1000 Days

Around the time I turned 50, I remarked to my brother-in-law (who is slightly older than me) that I thought I’d know more by the time I was that old. He laughed and said, “I just didn’t realize how much I’d forget!” Now that I’m well into my extremely late 50’s (I’ll be 59 in April), I occasionally have the feeling that I’ve figured some things out. But mostly I just keep blundering through - figuring out life as I go. Burley Coulter, my favorite character from Wendell Berry’s novels, puts it this way: “I never learned anything until I had to.”

Just over 1,000 days ago, Sami began struggling with speech. She apparently had several seizures, as well. Nearly 900 days ago, she passed away. One of the things I’ve had to learn in the last 1,000+ days (and that I find I must continue to learn) is how to carry on with day-to-day life in spite of my grief over losing my partner of 33 years. And just as I woke up one day and realized I was well past middle age, I woke up this weekend and realized that nearly three years have passed since Sami’s glioblastoma symptoms first manifested.

My grief began on that evening in the emergency room in late January 2023 when the doctor came in and told us that the CT scan he’d ordered showed a small mass on the front of Sami’s brain. The next day, after her first craniotomy, we (or at least I) had a glimmer of hope - we’d acted quickly, and Sami’s surgeon was confident that he’d removed the tumor. When she ended up back in the hospital two weeks later, and we learned from another neurosurgeon that the tumor had - what, regrown, not been entirely removed, we’ll never know - our grief and our anxiety returned.

Over the last three years, I’ve realized that the “stages” of grief inaccurately portray grieving as a linear process. According to this “model” one must experience denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance, before moving “on.” But I’ve also learned that Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, who famously described these elements of grieving, was not convinced that they were stages. My experience suggests that grief is a cycle - I’ve moved in and out of denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance since that day in late January 2023. I suspect I will for the rest of my life. And while I hope to move forward, I doubt I’ll ever move on from grieving for Sami and for what our old age might have been together.

I’ve also realized over the last year or so that Sami was also grieving throughout her brief illness. At one point, she told me she thought she’d outlive me (she said it laughingly, but she was serious). In some ways, I think, the cancer in her brain progressed so quickly that she didn’t have time to go through all of the “cycles” of grief. She certainly seemed to experience denial, anger, bargaining, and depression. Who could possibly experience acceptance of something like that?

Last weekend, I finished The Place of Tides, the latest book by James Rebanks (who, coincidentally is a sheep farmer. Like Wendell Berry. Like me). He writes, “There is no end to learning…. I had imagined that there was a moment when you felt wise, that you had learnt it all…. We are all just children. We never know enough, not even the half of it.” I’ve long felt this way about learning and experience; I now wonder if grief is the same. That once we’ve grieved for the loss of someone, we’ll always feel that grief. It will change as our lives change, as we have new experiences. But we’ll never know enough not to grieve. At least that's how it feels to me.

Over these last three years, the pain of losing Sami has (mostly) become easier to bear. In that autumn after Sami passed, I heard someone describe the pain of grieving as a box with a large ball in it. The box also has a button that causes pain. Early in the grieving process, the ball is quite big, and it frequently hits the pain button. As time goes on, the ball of your loss remains just as big, but the box of your life grows - and so the ball hits the pain button less frequently. That seems to be true for me.

Last weekend, I was sad and lonely (as I often am after having a wonderful time with our daughters). For the first time since Sami died, I didn’t feel withdrawn on Christmas, which felt good. On the other hand, we went through some of Sami’s belongings - sorting what we wanted to keep, what we wanted to donate, and what we needed to dispose of. That affected me more than I expected. Going through her things brought back the sense that we were robbed of the opportunity to grow old(er) together - and so I guess I was angry, as well as sad and lonely. Sometimes the cycles of grief seem to overlap.

