Would love to hear anecdotes and stories about your daily life. About the struggle. I feel it is the most noble profession. “The fields are black and ploughed, and they lie like a great fan before us, with their furrows gathered in some hand beyond the sky, spreading forth from that hand, opening wide apart as they come toward us, like black pleats that sparkle with thin, green spangles.”
They made a movie about me... I was a rancher for a while, but they made me look like a bad guy. I mean, I was forced into ranchers by European settlers. Now I'm forced to ranch. This isn't right.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RvyFFjP7RE admit it honey - you need a date <iframe width="420" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/6RvyFFjP7RE" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Some of us here have read Ayn Rand. You know she was a communist. Right? I resent you using an Anthem quote relying on her Soviet farmer memories as a way to describe Texas Farmers and Cowboys? And since when do Texans work fields that sparkle with spangles ... anyhow Here's the quote you were looking for to set your image of farmers/ranchers in Texas. But I understand you don't have much time for reading between your legendary otherworldly adventures : "The eastern sky was red as coals in a forge, lighting up the flats along the river. Dew had wet the million needles of the chaparral, and when the rim of the sun edged over the horizon the chaparral seemed to be spotted with diamonds. A bush in the backyard was filled with little rainbows as the sun touched the dew. It was tribute enough to sunup that it could make even chaparral bushes look beautiful, Augustus thought, and he watched the process happily, knowing it would only last a few minutes. The sun spread reddish-gold light through the shining bushes, among which a few goats wandered, bleating. Even when the sun rose above the low bluffs to the south, a layer of light lingered for a bit at the level of the chaparral, as if independent of its source. The the sun lifted clear, like an immense coin. The dew quickly died, and the light that filled the bushes like red dirt dispersed, leaving clear, slightly bluish air."
A great quote from the finest western I've ever read, and I've read quite a few. Thanks. I needed to read something like that after experiencing the game thread after tonight's win.
You haven't lived until you have pregnancy checked a cow. It involves a latex glove that goes up to your armpit. And castrating cattle is an interesting experience as well. After you yank the balls off (tears bleed less than cuts), the cowboys have a fire going, you throw those boys directly on the coals, and eat them hot. Yummy. I was a cowboy one summer. Best job I ever had, but for long hours and short pay.
cattle herders are an endangered species nowadays, what with big agrobusiness gaining an ever larger chokehold on marketshare. hopefully we will always have the maasai people to carry on nostalgia for future generations to remember this noble profession though. now sheep herders, they are alive and kicking stronger than ever before. found mainly on the top floors of the buildings on wall and broad streets, their stretch across borders with armies of stasi sheepdoggs to regulate things is at an all time high.
A bunch of my inlaws are crop farmers with some cattle on the side. Working cattle is hard work every once in a while. Other than that, the cows kind of take care of themselves if you run them fences (barbed wire changed the West). Crop farming (mostly corn and soybeans) is tough work most of the time. You basically have to know about farming, but be a mechanic, welder, laborer, and understand commodity markets and trading all at the same time. In South Texas, at least, you get a lot of time off, however.
Interesting. The landscape I'm familiar with is very different to Texas and cattle farming. My property is near Arezzo, and has long been extremely fertile due to the River Arno. When I was young the grand plan was to build a sprawling vineyard as the terrain is hilly and inviting, but after things took off for me I forgot about the simple, sexy way of man and dirt. It was also the women, who continue to hound me to this day. I'm leaning towards just fruits -ie, Apples, Lemons and Peaches. But.. I'm sure the philosophical aspects of being under the clear sky with a few concubines (a term I use in jest) and a hard day's labor is similar. I strongly believe when you nurture the earth, it will nurture you back.
You should talk to the married men of this forum. They've gone through a similar castration process but still have the pride to get up everyday and for what? I don't know. Game's over. I will definitely take up riding again. I always saw myself as a man of steed, similar to the Marlboro man.
