I AM sitting in the apple tree looking at Joyaska Ranch. Dad says it’s over a hundred acres, mostly fields of alfalfa, clover and timothy grass to feed our cattle and horses. The house is built of cedar planks with cedar shakes on the roof which are almost black because they are so old. The house has bay windows, a porch in front, and a verandah at back. Mum’s lilac bushes and two tall trees stand in front of the porch. Behind the house there is a woodshed, meathouse, the vegetable garden, the well and the pond. Farther off is the chicken house and the outhouse, and the trail that leads to the river. Right below me is my dad’s truck, a 1948 Fargo pick-up, navy blue.
Sometimes when my dad goes to town he lets us kids ride in the back of the truck so we can open the gate for him. Then we walk home. When I open the gate I like standing on the lowest pole and riding it as it swings open by itself.
Missy likes to picnic there outside the gate under the trembling aspen where an old log has fallen across the road. Every day she takes her little lunch up the road to her spot.
Past the three tall cottonwoods to the left the road goes straight through pine trees where an old grey log fence zigzags along the road. That’s where Jimmy planted some strawberries. It’s a nice place to sit in the cool grass and tell stories on a hot day.
After you pass Jimmy’s secret strawberry place, the creek crosses the road. If you follow the creek into the trees you come to the place where dad puts the stillborn calves. Coyotes come there at night to eat the carcasses. When they howl it sounds spooky like ghosts. Our dog Spud barks at them.
At the dead calf tree you can see round circles in the ground, where Mum says the old Indians used to build their winter houses partly underground. They dug big round holes in the ground, then built log roofs over them. They stayed there in the winter when there was snow on the ground. The Indian word for it is shee-eesht-kin, meaning underground house.