Early on in my grieving, I felt as though most of the people around me knew what our family had just experienced. Like my grief (and the reason behind it) was obvious. As time flows on, I meet new people who have no idea of my backstory. Sometimes I wish there was a “grief shirt” I could wear so I wouldn’t feel compelled to awkwardly tell a new acquaintance, “hey, my wife died recently.” Perhaps the Jewish tradition of rending one’s clothes when a loved one dies acknowledges our need for others to see our grief.

Today, 1,000+ days into this season of my life, I find that I often feel an odd combination of wanting people to know what happened but struggling to bring it up in conversation. Obviously, I write about it frequently (too frequently, perhaps, but I find sharing my written thoughts therapeutic). But last summer I decided not to attend my 40th high school reunion, simply because I didn’t want to tell the same story about why I was there alone over and over again.

I’ve come to think that when your partner dies, something dies in you, as well - and your grief feels doubled. I guess this is true when anyone close to you dies, but it seems especially true when it’s a life partner. And grieving, I think, is partly a process of rebirth. Of discovering who you are going forward, while honoring who you were before. 

Starting Over

I’m enough of a weather/nature nerd that I’ve kept a weather diary since 2001. The green hard-bound journal, with a page for each day of the year, sits on my nightstand, along with a min/max thermometer. Every evening, I jot down the high and low temperatures for the day, record any precipitation we received in the last 24 hours, and note sky conditions and any remarkable happenings in the natural world (when the first lilac blooms, for example, or when the tree frogs start to sing). I filled up my first journal in 2022, starting a new one three years ago. And on January 1 of each year, I flip all the way back to the front of the journal. I start over.

As I flipped back to the first page in my journal last week, I realized that the pages later in January would begin to document our family’s journey three years ago. In some ways, the anxiety we felt when Sami first experienced the symptoms of glioblastoma is still palpably with me. In other ways, I can’t believe how much has changed in my life since those days in early 2023.

While rangelands have been a common thread in my professional life, changing jobs has been the norm. I’ve worked on rangeland and livestock policy issues (with the California Cattlemen’s Association), rangeland conservation (starting the California Rangeland Trust and working with the Nevada County Land Trust), rangeland economics (as a coordinator for the High Sierra Resource Conservation and Development Council), and finally, rangeland science and management (in various positions with UC Cooperative Extension and UC Davis). I’ve even managed my own livestock on rangeland (first with a handful of cows, later with my own commercial sheep operation). Despite this continuous focus on rangelands, though, I seem to reinvent myself every 5-7 years.

My love of working outside and working with my hands has also evolved throughout my adult life. Last week, while the girls and I were going through boxes of things I’d moved from Auburn, I found the plaque I received in high school for a Bank of America award in applied arts. As I recall, my shop teachers nominated me for the award, which involved making a presentation about why applied arts (like woodworking or welding, for example) were every bit as much an artistic expression as fine arts. Early in our marriage, I was a woodworker, building furniture for our home and as gifts. Eventually, raising livestock (as a hobby at first, later as a business) became my opportunity to work with my hands and be outside. Now, operating my portable sawmill and building things from the lumber give me a chance to work outdoors and an outlet for my physical creativity.

Turning the pages of my weather diary back to January 1 last week made me realize that grieving the loss of a partner is, in a way, like starting over. Despite all of the new beginnings in my professional life, my personal life was marked by the 33 years I was married to Sami, and the 30 years we lived in Placer County. While I went from being the assistant vice president of the California Cattlemen’s Association to becoming the UC Cooperative Extension livestock and natural resources advisor for Placer, Nevada, Sutter, and Yuba Counties over the course of those 33 years, I was always Sami’s husband. I spent more than half of my life in that role. That one constant changed on August 13, 2023.

Since I became a widower nearly 30 months ago, lots of other things have changed in my life. I sold our home in Auburn and purchased another in the tiny Calaveras County town of Mountain Ranch. I transferred to a new job (I’m still a UCCE livestock and natural resources advisor, but I serve a different set of counties, including the one where I was raised). I’ve sold virtually all of my sheep. I’ve purchased a portable sawmill and learned to use it. I’ve tried to learn to live alone.

