Growing up I'd always imagined that our house in the suburbs was really just a place to stay while we went to school --- where I thought we were from --- where our family really lived was my Grandfather's ranch in New Mexico. We, my parents,brothers and sisters, spent so much time on my Grandfather's ranch that it formed my as well as my siblings sense of creativity , play , work ethic --- it is the fabric of our identity. We would work and play in days that ran into the next only breaked by meals and sleep. My Grandfather had a very prized gentle bull --- named Silver-tone --- we would put a halter on, lead to the fence and take turns riding around the corral--- our version of a carnival pony ride. We loved riding horses. Not just meandering around or bouncing in a docile trot---- the horses we rode were gentle --- and they were cattle horses so running and stopping short and turning quickly was what they were meant to do --- and they played right along with us readily. And,when they were ready to be done with us riding them through the scrub oak and around the fields they would stop ... just stand there--- the power struggle was short lived ---- we would turn them around and head home. Back down the canyon through the scrub oak , through the field and back into the yard. The sound of the wind mill , the calling of the cattle, the smell of the yard -- a mixture of animal and gasoline , hay and a kind of sweet wetness from the corral , the chickens constantly busy , and broadcasting the completion of their latest project.
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