Meditations From "The Ranch"

That’s right, my friends, I am sipping iced coffee from a glass cowboy boot, gazing out upon a pasture of splendidly lazy cows as they stroll and nibble from acres of golden prairie. A 360 degree backdrop of the low sierra mountain ranges surrounds the prairie, as well as the house, also affectionately known as The Ranch, where our family enjoys dwelling for this dreamy week of summer. Hardly a sound out here, at least sounds as I know them in my usual life – cars, lawn mowers, sirens and such. Every now and again, the lovely owl hoots consistently from her tree across the grasses, such a soothing, primitive, wind-instrument sort of sound. Also, the shift of dry, delicious grasses in the jaws of cows, when they roam near enough for me to hear, and the swish of their hooves through the land as they pass on by. Hardly any movement, but for the occasional tickle of grass blades in the hot breeze, but for the black cow swishing her tail in a steady tick-tock rhythm as her calf sips from a willing, dangling teat. I can only imagine how hot the milk pouring forth from her body is, coming from that fur-covered Mama cow in this 98 degree heat. But somehow it all works together for good out here, uninterrupted, unforced, at an easy, natural pace, like the slow, lilting walk of the cattle herd, whenever they decide it’s time to actually move.

From the persimmon tree, whose trunk grows right up out of a hole in the end of the deck where I sit, a mysterious chorus of insects makes a mid-pitched rattling noise, like a hundred maracas might sound shaking from the high hills. Then, another vibration from the willow trees farther off, at a deep yet more soprano pitch; but this one comes and goes according to its own mysterious intervals, like a cuckoo clock – cicadas, perhaps?

In the near distance, where a huddle of cattle have been lounging beneath the graceful shade of a tree for the most of the day, sits a white trailer speckled with auburn clouds of rust. It rests in dry, golden grass like it hasn't moved for centuries – its stillness so insistent, its history rich, its presence such a persistent part of the landscape. It dares me not to move a muscle, as do the cocoa brown horses in pastures beyond a white farm fence, whose lean, reflective bodies have occupied the same sunny spot for at least an hour now.

In the pond to the right of me, just below the deck, frogs blip, breaking the water’s surface every now and then, just often enough not to be forgotten. So gentle and sweet, the little blips. Fish join in too, with their elusive bodies sweeping the surface of the pond's green water for a split, nearly imaginary second.

Out here, nothing fast, or pressing. Nothing loud or insistent. Nothing confusing or awkward. Nothing even too vibrant; instead, all things spilling out easily across the land in a slow, gorgeous array of muted hues of green and brown, everything making a beautiful sense – all things subtle but steady, strong but still…sort of like the landscape I desire for my soul.