Lie in August’s Welcome Corn!

     “Join in black December’s sadness, lie in August’s welcome corn, stir the cup that’s ever blending with the blood of all that’s born . . .”

-- Jethro Tull,  Cup of Wonder, from Songs from the Wood

                         

Pesach took me by surprise and then there was a long silence on this blog. So many things happened in April and May and then summer was upon us, and now the Monsoon and the first hints of autumn are already showing themselves here in the high country. Elul is also upon us, early this year just as Pesach was. But in order to begin looking to the year ahead, I need to look back at least a bit to see what brought me from there to here.

 

April, Come She Will:

The post-Pesach Spring Term was divided between Freedom Ridge Ranch and the house in Sedillo. Both the Cowboy and I were taking classes, he at CNM and me at UNM. In April, we drove up to Albuquerque every Monday morning and returned late Thursday night. It was a hectic busy time, make more do-able by the increasing light and warmth, although it was a cool spring in New Mexico.

In April, I:

•   Edited a dissertation for my Ruby Slipper friend, doing both APA Style formatting, grammar and spelling, and helping with writing style.
• Worked on a literature review for a class I was taking, as well as a research proposal and presentation.
•   Enjoyed down time hanging out at Barnes and Noble in Albuquerque, and began planning the summer work at the ranch.

May Days:

The term ended for the Cowboy and I at the end of April,  and he returned to the ranch and stayed. However, I was still back and forth there, and on up to Aurora, Colorado, mostly on Libertarian Business.

In May, I:

•   Helped plan and attended the LPNM annual convention, where I was termed out as Vice Chair and began a term as Secretary. There was a lot of politicking involved this time as we had a take-over threat and I really wanted our current Chair to remain Chair, although he wasn’t so sure.
•   Continued final editing on the Ruby Slipper’s dissertation, which reported a kick-ass study he did.
•   Drove up to Aurora one weekend for the Libertarian State Leadership Alliance meeting, held in conjunction with the Colorado State Convention. This was great—more relaxed than the bi-annual National Convention—there was plenty of time to talk to Libertarians. It always feels like coming home!
•    With the pressures of committee and comps preparation over for the semester, I had a chance to spend time with Excel Manufacturing friends after a long hiatus.
•   At the ranch, we welcomed our only baby calf of the spring (we had shipped some of the older cows and the bull earlier in the year). We also had water-pipe problems and had to work on the system, and install a new French drain in the irrigation system as well. We got the fencing complete for the greenhouse/garden area.

June is the Hottest Month:

June is hot and dry in New Mexico. Every living thing begins to long for water, and people slow down. We had several weeks of very hot weather, and late in June, temperatures climbed to a record 106 degrees. During late May and June, we had a number of serious wildfires in New Mexico and Arizona, and we saw some smoke at the ranch and in Albuquerque.

In June:

• I picked up my nephew, the Illinois Boy, at the airport as his parents moved to Texas and he came to try out life at the ranch. Once he adjusted to the altitude, he took to it very well.
• The day I picked up the IB, I had a long talk with my realtor, and we brought the price down for the Sedillo house, my beautiful Hobbit Hole. It was a painful decision, but important. We knew we needed to sell the house.
• On the second Friday in June, I thought I saw lightning as I was setting the Shabbat table. Dry lightning is common in June, so I thought nothing of it. The next morning, I woke up with a floater in my eye. I called Eye-Doc Randi that afternoon, and the short of it is that I had a vitreous detachment, requiring numerous trips to Albuquerque and UNM Eye Clinic for monitoring.
• We started fencing for a new horse pasture, and the Cowboy was really happy to have the IB’s help. The IB also learned to ride a horse, drive cattle and drive the tractor. We will make a cowboy of him yet!
• I went riding every week with a friend, JL, another Jew in the Republic of Catron. She was a wrangler for years in Arizona, and passed on some of her riding expertise to me.
• The Cowboy broke his hand while driving cows, and spent five weeks in a cast. Or he was supposed to, anyway!

 

 

Glorious July: 

July was truly a wonderful month, because the Monsoon  came right on the Glorious Fourth and stayed through the month. We got 3.53 inches of precipitation for the month, several of them in cloudbursts that re-arranged the landscape.

