~The Fragrance of Time~

“And the heady perfume of the wild plum in blossom, drifting through an open window to braid itself softly about us, all wildness itself — how it carries us back further, to a time before history, to a place through which we grope our way, longing for something we cannot quite define, waving a peeled and painted wand with a packet of tobacco tied to its end. Oh, dear fragrance on the swollen river of spring, sweet wistfulness turning and turning on the speeding black current.”

~Ted Kooser, Local Wonders

The plum tree south of the stackyard

Late April.

When the wind isn’t whisking the air north to the Dakotas or south to Kansas, the scent of blooming trees and shrubs finds its way to my nose. Plums, crabapples, and currants unfurl delicate petals among spiky branches and perfume the sky.

If scents could sing praises, if smells could pour forth melodious sonnets of verse, surely the fragrance of the wild plums blooming in the spring would top the list of odes.

Near ranchsteads, houses, and old homestead sites, wild plum trees and currant bushes dot the Sandhills. They sit at the edges of the highways and along the railroad tracks. Jon says they like the sandy soil. Did they always grow here? Did birds plant them with their droppings? Or was it something that came with the homesteaders, like the rhubarb?

In previous years, I’ve made jellies from the plums and the currants. The currants ripen first in July. Tiny, hard green balls swell and ripen — first to a jeweled rose, then a purple so deep it’s almost black. They burst tart and astringent in the mouth; my son and I and the dog eat them by the handfuls.

In August, the wild plums ripen. Small, smooth-skinned, blushing fruits reveal juicy, tangy orange flesh surrounding a tiny pit. We spit the pits, but the coyotes don’t. They love plums. They gobble up the fallen and bruised fruits from the ground. Many fruits never make it as far as the ground, though; birds snatch them up before we and the coyotes find them.

I boil and juice both fruits for jelly, but Jon’s dad loves a currant pie. His mother was a first-generation immigrant from France, a Kinkaid homesteader whose family was settled by Old Jules himself. She always told her son, if he picked a hatful of currants, she would make him a pie. I never did ask her for her recipe.

Currants

It frosts thickly, and the ground glitters white. I stop to check the plum tree out south two days later. A log near the tree hosts a dozen or more painted turtles, and I pause to appreciate their peaceful assemblage. The plum tree is still blooming profusely; perhaps the turtles have gathered on their wooden pew to pay homage to the majesty of scent.

Western painted turtles are common throughout Nebraska, and enjoy the plentiful of freshwater in the Sandhills

One stormy evening, I race to Ellsworth to the maternity ward. Jon is there, waiting for me with a new slick calf. For whatever rare reason, the umbilical cord didn’t seal correctly, and the calf is bleeding out from her naval. All that is stopping the calf from dying there on the meadow is Jon’s fingers pinching the cord shut. A little bubble of blood fills the cord above his fingers, a miniature blood balloon, ready to burst like a ripe fruit, and I hand him a clamp. His hand now free, he can tie the cord shut with string and give shots of Vitamin K and Excenel. We work together to save the calf, and he sends me back home after the job is done. As I drive, I see the rain clouds splitting and going around us. I look north, up the slanted slot of valley, and see sheets of white haze blanketing those far hills. When the rain goes around us, so close like this, Jon consoles me, saying, “That’s okay, we have pastures there too.” But I want it to rain here, now, on me and the currants and the plums.

Jon saves a calf that would have died without intervention

I wake up to rain. Rain — not snow — at the end of April. Winter has slipped quietly away this year, and spring came with all her propensities, including rain. Rain in town, rain in the pastures. Rain on me and my currants and plum tree.

I drive to town to teach, with the windshield wipers waving a wide greeting of glee at the moisture. Trees move down the highway. Huge evergreens fastened to large flatbed trailers. Somewhere, someone is planting trees today. A perfect day for it, I think, with all the rain. The trees zoom down the highway in the rain, their roots scooped out of the earth and free, going to another place, another time. South of the stackyard near my home, my plum tree stands. Steadily soaking the life-water into its roots. I want to be there, soaking it in, the scent of those wet blossoms permeating my roots.

I get home after a long day, and walk south of the stackyard to smell the plums. I’m forty-four years old, but a piece of me is forever ten. Forever a little prairie girl who wants to run and explore and catch butterflies and lay on her back and watch the clouds turn into a parade of animals. And right now, she wants more than anything to smell those plum blossoms.

