The Power of Blue Corduroy

Why I am forever, #WYFFAProud...

I never dreamed anything could fit so perfectly.  I put it on and admired myself in the mirror.  It was a little stiff from being boxed up for so long, and it was more than a little wrinkled.  But I had never in all my 15 years seen anything more beautiful in my entire life.  Soft and starchy, blue and gold.  It was stunning.  And I felt beautiful, powerful, capable in it.

No, it wasn't my prom dress.  It was something so, so, SO much more important.  It was my very own FFA jacket.

It arrived just after our district speaking competition where I had delivered the FFA Creed and placed 2nd, well enough to advance to the regional competition in a few weeks.  I had worn a borrowed FFA jacket for the event, as I had on a few other occasions.  I was riding the high from my speaking win when we arrived back at the Cheyenne FFA ag shop to a big box.

"Ah, now you'll really be dressed for success," my ag teacher, Mr. Berry, told me as he handed me the jacket.

I couldn't wait to get home and try it on.  I stood in front of the mirror in our upstairs bathroom. Slowly, carefully, I zipped it up.  Tears sprang to my eyes, it felt that awesome.  It was if in my 15 years on planet earth, I had been trying on and discarding self-images that didn't quite fit.  Tomboy, nerd, B-team athlete, horse show girl, all of those were me but they weren't.  But this, THIS felt right.  Perfect.  Life-changing.  I was an FFA member.  I was part of an organization that was half-a-million strong, united in leadership and learning about agriculture.  I was growing to be a confident public speaker, learning about cattle and hogs and crops and finding my place in the world.  We might bicker among us, but when the chips were down, an army of corduroy clad friends and strangers had my back, and the chapter and state embroidered on my back proved it.

FFA is first and foremost and organization dedicated to teaching it's members about agriculture, our most basic and important industry.  And I learned public speaking, leadership, business skills and time management.  But I also learned smaller, more important lessons along the way.  Responsibility from raising animals, humility from losing in the show ring and in judging competitions, leadership from being elected to a chapter office,

I wore the stiff and new right out of that first jacket,  I wore it to county fairs, camps, State Fairs, speech competitions and chapter meetings.  It was on my back when I lost that next regional creed competition.  Over the years, I added pins for the greenhand and chapter degree.  Offices were embroidered under my name on the front, ribbons and programs and phone numbers of new friends shoved in the pockets.  I wore that same jacket four years later, when I won the state Extemporaneous Public Speaking competition and was elected to a state office.  And I wore it to the funeral of two of our chapter members, killed in a car accident the summer after I graduated.  Within it's fabric are woven some of the best, and hardest, times of my life.

I've worn lots of different clothes since those days in the blue corduroy.  Sweatshirts so soft and worn they practically lulled me to sleep; hot pink Rocky Mountain jeans that I hoped would make the boys look twice; a navy blue linen suit that landed me my first professional job; a silky white wedding dress as amazing and gorgeous as the man I married.  But those moments, that jacket and all the memories I made while wearing it stick with me long after it was time to hang it up.

Twenty years later, and I still feel in my heart like...

Happy National FFA Week!

Happy National FFA Week!

I've been having some fun making graphics for National FFA Week.  I was amazed that one I put together last year has been shared, forwarded and posted several thousand times.  So I thought I'd work to create some new ones to share on behalf of the Wyoming FFA as part of the #WYFFAProud social media campaign.  Maybe next year, these too will become part of the National FFA Week lexicon.  #WYFFAProud.

They are expecting a storm on the East coast that has everyone in a dither.  We call this a Tuesday.

Be a #VoiceforAg

When I was in college, ag major friends and I would often discuss the division found in the ranks of the agriculture industry.  It seemed like instead of coming together as an industry, there was always infighting.  Different factions struggled to present a united front on issues like the Farm Bill, Endangered Species Act, brucellosis testing or wolf management.

What would it be like, we wondered, if we could get all the crop organizations, all the livestock organizations, all the natural resource organizations to work together?  How powerful could the industry be if each of us looked out for the benefit if our whole industry instead of our own special interest?  How much stronger could we all be, politically?

But our discussions never moved beyond that, talk.  It took a group of nine different college students to finally stop talking and start doing. 

This year, the 2014-2015 Wyoming State FFA Officers have created an opportunity for everyone in agriculture to come together and be a Voice for Agriculture with the first annual Wyoming Agriculture Advocacy Week.

