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Hello God, it’s me, Mara: Horses were the means of transportation 80 years ago. A family with four girls had a big white horse named Daisy. These little girls loved all of their farm animals but especially Daisy as she was their means to get to their rural school, 3 ½ miles North of their home. Picture them, youngest to oldest, astride Daisy. Occasionally baby sister Donna got to visit school, too, rider number one on Daisy’s back. Prairie scene, besides various grasses, flowers, birds, it might include coyotes, gophers, badg...
As the poets and pickers headed home from the National Cowboy Poetry Gathering in Elko Nevada this past week, I was sent a poem perfectly timed to the upcoming calving season. Trent Nelson is a cowboy poet who was born and raised in northeastern Colorado in the agricultural community of Yuma. He has worked in farming and ranching his whole life from the Rocky Mountains to the sand hills of Nebraska. He currently resides outside his hometown where he works on a large farm/yearling grazing operation. This poem puts cows and...
Hello God, it’s me, Mara: You know, Lord, the Bible states that GOD knows our purpose on this earth before we were ever born. In this age of options, opportunities, choices, and more, You Lord, of all creation, made us for a specific purpose and reason, so, in one sense, we can’t be just anything that we want to be. Now that is ‘food for thought’ right? We were formed and set apart for YOU. Part of our journey here on this earth is not to create our destiny, but to discover it. As we choose to connect with You, our maker, we...
Although the Green New Deal seems to have been abandoned, there is still a lot of talk on the 2020 election trail about other brain flashes such as student loan forgiveness. I marvel at this concept. I grew up frugal and green, because my parents were 40 years old when they got around to having me, so they were children during the Great Depression. When I went off to college, I worked at every job I could find both on and off campus. I borrowed very little money, and I asked my parents for very little money. We lived...
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is closely monitoring an outbreak of respiratory illness caused by a novel (new) coronavirus (named “2019-nCoV”) that was first detected in Wuhan City, Hubei Province, China and continues to expand. Even though the 2019-nCoV represents a severe public health threat, the risk to individuals is dependent on exposure. For the general American public, who are unlikely to be exposed to this virus, the immediate health risk from the 2019-nCoV is considered LOW. Coronaviruses are...
Hello God, it’s me, Mara: You know, Lord, sometimes it’s pleasant to think back when we were just little kids and remember, now and then, how we’d pretend to be asleep, and watch for or wait for Mama to tiptoe in to check on us or just watch us as we slept. Every so often, one of us might have been ill and if that happened that we were sick, Mama would come in to check on us, or just sit and pray for us, telling us that she was joining the Lord as He watched over us as we slept. As we grew older, sometimes night time prayers...
I will continue on as reported in my last article. In 1910, the Scruggs family came to Ekalaka and filed on 320 acres on Rammey Creek about fourteen miles south of Ekalaka. After a couple of hard years, a house was built and then enlarged, wells and cellars dug and chickens and a milk cow bought. Teams that plowed gardens and did farming helped create abundant garden produce for the family and some to the neighbors. More land was acquired and cattle were raised. Also, the family increased as Mary, who came with them from...
I just love those helpful hint columns and books full of tips on how to remove every stain known to man or cure anything from warts to arthritis with a home remedy. Sometimes though, I have to question the effectiveness and efficiency of the remedies and helpful hints. I have actually had less than miraculous results with many of those tips. A tomato juice bath is supposed to be the cure-all for skunk spray. Do you know how much a tomato juice bath for a small boy costs? It was $92.00 cheaper and much less stressful just to...
I am going to start this article a little different by presenting names of a few individuals who I received cards, Christmas letters or phone calls from during the Christmas season. I felt these names may bring back special memories of school mates, relatives or long lost friends to you readers. See if you can remember some of them: Kay (Schnieder) Brown, Harlen Wash, Harlen Yates, Judy (Yates) Grismore, Marlee (LaBree) Askin, Tom Tooke, Don & Tunk Pulse, Mary Ellen (Townsend) Samola, Marlene (Figg) Tesch, Willard Padden,...
The most challenging cooking jobs I have ever had were my many years of wilderness camp cooking in the Scapegoat Wilderness for Brett and Julie Todd. Every time I rode out of camp, I would marvel that I had kept all those people fed under extreme conditions for a week with no opportunity to restock supplies. You see, at home I am one of those people who goes to the grocery store every day. One morning while I was cooking biscuits and gravy in the Meadow Creek Camp, one of the guides recounted a tale about my camp cooking coun...
Hello God, it’s me, Mara: You know, Lord, sometimes we need a reminder about certain things. How fun to discover that this coming Tuesday, the 21st, is called Hugging Day! Hugging Day is a special day to embrace the hug. Give your ‘mum’ a hug to show her that you really do care, that you love her, day in and day out; give your dad a hug to show him that he is loved and that you appreciate his attention in all that you do and have accomplished. Give your best friends a hug to let them know they are awesome, and together you c...
Since our son Bret bought into our ranching operation when he came back to the ranch after college, I am no longer the right hand man in this operation. I have been demoted back to assistant nobody, which is a great title. I love my life of part-time cowgirl and part-time County Superintendent of Schools. However, occasionally I come to the conclusion that I need to get a full-time job. The problem with a part-time job is that the ranch manager/CEO/husband person feels that since my hours are somewhat flexible that I can be...
