Anecdotes

Last week Russell and I went to Regina to accomplish a few different things. A main hope was to find a possible piece of equipment for our haying work. As it turned out we are looking for a very rare thing and of the four dealerships we visited only two even took our contact information down. It was a little bit of a downer.

A little something happened enroute that I find myself mulling over and not sure of the significance of. We stopped on the side of the highway before we got to Regina. This is common for us, we often switch drivers at this point as I am the city driver of our duo, Russ does most of the highway miles. As we went around the back of the car to switch sides I initiated a hug with Russell. From an outside perspective I find this a bit weird of me. I grew up in a family with a warm environment but still we mostly only hugged at the airport or other places where significant hellos or good-byes were said. However, I find alot of comfort in Russell’s embrace, so as we physically drew near to each other rounding the back end of the car it seemed a quite natural thing to do. As we hugged, me facing the highway and he facing the ditch, my chin on his shoulder and his chin on mine, we both spoke at the same time. He said, “I can see a fire way over there.” while I was saying, “huh, someone is land-rolling over there.” We got back in the car, feeling amused that even as we were engaged in a hug, we were both scanning the landscape. Russ had this theory about our words, that people of the land are always surveying their surroundings. There are surely several reasons for this but I know one big why. I am thinking about the many stories where the alertness of neighbors has meant that we, our land, our buildings, our animals and our machinery have received what was needed when we have needed it. Sometimes its our eyes that help our neighbors. Just yesterday Russ and Morgan were joined by a neighbor coming down the road and together they put another neighbor’s wandering cows back in their pasture. Scanning your surroundings is part of being a good neighbor, an acknowledgement that we don’t have enough eyes to monitor all that we are responsible for, our neighbors eyes are important in the mix. We have so many good neighbor stories, it is a big part of what makes being a steward of land and creatures possible.

Another amusing thing of that day happened when we dropped into the mall to make a return for a friend. We were in a woman’s clothing store that had some sales on. Russell said, “Kathy, why don’t you try something on.” I have not been feeling myself for quite a while and at times like that I think maybe its not much fun to try on clothes or even to know what to look for. I am in a bit of an identity shift perhaps, in times like that, what clothes do you need? I find I still want to dress like I did in the late 90s. I had a good collection of vests. Anyways….I found myself responding to Russell’s invitation to shop longer and try things on by saying this, “nah, no need for new clothes, lets go tractor shopping.” It was not lost on me that I was speaking words that I never expected myself to utter and I do feel that I let the sisterhood of farm wives down. I really was not that thrilled about implement shopping (we are looking for a self propelled haybine not a tractor, but it was the word tractor that fell out of my mouth in that moment.) I think I just had no space in my brain for clothes shopping. Its fun to take note of the times that words fall out of us that we never expected to be the source of.

Part of our time in Regina included a trip to Starbucks to see Jill at work. As we came up to the till Russ told the clerk that he wanted a black coffee and a hug from that girl over there. The cashier looked taken aback, which was partly Russell’s goal I am certain. I piped in, “thats our daughter!” You could see relief come over the clerk’s face. We proceeded to enjoy moments of back and forth with the cashier and Jill. When we sat down to enjoy our drinks a woman sitting near us said, “is that your daughter?” When we affirmed that yes it sure was, she said, “she’s good.” It meant alot to us to hear that. Jill later told us that she is a regular, I guess that means she knows what she is talking about. A parent’s heart is bolstered at times like that.

Last Thursday we did something really interesting, a little bit challenging and quite rewarding when we exchanged favors with ranch family friends of ours. Our part of the exchange was to bring lunch to their branding. There were 35 mouths to feed. Russell was my catering assistant. Morgan was on the roping team for the branding. I have never attended a branding before, we do things differently at our ranch. It was interesting to see how the large scale action unfolds. It was rewarding to feed a very polite and thankful crew and see in the eyes of our friends deep gratitude for what we were able to do for them. The fun part that we keep talking about was that I made a slapdash broccoli salad in the last minutes of my preparations. I threw together the ingredients and with no sense that I had created anything special we headed out the door. It was a hit. Sitting around afterwards people were talking about it. Zany things were said, perhaps not just right for this blog post, but we are still smiling about them.

One last anecdote to round out this post. Morgan has been burning the candle at both ends lately. He has been schooling, ranching and getting a few fun nights with friends in as well as being a cowboy every chance he gets. He has become quite exhausted and I feel bad about it. Recently I found him flaked out on our bed, sleeping so soundly that I could not rouse him. So I did what any woman would do who misses their little kids. I washed his face and read him two children’s books. By the end of the second book he did respond to the ridiculous duck on a bike with a pretty teenager-y expression, but otherwise, I read uninterrupted. It felt good.

Thats all. Just a few little nuggets from the days we have known.