Romanticizing Farm + Ranch Life

let's ride into the sunset together on horseback, shall we? || December newsletter

Dec 29, 2023

A few weeks ago, Rich and I were at a Christmas dinner, hosted by a company he sits on an advisory board for. We were gathered around a table with three other couples, and after one glass of wine, my ability to tell stories in public arrived.

We were talking about farming, as we do, and I told the other couples how I felt Rich pulled a “bait and switch” on me when we were dating and newly engaged 11 years ago. I dramatically told the group about the weekends I came to visit him, and we spent in the calving barn, both of us layered attractively in Carhartt coats and overalls, our heads donned with stocking caps, clunking around in Muck boots. In the early mornings, we could see our breath as the sun rose over the barn while we watched new lives brought into this world—mostly on their own, but sometimes with his help. I let the hours-old calves greedily suck my fingers, and we spent hours together in the barn, talking about cows, yes, but also our future.

What a romantic life I was about to lead.

Years later, each morning, I hear my brother-in-law and sister-in-law talking to each other on the two-way radio, working together, feeding the cattle, and preparing for calving. In the summer, they ride horseback together, moving the herds from pasture to pasture across the prairie under the big Montana sky. I picture their life as romantic and a fairytale, living the authentic ranching life.

Today, Rich and I rarely go to the barn together anymore, and when we do, I’m trying to keep one or more children from getting hurt and out of the way while everyone else is doing actual work—while I stand around like a bystander in my own life. The only thing that’s stayed the same is that I’m dressed like a marshmallow in my Carhartts and Muck boots.

And yes, of course, I’m romanticizing their life. But I told the group that night how, as our operation has grown over the years, Rich’s roles have shifted too. He’s no longer involved in the day-to-day of the cattle side of the operation like he was when we were dating. He still helps during calving, but for the most part, he’s farming or doing office work the rest of the year.1 And I know I could be out driving a tractor (and maybe someday I will be), but it doesn’t feel like the same romantic life ranching side by side that I imagined a decade ago.

Of course, I know it’s not all sunshine and roses, riding off into the sunset on horseback. (But it does sound like fun; if I weren’t scared the horse would run off with me and dump me in a ditch.) I romanticize a ranching life—and I live on a ranch. So, of course, I don’t fault other people for romanticizing it too.

This past week, I listened to a podcast interview with Barbara Kingsolver about her latest book, Demon Copperhead—a book I read and loved this past fall. Kingsolver is a prolific writer, but Demon Copperhead is the first book of hers I’ve read, and I knew nothing about her as a person or author.

I nodded along during the interview as she talked about rural life in Kentucky. Even though I’ve never been to Kentucky, I related to what she was saying about people in rural areas feeling overlooked and unseen by the media—the media that mostly comes from big cities. She said, “It’s profoundly debilitating not to see yourself anywhere.” She added, “Farmers need to see themselves, too. We’re tired of being overlooked.”

Kingsolver went on to talk about farming in Kentucky, “So we don’t have the giant combines. We don’t have the giant wheat fields and tractors that look like they came out of “Star Wars.” If we ever see farming on TV, it’s that. And that’s not real people. To us, that’s not farming.”

Wait, what?

I paused the podcast, rewinding to listen and see if I heard her right. I listened again, my shoulders sagging. I thought of the Christmas card I sent weeks ago; our family of five posed in front of those giant combines, and how, to another rural person, this wasn’t farming? We’re not real people?

News to me.

During the first part of her interview, I was encouraged to hear her talk about agriculture and rural life on this national platform. How rural people feel overlooked or generalized as hillbillies. But then, I felt discouraged and disappointed that she was spreading this misinformation about farming on a national platform.

I share these stories because comparisons and misunderstandings among agriculture are huge, even within agriculture. It’s something I’ve written about before. There seems to be this idea (from what I’ve noticed on social media) that you’re either a small farm with ten chickens and one cow—or you’re a factory farm. There’s no in-between. Influencers like Ballerina Farm (with MILLIONS of followers) glamorize small farms and homesteads. Which there is nothing wrong with. But in the same breath, bigger farms are automatically qualified as factory farms—that we’re not real people or real farmers like them.

I know Rich didn’t intentionally pull a “bait and switch” on me 11 years ago. We weren’t married back then—our romance was new and exciting, and we didn’t have three kids underfoot.

Things look different today for us. Both of our roles have shifted and changed. Farming looks different in other parts of the country (and the world!), and that’s okay, too. I believe we all need each other.

So I’ll keep sharing our farm story, not because how we farm and ranch is the only way to farm and ranch—but because it’s the only story I can tell.

(And if you read this, Barbara, hello from a “real” family farm that drives tractors and combines from Star Wars.)

Farm Happenings

This feels like a rinse and repeat from last month: the crew has been hauling grain, prepping for calving, shop work, and office work. My sister-in-law and I hosted an early Christmas dinner for our employees and all of the family. It’s always fun to get together outside of work.

Up next: calving season! Next week, the cows will be moved to the pasture behind our house, so you can find me with binoculars, looking for any signs of the first calf on the ground. The cows will start calving around the 15th of January, and then they will be moved closer to the barn because we try and calve all the cows inside our barn.

Thank you for reading Let Me Overthink This. If my stories resonate with you, I would be honored if you shared this post.

Lately, I’m . . .

Reading: lots of books! Last week, I hit my reading goal of 51 books. Some of my favorites this month were Breaking Clean, a beautifully written memoir about ranch life in Montana (I resonated with many aspects of being a woman on a ranch, but I’m also grateful that our farm/ranch does not operate as theirs did), The Mystery Guest (Molly the Maid, #2), and Small Things Like These (a short story that left me thinking long after I closed the book).

Watching: all the holiday movies! Every December, I rewatch Love Actually and The Holiday. So far, I’ve only finished Love Actually. I started The Holiday the day after Christmas, but the kids interrupted me; I hope to finish it this weekend. I also loved The Family Switch on Netflix.

Cooking: a double batch of these scalloped potatoes from the first Magnolia cookbook for our farm Christmas party.

Baking: these double chocolate cookies for Rhett’s Christmas party at school and as a gift for the bus driver.

Singing: this song by Tyler Childers.

Listening: to these two episodes about a woman switched at birth in my home state, and not finding out until she was 43 years old that her “parents” weren’t actually her parents. Such a wild and sad story. I also loved this episode from The Mom Hour, where Sarah and Meagan attempt to answer the question, “Do Today’s New Moms Have it Easier? Or Harder?”

Buying: this Ember mug2 for Rich for Christmas, but I think I’ll be borrowing it occasionally.

We traveled for Christmas, so my contribution to dinner on Christmas Eve was butter sculpted like a tree. And no, I didn’t make it.

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! Any exciting New Year’s plans? I’m planning on being in bed with a book before midnight.

Because January is a time of goal-setting, I’m sure I’ll set a goal to write more3 and post more on Substack in 2024. We’ll see how that goes. But if you don’t see me before the end of January, I’ll be back with photos of the new calves in next month’s newsletter.

Tell me, in what ways do you romanticize your life? Or someone else’s life?

Planting Season

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