Hello God, it’s me, Mara: You know, Lord, mending day happens to all of us; there are sock, shirts, jeans, you name it and it probably needs mending. Besides clothing, there is upholstery, fences, railings, relationships, and even broken hearts to mend. Mending clothing isn’t all that difficult but on mending day, aren’t we ever so thankful that You did not give us a ‘dozen children’. We’re thankful and grateful for the three special girls (or are there five girls now?) who always called us substitute parents even though they...
New federal law raises the minimum age of sale of tobacco products from 18 to 21 years of age. On December 20th, 2019, the President signed legislation raising the federal minimum age of sale of tobacco products from 18 to 21 years of age. According to the Food and Drug Administration, tobacco (nicotine-containing products) is considered any product made or derived from tobacco and intended for human consumption and used in any tobacco-containing device including “hookah, e-cigarettes (vapes), dissolvables, smokeless t...
Some of the hardest questions to answer start with why. Why will fish bite one day and not the next, or even stop biting when they were having a feeding frenzy a minute ago? Why did prehistoric people use a particular cliff face to draw a petroglyph? Why can't I win the lottery? Okay, scratch that. Just the other day, an acquaintance asked why magpies are black and white. First, magpies are not just black and white. Their colors include shades of gray, green and blue. In the...
The holiday season can be extra stressful for adults and children with the change of routines and the extra demands of our time. We are running around trying to make sure we have the right presents for each family member and friend and our kids’ friends and teachers. Then there are the Christmas programs at school and church. Oh, wait, don’t forget about the Christmas parties at work and with friends. And, we have our regular activities to fit in there – work, cleaning the house, dishes, laundry, cooking, etc. Excess stres...
Hello God, it’s me, Mara: You know, Lord, reading an article entitled REFLECTIONS, a challenge was given: “IF you were another person, would you like to be a friend of yourself?” What a good New Year’s Resolution THAT would be for every one of us to make, right? But – like it or not, that is a hard saying. That challenge calls for some inner inspection. Does our Christian walk go with our talk? We know that we should pray our walk would show. A person has to live with himself and in so doing, it’s up to him to see to it t...
Hello, I’ll start this week by wishing all of you a Merry Christmas. And probably a Happy New Year! Twas two nights before Christmas as I write this. It is with some regret, and also some relief, that I am letting you know that I am going to retire from writing my weekly column. No, it’s not something you did. It’s just that I don’t do as much as I used to and I don’t want to have to make anything up or exaggerate anything. That is how I roll. Well, maybe a little. I started writing a weekly column for the McKenzie County Fa...
Can we all agree that winter is here? We probably could have reached that consensus of opinion after the snowstorms of late September and early October, but at times since the weather has seesawed like polling data before an election. Now, however, as Christmas closes in, we realize winter is here. The calendar tells us so, as does the dwindling amount of daylight. So do relatives that keep telling me how nice the weather is now in Arizona. I don't hear so much from them in...
Hello, Maybe you noticed that I didn’t get a column in last week. I apologize. It’s not my fault. Well, in a way it is. You see, I was in Las Vegas. Sin City. The city that never sleeps. Or is that New York? I get mixed up. Two things you will never find in Las Vegas are clocks and business centers in a motel. I’m not real tech savvy. I know you find that hard to believe, but it is true. I can’t sit down with an iPad or my phone, take a fat finger, tap out a column and send a message out to the newspapers. I have to sit dow...
Jimmy Johnstone and Inga Senrud were married during the time when World War I was being fought by both Great Britain and the United States. Since Jimmy was a British citizen, he wanted to wait until after the war was over to become a naturalized citizen, as he wished to remain loyal to his native Scotland. He thought that if he were to file for citizenship papers, it would take too long and he would not have been able to serve either of the two countries that he loved. He remained a subject of King George V of England until...
Viruses can cause a host of different illnesses, from the common cold to influenza, to hand-foot-and-mouth disease, to Ebola. Viruses are fascinating little particles. Scientists have debated whether viruses are living or non-living organisms for decades! Scientists have a list of criteria used to determine if an organism is living or non-living. One of the criteria is that living things have cells. Well, viruses do NOT have cells. They have a protein coat that protects their genetic material. Another criterion is that...
Hello God, it’s me, Mara: You know, Lord, why do we write “Xmas” instead of “Christmas,” the short-hand way? This got us curious; so, we stopped at the library. A book of origins explained some of the things we do at Christmas. One reference stated: “If you wonder why Christmas is sometimes written “Xmas,” it’s because “X” is the Greek equivalent of “Ch”, used to represent the word “Christ.” A dictionary refers one to XP (the same as CHRISTMAS), as the first two letters (chi and rho) of the Greek work “Khristos,” a symb...
The pretty young lady that “Jimmy” Johnstone visited at the Anderson Ranch was Inga Senrud who was born June 4, 1895 at Laton Hegemark, Norway being an only daughter, along with two brothers born to Johan and Olive Audensons Senrud. Remember Jimmy was born in Scotland. It was reported that Mrs. Olive Senrud felt that her family would have a much better life if they were to move to the U.S.A. Her sister and brother-in-law, Mr. and Mrs. Ed Heggen, lived near a place called Ekalaka, Montana, and were urging them to come. So in 1...
Hello, December is a tough month for me. My notes are due at the bank. My calves are just weaning and usually I have to doctor a few that catch a cold after weaning. The snow is starting to accumulate and I have to dig through the drifts to find stuff I left to pick up tomorrow. I start to count my hay bales and see how many I can feed a day and still make it to May. And, this is the kicker; Shirley’s birthday is next week. You know by now that I am not much of a shopper. If they had a liquor store at Runnings or Tractor S...
