A Friend

Skyler has written a poem that I think is beautiful. I got his permission to share it with all of you. He is a gifted writer! Enjoy

A Friend

By Skyler Young

The idea of being alone,

Though our species is so vast,

Still exists so greatly.

Science may say impossible,

But in a human mind that concept takes no place,

I know this feeling.

The world seems so dark.

You feel so helpless.

It seems there is no escape from this one idea.

So small and insignificant.

As if it is you, yourself.

I know this feeling.

It emits a closed yet so distinct aura.

But nobody helps.

You tell yourself they don’t care.

You tell yourself they’re selfish.

Or maybe, could they just be scared?

I know this feeling

Then there is The One

Who sees past what the others do not.

He holds out His hand and lifts you up.

You’re a different person,

In a different world.

I know this feeling.

                                             Skyler carrying a sick calf into the incubator

CATTLEMEN VERSUS PEOPLE WHO HAVE CATTLE

CATTLEMEN VERSUS PEOPLE WHO HAVE CATTLE

            Published January 21, 2011 in Intermountain Farm and Ranch

            According to the Bible, Palestinian shepherds were noted for their protection of their sheep at the time of Jesus. In times of danger, the true shepherd was willing to give his life for his sheep. He would go in with the sheep and fight for their welfare. The hireling, or shepherd, on the other hand valued his own personal safety above that of the sheep and would usually run from any danger.

            In John 10:4 it states:

            “And when he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him: for they know his voice.”

            So, perhaps in working with cattle there would be a difference between a cattleman and “people with cattle”. They both build and repair fences, feed and water their animals even treat sick animals. But, as with the shepherd, the cattleman’s animals know him.

            My husband, Boyd knows his animals. He has a small red book that he carries with him so if there is a question about one of his animals he can quickly find the information. He can find birthdates of his calves faster than birthdates of his own kids. I watch Boyd walk daily through his herd of cows – speaking softly or not speaking at all, moving slowly and calmly. The cows recognize him. They “know” him; they “know his voice”. They remain calm in his presence. Even when the cows act rebellious, find a weak spot in a fence and get out, Boyd doesn’t rush them, doesn’t unnecessarily push them, but calmly directs them back to their pasture. Now there are times that he has to shout, even use a hot-shot or stick, but those times are few and far between. And through his example, our sons work with the cattle in the same way.

Boyd, Seth, and Kira in the calving shed

            Not long ago we had an accidental death of a heifer. Boyd and our son Derrald were upset about it because of the suffering the animal experienced. They talked at length about what they could have done to prevent this and what changes they needed to make so it doesn’t happen again. They did not walk away with a shrug of the shoulders and the comment, “well you lose some anyway.” No, they were the true cattlemen, sorrowing over the untimely and unnecessary death of one of their own.

            There are many in our area who work with animals in a compassionate and humane ways. Mark and Wendy Pratt are good examples of this. They run cattle east of Firth into the dry land area. On October 13, 2010, Wendy wrote the following in her blog:

            “We moved the cows to their fall pastures on the last two weekends. First the cows and calves on an uncomfortably hot day, over the mountain to Meadow Creek country. We do our best to practice low-stress cattle handling, but we found ourselves reverting to old methods as we pushed them begrudgingly up the steep incline.”

Yes, there are times when a hot-shot or whip needs to be used, but not every time the cattle are moved to another pasture, or even from corral to pasture or when loading cattle onto a truck. Sometimes you need to shout as they move as a group, usually to be heard more than from anger. But in observing – the cattleman tries not to stress his animals – the “people with cattle” don’t appear to think of the animal but of getting the job done, and even the monetary gain to be made when the cattle are sold. There are a lot of good cattlemen in our area, and a few “people with cattle”. It is difficult to watch the treatment of cattle under the care of the latter group. And you can usually tell by the way the cattle act if they are being taken care of by a cattleman or “people with cattle”.

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NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS - DOWN THE DRAIN

Published in Intermountain Farm and Ranch January 7, 2011

        By this time in January all of my New Years Resolutions have been broken, displaced, abandoned, or ignored. I start out each New Year with a list of things I’m going to accomplish and every year the same thing happens, I don’t follow through. Perhaps I am being too hard on myself, perhaps my resolutions are really unattainable or perhaps I am a procrastinator and like my life the way it is.  Whatever, I think I need a plan. What are the things that I want to change?

• My weight - This is something that everyone wants to do, lose weight. Maybe I’d be better off writing down specific things I am willing to do to lose the weight. I am already going to water aerobics, so maybe I could put that down. Is that cheating? It would give me a head start on something I know I will do.
• My lack or organization - It isn’t always easy living on the farm. I have often wished that I could lovingly send my husband off to work at 8 in the morning and greet him, just as lovingly, at 5 or 6 in the evening. Instead, my husband and sons are in and out of the house 24/7. (I still try to do the “lovingly” thing.) It seems sometimes that I am a short-order cook besides being the main gofer and extra hired man. So to become organized is almost impossible. But I could plan menus for the week and have supper organized while I’m fixing breakfast each day. Then when (not if) I’m called out with the cows or spend all day chasing parts, I would have a head start on meals.
• My messy office – I’m not sure anything can be done about that. I share the office with my husband, Boyd, and I’ve decided I’m the best “clutterer”.  I have piles everywhere, important stuff: information for taxes; calf weight numbers; bank account statements; etc. I have a hard time throwing things away, but maybe I need to invest in more file folders and get things filed, or a bigger garbage can and use it. 

