Marital Strife and Working Cattle
- August 25, 2025
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- Jan Swan Wood
Posted in: Featured, Ranch Life
My folks had a great working relationship and built a family and a ranch together over the years. Dad
worked outside, Mom worked inside, except for her yard and big garden. It was an equitable arrangement that served them well. Mom would drive a feed pickup or drive the pickup pulling one of the hay wagons, and would occasionally milk the cow, but otherwise she stuck with her very busy work in the house. Likewise, Dad would step up and wash diapers or do the dishes too, helping out when Mom was buried by the workload of small kids and babies.
So, with this in mind, this event happened in the last years before they sold the ranch and finally retired in their 70s. Dad was trying to sort a bunch of calves and some yearlings in the corral by himself. He had them in a pen with an out gate and a big door into the barn to sort into. He wasn’t having any success and was worn out from trying, so he finally went to the house and asked Mom to help him. She didn’t do that sort of thing but could see he was about to the end of his endurance, so she bundled up and went out to help him.
She was running the big door into the barn and the cattle continued to work terribly. Dad’s short temper had already been tried before she was there and it didn’t take long for it to reach the boiling point again. They kept at it and were just about done and those last ones were really tough to sort. It was at this point that Dad made the nearly fatal error of yelling at Mom. Suddenly the world stopped turning. She
looked him dead in the eye, turned loose of the big door that held the main cut behind it, and turning,
walked across the corral, through the gate and to the house. Of course the cattle all spilled back into the
corral before he could get to the barn door to close it.
I’m sure the air was absolutely blue from Dad’s cussing, but his helper was gone gone gone. He gave
himself time to cool off then went to the house. He apologized over and over, but to no avail. She was done and on the fight, and anyone who really knew my Mom knew that she stayed on the fight for days
after. It wouldn’t have been something to bring up even several years later, as she would be mad all over
again!
Knowing he had really messed up, he slunk out of the house and to the shop to use the phone. From
there he called me, as we lived about six miles away. He asked me if I could come out and help him sort
some calves. When I got there he was pretty sheepish and confessed to me what had happened and that my mother might still be be a little woofy if I went inside.
We went and sorted the calves. He was even careful not to yell at me, though that wouldn’t have been a novel experience for me. They did sort badly, as there are days that are like that with livestock, but we got it done and everything was put where it belonged. I helped him with a couple of other little things while I was there, then poked my head inside to say Hi to Mom before I left. It was still pretty chilly inside, even for me, so I made the excuse that I needed to get home and couldn’t come in. Dad sure as
heck didn’t go in either.
Dad never asked her to help him sort again, having burned that bridge with a fiery inferno that one time. It was much easier and less dangerous to just give me a call.
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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....