Over the last week, I’ve been reading The Place of Tides by shepherd/writer James Rebanks (a gift from my daughter, Lara). He says, “[I was] nearly fifty - when you wonder whether you have lived as well as you might, when you have to decide whether to stick or twist, carry on and accept your life, or strike out and make a change before it is too late.”

I realized this week that I’d begun thinking about the next phase even before Sami got sick. In early 2023, I’d agreed to buy out my sheep partner, who was moving to Texas. But with the realization that neither of our daughters were likely to move back to California, I’d also started considering a different side gig (something other than sheep) that would allow us to travel to see the girls more frequently. Sami and I had talked about using the proceeds from selling most of the sheep to buy a sawmill. But we hadn’t come to a decision.

All of which brings me back to this day three years ago. Had you told me on January 7, 2023, that three years later I’d be living in a different house, by myself, doing a new job, I’d have said you were crazy. One of the hardest lessons in Sami’s illness and passing has been the realization that I didn’t know what lay ahead of us on that January day three years ago - and that there’s no way for me to know what lies ahead of me tomorrow. But maybe I’m learning that I have a chance to start over every day. 

Flashbacks

When I walked out my front door this morning to do my animal chores, I heard a nuthatch chirping in one of the trees in my front yard. I was immediately transported back to our house in Auburn in February or March of 2023. To a warm late winter or early spring day when I was home with Sami, following her second craniotomy - I was taking a nap on the deck and heard (and then watched) a nuthatch crawling down one of the mulberry trees towards me. Until that moment, I didn’t know what a nuthatch’s song sounded like, or at least that the song I’d heard before came from a nuthatch. I realized this morning that the sound of a nuthatch is firmly imprinted in my brain - and it will be forever associated with the fatigue and anxiety I felt back in those early months of 2023.

Later this morning, while I was on my walk, I reflected on another walk I’d taken during that same time period. I’m pretty sure the girls were not home - and I’m certain that we were all worried about leaving Sami alone. I needed to walk, but I wasn’t comfortable leaving the house - so I walked two miles doing laps between the house and the barn. And listened to a less-than-comforting podcast about glioblastoma.

These flashbacks, for me, are different from my “normal” memories about Sami. Flashbacks seem to have the capacity to transport me back to an instant - to the sights, smells, and sounds of that moment. And to the feelings I experienced.

In the months immediately following Sami’s passing, the only things I could recall were flashbacks to these episodes during her illness. At the time, I wrote that I couldn’t really remember the sound of Sami’s voice - or much of anything from before she started having symptoms. Thankfully, the happy memories of our 34 years together are easier to recall today. 

But the flashbacks still come. Sometimes they are music-related - I’ll hear a song that reminds me of our trip home from New Mexico, when we started to realize something was wrong. Sometimes these flashbacks come when I’m at a doctor’s office (I’ve written previously about my experience with “white coat syndrome”). Sometimes they come when I visit our old hometown (as I did yesterday).

While I’m grateful that the happy memories come easier to me today, I still find that these flashbacks can knock me on my heels (or perhaps on another part of my anatomy, somewhat higher than my heels, but also on the back side of my body). And in these times, I find that I need to withdraw. To look inward. To give myself a break and sit with the physical and emotional reminders of what it meant to be Sami’s caregiver. I did that today.

I guess this is part of what I object to when I hear that grief is a feeling that we “get over.” I have an essay hung on my refrigerator by Dr. Dennis Klass, given to me by a hospice counselor. It says,

“Time can lessen the hurt; the empty place we have can seem smaller as other things and experiences fill our life;....we can learn to remember the good and hold onto that. But we can’t ‘get over it,’ because to get over it would mean we were not changed by the experience.”

In some sense, these flashbacks are very difficult, at least for me. They take me back to what was (at least so far) the hardest time of my life. But they also help me remember that the experience changed me. They force me to stop and think about how.

Recovery? Or Something Else?

