Harvest

Posted on November 18, 2015 by Laura Lindblom under Uncategorized

Dad is a South Dakota native, and he is back in his element. He went out this morning around 7:00, to “look for that buck.” Half an hour later, we got a call saying he had gotten a buck, in a meadow about a half mile from our front door. Talk about efficient. And he’s a dead shot, let me tell you. We’re not positive it was that buck, but we still have another tag left, so maybe we’ll get that buck after all.

Field dressing is something of a nasty business – The carcass is slit from the rib cage down and the entrails are essentially lifted out. They are all contained within a membrane sac and, provided you don’t cut the sac, they come out pretty cleanly. Nevertheless, it is a bloody process. Liver and heart are saved for cooking later, the inside of the carcass is washed out and the entire carcass is hung up to age.

In Illinois, with all the liberal bureaucracy and socialist gun control, being a legal hunter and firearm owner is challenging, and the hunting part isn’t nearly as simple as a hike from the front door. And you can’t just string the carcass up in your yard when you live in town, at least not in Illinois. I don’t think that is considered particularly socially acceptable.

Hunting is a misunderstood endeavor, by a significant portion of today’s population. When children are taught in schools the evolutionary idea that people are nothing more than a somewhat higher level of animal, why wouldn’t hunting be misunderstood?

But one only has to look as far as the book of Genesis to see that God gave mankind the job of stewardship of the earth (chapter 1), the command to fill the earth and subdue it (chapters 1 and 9), and permission to eat animals for food (chapter 9) which, I believe, was given with the condition of stewardship. God’s design for “stewardship” doesn’t mean leaving the environment alone, but treating it carefully, responsibly, and as a blessing from God. This includes responsible harvesting of wildlife and fostering healthy wildlife populations.

We aren’t exactly set up for processing the deer ourselves this year, and we need to get our freezer up and running, but we’re all already looking forward to having venison for a change.

Laura Elizabeth

Welcome home

Posted on November 11, 2015 by Laura Lindblom under Uncategorized

This was my welcome home this evening. Frosty got smart and waltzed through the not-so-electric fence. In her case, the grass really is greener on the other side of the fence…in our front yard.

I love coming home.

Laura Elizabeth

Relics

Posted on October 11, 2015 by Laura Lindblom under Uncategorized

I’m sure I don’t know all the stories of this old boy, but he’s become something of a fixture. I can’t even say I really know when Grandpa managed to come by this old Willys jeep, or how long he drove it, but it sat as a creative, backwoods yard ornament next to the chicken coop for years. Years.

Within the past few, though, maybe ten years, maybe five, the old Willys jeep was retired to a pen next to the corral. Can’t even be used for parts, but for some reason, there just is no getting rid of that old thing. None of us wants to, I imagine.

Even if I don’t remember the details, or never knew them to forget them, there’s something to be said for relics of the past. I don’t know if it is the reminder that everything eventually falls to disrepair (pessimistic) or it is the reminder of good old days, and people I loved (optimistic), but there is something important to me about the rusted body, the peeling paint, the almost-unreadable “Willys” on the hood and the back, the cracked windshield, the springs busting through the cracked leather seats.

It is a part of my dad’s past, my granddad’s past, which makes it a part of my past. If this place were mine to do with as I wished, the jeep would stay. In fact, I’d probably put it back next to the chicken coop.

Who knows when it got the yellow paint job – The green is visible under the cracking, chipping, lichen-covered paint. Who knows when the mice really took to the leather, or when the yellow jackets started taking refuge there – They sun themselves on the remainder of the seats, on the floorboards. Who could tell me the last day that old clunker was driven, or what its last trip was – I can’t even tell you the day it was retired to the the pen beside the corral.

But it is a relic. And it will stay.

