It’s probably never wise to overreact or panic, yet I find those responses are all too often my default mode. If I took a little time to think about it, I’m sure I could come up with several dozen examples through the years where my initial answer to some unexpected circumstance was some minor form of hysteria.

I’m reminded every so often of a conversation I had with a friend of mine over 30 years ago. The memory is usually triggered by some random comment or event, but it’s one of those memories that seems to always linger near the surface of my thoughts.

One of the blessings of living in the Intermountain West is the experience of living through the changing of the seasons.

The day started out in the realm of the common and mundane. I got out of the house 20 minutes later than I had planned, fed the bottle calf, filled the horses’ water trough, gathered eggs, turned the chickens out and grained the yearling bulls.

It was an early Thursday afternoon. I’d made the 26-mile run into Burley to a sale with a little load of leppy and oddball calves that, after a few weeks of TLC and too much money spent on grain, finally appeared respectable enough that I dared take such a ragged lot wearing my brand to town.

I’ve been hanging around for a decade or two. I’ve had some good luck, but I’ll bet I’m like you.

It had been a brutal week. After several days of sunshine, with temperatures in the 50s, the early March weather had transformed back into the nasty wench I’d grown accustomed to over the years.