The tree is still wet, even though the rain has ceased. The aroma hits my nose like a punch and goes straight to my gut. It soaks deep into my roots, and I can feel it in me, pulling and tugging at all wild wistfulness as Kooser said it would. I smell and remember — not merely my time, but yours. Your Sandhill spring. With the currants and the rain and the calves and the wind. And with the turtles on their log, I offer up a hymn of praise for this hallowed fragrance of time.

~Blogging, and Beyond~

How it Started ~

My blogging adventures began in March of 2020. Like the rest of the world, we entered the shutdown for Covid about the second week of March, and my kids and I were no longer heading to town each day for school. We were calving, of course, so life on the ranch kept going as normal. Communications for school and family and friends were all online, so—like many other people at the time—I posted photos and documented the things we were doing at home. I shared journal entries about ranchlife, what the kids and I were doing, and as I kept going, I found family and friends enjoyed what I was posting. They liked seeing the pictures of new life emerging on the ranch, of spring arriving as usual, and of us working together as a family on the ranch.

One of my Facebook posts during March of 2020 with a little journal and captions on each picture

By the time May rolled around, many family members and friends were strongly urging me to start a blog to share my pictures and journals publicly. I faltered on it, wondering why people would want to read my little musings about ranchlife.

A Facebook post from May – I enjoyed sharing photos of my home in the Sandhills

Finally, in September of 2020, I launched a new Facebook page titled Sandhills Prairie Girl. The name was a subtle nod to one of my favorite authors, Laura Ingalls Wilder, who titled her autobiography Pioneer Girl. I started writing and posting, never setting any kind of numbers of followers goal, but with the intention of trying it for a couple of years to see if I liked it or not. If, after two years, I didn’t feel successful with the blog or didn’t like it, I would move on from it.

Photo from my first “official” blogpost on Facebook

How it’s Going ~

Four years later, I’m still blogging and enjoying it. I’ve learned a lot about photography, and really developed it as an enjoyable hobby. I put together and sold calendars on my page last year with surprising success. I used the money to help buy a bigger, better camera lens, which in turn is leading to more pictures for the blog.

Taking photos has become a wonderful hobby

In February of this year, I got a phone call from the editor of Nebraska Life. He wanted to publish my stories and pictures in the magazine. I was stunned. We visited and emailed and began working on my first piece.

Excited, I fired off an essay, but it didn’t hit the mark. Another attempt wasn’t right either. I found myself frustrated, then thought, “How would I start my story at the ranch if given the chance? How would it read to go back to the beginning?” I pulled up a blank screen and began writing again.

It hurt, honestly, to drudge up those memories of my beginnings here, those first hard years. To bring my feelings forward and fresh again — so different from now — was difficult. When I finished and sent the email, I bawled.

That essay is what is printed in the March/April issue, and if you are a subscriber of Nebraska Life, you will get to read. It is a side of me that I haven’t shared much here on the blog and might surprise a few readers. I am already working on the next essay for the next issue, as this is to be a continuing series.

You can read the essay and see photos in the upcoming issue of Nebraska Life Magazine

I want to thank all of you for your support of my photography and writing. This is something I have always dreamed about doing. Seeing my name in print, my own words dancing across a page in a magazine with my photos of the cattle and the ranch blown up crisp and glossy and beautiful brought tears to my eyes. You have helped make my dreams a reality, and I wanted to share this with you today. God bless you all!

~A Little Hell and High Water~

Jon’s curlew photo

A photo comes through on text. “They are showing up a lot of places today,” my husband Jon says of the long-billed curlew he snapped with his phone camera. It is a good photo, but digital zoom can only go so far. I show him what I can do with editing, saying I want to go out with my camera. He teases me about being a camera snob now, with my new zoom lens. Phaw. I just want a good shot of curlew for the blog, I argue. No snobbery there.

I carefully pack my camera in a backpack with padding. I slather on the sunscreen and grab my hat. The wind is picking up this warm April afternoon.

Zooming north on the ATV, I head to some spots I have seen curlews in the past. Just over the autogate on the road into a pasture we call Bert’s, I spy a curlew on a small, nearby hill. Giddy with excitement, I stop and pull out my camera. I carefully remove the lens cap and start shooting. I climb off the ATV for a closer look, snapping photos as I go. Suddenly, the curlew takes off and flies right past me, circling and heading southeast into the Brown meadow. I follow it with my camera, panning across the sky, and I can tell I am capturing some amazing shots of the curlew in flight.

