In Our Blood - Insight 6
It is something you cannot shake, even if you wanted. Ranching is more than a job or a way of life. It is an inescapable existence with so many ups and downs that you, more often than not, question your sanity. Ranchers voice the common complaints: Why do we do this? Why do we keep going? Is this really worth it? Who in their right mind continues with struggles like these for so little gain? Are we the only ones?
The doubt is endless and seemingly constant, yet we persevere anyway.
Why? I will tell you…
There are indescribable highs from the clear, yet simple, smell of rain. There are deep, dark lows beyond your greatest imagination when you notice the tell-tale signs of death from a far corner of the pasture. A consuming joy from the surge in your chest when you reassess all the laborious improvements to the once broken-down carcass of a decaying homestead through decades’ worth of blood, sweat, and tears. The sickening drop in your stomach and the welling of tears in your eyes as the last cow on the ranch is loaded into a trailer for the final time. We hold infinite examples of the polarizing emotions painstakingly earned that form varied senses of certainty in the answers to why they continue. Peaks only grow and valleys deepen; the love only strengthens.
Like athletes that struggle to shake the competitive drug, we cannot purge our undying love. That is, in fact, what it is: love. When you stop by a ranch, you will see us during days filled with passion where we ask ourselves why others fail to comprehend our why. Then the next afternoon, we question why we stick around at all.
It is love that keeps us. You must love something as deeply as we do to push through the regularity of disappointments, unending repairs, and growing anger from an outside world that increasingly villainizes us. We look back on our personal struggles and may casually affirm, “Yep, that’s about right.” However, behind every acknowledgement is an even stronger desire to remain through the thickest and thinnest of times. None of us are quitters.
Ranching uniquely provides so much yet gives nothing at all. The opportunities, experiences, heritage, and lifestyle are provided by the access to our beloved land and the benefits it bestows. However, it never loves us back, never offers a shoulder to lean upon, never sits and listens to our complaints. It naturally throws us into searing summer heat and plunges us into frigid, frozen winters. This life gives to us just as easily as it takes away. In many cases our land and way of life are each simultaneously our greatest refuge and most overwhelming burden.
It is in our blood. It is bred into us. It is learned through childhoods, injuries, triumphs, and memories. Over time it creates a passion-infused life with an inherent tie to our origins as a culture, and even, as human beings. We love through the memories of those who came before as we continue to carry a flickering torch. We love with the delicate care of our livestock, with hopes of witnessing each of them prosper and play in the pastures. We love it all because there is nothing else to do when the going gets tough.
Just as scars remain on our knuckles, long ago broken bones beneath our skin, and memories inside our hearts, ranching will always be part of us. Why? Because it is in our blood.