Sunday walks and spiderwebs

Posted on August 31, 2015 by Laura Lindblom under Uncategorized

Sundays always go too quickly–The fellowship, the family time, the blessed enjoyment of the outdoors. We live in such a fast-paced culture, but I’ve been discovering a peace that comes with a quieter life. Sometimes life gets busy and schedules get hectic, but coming home to a quiet life at the end of the day is unbelievably restful and calming. Regrettably, the last week sped by with hardly enough time to breathe deep of the clear, piney air or to ponder flowers in shady corners of the Hills. I tried to make up for it today.

A quiet, solitary walk to scout some good photography locations was restorative, even with temperatures in the 90s. I explored a beautiful little ravine branching off our jeep trail to Hole-in-the-Wall, and enjoyed the sight of birch trees glinting in the 5:00 sunlight. Deadfall and rocks, mossy soil and sandy creekbed–The ravine was like something straight out of a western novel. I love not being able to see what is around the corner–Where might it go? What is just out of sight, waiting to be discovered?

Another ravine, the grass bent from flooding, was scattered with ancient, sun-bleached bones. Some of them were mossy and green, all of them porous with time. Life is so short, so transient. Like the “flower of the grass”, the Bible says, life comes and life fades, just like that. Human life, animal life, plant life. But unlike the flower of the grass, we have a soul that will not die! And God is good to His children. So good.

On the way back through the corrals to get home, which are built with the bare rock as the fourth wall, I nearly walked right through this beauty’s web. I watched as she snagged herself a grasshopper, then scurried back to the center to watch and wait. Ants are examples of industry. Spiders are examples of vigilance.

We were graced with a little thundershower this afternoon, just enough to wet the deck and scare the Dog. She’s a bit of a coward. The clouds rolled up so gradually, they looked like smoke and haze, but soon took command of the whole horizon and the sky above. A little thunder, a little rain, a little wind in the whispering pines. The moisture was pleasant.

Tomorrow is the start of a new day, a new week, and a new job! Off to new adventures.

Nothin’ more fun on dirt

Posted on August 9, 2015 by Laura Lindblom under Uncategorized

“150 pounds of cowboy, 2000 pounds of hulking, stock-bucking bull.” And with that, the bucking shoot bursts open and out cracks the bull like a bolt of greased lightning, the lean cowboy clinging to its back by one rosin-gloved hand.

Bull-riding–Some couple dozen cowboys from South Dakota, Wyoming, Nebraska, and Colorado gathered at the Custer County Fairgrounds this evening to give their best at riding 2000 pounds of sheer strength for a mere eight seconds. Sound easy? Not so much. Sarah and I joined a crowd of cowboy-hat-wearing, freedom-loving, patriotic Americans for an evening of a dangerous sport, the most dangerous eight seconds in rodeo, and an amazing thing to watch. Those are some crazy cowboys. The excitement, the patriotism, the love of country, the community, the upholding of manliness in an increasingly emasculated society, the daring of the bull riders, the sportsmanship, the bravery of the bull fighters, the physical strength of the bulls. If you want some clean, country fun, go to a rodeo.

And in spite of increasing pressure against Christians, a rodeo announcer will still offer an unapologetic prayer to our Heavenly Father. I’m sure there were some there who didn’t appreciate that, but no one walked out.

Nothing has ever interested me about sports–The normal sports, that is. Baseball, basketball, football…golf. I understand that it takes skill, physical strength, stamina, precision, etc., to participate in those sports and to do it professionally. But at the end of the day, who cares if the ball went through the basket? What good does it do the players that the ball made it to the end zone? Why does it matter that the athlete made a home run? Does it change anything?

But then there’s rodeo. I also understand that some may have the same opinion of saddle bronc riding, steer wrestling, and bull riding, but there is an innate practicality about those events for the cowboys participating. Those events are a display of skills that those individuals use on a day to day basis (except maybe not during haying). That cowboy who can sit the bronc or wrestle that steer–no, the cowboy who will sit the bronc or wrestle the steer. In case you were wondering, natural self-preservation doesn’t lead a man to hurtle himself from a running horse onto the head of a rangy steer. Or sit himself down on the back of a bull bred to buck, for that matter. But the man who does? He’s a tough man, a tough man to beat. Maybe crazy, but tough as nails.