A Passion

To everyone it is something. That one thing that brings you passion. That thing you can never escape no matter how you try. For some it is their job or career. For others it is an activity like hunting, fishing, or another endeavor. For me it is, has been, and always will be The West. It shows in the songs I sing, the stories I tell, the places I go, and the people and things I love the most. It is something that is hard to explain and even harder to understand unless it draws you as it draws me. It is the sound of the wind in the aspen trees, their leaves bright green in Spring and Summer but bright yellow in the Fall. It is that horse that, no matter how many years or miles he has been ridden, he still bucks every morning if it's cold. It's the creek of leather and ringing of the rowels in the spurs. It is the smells...coffee boiling before daylight, biscuits cooking in a Dutch oven and meat cooking over the fire. It's the smell of fresh hay cut and bailed. It's snow in the Winter, rain in the Spring, and hot dry dust blowing in the Summer. It's the old cow giving birth to and licking off that brand new baby calf...that one more calf you knew she could raise before you sold her away. Its drought and bad cattle prices followed by seasons of rain and good cattle prices, over and over again. It's the sounds when they jingle in the horses just before the light shows in the east. It's that funny looking Houlihan loop thrown over their necks one by one until the last mount for the day is caught and the even greater sounds of creaking saddle leather, hooves pounding and tack and spur clinking and jingling as the crew rides out in single file. It's big hats, tall boots, a guitar and a cowboy song. It is volumes of books on a shelf that take years to read all about life on the left side of the mighty Mississippi. It is Mexico to Canada, Texas to California, where things among the brotherhood of the horse are done differently but the same. Where differences are argued about but put aside when it comes time to ride a bronc or gather a herd. It's a simple nod from an old man in a coffee shop when the "kid" next to him in the big hat and spurs orders his strong and black. It's the look of admiration as a little boy watches the same "kid" walk out of the coffee shop and drive off in a big pickup pulling a horse in a trailer. It's the icon that sets us apart from the rest of the world. It's the heritage that began in the late 1500's when Mayan Indian boys given the task to watch after the cattle by the Franciscan Monks, get tired of chasing them around barefoot on the rocks and began riding the horses left behind by the conquistadors instead. It is something that grabs you when you are young or maybe before you are born and you cannot shake it. It is freedom. It is adventure. It is The West.

With its siren song one is drawn into a love and appreciation for bits and spurs made by craftsmen young and old with ornamentation of silver crafted, molded, and engraved by men and women who have honed the craft to art form far beyond function. The appreciation extends to the art of taking a hide from one of those old cows to be built into a beautifully tooled saddle, a perfect fitting pair of boots that speak volumes about the wearer's personality, or cut into strings of varied size and braided into everything from bridles, bosals, and quirts to reatas ranging from fifty to ninety feet in length, that will be thrown in a loop over the head of a beast running at breakneck speed to allude the one who would be its captor as he chases on horseback. When caught, the reata burns and smoke flies from the wraps around the saddle horn in an effort to slow the animal down without breaking the reata in two, an act that is an art form in itself. It is the pride one feels when he is the one throwing that loop and catching that beast. It is also the pride of the ones who built the tools of that trade...saddle, tack, bit, spurs, reata et al. If the reader of this passage has a passion, be it this or something completely different, they will understand, at least a little bit, what I am talking about. But if not, the reader will continue to be an example of what an old man told me once. He said, "Son, if anyone ever asks you why you are a cowboy,...well, they'd never understand or they'd of never asked the question." I believe God has a plan for us all. I also believe that He will give us a passion for that which enhances His will and plan for our lives that He might be glorified through it. "Whatever you do, do it enthusiastically, as something done for the Lord and not for men," Colossians 3:23

Find your passion and live it! To the glory of God!