 I have a sister who sets three- month’s goals instead of the standard yearly resolutions. This works well for her. I tried that last year and I still have my first three-month list of goals taped up over the computer in my office where I can look at it daily. I have finished or met most of these goals, but never got around to writing up the second three-month list. 

As I think about this I believe I will scratch this year’s resolutions list right now. It has been a waste of paper and effort before and nothing has been done so far this year.  Instead I am going to resolve to enjoy and appreciate each day as a new opportunity for growth.

• I will look forward to and enjoy the winter storms, the birth of new calves, the long evenings in front of the fireplace and face the challenge of slick roads.
• When spring arrives, I will welcome the sight of the first robin, marvel at the song of the meadow lark, and anticipate the spring cattle drive.
• The long summer days will give me the opportunity to garden, work in the yard, take photos, and have picnics, with the chance of spending time at the ranch and with family.
• Fall time, the time of harvest has always been a time of celebration for me – the hard work is over and we see the fruits of our labors as we harvest our crops, preserve the vegetables from the garden, enjoy the cool evenings and hot days. And we have the added benefit of being able to observe our annual color show when the trees and shrubs put on their fall wardrobes, which prepares us for the black and white of  the coming winter.

Yes, I believe I can keep this resolution!

CHRISTMAS MEMORIES

Published in Intermountain Farm and Ranch December 24, 2010

Christmas is so much different now than when I was young. Back then, Christmas advertising didn’t get started until close to Thanksgiving. We didn’t have TVs, so radio and newspaper were the only means of advertisements. No one had artificial trees, either the families would go out and cut their own or buy from the local gas station.

No one decorated outside of their homes, and the inside decorations were usually minimal. We had “bubble lights” on our tree. These lights had a round base, filled with colored fluid, and what looked like a birthday candle on top of it. When the fluid warmed up it would bubble into the candle.. These were fun  to watch the as they bubbled. 

There were no malls in Idaho Falls, but we did have Woolworths and Newberrys. right downtown Idaho Falls on Park Avenue. This is where we shopped to get the presents for our brothers and sisters. They sold “Blue Waltz” perfume, the perfume all pre-teen girls wanted.

We exchanged gifts in our school classes, drawing names early in December. The most wished-for gift was the Lifesaver book, which is still available today. One year I received a handkerchief and a pencil.  Not something a forth grader would look forward to receiving. I can’t remember if I was a gracious receiver, but I remember the boy who had my name, and the circumstance of his family. I believe the handkerchief was handmade by his mother, and I don’t believe I appreciated the effort it took to make it, nor the embarrassment of the boy who had nothing else to give.  

Schools had Christmas programs, and as students we looked forward to the preparation for those programs. We learned songs and memorized speaking parts. Mothers made costumes out of crepe paper. And all of the parents, brothers and sisters, and a lot of grandparents showed up the night of the program. Cookies and punch were served to everyone following the program. The evening of the program started our Christmas vacation from school. We looked forward to that as much as we anticipated the program. 

Our family met with grandmother, uncle, aunts, and cousins on Christmas Eve, for a special family program and gift giving. We didn’t have central heating then, and I remember returning from these parties to a cold house. Dad would have to stoke up the wood heater in the living room and we sat around it to get warm.

We hung our stockings from the mantel on Christmas Eve, and there would be a tangerine and nuts in them the next morning. Christmas morning gifts weren’t fancy, often handmade. We girls got a doll, and Mother made the wardrobe for the doll. When we were young we didn’t notice that the doll clothes were made from the same material as some of our dresses that Mother had sewn for us throughout the year. Paper dolls was a favorite gift, and a Nancy Drew book was always looked for. Our brothers got toy trucks, tractors, tools, and such. I remember the year they got the electric train set. Blocks, Tinker Toys and Lincoln Logs were popular then as now. I cannot remember needing batteries for any of our gifts, most of them required hand labor and imagination.

Maybe we have become materialistic and our children want way more than they need or even deserve, but there is still beauty in this season of the year.  Christmas time seems to bring out the giving spirit, people are more cheerful although more stressed. neighbors take treats to neighbors who they maybe haven’t visited with since the previous Christmas.  The words of the song: “Peace on earth, good will to men,” should be something that we implement in our daily lives, not just once a year.  But at least we do it once a year. 



A TIME TO SHOW GRATITUDE

Published in Intermountain Farm and Ranch November 26, 2010

            As a child, I looked upon Thanksgiving as a time to eat turkey and get together with family.  The idea of gratitude didn’t play a big part of it, other than the prayer at the meal on Thanksgiving Day.  I remember one time we were each ask to tell something we were grateful for.  When it was my grandmother’s turn she told us that she had a lot of things to be grateful for and a lot of things that she wasn’t grateful for. Because she was afraid she would get the lists mixed up she said she wouldn’t say anything.