Satisfied with the rush of success, I decide I will check out some of the images on my camera. I press the triangle to view photos. Nothing. I press again. A message across the screen informs me I forgot the memory card. The whole time I was shooting, none of the photos saved. Frustrated, I head back to the house for a card, not wanting to give up.

American Avocets

Jon meets me at the house, back from checking pastures. He offers to take me back up to the Brown meadow where I saw the curlews land. I quickly grab the extra memory card on the dining room table and plug it in. I double-check to make sure I can take a picture. Yep, there it is, I am good to go.

North we zoom, again, and there in the Brown—as expected—are two long-billed curlews. A pair! This will be even better, I think. He parks the jeep, and I climb out, slowly working across the meadow for a closer shot. The curlew let me get quite close, as I wade through murky swamp water, drenching my pants. The pair pause on a little rise in the meadow, perfectly framing themselves against a background of cows and calves grazing. Oh wow! This makes up for losing the shot of the curlew in flight, I think. I shoot dozens of photos of the curlew, as well as other birds in the meadow. A successful little venture.

Greater Yellowlegs

We start back for the house, and I push the triangle to playback some of what I shot to show Jon. No photos. None. How can this be? A message pops up about corrupted files. I grabbed the wrong memory card, and all of the photos are gone.

Dejected, I ride with him back to the house. Jon pats my leg. “I’m sorry, honey,” he says.

I plug in the memory card to my computer at home, just to make sure the files are indeed gone. It looks hopeless, even after some computer work to see if I can somehow retrieve the corrupted files.

Killdeer

I’m tired. I’m wet. My clothes smell faintly of alkali mud. Jon said before he left, “It’s okay, you can go back another day and try again.” But stubborn German blood flows through my veins, and I am bound and determined that this day I WILL take a picture of curlews. Come hell or high water.

I pack my camera. With a memory card. The correct memory card that works with my camera. I double-check everything and carefully load my backpack. Hat on, I pump a fist in the air and say, “Goonies never say die!”

My seventeen-year-old daughter stares at me. “What does that mean?” she asks. “What are Goonies?” Sigh.

I zoom back to the Brown meadow on the ATV, but I don’t see any curlew. The Shubert doesn’t hold any, and neither does Bert’s pasture. Maybe the Nancy meadow? Nothing. I decide to check the pairs in Bert’s, looking at the calves to see if they are healthy, and snap pictures of them and other birds along the way. Killdeer. Blackbirds — both Redwing and Yellow-headed. Greater Yellowlegs. American Avocet. Ducks, geese, meadowlarks, coots, even a ringnecked pheasant among a treebreak. But no curlew. 

The day is getting late, and I’ve spent far too long trying to take pictures of these silly birds. Slowly, I head back home, circling through the Brown meadow one last time as I go.

Western Meadowlark

Two brown bodies with long bills explode just left of me, crying as they fly. Cur-leee, cur-leee! I stop and watch where they land, near a marshy spot. It’s not ideal, but I’m going to go for it, I decide. After all this effort, I desperately want some photos of curlew. I park near the edge of the low, wet area and creep into the sopping sod.

I photograph to my heart’s content. I even lay down in the wet grass to get the angles I want. The late afternoon sun back-lights the birds, making them shimmer against the Sandhills behind them. It’s beautiful and magical and worth all the effort.

Back at the house, I plug in the memory card to the computer and see all the photos pull up on the screen. Lovely photos of such special birds. Maybe not as good of photos as the ones I would have taken the other two times, maybe better. The world will never know. But I got my curlew pictures, with a little bit of hell and some high water.

Long-billed Curlew

~Listen to the Wind Blow~

To others the country was aloof, austere, forbidding; the wind sucking their courage as it sucked the green from the grass by mid-June. Some saw it as a great sea caught and held forever in a spell, and were afraid. And here and there were a few sensitive to the constantly changing tans and mauves of the strange, rhythmical hills that crowded away into the hazy horizon. They heard the undying wind rattle the seed pods of the yuccas against the sky, sing its thin flute song over the tall, sparse grasses of the slopes.

Mari Sandoz, Old Jules

A mallard takes off from the side of the highway, but the high wind keeps the bird from gaining altitude. I gasp and swerve, but the duck’s body slams into my car. I hope, against odds, to see him fly despite being struck, but his body rolls to the other side of the road, and I know I’ve killed him.

