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Things happen. Situations change. Someone dies and that handshake deal you made 10 years ago is not worth the paper it is written on … oh wait, it’s not written on paper!
In Part I of “It’s always the bulls,” one Charolais bull had been delivered to the auction, but Charolais bull number two had refused to go anywhere near a trailer.
My wife and I pulled into the compound at ranch headquarters a while back to find a black Angus bull lounging against the front gate to the ranch house. With a deep sigh and resignation in her voice, my wife said, “It’s always the bulls!”
My parents and grandparents lived through the great depression of the 1920s – an event that dramatically changed their lives and colored their worldviews. The depression had a profound effect on the finances of my kinfolk and produced a family mantra I heard constantly: “Use it up, wear it out, make do or do without.”
The rodeo really started when Odie grabbed that rattlesnake by the tail. But that’s starting in the middle of the story, so let me try this from the top.
I love words. I try to use some every day so I don’t get out of practice.
What if I were in a wreck on my horse and couldn’t remember how to say, “Whoa!”? If I mistakenly yelled, “Wo!” instead, would my horse know what to do?
This is the season of the year when we are poignantly reminded of all the things for which we should be grateful. Too often, however, life gets in the way, and we don’t take the time to consider all our blessings. Between breaking ice in stock tanks, trying to get teenagers out of bed to do chores and working to remember what was in grandma’s turkey dressing before we leave the grocery store, we often don’t stop to reflect on all we have.
This month, ladies and gentlemen, we are going to discuss barn cats (barnicus caticus). I say “cats” plural, because it is impossible to have a single barn cat for more than three days. After three days, you will suddenly find your cats have multiplied according to the Fibonacci sequence (1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32 …), or your one barn cat has turned into no barn cats.
It was supposed to be me – I was supposed to be the first to go. Statistically, the husband dies first, so Pam and I made provisions for that far off, but seemingly inevitable, event.
I passed an old motor home on the highway the other day with a bumper sticker that read “Mamaw and Papaw’s playhouse.” Randomly plastered on the sides and rear end of the motor home was a large collection of “official state stickers” (purchased at the same places that sell “official state souvenir spoons.”) That motor home looked an awful lot like some of the cows we see at the sale barn.
