Hey Brother

Sometime over winter break I decided to find some new music for working out.  I like upbeat, fast paced, exciting music when I'm in the gym, so I usually have to look outside my normal genre.  One night on my way home in my parents Duramax I was listening to Sirius and heard   Hey Brother by Avicii.  I immediately liked it.  I just watched the video, and if I hadn't loved it before, I certainly would now, very touching.  Based off the lyrics and not the music video, I found it touched close to home.  I have a brother and a sister, and while over the years we've fought, we'd do anything for the either of the other of us.  It's just a nice song and I think I can say I'm liking this artist too.

Hey Brother
by: Avicii
Hey brother, there’s an endless road to re-discover.
Hey sister, know the water's sweet but blood is thicker.
Oh if the sky comes falling down, for you, there’s nothing in this world I wouldn’t do.

Hey brother, do you still believe in one another?
Hey sister, do you still believe in love I wonder?
Oh if the sky comes falling down, for you, there’s nothing in this world I wouldn’t do.

What if I'm far from home?
Oh brother I will hear you call.
What if I lose it all?
Oh sister I will help you out!
Oh if the sky comes falling down, for you, there’s nothing in this world I wouldn’t do.

Hey brother, there’s an endless road to re-discover.
Hey sister, do you still believe in love I wonder?
Oh if the sky comes falling down, for you, there’s nothing in this world I wouldn’t do.

What if I'm far from home?
Oh brother I will hear you call.
What if I lose it all?
Oh sister I will help you out!
Oh if the sky comes falling down, for you, there’s nothing in this world I wouldn’t do.

(Photo credit: ananyana.deviantart.com)

XO Loves,

Me

Quiet and Free

Since the late 1800's my family has lived at the base of the mountains in a quiet little valley along the river.  Five generations later, things(life) is very different, but everyday we fight to keep the old ways alive.  The ranch was split between my grandpa and my great uncle, but both of our families are still running cows in the same country as our great-great grandpa James and will continue to do so until our rights are taken away.  

Tonight my mama and I drove to the top of the mountain in search of my papa(who was already home).  I love my mountain home, love where I come from, and I feel an unexplained peace when I'm up there.  It's so easy to picture myself 100 years ago living in the line shack on top of the ridge with just my horse, my dog, my gun and cows to look after.  No loud vehicles humming by, no motorcycles scaring my colts, no one who doesn't belong.  Just the sound of the wind in the pines, the birds and chipmunks, bawling cows, the clear ring of their bells.  I'm in love with the simplicity of the past, and wish that I could have experienced it as tough a life as it was.  A time where the women were tough and the men were tougher.  You lived or you died, simple as dirt...

As the sun slipped behind the mountains in the distance I couldn't help but think about the family that came before.  About how many such sunsets they experienced in the same place(there were no roads back then). What was happening in their lives?  Were they happy?  Did they miss the old country?  What had they gone through to get to that point?  Did they simply marvel in the beauty of the orange light, or were they too rushed to make it back to camp to notice? 

Even a family who seems to know everything about their ancestors it's these minute details that are forever lost in history.  It's a shame that the simple things in life are not the ones that are handed down through generations.  I'm fiercely proud of my family and since I didn't get a chance to know them all, I'm extremely thankful to be experiencing much of the same things in life as they did.

XO Loves,

Me

 

Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree!

I just finished putting tinsel on our tree and it got me to thinking about all the different kinds of trees people have.  In our family we've always preferred the even, flat branches of a Silver Tip(Shasta or Noble Fir).  These beautiful trees only grow above a certain elevation, which is pretty high!  There's been several years that we got an early snowstorm and actually rode in to get our tree, dragging it back to the pickup behind a horse.

I remember the first time I got to go.  I was somewhere around 10 I think, but really that's just a guess. I was riding my sisters wicked little mare Shaniko, my dad was on his good gelding and my sister was riding a friends huge mare. Really my sister and I should have switched horses because even at 10 I was taller than her! When I say Shaniko was little I mean like pony size.  The snow got so deep she could barely wade her way through it, so I waited on the road while my sister and dad got a tree.  They wrapped it up in a tarp and my dad decided he'd pull it.  All was fine until they moved.  The sound of the tarp on the snow was too much for all of our horses.  The mare my sister was on handled it pretty well, but my dads horse took off running, trying to figure out why the sound was following him, haha.  Shaniko on the other hand, was the worst.  She loved to buck and just because she was belly deep in the snow didn't mean she wasn't gonna get rank.  Somehow I stayed on, got her straightened out and took off after my sister.  We weren't sure how far old Gus ran before settling down.

