HAPPY NEW YEAR!!


A look back and a hopeful look ahead

By Julie Carter

There has been a long-standing saying around here about this time of year that goes something along the lines of "We'll just get this year over with so we can start on next year."

That thought has been somewhat of a slogan for ranching for the past decade of droughts and rollercoaster prices. That will not change, because the sources of the hardships haven't changed.

The brink of a new year seems to be a popular time to reflect on the past and then move on to resolutions.

Resolutions are often repeats of redundant attempts to move forward when everything except your will power is pushing you back. It has been my experience that the best thing you can do for a new year is learn what you can from the old year and move on.

This County Views column began as a guest column in 2002 with an esteemed life-long resident of Lincoln County, Johnson Stearns, telling about life in early county days. The wisdom in his story was that, in all the changes that have come and gone in 75 years, the way the sun rises and sets has not changed one bit.

Matt Ferguson delightfully told of fixing pipeline leaks and other assorted ranch jobs that have little or no dignity. His daughter brought it all into perspective for him when she let him know "how lucky he was because he got to play in the mud whenever he wanted to."

Welda Grider shared stories of ranch living. The nuances of hired cowboys, their ongoing antics and raising children to be the good help on the ranch brought some seldom-pondered ranch living realities to town. She even explained why getting kicked in the shins by a calf or run over by a cow in the corral is all part of the Ranch Kid 101 curriculum.

Ronnie Merritt gave us a four-part history of his family's origins in the far northeast end of Lincoln County. His words painted pictures of pioneer ranching that are forever a treasure to this county's history.

I have shared with you the memories of my simple childhood growing up on a high-mountain ranch in Colorado, of the struggles and blessings of living so very rural and the uniqueness of the people who live off the land.

We have talked about cowboy lifestyles, clothing, manners and cuisine. At length we have shared the stories of the ranch wife's jobs that require more a keen sense of humor than skills.

I shared my heart with you over the death of a people whose lives were a vital part of the fabric of this rural way of life and the gaping hole their passing left. I laughed at myself, and with you, over a laundry list of everyday ranch life happenings ranging from taking a dirty ranch pickup to the big city carwashes to the evolution of the "hunters of wild game."

It has been heart-warming fun for me to share my back-porch thoughts with you as well as the "you can't make this stuff up" stories of others. Although the West is changing, the cowboy "ain't dead yet," so there will be more stories to tell.

Turning the page of the calendar doesn't change a thing. It is a ceremony we put too much emphasis on and hope, that because of it, things will be different.

What has begun within each of us today will be seed for tomorrow - no matter what the calendar says.

May your year be blessed with all that you need and most of what you want.

© Julie Carter 2006



A Kelo Christmas

Suzanne Kelo, the Plaintiff in the now infamous Kelo v. City of New London case has sent a Christmas Card to the people who took her house away:

Here is my house that you did take
From me to you, this spell I make
Your houses, your homes
Your family, your friends
May they live in misery
That never ends.
I curse you all
May you rot in hell
To each of you
I send this spell
For the rest of your lives
I wish you ill
I send this now
By the power of will