Bittersweet

Is the only word I could think to describe our trip this weekend. It was time to take my brother and my father up to the cemetery at Auburndale and although we said goodbye a while ago it is still never nice to reopen old wounds. My grandparents and great grandparents were members of the community here and probably had the family plot for a good many years before any of them needed it but over time a cousin, Brent, and my Aunt Hazel have joined them there.

My two brothers and my Dad join Grandma and Grandpa here in their spot. Dad lost his father when he was only 11 years old and always said he had Grandpa Macnab as a father for 50 years so he wanted to have his some of his remains here in the Mount Auburn cemetery.

But enough of that if you want to read about each of them individually you can read my journal entries on Dad, Brent and Kelly by clicking on their names.

A trip up into the Buffalo Coulee country is always a kind of homecoming for me, I spent a lot of time in my childhood here and have a lot of great memories from this place. My cousins and I roamed the countryside here as kids and this is where I learned to ride, along with a lot of other skills that have come in handy over the years. Hey I meant building a fence, feeding cows, and picking rocks.

It is always great fun to get Mike and take Brenda out and share some of those childhood trails with her. It might be 45 years but most of them are still there and the Saskatoon bushes still have berries in the right season and a fellow can still get a toothpick from the Hawthorne’s as he rides by.

The coulee is still a bright green at this time of year and the grass is looking great. Lots of places where it is stirrup high and after a winter in the desert our ponies have come to appreciate it a little more.

After we had a last ride through the coulee and stowed away some of cousin Randy’s great Blueberry Pancakes we got loaded up and head away from the Buffalo Creek Ranch and down the road to the Alliance and the J4 owned by our friends the James Gang. Derek, Shawna, Casey, Jessica, and Justin, along with Grandma Jacqui. We had a great visit and a fine dinner there Sunday night.

The young folk had to head off to school the next morning so Brenda and I headed out with Derek to get one of his bulls loaded up. Our horses are not all that familiar with cattle but we did get the job done. When we got back to the house the kids were soon home from school and Derek and I took off again, this time with Jessica and Justin and their horses.

Part way through the afternoon Shawna broke the news to us that they were expecting 3 inches of rain overnight so once we got the horses cooled out we grabbed a sandwich and headed up out of the the Battle River valley and down the road to Dogpound North. Didn’t pull into our yard till after 11PM but we did get here before the rain. Barely, as it has rained all day today. Sure is good for the trees and the grass though.