To be held Jan. 26 through Feb. 1, 2015, Wyoming Agriculture Advocacy Week will focus on encouraging FFA members and others to be a voice for agriculture and engage their local communities in discussion about where their food comes from and how agriculture contributes to Wyoming’s economy and culture.  The effort is being led by the state officers, but their hope is that others will join in their fight to educate about our most basic industry.

No more farmers vs. rancher, Angus vs. Herefords, corn vs. cotton, or chicken vs. pork.  Just one industry, coming together, to educate about all the things it is doing right.  One voice proclaiming why we still believe in the future of agriculture.

I commend the state FFA officers for hatching the idea and their fellow FFA members for getting on board to help make that dream a reality.  And I encourage our industry to follow the lead of these visionary young agriculturalists and get involved in the first annual Wyoming Agriculture Advocacy Week.  Share your ag story on social media with the #VoiceForAg  hashtag.  Speak out for agriculture in our state.  Get involved with an activity the local FFA chapter has planned.  Let’s show these future leaders we believe in them and support their cause. 

Henry Ford said “Coming together is a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success.”

Be a #VoiceforAg this week and make a pledge to come together, keep together and work together for the success of this industry we all need.  

A memory for the baby book...

I was in the kitchen making dinner while Outdoor Guy played with Emily in her room.  Pretty soon, I hear her door open and she goes racing down the hall.  Outdoor Guy saunters into the kitchen, laughing.  When I asked him what he was laughing at, he said the two of them had been enjoying a rather fancy and formal tea party.  They were being quite dainty when all of a sudden, Emily jumped up, declared "I have to POOP!" and ran to the bathroom.

Becoming a Real Writer Means You Must Write

A while back, I started a quest to read more books.  I saw an infographic that said less than two percent  of American adults will read 50 or more books in a year.  So I challenged myself to meet that goal.  As part of that, I picked up a copy of "The True Secret of Writing," by Natalie Goldberg.  I've been working on a novel for the last few years, but can't seem to get motivated enough to work on it seriously.  Mostly, because I'm convinced I'm not a "real" writer and that only "real" writers write novels.  So there my manuscripts sits, floating in the digital ether of my comptuer's hard drive, 18,000 words among all those 0s and 1s and tiny electrical connections while my brain searches for ways to connect the thoughts in my head to the paper under my hand.

I'm halfway through "True Secrets."  One of the biggest takeaways I've gotten from the book is simply that if I ever want to be a writer, I need to write.  Pen on paper, strokes on keyboard, it doesn't matter.  I need to take letters, form words and sentences and write.  And I need to practice.  Goldberg's theory is not to start with the novel but to practice writing and all that practice will get your creative juices flowing and maybe a novel will pop out.

So I accepted her challenge of writing for 10 minutes a day.  I've signed up with a few services to send me random writing prompts, and will use those to log my 10 minute writing practice.  These aren't meant to be graded or critiqued, only to practice writing.

I had every intention of doing this as blog posts, but after trying one topic for about three minutes today, I realize that is never going to work.  I can't do this on the computer because I can't control my compunction to edit and redraft as I go along.  And that is so not the point of this exercise.  So I will revert to old school methods of paper and pen and other tools of the troglodytes.

Wish me luck in 10...9...8...

Cheers for another mother

We have a huge pine tree just off our front porch.  Each spring, a robin builds her nest in the tree, diligently layering bits of sticks and grass to make a cozy little home for her impending family.  In the morning and evenings when the shades are up, we can sit on our couch and watch the industrious little birds as they go about their construction.  But the first two summers we lived in Boulder failed to produce any live chicks.  Each time, a magpie would find the nest and eat the eggs.  Dastardly devils.

Now I understand the circle of life and all that.  I know magpies have to eat too, but it bothered me that their meal came at the expense of the poor little robins.

So this year, I was skeptical when yet another robin built her nest in the tree.  Every afternoon when we played in the front yard, Wyokiddo would have to check on the mama bird in her nest.  Soon, though, she wasn't sitting in her nest.  I wondered if the mama bird had fallen victim to one of the many predators in the area.

I shouldn't have worried.  Soon enough, we saw the robin sneak into the nest and deliver a worm to her new brood.

 Now four little beaks peak out above the rim of the nest.  This year at least, motherhood triumphed over Mother Nature.  Well done, mama and papa robin.  Well done, indeed.