Originally printed in the Custer County Chronicle on August 21, 2024

A few days ago, my husband and I and my father-in-law were helping a neighbor precondition calves, the first of the fall cow work. The creaking of the saddle leather, the soft tinkling of spur rowels, the sound of hooves on ground surprisingly soft for August, with the sun just getting hot on our shoulders as we rode west to gather the cows – familiar sounds, familiar sights, familiar faces. It is just plain fun to listen as the conversations and commentary fly, punctuating the rhythm of the work.

“How’s that horse working out for you?”

“Did you get that hay bought?”

“My dog knows three commands: ‘get down,’ ‘come,’ and ‘dang it, get in the trailer!’”

But this time, the conversation turned quickly to one subject, and settled there: a local ranching family that is currently up against the Forest Service in a court case that could cost them their livelihood. The details of the case are still coming out, but it is shocking and concerning situation that has really galvanized the ranching community.

Farm and ranch families make up less than 2% of the American population, down from 80% in the 1700s. to about 40% in the early 1900s. With numbers like that, it goes without saying that even the percentage of those with a more rural lifestyle, who are more familiar with the community mechanics and dynamics, who know where our food comes from and how family-run agriculture works, has also dwindled. Politics and culture have shifted in favor of urbanization and industrialization, and social media and climate alarmists have helped to shape our culture’s overall negative view of the agricultural industry. People in positions of federal authority with no true knowledge of agriculture pass laws and initiatives that are not based in the reality that is America’s rural families and farming and ranching families, but based in politics heavily steeped in ideology, policies that have crippled the agriculture industry over the decades.

And this local issue has brought all of that to the forefront. A typically-reserved group of people are speaking up a little louder.

When you are part of an industry with rapidly dwindling numbers, you care. But more than that, when you are part of a community that depends on other members of the community and they depend on you, you care. When you work shoulder-to-shoulder, when you break a sweat and eat dust and tell stories and share life and sit down over a meal together, you are family. And family cares. And family stands up for its own. Because we know that what happens to one of us could happen to any of us, and what happens to one matters to all. We know, and we care.

In the few short years of being a rancher’s wife, I have seen what a unique and beautiful picture of family and community is demonstrated by the ranchers we are privileged to call friends and neighbors. Frankly, I haven’t seen that level of community anywhere else. I have seen how people rally around one another, in times of need but also in times of joy. I caught a glimpse of it before we got married, when this community rallied in support of the grieving family of a pillar of this community, who had died suddenly. I saw it during our wedding, with the number of neighbors who stepped in to help with food and setup, among other things. And roughly two years ago it was amazing to me to see how friends and neighbors leapt to action when my father-in-law had an ATV wreck in a remote pasture, and the number of folks who dropped what they were doing to help find him, help get him to the ambulance, and to help us get our fall cow work done in the absence of a fully-functioning Dave.

And why? Because that’s what community does.

So, when a family in this community is facing an unprecedented criminal suit, and a family, no less, who is loved and respected and known to be law-abiding, the broader ranching community takes notice.

We aren’t designed for a life lived in isolation from others. We were made for partnerships with people, face-to-face interactions, collaboration, commiseration. Now, I don’t for a moment assume that everyone who reads this column shares my faith. But if you’ll humor me and take the dusty Bible off your shelf (you probably have one) and look at the first few chapters of the Bible in the book of Genesis, where God saw the beauty of the world He had just made, and the Man Adam in the Garden of Eden, in spite of how good everything was, God said, “It is not good for man to be alone.”

I’ll confess, I use that line of Biblical insight on my husband occasionally when he annoys me, which is extremely, extremely, extremely rare. But we – people – were not meant to be alone. We were not meant to face life’s challenges alone. We weren’t meant to face life’s joys alone. We weren’t meant to live without thought of a bigger picture.

God doesn’t give marriage to everyone. He doesn’t put everyone in a community that is innately close-knit. He doesn’t give families to everyone. But to everyone He gives the capacity and frankly the need for fellowship and community. And, dare I say it, the responsibility to engage. It is just a responsibility that a lot of people don’t uphold.  

We weren’t meant to be alone, to selfishly pursue our interests, our desires, our wants and needs, apart from the needs of family and community. We were made for something so much better.