Dear Reader,
I think I have made it over the hump of home sickness and have settled into the reality of my new life. I think even if I did move back to Florida, my heart would not be satisfied because I am really homesick for a reality that doesn’t exist anymore, not necessarily a place. Now it is just a little world that I carry around in my heart and shake like a magic snow globe when I want to remember things.
But things are not all sad. I am glad that I get to experience life in a place that is so different from my childhood, not many people get to experience that. Of course, that has been a dream of mine since childhood, but I was thinking more of Mongolia in a yurt miles away from civilization. Maybe one day I will go to Mongolia or maybe I will just add it to my magic snow globe collection to shake when I am bored.
Right now, I am plowing through a book called “Shadow of the Silk Road” by Colin Thubron. It’s been the best thrift store find I have gotten in a long time. It was written in the early 2000s and details the author’s experiences as he travels the silk road in a modern day. But instead of learning about foreign cultures, I am realizing more that all humans are the same and we all have the same hopes and struggles hidden under different clothing and skin tones.
This past week has been busy, and I don’t think I’ve ever felt so American.
Our town had their class reunion, 250th Anniversary Parade, Bronc Ride, and Ranch Rodeo all in one weekend. Friday after helping some neighbors ride out pairs (ride out pairs means to sort out cows and their calves from the main herd) most of my family went to the Bronc Ride. I am not seriously into rodeo like my other siblings; I mostly just go for the social aspect and to annoy my sister with talking while she actually watches the rides.
Saturday morning, I got to fulfill a childhood dream and ride my horse in a parade complete with red, white, and blue bows in her tail. In the parade each rider held a state flag. With fifty riders in the line up plus a few for the American flag and a few others that were important that I should have noted, the biggest comment I heard that it was an impressive view. Small town parades are always the best, granted I have only really been in small town parades. It’s like watching a program that was put on at a family event. Some people are watching while some people are performing, but everyone helped put the event on.
On Saturday evening, it was back to the rodeo grounds to watch the ranch rodeo. A ranch rodeo is different than a regular rodeo. In a ranch rodeo, teams compete in events that reflect something that they might do on a ranch. My brother was competing this time with a team that our neighbors put together. This summer he has taken an interest in riding broncs for rodeos and was recruited to be the bronc rider for his team. I wasn’t nervous for him to ride, I don’t think he was even really nervous, but I did get nervous when the rider right before him got hurt.
That night, right after the rodeo ended, one of my aunts and some cousins came up from Florida to spend a few days with us. We spent most of the time in our town hanging out. I finally made it to the dam to go swimming and got sunburnt. My little cousin wouldn’t stop talking about how there were gators in the lake. Despite what I told her, I still kind of believe that down in the deepest part of the dam, there still might be a gator or some ancient monster. I wasn’t even this scared of gators or sharks when there was a real chance of actually being eaten by one.
On one of the days that my aunt and cousins were here we did the Badlands National Park, Wall Drug, and Mt. Rushmore. There is a trend online of people doing their work or homeschooling their kids at Disney, and I joke that I could do that at Wall Drug and Mt. Rushmore. Wall Drug has lots of nooks and crannies in their café that you can just plop down with a laptop and type away. Mt. Rushmore is the same way. The main walkway is usually crowded, but there are nice, restful places underneath trees where you could work or just read a book. There is great signal there too surprisingly.
Why this past week made me feel so American I don’t know. Maybe it was because that was my 4th time going to Mt. Rushmore, which is more than most Americans can say. Maybe it was just pride in showing off my new home state to family or that I was actually in a parade carrying a flag to help represent a part of my country. Maybe it was because I went to a ranch rodeo to cheer on my brother or maybe it was all of those things rolled into one.
Either way any day is a great day to be an American.
From the Rancher's Daughter's Desk 