June 10, 2009

Country Gal by Vanita Blundell I had a walk down memory lane today. I went to Kiowa to get some pork from the meat locker. Since Giz is at my mercy; he went with me. We went through the pastures to get to Kiowa. When we go this way- we go through my old stomping grounds. We checked a windmill on the way, and then we went through the Merrill Ranch- the Platt Ranch-- the old Z-Bar Ranch- which is also close to the Stewart Carthraes layout. The wild flowers are blooming and grass is growing tall, the wheat is turning golden- just a pretty drive.
There were some things are different than there used to be; houses empty and falling down or have been removed. The one thing that is sorta sad is on the road past the headquarters to the Z-Bar there used to be a booster plant. It employed a couple of men, I think, but anyway, there were a couple of homes there and now because of technology that job is no longer needed. So now you cannot even tell that anyone ever lived there. Technology is nice and I really like the advantages that I have that my grandparent did not have- but we do not need the man power that we used to employ. Now with people needing work; well, it just is kind of sad. In many ways I think that maybe we were better off working a little harder and not so dependent on machines.
Driving through the pastures - brought back the memories of the times that I rode and worked cattle with all of the cowboys on the Z-Bar and Stewart Carthraes. These guys were the real deal. When we worked for the Z-Bar there were about 25 of us and it took all of us to gather the West Pasture. The West Pasture was larger than most of our farms. I would be so excited to go with Dad that I could hardly sleep the night before we were to go on round-up. Working Stewart’s cattle we had to ride thru lots of brush. I see that the brush is thriving well- that was one of the things that had not changed.
The other thing that is different than when I was much younger- are the bridges. I think that all of the bridges had wooden floors - the really cool ones were metal structured. I loved driving on those old bridges-- except the ones that did not have any sides on them and Dad would decide that the nails were sticking up to high and he would try to dodge them. That was scary-- there were a couple of times I thought that he was going to drive us off the bridge. It did not do much for Mother’s nerves, either. It is nice to have pleasant memories and I feel fortunate to have them but it just makes me wonder what is going to happen next and what kind of memories are my grandchildren going to have.