My mom is very particular about Christmas decorations and even more so with the tree.  My dad Always does the lights and the rest of us do the ornaments and mom does the tinsel.  Most of our ornaments are ones us kids made through the years, with a few gorgeous crystal crystals(which are my moms favorite), some pewter ones and ones marking our births.  The topper has forever been a light up angel.  When I was little there was an accident and the poor angel burned her cheek. This year my mom was gone and she entrusted me with all the decorating.  So I made sure to do everything very tactfully!  The tinsel literally gets put on one or two pieces at a time.  It kind of takes forever!  But I know my mom will love the tree.

What kind of trees do your families like?  Bushy, open, short, tall?  What kind of ornaments? Homemade or store bought?  Do you use tinsel, garland, popcorn or bows?  Do you do the whole color coordinated thing?  Or even just go for the fake store bought tree?  What are some Christmas family traditions you have???

          (This was my tree last year. The lights were really funky and I didn't have enough.  It was green and pink themed.)




Xoxo Loves,


Me

Oregon to California

My cousin and I made it home Monday night late.  I meant to write this post Tuesday, but I got wrapped up in the excitement of being home.  Then we had calves to doctor and an injured cow to save.  To top it all off we were experiencing issues with our internet, which resulted in the amazing upgrade to wireless! So now the story telling begins, it's bound to be a bit scattered, just like the trip.

My cousin Casey is four years younger than me, his sister used to be my best friend, now we've become closer.  He's loud and odd and funny and we always have a blast!  He agreed to ride the Greyhound just to help me get home safely.  That's where his adventure started...

Casey got on the Greyhound in Medford, along with a lot of other people.  Right off the bat, the bus wouldn't start.  Once on the road it only makes sense with our awful Irish luck that the person in front of him would lay his seat back on top of him.  They struggled along to Portland, where he originally had a two hour layover.  My dad had previously warned him of the potential perils awaiting, and to find a spot in the corner of the bus station and not let his guard down.  Thankfully they were running behind and he only had to wait an hour, with several gang members skulking about and another pacing back and forth behind him(no where to sit on the wall).  He was pretty anxious and a little worried sitting there in a cowboy hat and sponsor covered ACTRA coat.  He thought for sure he'd be the target of a jumping...  Hehe, hey we come from a very small, safe community that is no longer even a town.  Needless to say the kid followed a mother and her children on the bus safe and sound.

On the way east it was rumored that there was a huge snow storm in La Grande, and they may have to stay in Stanfield.  I was contentedly tucked away in the movie theater watching Breaking Dawn Part II.  It was snowing, but not sticking.  After the movie I chose to stay awake just in case I needed to drive over the mountain and rescue him.  A snowstorm set in and we got a little worried.  They chained up over the mountain and got to La Grande an hour and half late.  I slept maybe 45 minutes.  We got another couple hours before getting up and going to Catholic class.  The rest of the day was spent riding horses, ending in a bitter cold blizzard.  The next morning we got up early and preg checked/vaccinated cows, in the snow.  That night we went out.  It soon became my friends personal duty to get him drunk, buying him a Cement Mixer that the bartender made him drink outside.  We got home around 5 am.  The kid and I passed out in the living room and didn't wake up until 2 in the afternoon.  The next morning we set out.

By the time we got all of my clothes loaded, the trailer hooked up, horses loaded and mail sent out it was 10:30.  We made good time though, it had warmed up and most of the snow and ice on the freeway had rained off.  As we approached the HWY 97 cut off I told Casey to watch for Bighorn Sheep.  He had about given up on spotting any, when we see 4 rams!  It was awesome.  We stopped in Biggs for fuel.  While inside, we got iced coffee at McD's, and there was a very attractive foreign(Russian) guy behind us.  I promise this has some importance.  When we finally make it out of the truck stop, we follow a cop onto the freeway.  He takes off, lights flashing.  Just a ways down the road, brake lights come on, and everyone starts to merge into the left lane.  I see the cop stopped but the Russian in his Toyota and little trailer is right next to my trailer, and I'm trapped in my lane.  I brake, but there's nothing I can do.  When the road opens up I see large traffic cones all over my lane.  There was nothing to do but run them over, but I only hit one.  I panic, because I didn't see it come out, and I didn't move over for the cop.  Casey tries to reassure me that everything is just fine, but I know better!  There's just no where to stop.  Next thing I know, the cop is behind me with his lights flashing.  Dang it!!!   Why me?  Why do I Always get pulled over???  Casey's just laughing because he was with me for my last ticket, pulling my trailer.  There is no shoulder and we're on the freeway, but I finally pull over.  As the officer approaches my rig he stops and grabs something, the cone!  There's no base left and it's much worse for wear.  He comes up and says that he just wanted to get that cone out, because it was really starting to smoke, I apologized for not moving over, but he saw what happened and knew I couldn't.  He was a very nice guy, and pretty cute himself!  We made it through Portland without a hitch, and stopped just south of there to let the horses out.  I was done in and Casey took over.