            I’ve thought of that day with my grandmother and can see the wisdom in her thinking.  Too many times we expound on what we are not grateful for and mix it up with the things we should be grateful for.

            As people who live on and work the land, farmers and ranchers have a lot to be grateful for, not only at this time of the year when the harvests are rolling to an end, but all year round.  I would like to list some of the things I’m grateful for, and try not to get my grateful list mixed up with my ungrateful list.

• Our families.  They can and should be our support group as we face the challenges in our lives. 
• The chance to live on the land, to be a steward of the land.  To work the soil, watch seeds sprout and grow, to harvest the crops.  To be able to spend all day out in the fields, and return to our home at night tired but knowing we have accomplished something.
• Water!  Our cattle need to drink, our crops need water to grow, and we need water for personal use.  The saying “you never miss the water until the well goes dry” certainly hits home in dry and drought years.  In being grateful for water, we need to recognize the necessity of preserving the water we have, and be wise in the use of it.
• Our mild climate in this part of the United States as compared to other areas.  We don’t have hurricanes; rarely have tornadoes, and not often floods.  We do have blizzards and winter storms and dry years with droughts, but those are rarely extreme. 
• Our means of communication.  Yes, technology has become big and sometimes overbearing, but there are so many advantages to it.  The cell phones alone have saved us many miles of traveling when someone can call from the ranch and order parts, get a service man to come, get help from home, and let other’s know your location. 
• The beauties of nature that are all around us.  Each season brings out a different aspect of these beauties.  Sometimes we get so involved in what we are doing we fail to take the time to look around, enjoy what is in our own backyard.
• The opportunities we have to vote. This time of the year it is easy to grumble and complain about all the advertising that goes on with the voting.  But we are blessed to be able to choose, to vote for the people we feel will do the best job, and then to respect and support those who are voted in, whether they be our choice or not. 

This list is by no means in order of importance.  And there are many other things we as farmers/ranchers have to be grateful for.  Sometimes life gets so busy that we fail to be grateful, to give thanks for small favors, to simply say “thank you.”  But as we take time on Thanksgiving Day to give our thanks, I for one am going to set a goal for the next year to try to overlook my list of things I’m not grateful for and increase my list of things I am grateful for.

APPRECIATION FOR MODERN CONVENIENCES

Published in Intermountain Farm and Ranch November 12, 2010

As I walked in the door of our valley home the other evening, the smell of supper  revived my tired bones. We had been at the ranch all day separating the cows and calves. The fact that supper was ready made me stop and think of the people that settled in the area where our ranch is. Back then, as now, the women were out in the fields helping their men along with doing their own household chores.  What wonderful conveniences we have today to save us time! What challenges they faced without them.

I use the crockpot often, as I did the day we weaned calves. My early settler grandmother didn’t have electricity to use a crockpot. But she did have a wood cook stove. Many of those stoves had warming ovens that would keep food warm, and if not it would usually have a shelf above the stove that worked the same way. To cook food slowly they could push a pan to the very back or far side of the stove. That is probably the best they could do and the closest to a crockpot they had. Another modern convenience the early settlers didn’t have was a microwave. No eight minute baked potatoes for them!

Refrigerators and freezers provide us the means to preserve fresh and frozen foods. Back then, keeping food cold and from spoiling was not easy. If they had an icebox, it had to be kept full of ice. As the ice melted in the ice box, the water would often run out onto the floor of the kitchen. In order to have ice in the summer, early in the spring they put straw over snow and ice, thus insulating it. Back in the early 1900s, many ranch homes didn’t even have an icebox, and depended on a nearby spring to keep their food cold. They would put a wooden or metal box into the spring and put food items that needed to be kept cold in the box. Or if they had a well and put milk and other foods needing refrigeration down the well.  Some had cellars, which remained cool all summer.   Potatoes, apples, carrots, and such were stored in these root cellars..    

They baked bread in their wood cook stoves. A women I visited with recently told me that she was able to determine if the oven in her wood cook stove was the right temperature by opening the oven door and putting her hand inside. If it was not hot enough, she would put more wood in the stove, if it was too hot, she would leave the oven door open for a few minutes to let it cool off.

To bathe, they had to haul buckets of water from the spring or well. While the water was heating on the cook stove, they would take down the big tub hanging on the outside of the house and set it on the floor in the kitchen. When the water was warm enough, it was transferred into the tub.  After a bath, they would have to empty the water out of the tub, a bucket full at a time, then hang the tub back up.  Not something you would do every night or morning. Bathing was usually a once-a-week occurrence, and the entire family used the same water, with a bucket of hot water added between each bather. No twenty minute showers for them!

They faced these challenges because they had no other options. This is the way things were done back then. They didn’t have the exposure to more modern conveniences that we have. Sometimes it is good to look back so we can appreciate the things we have and that we take for granted.

That evening’s reflections on the past made my hot bath and crockpot supper even more enjoyable.