I saw a comment about me on a friend’s social media post about our half marathon experience today - something to the effect of, “Dan is slowly recovering in his grief.” The comment nagged at me most of the afternoon, and I struggled to figure out why. Tonight, as I was feeding livestock and stoking my woodstove, I realized that the comment bothered me because it suggested that grief is an disease. Something to be "cured." And at least for me, it’s not. Grief is an emotion (a very powerful one, to be sure) that every human being feels at some point. Grief is not a condition to be healed; rather, I am finding that it is an emotion to be understood (to the extent possible), embraced, and carried forward into the rest of my life.

Looking back, I know that my grief for Sami began with her diagnosis of glioblastoma. It ran parallel with my grief for the loss of the life I’d hoped we’d share into old age. But processing that grief was inhibited by my care-giving responsibilities. In retrospect, during the spring and summer of 2023, I was in constant fight-or-flight mode (mostly fight, at least when it came to advocating for Sami’s care in an incredibly frustrating health care system). I suspect that I really didn’t start processing my grief until the momentum of caregiving and dealing with death’s practical aftermath subsided. But if my grief had an identifiable starting point, I don’t think it will have an ending point - it will always be with me. I frequently think back to what my friend Jackie Davis told me in October 2023 - that he still grieved for the wife he lost in 1979.

Which, for me, brings some degree of understanding. Grief, I think, can’t exist without love - for a person, a life, or anything else. Looking back on the 34-plus years Sami and I were together, I know there were rough patches. There were times - stretches of time, even - where we were each focused on our own little worlds. There were occasions when we disagreed on things large and small. There were instances when we were less than perfect partners. And yet now that she’s gone, I am realizing the depth of our relationship. This might seem like a throw-away statement, but at some point during the spring of 2023, Sami said, “I didn’t think I’d be the one to die first!” Looking back now, I know that she would have done for me what I did for her, were our roles reversed - which I find comforting. The intensity of my grief, I think, is directly proportional to the depth of the love we shared, despite our faults.

As I’ve written before, my relationship with grief continues to evolve. Even in my new place - a house in which Sami never lived - I find little reminders. A note in Sami’s handwriting, or a recipe she copied. A piece of jewelry she used to wear. Even now, I find a strand of Sami’s hair attached to an article of clothing or a piece of linen (we had a running joke that she lost more hair than I did - it just didn’t show on her!). Whenever I see a red tailed hawk, I say, “Hi, Sami,” and proceed to tell her something about my day. But increasingly, these reminders bring something other than profound sadness. Often, now, they bring smiles - wistful smiles, but smiles nonetheless. Most of the time now, two years in, my grief has evolved into opportunities to remember Sami.

And so we come to the word, “recovery.” I guess what bothered me about that term today was the implication that grief is an affliction. An illness to be cured. For me, at least, my grief is becoming a reminder of the love and relationship that Sami and I shared. Grief is something I expect to carry forward - and yes, I expect that sometimes this grief will bring tears. But losing my grief - recovering from my grief and moving “on” feels wrong. Losing my grief feels like forgetting Sami.

Last Sunday, as I was completing the Monterey Bay Half Marathon, I was surprised at my lack of sadness. For a brief moment, as I passed the spot near the finish line where I’d cheered for Sami in 2022, I choked up. But I touched the small horsehair tassel Sami had made, which was pinned to my race bib. I touched the image of a red tailed hawk on my t-shirt. And I felt better (better is relative - my hips, knees, and ankles hurt like hell!). I felt like completing the race was helping me move forward with my grief - and my love - for Sami.

A Few Observations from a Half Marathon

Last Sunday, I ran (walked and jogged, actually) my first half marathon in Monterey. My first formal athletic “competition” since high school, and my first distance race since sixth grade. My daughters Lara and Emma, my sister Meri and one of her daughters Sara, and my good friend Roger joined me. And I had 2 hours and 57 minutes to think about what doing the same half marathon that Sami completed before her cancer diagnosis in 2022 meant to me. At least when we weren’t talking or I wasn’t complaining about how much my legs hurt over the last four miles, I had time to think! And I’ve been thinking about it ever since we crossed the finish line. Not sure any of this will be of interest to anyone but me, but here’s what completing a 13.1 mile “race” means to me (at least from the vantage point of two days after).