Casey has astigmatism, and really doesn't see very well without his glasses.  Which he quit wearing because, "they looked dorky".  We stopped in Salem for fuel.  This is where the magic happened.  On our way back out to the freeway we were sitting at a stoplight.  Just making conversation he asks if that street sign says Hawhorse.  I start laughing hysterically because its Hawthorne.  "Oh Lord, I feel like  you need a walking stick and seeing eye dog! And not be driving".  We're both just rolling at this point, but I wasn't sure if I'd get to sleep after that or not.  But I was tired and he promised he really could see just fine, so I slept until Eugene.  I want to add in here that my puppy Macie was a wonderful little passenger the whole way.  We joked,  laughed, made fun of each other and sang pretty much the whole rest of the way.  Slid into the truck stop at Central Point with maybe a gallon or two to spare.  The tranny got pretty hot pulling the Siskiyous but we made it over just fine.  I wasn't sure if we'd make it down the river in one piece though because he pretty much never saw any of the deer.

We rolled into the ranch around 11, unloaded and cleaned my pickup out so he could take it to work the next day.  I crawled into bed and thanked God for good family and making it possible for me to come home.


This is probably the longest post Ever, so I understand if you didn't make it all the way through :) If you did, thanks for reading.  I'll try to never ramble this much again!


Xoxo Loves,


Me

Thanksgiving.... Last Year

I've spent a lot of holidays alone, some completely alone, others with other families.  The price I've paid for being a little gypsy ;)  It was hard at first, but got easier as I got older.  

I moved back home in 2011.  It was wonderful, I got to celebrate my mama and papas birthday, my sister and brothers, and mine with family.  Last Thanksgiving was a truly special event, and probably one of the most memorable.  My sister is the only one of us that's married, so they split Thanksgiving and Christmas up between each family.  Last year it was our year for Christmas, but not Thanksgiving.  So it was just my parents, my brother and I. 

A couple weeks before Thanksgiving, my parents were off visiting my sister, leaving my brother and I in charge of calving.  I got home from work one night late, and noticed some calves in the pole barn.  I drove up to the house, and got my brother, and we went back down to fix fence.  It was raining, pretty late and I'm so surprised my brother and I got along so well.  What I didn't know was that he had left a pot of hot dogs boiling on the stove.  He didn't go back to the house, and I wasn't living there.  The next morning what he found was a disastrous mess, but thankfully the house was still standing.  The end result was some serious smoke damage of everything in our parents house.  My parents were outraged, my brother felt awful, but we were all So thankful that the house survived.  The smell was atrocious.  My mom spent the first couple nights in a motel, my dad toughed it out, but shouldn't have been breathing that stuff in.  For a week, every window in the house was open, and it was bitter cold inside there.  I took the bird, the cat and my mom.  Finally the insurance sent in a team, and my dad moved out. 

I was living in my grandparents old house, and my mom and dad were staying in my dads old room.  It was so nice!  My brother would come down during the day and start a fire for us all.  We had family dinners every night.  Problem was, I didn't have a dining room table.  Or really any chairs, or anywhere to sit.  But it was so special to see my papas reaction.  He hadn't slept in that house in almost 40 years.  A lot of memories came back.  He only came in the back door, because his mom would get mad if they drudged their dirty boots through the house. 

Thanksgiving rolled around.  Mom brought down a card table, my cousin brought over some fold up chairs, we were set!  My oven wasn't very big, so we just cooked a breast, made some stuffing, mashed potatoes and biscuits.  It was a fairly sparse spread, but I didn't have anything to cook with.  So we did the best we could with what we had.  And it was very nice!  Even though my sister wasn't able to be there, it was special.  It was my dads first Thanksgiving dinner in his old house since the mid 70's.  It meant so much to him, and it warmed my heart to see how happy he was.  He told us stories of his childhood, him and his brother fighting, playing army under the house, milking cows and cream separating...  I didn't know my grandparents very well, so spending a holiday in the home they built together meant more to me than I can express.  There was a lot of laughing, a lot of whiskey and wine and a few tears.  It was a day for the books!

