When the Storm Rages

When a person chooses to live a life of agriculture it really is more than a livelihood, but truly a way of life. This means that when we drop into the arctic tundra temperatures, we must still get out of our warm houses, put on as many layers as we can, and venture outside. There are lives that depend on it – actually hundreds of them.

As we watched the weather forecast and saw the impending storms headed our way, it really didn’t matter what else had recently gone on in our lives. It didn’t matter that we had buried my father-in-law just days before. It didn’t matter what else was on the calendar that day. Again, our only choice was to take care of the animals that depend on us.

Our little family of six were the resources we had available – two adults, two tweenage cowpokes and two lil’ ‘pokes. We knew that my father-in-law in his “retirement” may not have wanted to go outside with us, but we also know we could have depended on him during the storms – with his death, he was no longer available. The sting of the this storm felt like it had a little more bite without his presence.

Plenty of neighbors have offered to help, but we also knew that those same neighbors were working diligently to prepare their own critters for the winter storm.

Again, we were going to make it work with the young ‘pokes we are training up to have the same depth of character as the 18-year-olds that had to charge the beaches of Normandy. Our cowpokes will become men who know how to face the storms of life.

Their job was to drive the feed pick-up and use the tantalizing temptation of hay to convince the cows to move from one pasture to the next. They can barely see over the steering wheel while they are bouncing around in the pasture, but they can do it all the same.

Many years ago the United States government blasted a state highway right through the middle of our land. That means that when we need to move cows across the highway we are some of those people that stop traffic. When the road conditions are poor this becomes a fairly dangerous endeavor.

This was my job with the two littlest ‘pokes. They were safely buckled into their car seats, but it doesn’t mean that most Americans have neurons that are firing with the idea that they should possibly slow down when they see that there is a car with flashing lights and thousands of pounds of beef crossing the highway.

My cowboy took the job that required the most grit. He saddled up his horse and pushed the herd from the back. The wind was blowing, the snow was raging, and he knew that his responsibility was to get the cows to more feed, while also making sure his family all got home safely. I cannot imagine the burden he feels to carry that weight. He never complains. He just gets the job done. He is 100 percent a pure-grit cowboy.

The storms will constantly come. We all have work to do on this earth. Our forecast on our ranch looks incredibly different than what we thought, but we are grateful we chose this way of life so we have the opportunity to steward the land and cowpokes that the good Lord gave us.