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West Texas Cowgirl  Recently my wife and I returned from a few days in Southwest Texas. This is our most favorite 'retreat'. Sparsely populated, but you will find a lot of very nice folks out there. This is also the land of the very old, large ranches - many that are still owned and operated by descendants of the original ranchers. If you met one of these ranchers on the street, you probably would never know that he/she ranches a few hundred thousand acres. And, by all means, I point out that several of these are owned/operated by women. I know of one that is owned/operated by three women who share the same last name. I'm not sure how that breaks down.
Having been born/raised in the country, it always feels like home whenever I do get back there. On the other hand, my wife was born/raised in Chicago and has never lived anywhere but a city. Try as I did, I could never get her to move to even a small town. But, she admittedly enjoys living here in Texas, and enjoys going with me on my excursions. However, when she is along we have always had to stay at a resort or hotel. This year, and for a change, I convinced her to stay out on a ranch that I knew had a guest cabin.
So, yes, once you leave the road there are several cattle gates to open/close before getting the ranch HQ and guest cabin. And, yes, there were cattle in the pastures.
As a reference I mention that we were in my red (maroon) pick-up truck. After stopping and unlocking the first gate, and driving through, and subsequently stopping to go back and close/lock the gate, my wife decided that she could do that so I wouldn't have to get out of the truck on both sides of each gate. She got the hang of it pretty good. But, whenever we stopped by one of the gates, she noticed that the "cows" we're starting to move over towards us, and thought that 'greeting' was kinda nice. That was I informed her that, first of all, those weren't cows. They weren't even steers! They were a herd of 'young boys' that had been separated from the cows. Then she became worried because we were in a "red" truck. "They don't like red, do they?". So, then I told her that they cared less what color the truck was, and were coming over because they thought we were bringing a load of hay for them to feed on!
After than, she didn't waste any time opening/closing the gates. Then I told her that using the term a bit loosely, she would now qualify as a "cowgirl". Or maybe a "bull" girl. Anyway, I promised to buy her a hat next chance!
I really have to credit her though. She (we) did so thoroughly enjoy those few days on that ranch. We were hardly in to it before she was already making plans, not for next Christmas, but for this coming spring. The only comment to her that I made was "see what I've been talking about all these years?"
 From our front door we could see McDonald Observatory on top of the mtn.
Cheers, Y'all
L e e
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