we peeled ourselves out from under the blankets and obliged.

See, the women in my family have little traditions like these. We are not bakers. We do not attempt bread dough or pie crust or elaborate gingerbread houses with gingerbread men and women standing outside hand in hand in little dresses and overalls.

We do not make beautifully decorated and personalized delicate treats in tins with fancy wrapping and beautifully piped frosting.

No. We do not do these things.

But we do raid momma’s liquor cabinet and find what we need to mix our selves a fancy cocktail…

…and dip things in chocolate…

…and pops sometimes helps and makes things like this…

"My chocolate covered pretzel glasses, my chocolate covered pretzel glasses, without them, I am powerless."

..and then we dig out the cookie mix that comes out of a bag or box and proceed to exercise our creativity by cutting out holiday shapes and decorating the cookies into tie died peace signs, Santas in green and blue suits, multi-colored churches and green stars, all the while wondering why there is a sailboat mixed in with our Christmas cookie cutter collection.

Why the sailboat every year? I don't get it. I just don't get it.

There have been multiple explanations. None of which I accept.

By the time it’s all over momma’s kitchen looks like this:

A Christmas war zone complete with frosted walls, sprinkle coated floors, cranberry vodka puddles and half eaten Santa cookies. We might be in the middle of an argument about who has the most beautifully creative cookie and then we might make pops make the final decision. He usually picks the top five, in no particular order, so as not to hurt anyone’s feelings. And I might stomp my foot and say something like “No, that is not acceptable. Pick one. You must pick one and only one!” while presenting to him, in the least obvious way, my best effort.

And then, when he doesn’t chose mine, I might accidentally throw flour in someone’s hair, or wipe green frosting on someone’s ear or chase someone down the hall with both ingredients, threatening a full on food fight….while screaming “I am not a sore loser…I. Am. Not!”

No, this is not a Martha Stewart Christmas cooking experience.

Cocktails anyone?

But it’s ours.

And the cookies are delicious, out of the box or not.

But they are always out of the box.

And there is always laughter.

And lounging.

And that’s how we get ready for Christmas around here.

It’s my favorite part of the whole ordeal.

So Happy Christmas Eve everyone.

I hope your little sister comes home in her sweatpants with a matching pair of jingle bell earrings for you…

…and if you have another sister, with a new baby and a nice husband, I hope she comes home too.

Cause this Christmas I miss my big sister that has a new baby a nice husband…

But, you know, she usually wins the cookie decorating contest….

…hmmmm….so I should have actually had a chance this year…

I demand a re-count!

Oh well…

Merry Christmas!

See ya at church.

She will be a mother.

Posted on September 27, 2010 by Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

So my big little sister is having a baby. I say big sister, cause she’s older than me. I say little because she’s smaller. Much smaller. Petite. Lovely. Fragile. Like a porcelain doll.

You know, the opposite of me.

And we’re all laughing around here because this woman, this ballet dancer who wears nothing but dresses and high heels and red lipstick, this woman whose wrists are about as big around as spaghetti noodles and who is the epitome of feminine, (you know the opposite of me) is having a boy.

Well, “it” hasn’t popped out yet, so I guess anything can happen, but you know, they are pretty sure…

This is a big deal around here, not only because it’s the first grandkid and it will be funny to see how it all turns out, with the trucks and boogers and snakes and noise and dirt and squirt gun fights that come with boys, but it will also be the first boy to have entered the picture since husband first started driving his Thunderbird out to see me when we were 15.

Poor pops.

Anyway, I have been an aunt now for a while to three wonderful little girls, so I know something about what it means. Like candy when they want it and projects that involve glitter and pink and taking them swimming and saving them from their mean uncle who makes them finish all of their macaroni and clean up their crayons. I know a thing or two about giving the kids what they want.

But I have to say, I wasn’t prepared for this: watching my big little sister–the one who forced makeovers upon me, who made me her own personal baby doll (until I was the age of 4 and I started beating her up), who baby-sat me when our parents were out of town and let me have popcorn and Oreos for dinner–preparing to become a mother.

I heard the news eight months ago and smiled, but the reality of this life-changing situation doesn’t kick in until you see her each day, her small graceful frame that treads so softly on this earth slowly taken over by a life. Each day, she glows a little more, each day her belly more swollen and her back arched a bit further, dresses stretched a little more snugly across her torso, until the one sad day when her husband outlaws her high-heals and we all know what happens next…

But she has never looked more beautiful.

And my big little sister has always been beautiful. Seven years my senior, there was this adoration, this mystery, this absolute intrigue that she would exude to me, an Olive Oyle-esc adolescent, all arms, elbows, fuzzy hair and bad t-shirts who wanted nothing more than to wander the hills alone picking berries and singing at the top of my lungs.

I was a wild child. My sister was civilized. I was a bit unkempt. She was polished. I was a tomboy who belched a little too loud and a little too often. My sister was a lady who I was certain had never even farted. I was an earth tone. She was sultry red. I loved dogs. She loved cats. I was a Pippy Longstocking. My sister was Marilyn Monroe.

We were perfect opposites, and even though I ridiculed and tortured every boy that she would bring home and complain when she would take too long in the bathroom, my big little sister never scorned me for my differences. Yes, there was the occasional bribe to let her experiment on me with makeup and eighties hair and she did pay me money to let her shave my gorilla like legs, but I think mom may have been involved in that one (God bless her).

But, she never made fun of my Garth Brooks posters, the 101 Dalmatian sweatshirt I wore until the seventh grade or my earthy, over-the-top poetry. No, she never made me feel ridiculous, she just embraced her quirky sister and took advantage of the fact that I had no problems playing the male role in all of her dance routines that we, unfortunately, captured on video (thanks to the filming capabilities of our much younger sister) …

Yes, I may or may not have donned a fake mustache and suspenders in many a home movie.

And that’s what I’m saying here. Those days don’t really feel so far away do they? I mean, wasn’t it just yesterday that we were arguing about whose turn it was to unload the dishwasher? Didn’t she just get after me about tormenting our little sister? Didn’t I just eat the tuna noodle salad she always made for us when she was babysitting? Didn’t she just leave the house for college? Didn’t I just eat a piece of her wedding cake?

I know at 27 I might be too young for this type of nostalgia, but I guess these big moments, you know, the ones that change everything, bring it out of me.

And as we prepare for the little bun’s arrival, and big little sister cooks him a bit longer, and pops is planning ways to steal him away and mom is thinking about how she’s going to dress him, and little sister is vying for babysitting duty, I am standing here, mouth agape, watching helplessly as the world flies by at a thousand miles an hour.

Because I don’t know if I will ever be a mother. I don’t know if I will ever get to worry about what color to paint the nursery or who to choose as Godparents, how to dress the baby for his first Christmas, what sport he will play or if he can make it through his first sleepover. I don’t know these things.

And that’s ok.

But I do know one thing. I know my big sister, the one I used to beat up, the one who borrowed my 101 Dalmatian sweatshirt for “nerd day” at high school, the one who laughs at my stupid jokes and never gets a word in at the dinner table, is going to make all these decisions and more with the grace, style and compassion she has always possessed–just with a bit of spit-up on her dresses and boogers in her hair.