counting sheep

I can't say that I have always loved wool. I started realizing its value for warmth in high school, when I bought a pair of military surplus wool pants. Surprisingly, these pants are classy yet utilitarian enough that I have carried them with me through the years. I have worn them while winter camping in the Boundary Waters, at work with a tie, and with a heavy charcoal gray turtleneck sweater to keep me warm on cold Minnesota days.

When I started to buy sweaters to augment my wardrobe as an undergrad in the Windy City, I began to look a bit more closely at the fabric and texture of my wool garments. I was intrigued at the diversity of colors and weights I saw. Finally, I became entranced the first time I stepped into a yarn shop. I was somewhat intimidated by the vast array of yarns and colors represented, but I immediately wanted to learn how to craft that wonderment in to garments of enduring quality. With that visit, the wisps of my past began to spin themselves into the promise of a hope for the future.

Rewind 25 years. Although I like to think that the wildness of the American west is in my blood - a legacy of generations of ancestors who were trappers, indian warriors, hardworking farmers and rugged ranchers - the truth is that I happened to experience the wild and lonely immensity of the Colorado prairie and its infinite blue sky at a formative age. Beyond wandering over the plains as a toddler, I have flashes of memories riding in my grandpa's pickup as he farmed sugar beets and climbing the windmill at my great-grandparents' ranch outside Douglas, Wyo. The impression that these memories have left are indelible.

These threads of my past are being shaped into a yet unfinished tapestry, a tapestry that depicts dreams of sheep. Ginny and I met in the beautiful, pastoral coulee country of southeast Minnesota. Every valley that cuts through the prairie on top of the bluffs contains a farm, and through every farm winds a burbling stream teeming with trout. She had grown up on a hobby farm and has always wanted her children to experience the joy and responsibility that tending to a farmstead requires. As we were driving down toward Winona over the holidays, we continued a conversation we has begun sometime in the past. We began to imagine a future on a farm with sheep and other animals that are harvested for fiber.

I have no illusion that tending a farm is easy. I relish the challenge of tending to animals, maintaining outbuildings, and mending fences. Some of my most cherished jobs have involved working outside with my hands. However, my idyllic pastoral desires may have inured me to the hard reality of making a living from the land and the canny intelligence involved in eking a living from the land. Time will tell. Until that potential future, I will continue to count sheep with every stitch I knit.