First, I realized that I am more dedicated to my fitness when I have a goal. We registered for the race in May, and I started training (mostly by walking 5-6 days a week) just before Memorial Day. I knew that I needed to average 16-minute-miles to finish in 3 hours and 30 minutes (the course limit); I also knew that when I was in decent shape, I would be able to walk a bit faster than that (despite my very short legs!). I also realized that my personality is such that keeping track of my progress (yes, I actually made a spreadsheet) was critical to maintaining my dedication. From the day I started formally training on May 26 through the end of race day on November 9, I walked 808 miles (both in training and in day-to-day life).

Second, I learned what probably every other runner already knows - that training on hills at some elevation (my house is at 2,600 feet above sea level) makes jogging (I can’t say that I actually ever ran on Sunday) at sea level on a reasonable level course much easier cardiovascularly. Even though we jogged roughly half the race, I never really felt winded.

But walking the hills around my house (even walking distances up to 9 or 10 miles) didn’t prepare my leg muscles and joints for 13.1 miles of walking/slogging (what my sister calls the slow jog we adopted as our “faster” pace). By the time we’d covered 9 miles, my hips were complaining. At mile 10, my quads, knees, and ankles joined them. The last mile was the most difficult - Roger videotaped me crossing the finish line from behind, and I was waddling like a duck!

But I finished. We all did.

Sunday evening, after we’d taken a dip in the cold Pacific (which helped relieve my soreness), I felt an odd sense of pride in finishing and sadness that the thing I’d worked all summer to complete was over. Strangely, I experienced a similar feeling after Sami’s passing - profound sadness, mostly, but a sense of accomplishment that we had been able to care for her until the end, and a sense of relief that her suffering was over. I trained for 167 days. 197 days passed between Sami’s first surgery and her death. The first trial was far more difficult and far less satisfying to complete, but the mix of emotions was similar (if less intense).

And finishing (like caring for Sami) was a group effort. Emma and Lara finished ahead of me; Meri and Roger finished with me. Sara finished the course, too - even though the race had ended. My brother-in-law Adrian walked the last 5 miles or so with her. And Sami’s sister Suzi, as well as my other niece and her family (Hanna and Wyatt, and Ada, Arlo and Boone), cheered us on.

During the race, I was struck how the slower group that we were with became a community during the 13.1 miles. We’d pass people slogging; they’d pass us again when we walked. We’d cheer each other on. We’d clap for the friends and families holding signs of encouragement or playing music to keep our spirits up. Roger and Meri encouraged and supported me when I began to fade in the last third of the race. Several miles into the race, we caught up to the two women who were pacing the runners at 3 hours (a 13:45-minute-mile) - they wore mitres, which we all laughed about! We’d be within 100 yards of them for the rest of the race. We joked and talked with them every time we caught them - and every time they caught us. And with their help, we crossed the finish line in 2 hours 57 minutes and 17 seconds - considerably faster than I’d expected.

This support system made me wonder about Sami’s experience during the half marathons she ran (three of them, including Monterey Bay twice). She was in far better shape than I am now, and she was also more competitive by nature. I’m sure she visited with the runners around her, but she didn’t have friends and family by her side for the entire race. I’m not sure I’d be mentally tough enough to do what she did.

This morning, even though my thighs are still a bit sore, I’m excited to keep training. I proved to myself that I slog for greater distances than I thought possible. I learned that having a goal is important to keeping myself fit. I want to continue to find time in every day to exercise - and I want to add strength and flexibility training to my routine. And I want to run another race - I’m shooting for the Old Mill Run in Columbia on my 59th birthday next spring. And I hope to do the Monterey Bay Half Marathon again.