In July:

• We celebrated the Glorious 4th small-town style, with a parade and BBQ. Yours truly was honored to read the Declaration of Independence right after the choral presentation of patriotic music.
• The IB settled in, helping me dig retention basins around the trees, and we started a garden.
• The Cowboy spend several weeks working cattle at the York Ranch, but that ended in mid-July because the Monsoon had not yet hit the Continental Divide Country, and they shipped their cattle to a ranch in Texas for better grass.
• I qualified for my Concealed Carry Weapon license, shooting the EG’s Glock .40!
• The Cowboy removed his cast prematurely at the York Ranch, cutting it off himself, because it was getting gnarly. He’s definitely a Cowboy.
• The IB had to return to Illinois to take care of some business late in July and we weren’t sure if he was coming back.
• In the same week, Eye-Doc Randi found a small tear in the retina of my right eye—the one with the vitreous detachment—and I had a week in Albuquerque, playing appointment tag with an over-worked retina specialist.
• In the same week, the IB decided to come back—with resome gentle pushing and bribery from his mother and grandparents, and I arranged the flight.
• In the same week, we had a real gully-washer and frog-strangler, that washed away half the county. We have a new micro-topography here at the Ranch.

 

Lie in August’s Welcome Corn: 

And here we are at the end of the first full week of August. Time speeds when there is so much to accomplish and so many things happening.

The country looks like spring does elsewhere, all green and gold with water falling from the sky, running, trickling and making mud for the dogs to play in and trucks to get stuck in. The IB, gone barely two weeks, did not recognize the place.

And the day I picked him up at the airport, we got an offer on the house. Monday, that was. We dickered Monday evening to Tuesday afternoon. We came to agreement just after I had a good interview for a part-time staff position at CNM, a position I applied for in the Disability Center.

Whoo-hoo! The house is under contract. And, sniffle, we must now say good-bye to that era in our lives.

And just in time for Elul—the season of our turning . . .

But that’s another blog.

Technorati Tags: Meanwhile Back at the Ranch,Summertime,Times and Seasons,Family Life

Slowing Down: Thanksgiving at Freedom Ridge

I blinked, and Thanksgiving has come and gone, special baking done, leftovers packed and sent back to school with the Catron Kid, and quiet has now descended on Freedom Ridge Ranch.

Last I looked, it was September, and the High Holy Days just finished. We were looking forward to Sukkot, and suddenly we are on Standard Time, the leaves have fallen, the Sukkah is long down and the days are alarmingly short. How did the fall days get away from me?

The election, that’s how. From the day after Yom Kippur until election day, I was caught up by the needs of the Gary Johnson Campaign. As the New Mexico State Director for Gary Johnson 2012, I felt as if I was swept away for the month of October, with the High Holidays serving as the deep breath before the final lap. The rest of the week of the election was spent in Albuquerque, too, doing the post-mortem on the campaign with senior campaign officials, and the Libertarian Party of New Mexico, along with spending time with my new primary dissertation advisor, getting myself primed for The Next Big Thing.

I intend to write about the last weeks of the campaign—I really do!—but I need to let it all settle. It was exciting, maddening and exhausting. I learned so much, and I need to let it all settle before I decide which lessons are lasting.

I arrive home on Veteran’s Day, and by the following Thursday—Rosh Chodesh Kislev, for I seem to have missed Cheshvan entirely!—we were in Show Low, the Engineering Geek and I, shopping for Thanksgiving. On Friday morning, I began my baking, and then after a weekend adjusting to not needing to be glued to the computer, it was Elisheva’s All Kitchen, All the Time Station right up through Thursday. After several months of neglecting my family in order to be mom to various and sundry Gary Johnson volunteers, I felt the need to s-l-o-w down and bake and cook, and bake  and cook some more. We also deserved some time to talk, to study, to do a slow dance in the kitchen to a Hank William’s Jr. tune, and read to one another in bed in the morning until the sun comes over the mesa. So I cooked for five days of leftovers, and made everything from scratch: from crescent rolls to pumpkin pie. (I made my own filling for those from the pie pumpkins we grew in the garden).

The weather has been wonderful. Short, late fall days of sunshine with those heartbreaker turquoise blue New Mexican skies, that fade into deep blue as the sun goes behind the mesas by four in the afternoon. Afternoons at 60 degrees are followed by cold, star-filled nights that cry out for a fire.

Since he had a late class on Wednesday in Albuquerque, the Catron Kid had driven down early on Thursday morning, and rode El Chapo in the early afternoon, when I chased everyone out of the kitchen—everyone, including dogs and cats.We ate our Thanksgiving dinner as the sun slipped behind Power Line Mesa, slowly and with great attention to the goodness of our fortunes. Elections, war, and scandal notwithstanding, our little family is truly blessed and we know it.

After dinner, we settled down to watch Monumental, Kirk Cameron’s film about the Pilgrims. We were reminded that  this election and the challenges it will bring to our freedom are grave difficulties, the door seemed to be slammed repeatedly on the Pilgrims, they did not give up, cry foul or fall into despair. They persisted in believing in their 500 year plan. And since we have a bit more than 100 years to go on that, we should be strong and resolute as were they.

