Horses on Wheels

As I was driving to work recently, my progress up a long hill was slowed by a pickup truck pulling two horses in a trailer.  I was struck by the irony of seeing horses transported by wheels powered by engines whose strength is measured in "horsepower"  when it used to be that horses once hauled our wagons and goods instead and the wheels only turned because the horses pulled them.   These days, we have to haul our horses in trailers just to get to some safe open space where we can enjoy riding them or letting them run free.

I guess that's one reason I love driving trips that take me to rural areas and wide open spaces and fields where horses run free.   I got caught in an old-fashioned cattle drive last summer and here is what I saw:

Driving in the city and being slowed by a big truck, construction, roadblocks brings my blood pressure up.  But being stuck behind a cow and her calf (see the little critter underneath her) makes me realize there are still places left in our country where time moves with the rhythms of nature and peace abides.  

"Baby Mine"

I recently bought a CD by Alison Krauss called "A Hundred Miles or More."  I don't know how one would categorize her music (country, folk, light rock, etc) but I was really taken with the beauty of her songs.  One in particular brought tears to my eyes.

She sings "Baby Mine" beautifully.  Many of us will remember that song-it was part of the soundtrack from "Dumbo", a Disney movie first released in 1941 and beloved by children and their parents ever since.  

In the scene where the song appears, Dumbo, the baby elephant with the big ears, has been separated from his mother, who is confined to a cage because she flew into a rage when boys played with her baby's large ears and made fun of him.  Dumbo comes to see his mother and although they are separated by  iron bars, she sings him this beautiful lullaby.   A few if the lines go like this:

"Don't you mind what they say,

From  your head to your toes,

You're not much, heaven knows,

You are so precious to me,

Baby of mine."

I think this song evokes strong feelings for me, and probably for many mothers, because we love our children fiercely and want to protect them, as this elephant mother did, but our efforts don't always pay off and we can't always protect our children.

Children grow from beautiful babies to funny, frustrating toddlers to  cute grade schoolers and then they enter the awkward, gangly teen years.  Before we know it, they are adults, not always as cute and appealing as we would like them to be.  But for most mothers, our babies still remain precious. 

I have helped seniors clean houses and purge files and yellowed papers.  Among the papers, there is often a preschoolers drawings, a scrawled message on a Mother's Day card that says "Mommy, I love you", a wrinkled report card, school pictures of toothless, grinning kids.   

Our adult children question why we save those things:  it's because we cherish and love the memories of that little, helpless baby, that funny awkward kid, the days of high school proms and solemn college graduations. .."you are so precious to me, baby of mine."

Dust Devils on The Road

I was driving along a rural desert road on my way to work last week when the car was suddenly engulfed in a maelstrom of swirling dust, cactus debris and weeds.  "Yikes, I've been hit by a dust devil," I thought as I clung to the steering wheel for about 15 seconds without seeing where I was going.  And then, just like that, the mini-tornado continued on its vortex course across the road and beyond and driving conditions instantly reverted back to normal.

The Arizona Vacation Planner calls dust devils "ephemeral whirlwinds (that) can stir up trouble."  They are a weather phenomenon that occurs under sunny conditions during fair weather.  They rarely do damage and usually dissipate in less than a minute.  

I got to thinking about people who are like dust devils-they whirl in, drop a few choice words on you and whirl back out again, except your "driving conditions' don't revert back to normal instantly.  Instead, you are left puzzling over what just happened and feeling quite upset about whatever course of action you were on before the appearance of the "dust devil."  You now have lingering doubts about whether or not you are on the right road.

This happens with families a lot.   We might be making plans for the future of an older adult or plans for a family reunion and suddenly a "dust devil" who has not been previously involved with decision making, swoops in, makes some suggestion or comment

and leaves again, causing everybody to question previous decisions. 

Sometimes, dust devils play a necessary role.  They cause you to question or refocus and may have a valid point.   At other times, however, they can create brief, but unnecessary chaos.  

We all have dust devils around.  They may not be on a desert road, but they are there, waiting for just the right conditions to make an appearance.  The Navajos believe they are the ghosts or spirits of dead Navajos.  Depending upon which direction they spin, they can be good spirits or bad spirits.  I suppose it is up to us to determine in which direction our dust devils are spinning!