All of my life I have considered myself to be a country girl. But,until moving to the ranch Northeast of Boise City, OK, I didn't know what the country life really was. I was in for a few lessons from that day forward and took all my knocks on the chin in stride....with a few grunts and groans to boot! Adventure is a matter of perspective. My outlook on adventure was to be "ready for whatever the moment called for" and that moment was present around any given corner while living at the ranch. The surroundings were so beautiful in every direction. From the closest small town, it took nearly an hour to get to the old rock home that we lived in which sat right next to the Cimarron River. The long stretch of dirt road that led to the house was super bumpy and secluded from anything or anyone. I loved it!! I hadn't ever thought about living anywhere so beautiful and I felt like I was living in a dream. I began to learn that being in the ranching business would mean that I would spend much time alone with myself and I started to think alot about how my life was about to take on a whole new direction. I spent days roaming around exploring through the river bed while the trickling stream glistened over the polished rocks, through the hills in search of skulls or any other bones or treasures, and scoping out the endless pastures filled with cactus, wildflowers, wild creatures, and cow patties. I was just getting used to this quiet way of life when I first realized.........Don't! For every quiet moment I found in the midst of this beauty there was never a lack of commotion to rev things up. For instance.......there had been some heavy rains earlier in the week somewhere up North and things happen when you live next to a river and rainwater needs a place to go. Earlier in the Spring, while moving our things up to the Ranch we had loaded up our old, red, fiberglass canoe thinking it might be fun to have it there in case the Cimarron River ever "came down" and it indeed did come down......AND BIG!! It was about midnight in the middle of the summer of 1984 and we woke up to a loud roaring noise. Jim jumped out of bed and going out to check on what in the world was happening, came running back into the house to tell me that it was the river making all of that racket. He was so excited about it and said we should go get the boat ready so that we could ride down the river while it was running. It took me by surprise that we were talking about starting this trek right now, in the middle of the night, although the moonlight was bright and full. But indeed, that is what we were about to do. We began running around gathering a few things that we might need, which amounted to throwing on the clothes lying closest to us and grabbing the canoe and the oars. Last but not least.....call Fred Wells to tell him to pick us up the next morning about 10 miles down the river at Kohler Dam. Now we were ready for this adventure!! The Cimarron River was surging along with such force that it was startling at first to think about how to get started, but with a little grace and teamwork we were soon floating down the middle of the river in style. What could be more thrilling than this?? We were moving swiftly, but it didn't take away from the mystery of the woods that we were threading through with all of the sounds of the darkness around us. This was the life!! Jim & I were both learning how to navigate a canoe and eager to become good at it. We were both very patient while learning how to move the oars in order control our direction and the different responsibilities for each position. He in the back.....me in the front (which became our norm). We were dodging banks that jutted out, huge rocks that would have splintered the canoe if we rammed them, tree trunks and other debris that floated by, while pushing through big clouds of foam which had formed because of the turbulance created by the raging currents. Our eyes had adjusted to watching the reflection of the water to determine when something was coming up that we needed to circumvent. All of this was exhilerating and we continued on for a couple of hours at this rate. It had been just long enough to get us quite a distance from the house, and we started to realize that we were avoiding more and more obstacles. Then it happened! We felt the canoe lose it's feel of smooth sailing through the water and then heard the sand dragging along the bottom of the boat. We had no idea what was happening for a moment and kept pushing our way through, thinking that we had just hit a sand bar created by the currents underneath. But it soon became apparent, much to our chagrin, that the river had raced itself right out from under us! When we stuck our oars in the water to check the depth......what we saw was NOT GOOD. We were stuck!! By now it's about 3:00am and the river had just played a very funny trick on us. Here we were......setting at a distance right in the middle from where our house was located and our ride would be awaiting us.....both about 3 hours away. Already soaked from head to toe, we pulled the canoe up on the bank so that we could come back later and retrieve it and then decided to begin walking back to the house. It was dark inside the trees along the river and the water passing through had disrupted any paths that might have been cut by livestock so it wasn't going to be an easy hike, not to mention that there are spooky things out there in the middle of the night. I had the solution. Grab the oars and have them ready for whatever might come our way. I got the "stinkeye" from Jim on this move because he thought that was the silliest thing he had ever seen and he promptly told me "Don't expect me to carry that thing for you". No problem.......I had NO intention of giving it to him. If something was gonna get me.....then I was ready to whack it :) Off we tromped!! Through the mud, trying to avoid the broken tree branches dangling down from poking my eyes out, straddling across rotting tree trunks, and as the hike went on for a couple of hours....trying to keep my eyes open from the lack of sleep. That oar didn't come in handy for defending my life from any wild creatures that night, but it did give me a crutch to make my way through all of that mess and I was glad to have it. By the time the sun started peeping out from the horizon, we looked like a couple of ragamuffins dragging ourselves in for a bath and a bed. And that's just what we did. We were both too exhausted to realize how much fun we had just had and it would take a while for it to sink in that this night would be a lifetime memory. This adventure was one of many had while living at the ranch, and it is one of my favorites. And as for Fred, he had waited at Kohler Dam for us for a bit, until he realized that you can't float down a dry river. He might have told everyone in Boise City about our adventure because he got quite a kick out of it. I learned something about life that night.......when you least expect it......you can look down and it's passed you by.
