Honoring the Quiet

I recently spent a week house sitting and caring for my son’s dogs while he and his bride were on their honeymoon.

They live on a ranch in southeastern Oklahoma. Luke (my son) manages the property there and the livestock. It’s a beautiful, peaceful area surrounded by thick trees and steep hills with a vast set of trails Luke has restored or created inside the brush and timber.

There are deer, and turkeys, wild hogs, and fish in several ponds.

Tawna (my new daughter-in-law) owns a barbershop a few miles away with customers from all around. Luke and Tawna are amazing.

I spent over a week there looking over things, mostly just playing with the dogs and watching the rain. A ranch hand did all the chores that needed doing.

I watched the news and a movie or two, read some, did a little writing, ate like a king, and enjoyed the quiet, the fresh air, the sounds of rustling leaves in the breeze, and the soft pelting of rain on the roof.

The dogs—Gus, Maggie, and Trapper—were my only companions, other than sharing a few beers with the ranch hand one afternoon. The dogs are like children, playful and jealous and fun. They slept near me and protected me.

The Oklahoma humorist, Will Rogers, once said, “If there are no dogs in heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went.”

I do, too.

I drove one afternoon into town some 30 miles away and went to Walmart. The people I saw are a hardy crowd. They are not at all pretentious or fake or the least bit interested in putting on any kind of airs. Rural people are some of the most authentic people I know. And in many ways, they inspire me. They are good neighbors. They are people of faith. They are loyal to their beliefs. They work hard jobs. They care for their families. They get things done.

Life in the city often blinds me to what is truly real, what matters, what gives our existence some sense of meaning and purpose. America is made up of people with big hearts. They are everywhere: in the country, in the suburbs, in raw urban enclaves, in fancy buildings, in the country club crowd, in farmers and ranchers, in store clerks and physicians, in teachers and police officers.

City life has its delights, its conveniences, its art and culture, theater and concerts, and every kind of eating establishment imaginable. But there is a hard shell to much of it. There is often anonymity, aloneness, indifference, and distance between people.

Country life has its problems, too. There are no perfect places on earth. There are some real paradises, some stunning awestriking places. But as for the people, we’re all a bit screwed up in our own way, we’re all thoroughly human, and we are what makes a place whatever the setting, pleasant and meaningful, or adversarial and cheerless.

And yet, on the way to the ranch, I found myself in my usual hectic pace, cursing slow drivers and rushing without any legitimate reason to do so. What was the hurry? I have no idea. I’m afraid it’s a habit of city life.

Once on the ranch, in the company of the dogs, surrounded by grazing cattle and loping trees, I found the old calm, the sweet feeling of accord, of no longer hastening to arrive, but just being still and honoring the quiet without and within.

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The Unclad Soul

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