 

13.1

On November 13, 2022, Sami ran the Monterey Bay Half Marathon - her second time running the race. She’d trained for it through the summer and fall of that year. One of my favorite photos of her is from that day - shivering in the pre-dawn chill near the start-line next to Fishermen’s Wharf. When her group crossed the starting mat, I went for a walk of my own - I walked 6 miles, and had time to grab a cup of coffee, in the time it took Sami to complete 13.1 miles. I watched her finish.

We had a wonderful trip to Monterey for the race. We drove down Saturday morning, picked up her race packet, and enjoyed dinner at one of our favorite seafood restaurants. I’ve visited Monterey and Pacific Grove since I was a kid (they were among my parents’ favorite places); Sami and I picked out her engagement and wedding rings at a jewelry store in Monterey in 1990. On this trip, we sat on the beach near Lover’s Point after dinner and watched the tide come in.

Sami’s race didn’t go as well as she’d hoped. As I recall, she wanted to finish in just over two hours - averaging just under a 10-minute mile. And she was on pace to do it (again, my recollection is a little hazy, but I remember checking the race app and seeing her on pace). But somewhere after mile 9, she slowed down. She didn’t know why her pace slowed, but she was very disappointed. At the finish area, she had a bowl of soup, and I enjoyed her complimentary post-race beer. We went back to our motel, showered, had lunch at another favorite restaurant, and headed home. She slept most of the way back to Auburn.

Seventy-six days later, on January 28, 2023, Sami had the first of what ended up being two craniotomies. She’d probably had at least two seizures earlier in the month; she had other symptoms on our trip to Las Cruces, NM. And just 273 days after she ran a half marathon, she passed away from glioblastoma.

When she got sick, Sami had been training for another half marathon in Sacramento on St. Patrick’s Day. At some point in early January, she’d fallen during a training run. She told us, “I don’t know what happened - I just ended up on the ground.” As all of us began to wonder about early symptoms we’d missed, this episode stood out.

The speed at which all of this happened still boggles my mind. That my incredibly beautiful, active, and intelligent wife could go from distance runner to cancer patient to deceased in exactly nine months seems impossible. And yet it happened. Nine months to the day, which I only realized as I wrote this essay.

In two weeks, I will walk/run the Monterey Bay Half Marathon, along with our daughters, my sister and her oldest daughter, and a friend. This will be the first race I’ve “competed” in since high school track - and the first distance “race” I’ve run since the Jamestown Run 10K when I was 12 or 13. At some point after Sami died, I decided that I wanted (needed!) to put in the training time to allow me to complete 13.1 miles - to participate in a race that was so special for Sami, in a place that was so special to both of us.

During a summer and fall of training, I’ve realized that I want to finish this race in the allowable time of 3 hours and 30 minutes. This means I’ll need to average 16-minute miles. Since I’ve been training at 2600 feet above sea level, on hills, I’m feeling reasonably confident that I’ll be able to do this - this morning, I walked 9 miles averaging just under 15:30 per mile. And I’ve also been able to jog a bit - I’m hopeful that at sea level, I’ll be able to finish 13.1 miles in just over three hours. We’ll see.

The race itself is important to me - I want to prove to myself that I’m almost as strong as Sami was. But the fact that we’re doing this together - as a family - is even more important. I know that crossing the finish line will be emotional for all of us. I know that I will want to get in the ocean after we complete the race - Sami’s ashes were spread in the ocean, and I will need to feel her “embrace.” I know I will cry.

But the process has also been helpful. Doing something as a group has been enjoyable. Having a goal - one that improves my physical fitness - has been wonderful. I’ve been a walker for quite some time; having something to shoot for has made me more dedicated. Maybe I’ll keep entering these kinds of events! And doing something contemplative - for me, walking is a bit of a meditation - has helped me examine my memories of Sami. And not just the hard things that happened between her last race and her last breath. Training for this 13.1 miles has helped me recall other important parts of our 34 years together.

