Saturday at the Ranch

Today is the first Saturday I've spent at the ranch in several weeks, and of course my to-do list is longer than the length of the day. Already I've spent several hours helping my younger kids clean their rooms; done several loads of laundry; made lunch; laid out meat for supper and baking ingredients for making dessert. Other chores clamor for my attention -- the horse paperwork stacked on the side of this desk; the mending pile that whispers to me every time I walk upstairs; the sacks of castoff clothes and toys in the basement that need to be sorted to take to the emergency closet in town.

So it is with guilt that I sit down at this computer, to attempt a few minutes of creative effort. Already my focus is diverted by the children, arguing in the bedroom next to the office. Already I hear Shawn drive the tractor through the yard and wonder how he'll react if he finds out I'm writing instead of tackling those horse papers. Already I struggle to write anything of "meaning" -- time spent at this computer should, after all, yield profundity, or at least some practical advice.

Haven't I already taken enough time for myself today? Early this morning I spent a luxurious hour in bed after Shawn had gone out and before the kids woke up, reading magazines and sipping coffee. Just before lunch, I left the kids to finish their chores, and set off tromping through crusty snow with the dogs, enjoying the simple joy of breathing air that wasn't, for once, cold enough to burn my lungs. Those minutes should be enough, the list maker in my head chastises me. There are so many projects awaiting my attention that this one, which yields no tangible benefit, should not be my focus now.

But then I stop, and remind myself of the purpose of this blog: to explore different choices for these 40 years than the ones I made in the first 40, to take my lessons from the world around me and try to achieve a level of satisfaction and authenticity that has so far eluded me.

In my first 40 years, I've been the ultimate achiever. My house has rarely been dirty; my children are well-fed and well-educated; I've managed careers, started small businesses, lost baby weight six times. I've written a book, made nine houses into homes, and managed to build a marriage that's relatively healthy. I'm proud of what I've done, but I also mourn what I haven't . . . there have been too many Saturdays filled from daylight to dark with work, too many walks not taken, too many words that floated in and out of my head before being captured on the page.

Choices are choices, and one rarely has the opportunity to make them over. I have only one last Saturday of January, 2010 -- only one non-frigid weekend between winter storms to enjoy being outside -- only one precious (sort of ) uninterrrupted hour to write and reflect on the life I've built, the one I'm now supposed to be nurturing.

Outside, the world is slower, more peaceful. One of my daughters commented about how "quiet" the ranch is today -- because it's winter, and other than the occasional coyote howl, or the sound of the feeding tractor, there isn't a lot of noise. We all need periods of dormancy, times when we don't accomplish as much on the outer plane, but we build an inner life that will carry through the clamorous, busy times to come. For me, on this last Saturday of January, now is that time.

Dog Walker

Another morning walk with my dogs today . . . one of the gifts of a day off, since I don't have to leave the ranch right after putting my kids on the school bus. Just before I went out, while I was eating my cereal, I flipped through a popular women's magazine. In an article about maintaining a fitness routine, the author suggested finding a walking partner -- a friend to keep you motivated through the long months of winter.

I've always walked with dogs. Today, there are five who share my life; in other times, other places, only two or three. But always a dog. This morning, as I watched the five of them tumble over each other, wrestling out the kinks and stiffness from spending winter nights outside, I found myself glad to have canine, rather than human, walking companions.

For one thing, I don't have to talk to my dogs unless I want to. No need to carry on a conversation -- just the occasional "Max, come here," or "Sam, get behind," that is an integral part of training and disciplining ranch dogs. After all, these dogs also help work the cattle, so letting them misbehave during their walks with me would only lead to problems when they have real work to do . I can talk more if I want -- and I do. With my old dog, Sis, I carried on entire monologues while we hiked up mountains or through prairie pastures; she would cock her head quizzically, decide that I couldn't possibly be talking to her, and carry on her merry way. I have worked out more lesson plans, writing ideas, difficult conversations, and grocery lists that way. . .

Another reason I walk with dogs is that they are tougher exercise partners than a human could ever be. Dogs simply love to walk -- or trot, or bound, or run -- and they don't like short distances. I walk farther, faster and more often because of my dogs. I have yet to look into Maggie's eyes and be able to say, "No, not today girl," without feeling guilt. I mean, how do you tell a dog it's too cold to walk when they are outside all day long? And I know that if I don't walk with my dogs, they will hang around the ranch yard most of the day, bored and getting into mischief. I figure I'm doing my part for world peace -- or at least ranch peace -- by taking them out to run.

But once we are out there, the real rewards are for me. Dogs are pure joy, particularly when they are free to explore and play. It's hard to be worried about the budget or the deadline when walking with dogs. Dogs notice little things, things we humans are just too busy to see. This morning, they all spent several minutes sniffing around two holes in a snowbank. Had I just walked past that bank alone, I wouldn't have even noticed the holes, or I might have thought that a calf simply broke through the hard crust to the softer snow underneath. But, watching my dogs get so interested, I looked closer -- long claw marks by the holes told a different story. A badger, probably, digging for shelter from the wind, or looking for food. A human companion wouldn't have seen those faint tracks, white scratches on white snow; but dogs spend their days sniffing out the little details: they notice things.

My kids don't really like to walk, and even my husband thinks I'm a bit crazy to prefer walking to riding a horse. Since most of my neighbors live at least a few miles away, walking dates are tricky to coordinate. And I'm inherently an introvert, so I'm not likely to call one of them up anyway. Given all these facts, I'll probably find myself walking alone -- with dogs -- for many more years.

Lucky me.

Frost and Frost

This morning, after shuffling my kids back to school, I left the house to walk my five dogs. Stepping out the door -- I hadn't really looked out the window yet -- I was amazed to find the whole world covered in white hoarfrost. Walking through the pasture was like walking through crystal -- the naked tree limbs, the blades of dried-up grass, even the barbed wire stretching across fences -- every surface glistened with fine particles of ice, so delicate that they snowed down to the ground with the slightest disturbance. As I clumped through the snowdrifts, I could not see another human being; sure, I know my husband and his hired man were out there somewhere, feeding, and I could hear the sound of vehicles driving by on the highway . . . but for just twenty precious minutes, the world consisted of me, my dogs, and a palace of ice.

This is the life I've chosen. In my world, I can't run to Starbuck's for a coffee whenever I want, or pop over to the nearest gas station when I forget to buy milk. My Internet connection, satellite-powered, is still glitchy enough that I don't spend a lot of time online. Therefore, I don't have a Facebook or MySpace page, don't Twitter, and am only just discovering the depth and breadth of the blogging world. Who knew? There are so many elements of our cyber-powered world that I am a novice at, so many high-speed pleasures that I haven't experienced. But, my world holds an ancient beauty and calm, a connection to land and creature that can't be found online, or in a busy city.

So -- as much as this makes me sound like the corny former-English teacher that I am -- this morning's frost reminded me of Frost. Like, the guy, the poet. The one who wrote, "Two roads diverged in a wood, and I --/I took the one less-traveled by,/ And that has made all the difference." (from "The Road Not Taken," Robert Frost)

I thought of this poem this morning, because there were so many roads laid before me when I was twenty; many of them still there when I was thirty; but at forty, with a husband, six kids, five dogs, who-knows-how-many cats, and more horses than I probably should own . . . some of those old roads are pretty faint tracks by now. "Yet knowing how way leads on to way/ I doubted if I should ever come back." (Frost)

Regrets? Maybe a few. But not so many that I can't appreciate the other-worldly beauty of a world kissed by snow angels, the world that I was privileged enough to walk through this morning.