Friday, the Engineering Geek and I took an afternoon’s lazy drive up into the mountains behind the Little Colorado over in Arizona. We worked our way up into the caldera that holds Crescent Lake, and then descended again along a Forest Service Road into Greer, enjoying the bikers and trail riders of that mountain resort town, while we talked of the future plans for Freedom Ridge and hopes and dreams and half-baked ideas that may shape the days to come.

Yesterday, we took a Shabbat walk with the dogs and our walking sticks in hand, we climbed to the top of Freedom Ridge, our mesa to the east and marveled at the view of the Red Hill and its attendant volcanics, and the San Francisco Mountains to the southeast.

And today, Sunday, I ironed shirts for the EG and the Catron Kid; I packed him up some quart-sized zipper bags of turkey and the trimmings and holiday eggnog to take back with him to his little apartment in Albuquerque. I watched as he drove away, straining to see the movement of the white car against the dark volcanic pressure ridge extending from the Red Hill as he turned onto the county road two miles away. Thanksgiving 2012 is a wrap, but in two weeks he will be home again for the long winter break, just in time for Hanukkah.

I have some work to do to get my Comprehensive Exams back on track because of all the changes in my committee since EN, my original advisor, retired. We have chores to complete while the weather holds, here at Freedom Ridge Ranch. And our renters at the Los Pecos House decided to relocate to warmer climes, and so we have our contract with them to conclude and the house is on the market once again—for sale or rent. There’s lots to do, as always. But nothing that requires the kind of immediate response and dedicated time that managing even a small campaign team requires.

Although it does look like I am being tapped as an alternate for the Libertarian National Committee . . . but more on that after we watch the sun drop down behind Power Line Mesa, and after we feed the animals and gather any eggs laid since this morning by our fine-feathered hens and after we feed the dogs, enjoy a turkey dinner and a glass of wine together, here on Freedom Ridge Ranch. Where the mountains are high and the tumult is far away . . .

 

Technorati Tags: Times and Seasons,Meanwhile Back at the Ranch,Thanksgiving

On the REAL Name for the Ranch

Welcome to Freedom Ridge Ranch: Where all the women are strong, all the men are good looking, and all the cows are above average.

Alert readers may have noticed that the name of our ranch has finally been decided upon. I have been calling it "Ragamuffin Ranch" here on this blog and in general conversation because, well, I liked it. But there are other people involved in this enterprise besides me. The CIT thought the name was too cutesy, and threatened to pull out of the whole enterprise if it stayed that way. "Mom," he stated, "You don't rope cattle on a place called Ragamuffin Ranch." The EG was in total agreement, the name was too 'girly girl" and had to go. And he pointed out that even our ranching partner hated the name. "She hates that as much as you hate anything with the word 'Pointe' at the end of it!"
It is true. I refused to buy property once in a place with 'Pointe' as part of its name. I hate that pretentious 'e' at the end, and mocking call a place called Primrose Pointe, 'Primrose Pointy.'

We thought of a lot of possible and not so fussy names. We thought of a lot of humorous names, too, but we didn't intend to use them. "City Slickers Ranch" or "Broke Acres" just doesn't have the proper ring, the one that will make certain people want to be part of this adventure. So we looked at names based on local rock formations and local features. I really liked the idea of "Point Lookout Ranch, a name taken from the Point Lookout formation that makes up the caprock of our mesas and ridges . But the name with the most 'ring' to it was "Freedom Ridge Ranch", named after the ridge there behind the cabin the picture. This is the ridge that the old homesteader who took out a claim on this land a hundred years ago looked up at every day while proving up his claim, and the one that rainbows like to visit and mists (and smoke) like to curl around.

Freedom Ridge Ranch.
It brings up connotations of grass fed, grass finished beef raised in freedom right here on the ranch. It brings up the wholesome goodness of free-range chickens pecking in the grass, producing eggs with the yellowest yolks you have ever seen. And for Studley Dooright, our bull, it brings up the run up the ridge and through the fence to check out the pretty cows in season over at the McKinley place--but that's another story.

Most importantly, it reminds the EG of why he invested in the project in the first place. Freedom might have been 'just another word for nothin' left to lose' to Janice Joplin, but for the EG it means self-employment and entrepreneurship--and the time to craft really fine wood products-- after years of being just another engineer at a government lab. Our ranching partner likes all the connotations, but seems particularly taken with the idea of naming the ranch after a local geographical feature. And the CIT likes the freedom he has to swing a rope and to ride his horse daily.

And me? I like the whole concept of freedom. The freedom from the noise and traffic of the city. The freedom to set my own daily schedule, and the freedom of having my husband around all the time . . . (Hmmm. I wouldn't go that far, even out of sheer enthusiasm).
But I especially like the idea that we are free and clear, and can decide how to use this wealth made up of this place at this time using for our own best interest. That's the best part of having one's husband retire. Not to mention that the alarm does not go off at dark o'clock anymore. I never see a cow until after the sun comes up . . . Perhaps that's the greatest freedom. The Freedom from the tyranny of the alarm clock.

