how it started:
It was early October; the pastures brown and dry and streams barely trickling in their gravel beds. The low autumn sun warmed up the days but nights had a wintry bite.
My best friend, Jasper, from the next ranch over, and I were on our horses, vaccinating calves in the corral by the house.
Jasper’s big old blind dog, Willie, lay in the shade near the corral, dozing. I could hear him snore and saw all four of his paws twitch in rabbit-chasing dreams.
The calves we were tending were bummers who’d lost their mothers or been rejected by them. Having lost my own ma, I was a sucker for an orphan, so Jasper and I had bottle-raised them. We kept them down here at the ranch when the rest of the herd was driven up to the mountain pastures last spring.
Jasper and I were giving the bummers their second round of shots. They were like our own little herd, and we were responsible for them. I liked the feeling.
The other calves on the ranch all got branded, vaccinated, and ear-tagged at once. A whole crew came in to help. It was like a party (but not for the cows and their babies, of course.) Ranchers and cowboys moved from ranch to ranch to help get everyone’s cattle done each spring.
Sometimes, I pretended the ranch was mine, not my pa’s, and the miles of fence were mine to mend, the acres of hay mine to water and cut and bale, the cattle mine to raise and care for and sell.
I was on my horse, Rowdy, although I could have done my part on foot. I loved working cows on horseback. Couldn’t get enough. I guess it’s in my blood from my pa and my ma before she passed away and their folks before them.
I may be the last in my family of Central Oregon ranchers. In fact, this very ranch was homesteaded by my great-great grandpa when he came over from Arkansas on the Oregon Trail. But that’s another story.
My dream has always been to stay on this land working cows forever. Well, for the rest of my life, anyway.
“Get behind him, Jasper,” I pointed with my chin at the last calf, my hands being full of lariat and reins.
“¡Claro!” Jasper said. “¡Estoy intentando, Cassie!” Jasper was half Mexican, on his ma’s side, a small, wiry, quiet kid, and he lapsed into Spanish sometimes, especially when he got excited.
Jasper wheeled his horse, Tigger, to the left and cut off the calf’s escape. Tigger and the black calf had a stare down for a few seconds. Jasper sat low and straight, sunk into the saddle like he’d been working cattle forever. I think he felt best there because his limp didn’t show.
Tig stepped forward; the calf stepped back. I urged Rowdy in behind the calf, leaving it nowhere to go. I was a pretty good horsewoman myself, a head taller than Jasper, but not as good with a rope.
Slow and easy, Jasper shook a loop on his rope, dangling it against his leg on the side away from the wary calf. I kept my own rope in my hand, ready if Jasper missed his throw. But he never missed. The calf bawled once as the loop hung in the air then settled over its neck.
“Good job, Jas.”
Jasper backed Tig up, tightening the rope between the saddle horn and the calf. The calf ducked his head, struggling against the rope, reared up on his hind legs, then lowered his head and kicked up his small back hooves.
“He’s a wild one,” I said, admiring the animal’s spunk. “He’ll be daddy to a lot of good calves when he’s grown up.”
Between the two of us and the two horses, we finally got the calf to stand with all four feet on the ground. I swung down and hooked my arm around the calf’s neck, talking in my most soothing and convincing voice, “It’s for your own good.”
I stuck the needle in his haunch and pushed the plunger down with my palm.
“Got him,” I said.
Jasper snaked the loop loose from where he still sat on Tig. “Maybe you and I could buy this calf and start a herd of our own,” he said. “Something to think about.”
I slapped the calf lightly on the rump and sent him running back to the others where they were milling around in the corner of the corral.
I unhooked Rowdy’s cinch and hauled his saddle off, propping it against the barn wall. I led him into his corral and took off his bridle. Jasper swung down off Tigger and tied her to the fence rail in the afternoon shade of the barn.
“Our own herd.” I considered it out loud. Sounded good. “Start with a couple cows and a bull. Pretty soon they’d have babies. Then we’d have yearlings. Keep the heifers to have more calves, sell the bull calves at auction.”
Right now, Jasper and I were just helping out on our families’ ranches. Just kids playing cowboy, really. But our own herd, that would be different. A lot of responsibility.
If the cattle fattened and had good calves, we’d make a slim living; if the winters were harsh, the hay got rained on, the calves got scours or worse, we’d lose everything and have to start over. Cattle ranching was a precarious business.
I lifted the handle on the hydrant in the barnyard and let the cool water rush over my dusty hands. I splashed my face and rubbed the back of my neck, then stood back to let Jasper do the same. He stuck his whole head under the faucet, then turned it off and shook his soaked black hair like a dog coming in from the rain.
“I better get home,” he said. “Dad’s cooking chili tonight. And corn bread.”
“Your favorite.”
“Yep.” He untied Tig and tucked his left foot in the stirrup and swung his leg over. “See ya on the bus tomorrow. Ven, Willie.” The big black dog stood and shook the dust from his coat. He followed Jasper’s voice and fell in behind the horse.
“Oh yeah. Monday. Thanks a lot for reminding me.” Sitting in school was not my favorite way to spend the day, but you probably already figured that out. Especially this time of year, when the days were getting shorter and there never seemed to be enough time to ride and play after homework and chores. “Wish it was still summer.”
Pa stuck his head out the back door as I waved goodbye to Jasper.
Jasper rode up the hill that separated his family’s ranch from ours. Willie trotted along behind, following the sound of Tig’s hooves scrunching on the dirt track. I watched Jasper smile back at his dog. He sure loved that old guy.
“Cassie,” Pa said. His voice warbled odd across the yard, like he had a catch in it. Like when he’d come back from the hospital without my ma two years ago. Like the first time my world fell apart. Seemed like I was only now starting to get it sewn back together.
My heart took an extra thump in my chest, remembering that day. “Yeah, Pa?”
“Would you come in here, please?”
He leaned on one crutch. He’d broken his leg when he fell off his horse a couple weeks ago, the night Mr. Daly’s buffalo got into our alfalfa and he and my big sister, Fran, and I had to get them out. But that’s another story, too. I’ve got a lot of ’em for being only a kid.
Anyway, the broken leg seemed to weigh on Pa, making him slow and sad
