Page 52 of Between the Stars

Ranch life isnothing like most assume. It’s so much more than feeding animals, or whatever else you’re doing on the ranch, as every one of them operates differently. Some raise cattle, some breed horses, and some function more like farms. Or maybe it’s a combination of all.

Grady Ranch breeds horses for the most part and raises cattle to be slaughtered. On this ranch I’ve learned the value of hard work and what it can teach you. Work ethic. And you’re proud of what you do as it has meaning. You show up. Be prepared. Do what you say you’re going to do.

Just so we’re clear, this does not apply to my love life.

Or Sev and Camdyn because you canneverbe prepared for them.

“What does their milk tastes like?” Sev asks, holding up one of the bottles we use to feed the baby goats.

I laugh and help her fill one bottle in each slot of the rack feeder. “I don’t suggest you drink it.”

We can hear the goats maaying as I organize the bottles. Sev laughs. “They’s so crazy.”

I peek over the gate to their pen and see them jumping around like they’re in a music video. There’s twelve of them and I’ll never understand the energy these crazy baby goats have. Larry, the little runt of the bunch with black and white spots, catapults himself through the air and into the wall. He does this all the time and I still don’t understand the purpose of it. But Larry is not the smartest. Camdyn named him, after one of the ranch hands who, okay, how can I say this in the nicest way possible? He’s… not all there. Love the guy, but his nuts and bolts are a bit loose at times.

Sev and I feed the goats, Camdyn collects eggs from the chickens and takes them up to the house. We have a system here, and while the girls aren’t here every weekend with me, it’s kinda nice to have the distraction of them today.

You know this by now, but I spend a lot of my time on the Grady ranch, or out at the only thing I own besides my Jeep. Twenty acres of land my granddaddy left me. Until spring comes and I can start the foundation when the ground thaws, I’m left working out my frustrations on the ranch.

The only way I can think is to be active and do something. Whether it’s wrangling steers, repairing fences, chasing down pigmy goats, and the occasional wild stallion that thinks he needs to run wild, I can honestly say I’ve found myself in North Texas. My heart might be a mess, but I call this sleepy town home. I grew up here and while I might be a ranch mechanic during the day, nothing’s better than working hard before sunrise. There’s no city lights out here, no Starbucks, but there are chickens. And one is pecking the shit out of my boot.

“Knock it off, cock sucker,” I grumble, moving my foot away from him. He really is a cock, and a mean one.

“Hims name is Tulu,” Camdyn informs me, brushing her horse Lulu’s hair, laughing.

At least she didn’t repeat what I said. Sev, on the other hand, I can already see her lips trying to form the word.

I lift another bale of hay into the stack, careful to haul it high enough I miss the top of Sev’s head. She’s chasing the rooster next to me. “Do all the animals you two name end in Lu?”

“Not all of them,” Camdyn tells me.

“Comes here, cook sucker,” Sev snaps at the rooster, grabbing at his feather, only to have him crow at her and try to peck her. She immediately covers her ears and glares at him.

I might have to separate them before she rips his feathers out and turns him into dinner.

You might be wondering why I’m with Sev and Camdyn again. They like me. That’s why.

“Uncle Jace?” Camdyn says, setting Lulu’s brush down.

“Yeah?” I don’t look back as I continue stacking the hay with the cut side down so moisture will run down the stack to the bottom layer. Running my forearm over my sweating brow, I take inventory of the stacks and the crisscross pattern.

“Can we ride on the tractor with you and feed the cows?”

I intend on hooking up the diet feeder, loading the hay and feeding the cattle this morning, and that’s probably why the girls followed me in here instead of staying with Bishop at the house. Any time they see me or Morgan on the tractors, they come running.

I nod to the tractor next to the open barn doors. “Sure.”

They pile in and I think nothing of it. When I’m inside and turn the PTO on. You might be wondering what the fuck a PTO is. It’s short for power take off. All it means is a long rotating pipe is taking power from the transmission and delivering it to a rotary implement. Like a diet feeder that basically grinds up hay and spits it out the side for cattle. You run the tractor inside the barn and it delivers the hay into their feeder. Simple. Right?

Not today.

This is probably where you’re cringing, huh? Do You know what’s about to happen?

Well, maybe cover your eyes.

I hear a knock from the diet feeder as soon as I turn it on and frown. “Stay here. Don’t move,” I tell both girls who are fighting for who will sit on my lap.

I slow the PTO to a slow idle and jump down from the tractor. Around the back, I reach down to adjust the hydraulic pipe, but the second I’m near the PTO, it catches my coat sleeve and throws me on the other side of it like a rag doll.

---