A pair of Northern Pintails are one of the many species of ducks that return to the Sandhills in early spring.

Dang wind, I think, blinking back tears. I hate knowing if I hadn’t been driving on the highway, that poor mallard might be alive.

Earlier in the day, we flew kites — my kids with their cousins — the wind lifting the little plastic rhombuses high in the air, colorful tails trailing as the kites swooped and dove.

A pair — cow and her calf

The rest of the week, I substitute teach in town. The wind dies down in the night and kicks back up by afternoon each day. A student tells me at recess, “It’s a sandstorm, Mrs. Louden!”

“How was your day?” Jon asks, tossing his gloves on the chair after coming inside. “Were the kids as wound up from the wind as the cattle?” He chuckles as I relate my stories from school.

A calf finds a little swale in the meadow to lay in on a very windy April day

The next day, the wind is worse. Slamming a shoulder into the water of the lakes, the wind riles up white caps and foam that gathers at the southern edges. The water looks muddy, a murky brown against the blue sky.

White caps on the lakes in the Sandhills indicate wind speeds of 30 mph or greater.

The wind sets the cattle on edge. They drift behind hills, finding pockets of protection; they lay down in sheltered spots and don’t want to get up and move. A mother cow refuses to lick her calf. She lays next to him, but never licks — is it because of the wind? Has her scent of him been carried away in gale? The cattle rely so much on their sense of smell. Jon says, “When the wind blows this hard, it’s almost like it has blinded them.”

Doe-eyed calves are everywhere now on the ranch. We are well into the calving season here.

The windmills turn, metal sails spinning wildly in the strong wind. The pump rod lurches up and down at a frenzied pace, while a steady stream of cool, clear water pours from the lead pipe into the tank. The wind blows harder yet and shuts the miraculous contraptions off.

My husband grumbles as he reads the forecast. A dip in temperatures over the weekend increases our chances for moisture. Lows are predicted to hover around freezing, but that isn’t what is setting his teeth on edge. With sixty mile per hour winds, it won’t matter if it stays rain at those wind speeds — the heavies will need to be corralled, and every new calf will have to be brought in the barns. “The wind is a multiplier,” he says, “it makes everything harder.

A Canada goose nests on top of a muskrat house in a marshy area in the meadow.

I watch a heavy cow run toward the pond, her tail a pump handle showing she is almost ready to let loose a calf. She hits the water, turns and runs along the shoreline, then speeds across the meadow away from the rest of the herd. Her behavior of leaving the herd to calve isn’t strange, but the speed at which she does so is. Is it the wind, beating at her backside, making her a little wild? 

A haze fills the air all afternoon—is it dirt? Smoke? I sneeze and try not to talk at the pickup line at school, still managing to inhale a mouthful of dirt. At home, I ride with Jon to check a pasture, we both sneeze, and I wipe brown gunk from the corners of my eyes.

Dirt or smoke fills the air on a windy April day

I ask him if he wants to corral the heavies tonight. He says no, we’ll do it the morning. There’s a storm coming, but it’s time to rest tonight. Listen to the wind blow, and wait for the sun to rise.

A Western Meadowlark sings atop a fencepost, a very “Nebraska” sight.

~Ordinary Magic~

My favorite place on the ranch is the Shubert Lake. North of our house, about a half mile or more, the lake is large enough to show up on maps of the Sandhills.

It’s my favorite spot for a couple of reasons. One, it is the largest body of water within walking distance of my house. And two, it is part of the ranch that Jon and I own together. That, and it is a beautiful valley and lake.

Owning land is a new thing for me. I grew up in the town of Cozad, Nebraska—population around 4,000. The town sits just north of Interstate 80 and the Platte River, and Highway 30 runs through the middle. My parents owned a little house in town right across from the high school, and that is where I spent the major part of my life growing up.

My mom stayed at home with us until my brother started kindergarten, and then she went back to the workforce. During the school year, it didnt matter as much with my dad getting off work at three and being home after school; but summertime meant we needed supervision, and that meant every day all week long at Grandma’s house.

A little highway runs north of Cozad—it eventually gets you to Callaway. My grandparents lived along that highway, about 4 miles north of town.

