all my belongings were packed in my little yellow mercedes and my parents' airstream camper. my bay mare was in the trailer and we were all headed west to wyoming for a moving trip/family camping vacation. i also had a farm kitten in my car, which i'd nabbed from under the grainary right before leaving. that's the present-day link cat.
here is the little link, in 2006, shortly after moving into my apt. those were the days when i had all the time in the world! i cooked a lot, i learned to knit, and then crochet, i braided a large living room rag rug, sewed link a coat complete with fur trim.... i did enjoy that time alone, and i'm glad i did, cause i sure don't have time to do those things now! i'm lucky if i have a few evenings a week of down time. my weekends are full, and usually several weeknights. but that's ok, i love going places and meeting people and visiting those whom i've already met.
and you know what? 95 percent of what i do these days is because of meeting up and beginning to associate with scott. his kind of people are my kind of people, so it works wonderfully. and he likes to travel and visit, too. :-) so we feed off each other. usually, if we have a free weekend about a month and a half in the future, one of us will says, 'so, that would be a good weekend to go here, or we should go see them.'
and, no matter how much we determine that we are going to keep a weekend free, we can't help it and end up going somewhere.
we already have valentine's/my birthday 2011 plans - the cutter races in jackson! sounds like perfect birthday plans to me. and when people ask how we met, i say, 'well, just going to brandings and seeing each other around at different community happenings.'
but, i digress.
so 2006 was four years ago, when i moved out. in 2007 i was still with the ex-him, and still didn't have a whole lot going on, and i was still hell-bent that i was moving back to iowa after i did my time. i told myself i'd stay for two years.
then, in 2008, about this time of year, i attended billy keith's branding with good friend emily, whom i met when she came to wyoming on internship from missouri, and sister melissa, who came over from the west side of the state. emily and i stayed out there the night before, after helping the keiths gather their cows into the 'trap,' or smaller pasture right next to the corrals.
this photo came from that branding:
it's classic. :-)
after the branding new friend griff invited us to go to deer creek days in glenrock, where his cousin (scott!) was competing in the ranch rodeo. that evening i also met friend dejoe. that evening i had pendleton for the first time.
and the rest is history.
the rest, i finally figured out recently, came about because the west had won my heart, and the ex-him had lost it forever. i just didn't know it yet.
so then the next summer in 2009 scott attended billy keith's branding, and i had recently seen him at the powder river sheepherder's fair, so we talked again, and that's when he asked to ride with me back into town, and he got my phone number in a roundabout way because he was too scared to ask me for it straight-up. :-) in the weeks to follow we went to frontier days, pathfinder days, i helped moved cows at the association, and the rest really is history.
he loves to do all the things i love to do, and i didn't intend to start dating him, but his offers were so tempting and i could never say no. he gives me the opportunity to do all the things i've always wanted to do.
that leads to this year, 2010, where billy keith did not have a branding, so good thing scott took the opportunity last year!
that leads to this photo a few weekends ago at the meeteetse ranch rodeo, taken by bob, which has quickly become my all-time favorite of me and scott together:
looking through my photo folders on my computer from the last year, this is what the 'events' folder reads: buffalo creek camping, camp branding, christmas, elk hunting, holly's visit, horse branding, housewarming, ice fishing, july 4th, meeteetse ranch rodeo, memorial day moving cows, pathfinder branding, paula and michael's wedding, pocatello rodeo, roundup office moving, stone branding, trav's branding, roundup picnic, truck lights and tyrone day.
and those are just the things in one category! i may be too busy to remember five of the ten things on my grocery list, or three out of three things i need to take to the office on a given morning, but really, i wouldn't have it any other way.
being with the guy in the photo above makes me thoroughly happy, and i'm looking forward to the next 85674 weekends full of trips, travels and events, shared with him. the next red-letter event that approaches is the pendleton roundup in mid-september!
highlights of my fourth year in wyoming:
first pack trip in the winds with my sister
start dating scott
elk hunting for the first time
promotion to managing editor at the roundup
leave my apartment, purchase a house
add a silver mercedes to my automobile collection
compete in a ranch rodeo
get my own livestock brand, as a gift from scott
new state visited: idaho
get a puppy! finally my own dog
help with various brandings/cow work throughout the year
and more i'm probably forgetting.... or that haven't happened yet.
for now, it's up to the ranch with a horse this evening, and pathfinder days tomorrow. good times!
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