There's only ever been one other Thanksgiving that was as special.  So as I prepare to spend yet again another T-Day without my family I remember the truly happy and amazing holidays I have gotten to spend with them.  And look even more forward to going home for Christmas!


So Happy Thanksgiving everyone and don't ever take your family and friends for granted, no matter how crazy they make you!!!!!




Xo Loves,



Me

I Still Love You

"Don't you know I'm not your ghost anymore.  You lost the love I loved the most.  I learned to live half a life.  Now you want me one more time. Who do you think you are?"


I had a fantastic weekend.  Rodeo, beer, music and dancing, horses and family.  But while spending time with my cousins, I saw something in them that I live with in myself.  The in-ability to mend a broken heart.

It's been three years since my world fell apart.  Less than one since all contact ended.  It was the best yet worse thing that has ever happened to me.  The highlight of my life until I lost my love and my health.  It's been a long three years but finally I feel healthy again. I still have a ways to go, but I'm so proud of how far I've come.  My emotions however, have been harder to heal.  We were perfect in so many ways, but we also had tornado in a small town days too.  It's these days I now seem to have forgotten.  The petty fights and harsh words nothing but a faint memory.  I remember the good, hell the great.  I haven't felt that since, and sometimes wonder if I ever will again.  You can apologize, plead and hope, but sometimes nothings ever enough.  I had my days of mourning the past, the self-pity, the hate, regret, a sense of total loss.  Now, I'm just empty.

This weekend I saw the same emptiness in the eyes of my cousins.  The distracted conversations and sudden disappearances.  Ending in the attempt to lose themselves in the arms of another woman.  These boys are brothers and look out for each other, but they don't know how to fix this kind of broken.  They're both completely confused.  The oldest more lost than the other.  I hurt for them because the same pain is still so real for me.  My heart has become a ghost and I miss the one I loved the most.

Love should be easy.  Life isn't, but the true act of loving is the most basic aspect of our lives.  It comes to us naturally, some ignore it, some mistake it for other feelings, and the lucky simply enjoy it.  We all know if it's meant to be so shall it be.  But it's that revelation we can't always come to terms with. 

I wish I could help my cousins, but men don't listen to women well (unless it's their mama).  What's the point in experience if you can't help others. 

I still love you and always will, but we'll never get back what once was, alone or apart.

Missing You

I miss his gruff voice.  Their loving bickering.  The smell of her Tabu perfume.  The familiar clink of ice in the nightly high-ball.  The strong hand that ran our family.

I  miss the sound of him chewing gum.  The seriousness of every look.  The tall quiet southern man who was once the bull of the woods.

I miss his arms around me, his chin resting on the top of my head. The sense of belonging.  Being loved.  Feeling safe.  His crooked flat hat.  The blue eyes that looked into my soul.

I miss his semi-negative influence.  The uncanny way he always knew when I was down.  The fun we had.  My friend.

I miss her clunky rough gate.  Her very female attitude.  Her silky soft coat.  Her big round feet.  We were a team.  She took care of me every time out.

I miss the sound of her jingle-bell.  How tiny she was.  She growled and barked at every stranger, and every boy.  Even getting locked out of my pickup in subzero temperatures.  Her warmth at my feet under the covers.

I miss her fierce little face.  Her scars from battles won.  Her undying loyalty.  Constantly stumbling over her because she always had to be close.  Her protective nature.  My best friend.

I miss the love lost, the friends of my past.  Feelings felt and torn.  I miss what for now are my good ole' days.

But I don't miss the heartache and pain.  I'm just missing you.



Xoxo Loves,

Me

CHRISTMAS Lights

 

The best part of todays Christmas time, are the lights. Now don't get me wrong, with my new found Catholic Religion being studied, I know that's not really what Christmas is about. But, I Love Christmas lights. Driving around in town looking at all the lights is always a fun family tradition.  So here are some fun Christmas light pictures:

I would be SO happy walking down this street!

Just Gorgeous

I want to stay here for Christmas!

Love colored lights, but this is very classy.

Eerie, yet lovely. Had to share..

That's all I have.  Hope all of you enjoy this years lighting decorations.  Unfortunately I don't have any outside, due to lack of outlets.  But next year, my barn will be decked out!!! 

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to ALL!!!


XoXO

Me