As a kid, it did not matter that their house was small, or that it was somewhat untidy, or that one tiny bedroom converted to a sewing room was completely jam packed with yarn and fabric and beads and crafts. What I remember most is the expansive yard filled with gardens and trees and laundry lines. An old large wooden spool under a crabapple tree was a table for thousands of games and play-imaginings. There were mulberry bushes lining the fence under enormous cottonwoods where wood ducks and owls frequently hatched young ones. Quail hid in the line of cedar trees to the north, and a steady stream of birds visited grandma’s half dozen feeders and homemade gourd houses in her yard. She grew flowers in old kettles and porcelain tubs, and at least three large tilled vegetable garden plots every summer. A dozen cats ran around, along with a dog or two, and chickens and roosters had a yard just west of the house with a little shed to roost. A veritable heaven for an imaginative little prairie girl about eight years old.

Rainy summer days kept us indoors, but there was still plenty to do. And if we ever told Grandma we were bored, she’d pull out the Chinese checkers and castle blocks and Lincoln Logs. Curling up in the arm of her easy chair, I could often persuade her to read to me from our favorite old book about Dolly the Circus Horse.

Once in a while, I’d point a small finger at the glossy paper calendar from the local feed store that hung on the side of the refrigerator in the kitchen and displayed moon phases and fishing lore. “There’s a good fish today,” I’d tell Grandpa, who only moved from his easy chair to eat, use the bathroom, and fish. He’d squint out the window as I waited to see if the calendar agreed with Grandpa. “Too sunny,” he’d say, and return to his chair next to the end table  and bowl of nuts and lemon candies.

When he determined the weather right, calendar or no, the usually sedentary man became a flurry of activity. Tackle boxes, poles, hats and boots, styrofoam buckets of worms and minnows, along with a bucket of the smelliest goop on earth, all were loaded in the back of an old black Ford pickup. My brother and I were crammed into the middle of that hard bench seat between Grandpa and Grandma, and that old engine roared to life. Maybe the pickup lived for fishing too; they drove the car everywhere else.

Fishing was okay, but I lacked the patience to sit for long hours with my pole like Grandpa. What was far more fun was exploring the lake or river or waterhole where we fished. Tiny minnows might swim among the rocks at the shore, with larger silvery fish always seeming just within reach. I would beg Grandma for the minnow net and try and catch more to fill the Styrofoam bucket. Every now and then, I’d take off my shoes and socks, wade into a shallow area, and squish my toes into the sand. There were all sorts of reptiles and amphibians and bugs to try and catch, some which Grandpa might use as bait. The grass and trees and shrubs were always of interest to me while we fished, I wanted to ask Grandma all their names. Often, I would make little collections, some to take home and show my mom and dad. Sometimes, my brother and I would give up on fishing and simply throw rocks in the water until Grandpa grumbled at us that we were scaring all the fish away.

Back at the house, any fish large enough to keep were cleaned and breaded and fried in a cast iron skillet. I know I’ve tasted better fish, but the fact that WE caught it made it the greatest tasting fish in the world. The same went for the peas we helped grow, the potatoes we dug, the corn we shucked, the strawberries we picked. Never did anything taste so delightful as the food we grew and caught and raised ourselves.

The summers spent with my grandparents in the country fishing, gardening, gathering eggs, playing in the dirt and mud, running up and down hills, playing with animals, were the most magically ordinary days of my life. I got a taste for the life I wanted—that laid-back hard work in the dirt—for the rest of my years. While a life on a cattle ranch in the Sandhills may not have been exactly what I had in mind, I can’t help but feel that same sweet satisfaction in so many aspects of this country life. When I hear the birds sing, when I plant my garden each spring, when we get done working cattle, when we drive through the hills with no people for miles, when I enjoy that homegrown beef and vegetables, and when I stand at the edge of the Shubert lake with my toes in the sand, I’m still that little girl having the most ordinary magical time.

~January Thaw~

South wind shoos out the cold front as violently as the north wind ushered it in. The air settles, the sun warms, the high temperature each day is normal and then some.

Skunks, badgers, and raccoons rouse from their torpor to inspect the warmth. We, too, stretch tired limbs and come out of our half-hibernated state, thankful to not need to chop ice. Kids shuck coats at recess, I leave layers of wraps on the hook, Jon is out the door with only his winter coat. Flies materialize out of thin air and buzz inside the windowsill.

January crawls to the finish. Despite being very busy—both on the ranch and off—time passes slowly. Another week drags on, but it’s still the 26th. I drive home into a blushing full moon, set plump and shy on the eastern horizon, then turn and drive into it again, now morning-brilliant in the west from her dalliance during the night.