Getting to Know a Place

For some time, I’ve thought a great deal about how long someone needs to really know a place. To know its geography, for sure, but also to know its moods. Its seasons. Its variety. To know how to get from Point A to Point B - and to know what I’m likely to see along the way, according to the time of year. And the type of year.

This thought first came to me as I was studying livestock guardian dog behavior on Forest Service sheep range north of Truckee, CA. My project involved placing trail cameras in a systematic grid over the thousands of acres of the Kyburz and Boca Allotments, and then checking them regularly. As part of the project, I also needed to find where the herder was camped, and where the sheep were grazing. The herder always knew where he was and where he would be next; I needed about three years to learn the country.

But that’s not to say I actually knew the place. Part of being curious, at least for me, is being open to new observations. Being open to the delight of seeing a new plant or animal, or a familiar plant or animal in a new place or new season. My innate curiosity is part of why I love what I do!

One morning this week, I realized that I’ve been in my new place in Mountain Ranch for a year. I’ve experienced all four seasons now. This realization came when I entered this October’s weather observations in my weather journal (a habit I brought with me from Auburn). Last October, at least during the first week, it was hotter than hell here - in the mid 90s. This year, the first two weeks of October have truly felt like fall - on Sunday, it froze hard enough to kill my summer garden. Last year, we didn’t get a germinating rain (a big deal, even to a recovering sheep rancher like me) until mid-November. This year, we’ve had enough rain to start the grass as of this week.

Looking at my weather journal, I realized that I’ve also tried to pay attention to the climate, the flora and fauna, the “mood” of my new place. I remember noticing that all of the ponderosa pines on my new place dropped lots of needles last fall and early winter. I see their needles turning brown now and know what to expect. Last fall, the deer that frequented my property disappeared as hunting season started (including some of the biggest foothill bucks I’ve ever seen). This year, the deer are equally attuned to the calendar. I haven’t seen any on my place for at least 10 days.

Living just upslope from Jesus Maria Creek, I’ve enjoyed the diurnal winds that come with living in the higher foothills - and I’ve been nervous when these winds coincide with low humidity in the summer months. As a lifelong Sierra foothills resident, I’ve always paid attention to sirens and fire planes during fire season; seeing smoke or low-flying planes has taken on new significance now that I’m not surrounded by green lawns and irrigated pastures. My community observed the 10th anniversary of the Butte Fire last month. Many of the residential lots on the other side of the county road from my place remain empty.

My new place is about 1200 feet higher in elevation than our home in Auburn, and about 60 miles south - which means I’m in an entirely different plant community. I recognize most of the grasses, but I’ve enjoyed seeing new wildflowers - lupine and mule’s ears. Coyote mint and naked buckwheat. I miss seeing the brodea and blue dicks that graced our lambing pastures in Placer County, but I enjoy the black oaks, ponderosa pines and incense cedars at my new place. I also think naked buckwheat and blue dicks are among the funniest plant names I know!

This year, I bought feeder lambs to help reduce the fuel load on my six acres. I tried to wait until I thought the grass was ready, and I tried to buy enough lambs to feed off the grass by mid-June. I discovered that I bought them too late (mid April) and I bought too few (I purchased 12 - I should have had twice that many). Next year, I plan to have 25 sheep on the place by late March. If I ever get back into the breeding sheep business here, I think I’ll try to lamb a little later than we lambed in Auburn, simply because the cold weather hangs on slightly longer here - and the spring flush of grass growth is several weeks later.

But even though I’ve learned a great deal about my new little place on the planet, I know that I don’t know everything. I’ve not experienced drought here yet. I’ve not experienced an extremely wet or cold winter, or an extremely hot summer. I’ve had some fire scares, but I’ve not had to worry about evacuating. I’ve grown one garden, and learned a bit about what grows well - for me - here. More experimentation will be needed!

I guess what I’m trying to say is that I don’t know how long it takes to know a place. Probably a lifetime. Maybe longer.

Here are some photos from my first year in Mountain Ranch! Not in any particular order, but through the entire last 12 months plus!