A Cowboy Gets Western
- May 12, 2026
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- Jan Swan Wood
Posted in: Featured, Ranch Life
Back 20 years or so, before everyone and their dog had a cell phone, cell towers were few and far between and cell service was very spotty over the whole country, but most particularly in rural ranching
country. Most people in the ranching country didn’t bother with one or only had one for when they went
to town.
Imagine my surprise when I saw that my young friend Casey had one. I saw it on the table when we were drinking coffee. Now, to say his place was remote would be an understatement. Miles in on a trail road off a sketchy county road, and down in a rugged canyon and breaks country. That he even had a house phone and electricity was pretty remarkable, but a cell phone? I asked and he said that he thought that it might not be a bad idea to have one, seeing as how he lived and worked alone on the ranch. I agreed but sure wondered how much good it would really do him if something was wrong. He said he’d just gotten it and didn’t really know much about it yet. He had put some numbers in it and that was about
it. I watched as he put it in his shirt pocket and snapped it shut.
He had invited me out to his place to make a video of him doing daily work for some deal he was asked to be in. He was the genuine article cowboy, did his feeding and fencing with teams, and did all his work horseback. His horses were not very user friendly and bordered on being total outlaws. He could get a day’s work done with horses lots of folks would be afraid to feed hay to. In this video he was to ride and
move some cows and calves around, then we’d go feed some hay and I would video that.
We headed to the barn and once inside, he untied a roan gelding that had been saddled and soaking for a while. His team was also harnessed and waiting for the day’s work. He was talking about how well his team was doing from not even being halter broke the fall before to being decent to feed with. I was walking several feet away from him, as we approached the walk-through door that was about four feet
wide. He unlatched it and swung it open toward the outside and I was a step ahead of him as we started
out the door.
He was starting through the door when he yelped and boogered, hit the doorframe on one side, then
bounced off the frame on the other side before running backward, thus scaring the snorty roan horse he
was leading. I was watching this wondering what the heck, then the ruckus had spooked his team as well and they set back on their halter ropes, adding to the chaos.
I could see he was trying to keep the roan horse from getting his hind end toward him to keep from
getting kicked, and after the horse had dragged and fought him most of the way across the barn, he finally got the wreck stopped. I asked Casey what the heck had happened. He said, breathing hard, that his pocket had buzzed like there was a snake in it. He unbuttoned the pocket and dug out his little flip phone. Sure enough, he had for a nanosecond had a signal and it had vibrated with a text or call. He had never felt anything like that before!
We got the giggles about it and pretty soon we were hanging on a fence laughing like idiots. His roan horse and the team were still blowing rollers out their noses, but the dust had settled. He opened the
phone and shut it off. He sure didn’t want to risk himself blowing up from what felt like a rattlesnake in
his pocket and having a horse wreck because of it!
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Posted in: Featured, Ranch Life
About Jan Swan Wood
Jan was raised on a ranch in far western South Dakota. She grew up horseback working all descriptions of cattle, plus sheep and horses. After leaving home she pursued a post-graduate study of cowboying and dayworking in Nebraska, New Mexico, Montana, Wyoming and South Dakota....