Each morning, we walk on stars, the crunching crystals loud underfoot. By midday, everything is melting again. The air is filled with the dull sploosh of soft snow and ice, the splashing of puddles, the squelching of mud, and the steady drip, drip, drip of melt from the eaves.

I ride with Jon as he feeds grain to the cattle on the ranch. The steer calves run and buck and play, happy in the warmth. By contrast, the cows plod along slowly to the bunks, their bellies rounder, fuller than the week before. No amount of warm days will make them hurry for feed now; the calves inside are putting on weight rapidly in this last month or so of gestation.

I go for a walk up the road on a sunny, warm afternoon. Puddles of mud and water make me walk around the road, tramping instead through banks of snow-cone-consistency ice. The next day, I drive to visit a friend at the south house on the ranch. Jon advises to take the pickup instead of the car, with the road filled with muck and mud and water. Mud is in the very veins of spring, a lifeblood in rivulets through rain and snow that breeds green on the prairie. But this is not spring yet; this is merely a January thaw.

The evening church service ends around a quarter to six, and, to our surprise, there is still light to the west as we leave. Deep yellow and orange and blue blend seamlessly in the western sky, and the hills form a stark silhouette against the lingering twilight. The next day, the same light in the same rich colors appears on the eastern horizon, a quarter after 6 a.m. The days are growing noticeably longer.

By the 30th, the thermometer reads 58°. Brown has returned as the primary color of the landscape, with splotches of white clinging fast to north faces of hills and low spots where the snow drifted deep. The sun blazes with a jolly grin, as if he’s just been a part of a wonderful joke.

We send January out with a day over 60 degrees Fahrenheit. Did I really write about the bitter cold two weeks ago? It seems more like a month or more. Standing outside at recess duty, with the sunshine beaming at us like April, I close my eyes and smile. Whatever comes, I’ve enjoyed this January thaw.

~Poetry~

Every so often

I can snatch a poem from the air.

Grab its long body

with iridescent wings

and set it on my palm.

Watch it watching me

with multi-faceted eyes.

Knowing I am not skilled enough

with verse

to keep it there,

it quickly zooms away.

And I wonder—

as I see it leave—

was it ever really mine?

~Cold~

White wall winds wheel snow out of Saskatchewan and roll it across the northern Nebraska plains at alarming speeds. The Louisiana guy comments that it’s snowing sideways—something he’s never seen before.

I wave a hand toward the window, “Snowing and blowing… how is this NOT a blizzard?! A Winter storm at the very least!” I’m grumpy because all that’s listed for our area is a winter weather advisory and dangerous wind chills. I’m grumpy because I hate driving on snowy roads with poor visibility.

Mr. Cooperative Weather Observer points out that this doesn’t quite meet the qualifications for a blizzard, and a winter weather advisory was correctly hoisted. I harumph at my husband and stalk off to start on some homemade pizza dough for supper.

As I mix and measure, I watch the wind howl outside. Jon says the 8 a.m. temperature of 5° Fahrenheit will likely be the high today; the temperatures continue to drop as the day wears on. With the wind, temperatures feel well below zero already.

Being a teacher with a minor in science, I know that cold itself is not a thing. It isn’t a substance. It isn’t a quantity. You can’t measure how much “cold” is in something. I can explain it to you— scientifically speaking—how cold is merely the absence of heat. But knowing this logically doesn’t matter. Not to my toes, still frigid under thick socks.

“The pipes burst at the middle school again, so those kids all had to come up to the high school. The commons was so cold, Mom,” Abigail is uncommonly chatty when we pick her up after school.

We drive home, and I watch cows on cornstalks at the edge of town huddle together with their backsides facing the wind. Tiny birds sit where pavement is open from snow, fluffed bodies exploding into the air as we zoom by. I touch the glass on the window of the car—the heat from my fingertips is snatched away instantly. You can’t tell the animals that cold is not a thing.

At home, the heifers are pocketed behind the tall hill on the north side of the granary. Many are laying on extra hay and looking quite content despite the weather. The sky is clearing; colder temperatures are coming.

Overnight, the temperature drops to -12°.  The stars shudder brightly in a clear sky. Jon decides to keep us home from school since it is so cold. The sun shines and temperatures eek over zero. The guys feed extra hay, extra grain, and pitch ice at water tanks. Never rising out of single digits, the temperatures plummet again as soon as the sun disappears.