Pass that grass fed, grass finished beef, please.
And welcome to Freedom Ridge Ranch.

And After the Fire . . .

וְאַחַ֤ר הָרַ֙עַשׁ֙ אֵ֔שׁ לֹ֥א בָאֵ֖שׁ יְהוָ֑ה וְאַחַ֣ר הָאֵ֔שׁ קֹ֖ול דְּמָמָ֥ה דַקָּֽה׃
And after the earthquake, a fire--the Eternal
was not in the fire. And after the fire--kol
ramamah dakah--a soft murmuring voice.
-- I Kings 19:12

The past month has been a very fast ride. During the first week of June, the Wallow fire in the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest took off, leaping quickly to the northeast, sending its smoke and ash up to our ranch on winds so strong that the fire was spotting up to three miles ahead of the line. That week was surreal here, as we went about with windows closed, peering through windows at a world gone smoky and eerily, translucently orange and red. Even up in Albuquerque and Tijeras, the smoke was seen and smelled, the funeral pyre of thousands upon thousands of trees covering six states.

We lost a lot of time down here on what has now been formally named Freedom Ridge Ranch, the chickens are late arriving, the garden only got half-in, and will have to be stocked with plants started at nurseries in Show Low and Albuquerque. We spent a day moving the horses down to the Middle Rio Grande Valley and another moving them back. But we did get the house in Tijeras on the market (listing here in case you know somebody . . .) and we are pretty close to being done moving in down here at the ranch. Work here is now proceeding apace, and though catching up to what we envisioned for this summer is highly unlikely, we find ourselves grateful for what could have happened but didn't as we greet a timely monsoon season with fresh appreciation.

Over the past week we have had the opportunity to drive roads that were closed a week or two ago, through the Apache-Sitgreaves and in the Rim Country, on Monday, down to Luna and today over to Pinetop-Lakeside. Each time, as we drove across the state line, we saw the shadow on Escudillo Mountain, the burned areas coming down near to Eager itself. We saw the blackened places along US 180 and SR 260, where backfires had been set. But we also saw the damp ground where the monsoon rains had brought out the green of new growth. And near the Fort Apache ski area, we saw the ferns under the jack pines, impossibly green where a month ago there was only brown. Deer crossed the highway, taking their own sweet time, and wild horses were grazing again near the lakes and rivers between the Greer turnoff and McNary.


The fire was terribly hard on some of our friends and neighbors, some losing their homes and everything but what they could take out, but many lost only their refrigerators full of food when the electricity went out while they were evacuated. We discovered this when we went into Lowe's at Show Low today to find a fitting for the ice maker/water line we were installing for our refrigerator. Lowe's was out of refrigerator water line fittings. They were low on refrigerators. They had been selling them off the floor to people who needed them. People from Nutrioso, from Alpine, from Greer and Sunrise. The insurance companies were paying Lowe's to lock and haul off the old refrigerators with spoiled food within, and install new ones. And Lowe's was throwing in the new fittings because although the old ones may have been good, when they install they are liable for any new leaks. The kindness of neighbors and the kindness of strangers, and even of large corporations, is a balm to the spirits of those who are now rebuilding homes and lives. We saw each other through, with a little help from friends and strangers.

The fire was terribly hard on some, and very difficult for most here, but the primary response is gratitude. Where ever we have seen burned ridges and valleys, we have also seen the signs. In Nutrioso, in Alpine, in South Fork, in Luna, in Greer: THANK YOU! God Bless Our Firefighters! Thank You, Our Heroes! GREER, ARIZONA: Still Here, Still Green. In case Obama is wondering, this is the fiercely independent, decidedly can-do spirit of Flyover Country, the real America. We do cling to our God and our guns. Proudly. Gratefully. We lift our small voices to the sky.


And now the monsoon rains have come, on schedule, and they are falling every afternoon over the White Mountains, from the Rim to Escudillo, just as they do most years across the southwest beginning on the 4th of July. Waters are moving over the burned scars, and in the unburned forest still here, still green. The waters trickle, drop upon drop, they beat a steady rhythm on the metal roof at Freedom Ridge Ranch. The winds blow cool air and soft clouds where once it was all fire and smoke and ashes. And we have seen rainbows, double and triple, arching across the mesas and canyons. Promises that life returns with the water.


And after the fire . . . kol rammamah dakah. A soft murmuring voice.

Picture Credits: Top--National Forest Service InciWeb. Middle--Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest Web Page. Bottom: Rain over Escudillo, taken August 2010, Ragamuffin Studies.