The mercury drops to -20° Fahrenheit Friday night, and Louisiana says he’s never seen it so cold. I laugh because I know we haven’t seen the coldest of this audacious Arctic air yet.

Saturday, Jon won’t let me out of the house due to the dangerous wind chills. Not to go to town to get milk. Not to ride along and take pictures. Not to haul out the trash. Cold slaps Jon in the face and yanks his nose hairs stiff as he leaves the house in the morning, ages his whiskers white with frost as he feeds the cows, and brushes his skin red with sandpaper fingers. The high for the day is -16° Fahrenheit. The HIGH. They’ve canceled church on Sunday, and warnings are out everywhere to stay home and stay indoors until this thing breaks and normal temperatures return. Cold has besieged us, holding us hostage in our homes.

The sun sets in a crystalline sky, brilliant as the wind dies down. Cold—emboldened in the darkness—scratches at the windows and shakes the icicles along the eaves. Reaching through the tiniest cracks and crevices, it finds its way inside the house. Leeching through floorboards—turning them icy—seeping into pipes and tiles and tubs and walls and windows and even the carpets feel chilled. The heaters try to beat it away but can’t keep up; we crank the fire on both of the propane stoves. I go to the kitchen and open a cupboard, and there it is—Cold mixed amongst my flour and sugar and bread. I tiptoe to the basement pantry for a jar of peaches, and gasp—Cold has flooded the basement. I retreat quickly back upstairs, shielding myself from the haunt in our house.

Sunday, I wake and make coffee, seeing the temperature has risen from the -24 to -14 in the night. I look at the forecast and sigh. Two more days that the highs won’t break above zero. Two more days of this ridiculous Cold, then temperatures return to normal. Not Cold—I remind myself, only half-amused—the absence of heat, and our hearts will be all the fonder for warmth’s return.

The wind is down, so I go with Jon to help pitch ice. Four hours later, I’m inside trying to warm myself by the fire. It seems like the Cold is in my very bones, a deep ache the heat doesn’t want to touch.

Cold is not a thing… oh, but it is.

~Threshold~

The clouds spread silver scales across the pale blue sky. It’s warm as I drive to town—warm for November at 64 degrees—and the wind ruffles the brown of the prairie. Red-brown, yellow-brown, silvery-brown, light and dark alike, all mixed in swaths and streaks and splotches, but all some shade of brown. Except for the ever-green soapweeds, and even they sport brown in their open, hardened seed pods. Gone are the fall flourishes. Gone are all the flowers. Gone the autumn-festooned grasses and vibrant forbs. The prairie has thrown off her radiant robes to reveal her bare contours and form, beautiful even without the garlanded garment.

The hay we baled up for months on end is slowly placed in neat rows with a tractor, four and four together, then picked up with the stack mover and tucked away in stack yards in longer rows yet. A truck arrives with a load of protein lick tubs, and another truck dumps grain in the granary.

The next day starts with scaly clouds, but the wind peels them back by midday to reveal a deeper blue sky and wispy white clouds higher yet, like milkweed silks that flitted on the wind and adhered to the heavens. Heifer calves lounge in the meadow, basking in the warm sun, while some pick lazily around on the dormant grass. Weaning calves and preg-checking cows is done for another year; the major cattlework through corrals and chutes is done until spring. Autumn is the end of the rancher’s year.

Jon and the hired men work on projects—windmills and gate levers, patching holes in fence, combing pastures for stray cows and calves. A bigger tank is installed out at the Andrea for the steer calves. Bunks will be put out for cows, windmills turned on in winter pastures, and salt and mineral placed near mills. Number one diesel will go in the fuel tank to keep the tractors from gelling up.

A strong north wind smears more white clouds all across the sky, deepening them to greys and blues. The day feels more November-y than before, with the cold wind that nips hard at bare skin. I pull out coats and mittens and hats and scarves, washing them and hanging on pegs. I unpack extra blankets and bulky sweaters and Jon’s favorite winter hat. The cattle grow shaggier each week, putting on winter coats of their own. November is often the liminal space between autumn and winter; the threshold that invites us to linger between seasons.

Two winters ago was emotionally grueling for us with the car accident; last winter was physically exhausting with the difficult weather. We stand now, as Jon says, “with bated breath” at the approach of another winter. What will this one bring, I wonder?

Grey gives way to blue, the clouds grow into scaly patches again, then dissolve into feathery sylphs that dance around the sun.  Not dreading nor impervious, we prepare and hope for the best. The forecast holds warm and dry for another week; the cirrus clouds’ predictions of fair weather are holding true. The threshold lengthens as we linger, enjoying the wait. Waiting, at the doorway of winter.

~October Blessings~

The sun shivers under its paltry shawl of clouds, casting blue-grey light across the thickly frosted meadow. The wicked wind from yesterday is no more than a gentle breath today, and the ground is still damp from the freezing rain—over half an inch—that fell with Friday’s system. The weaned calves bawl harder today, missing mothers more and free from fighting the frigid rain and wind.

I cook stew and bake rolls for the cattlework crew, but no one stays for dinner except my own family. Abigail comes in, chilled, after running the chute all morning for preg-checking cows, and grabs a bowl of hot stew. She dunks her roll in the steaming concoction, warming herself from the inside out, proclaiming it the perfect food for a day such as this.

“Did you notice the solar eclipse?” I ask, sitting and joining her with my own bowl.

“I didn’t. We ran cows through, and afterwards, someone said there was a partial eclipse, but I didn’t even see if it got any darker or anything,” she tells me between bites.

I had taken Samuel out to view the crescent sun in shadows, showed him the dimming of light, but he lost interest quickly, so we went back inside. I relate as much to her, and we eat the rest in silence.

Jon comes in after checking the calves in the pens next to the barns, piling his own steaming bowl full of beef stew. The calves weaned a hundred pounds light, and the breed up on this group of cows was poor; the hard winter is still following the cattle, even with all the summer grass. Jon explains it: the late spring, the higher percentage of old cows, the fast growth of the grass after the rains came. He uses terms like “shelly cows” and “washy” grass. Tears leak from the corners of my eyes as he works to assure me that we will be okay despite another set-back. I’m already down this week—it feels like one more blow.

In the afternoon, I tie a scarf around my neck and pull on a heavy denim jacket. Jon lifts his head and watches expectantly until I explain I’m heading out for a walk. His eyes narrow, and I quickly promise to stick to the road, staying in sight of the house in the meadow. I know from past experience that dozens of bawling calves attract predators. And without our larger dog—who was killed by a train this week—to accompany me, it isn’t wise to venture to the tops of the hills around the place right now.

Outside, the breeze is still a gentle brushing at my cheeks, and the coolness is pleasant in the sun. I whistle to Tipsy, who is bouncier today, but still missing her friend along with the rest of us. It hurts each time I head out without the second dog, but I know time makes it easier, time will ease the ache.

I walk away from the bawling calves. Away from the cacophony that tightens and pulls at my head, frays my nerves, and quickens my pulse. I’ve never liked it. Twenty years here hasn’t changed that. The north side of the meadow finds relative quiet, with the barns, buildings, and hills muffling their cries. I stop and stand and listen.

A smattering of grasshoppers—not killed by the frosts and freeze—saw wings half-heartedly, and a lone cricket gives a few slow chirps to punctuate their song. A growing flock of blackbirds raises a clatter on the fence before lifting off in a rush of wings. Two gulls cry and land on the little mud hole at the north end of the valley. The noises, I find, are peaceful here. Comforting.

My mind drifts while I watch a single lark watching me from the wire on the fence. Tipsy races ahead, acting as if she has something caught in the grass. Snake? Mouse? More likely just the breeze, stirring the grass. I wonder if any of my musings, any of my random thoughts are worthy of publishing. I’ve subbed all week, been absent from all the cattlework on the ranch, and felt pressed under the cloud of sadness of losing a loved dog. I’ve taken few photos and found little to amuse or delight in the last week. I head home, feeling discouraged yet again.

Sunday opens with my mood like the air, foggy and dark. My throat is scratchy, I could be getting sick. I want to crawl back into bed more than I want to go to church. But I go. And there, freezing on a wooden church pew, God nudges me.

“Though the wrong seems oft so strong, God is the Ruler yet.”

We sing the old familiar hymn, my voice lifting with the small congregation, and I know this is the encouragement I have sought.

A new week begins. A week of helping on the ranch more than in the classroom. I haul buckets of grain and walk fencelines and count calves and drive the tractor. The warm October sun smiles a welcome blessing after all the rain. A blessing.

Twenty years on a cattle ranch has taught me that there will always be challenges. There will always be losses. There will always be those things that pull me down and make me sad. But I know I need to have faith. And count my blessings. Always count my blessings.