Скачать или смотреть Get out there and do something because it means something even if right now it feels like it doesn't

I remember when I was young, and I would spend days with my grandfather.

While my single mom worked we hung out and he would tell me tales of growing up on a Papago reservation in Arizona, learning to ride bull on cows because that’s all they had, drinking, fighting even running cattle out of the king ranch in Texas but he had moved to the city long before I came along but to me he was every bit of cowboy that ever was.

He kept his saddles and tack for that day when his ranch would be ready, and once again he could ride the open prairie.

And every year at around the same time, we would get down the saddles and bring them right into the kitchen - not sure grandma was aware - place them on wooden saw horses, break out the saddle soap - still one of my favorite smells - and we would clean and condition those saddles like we were going to ride in the morning.

Now you might be wondering why we would do that - he didn’t have any horses and really no prospects anytime soon, yet like clockwork, we did this annual ritual.

First of all, it had to be done - this is just part of the deal with saddles.

But looking back now, I have realized that, more than that, this is what he could do - think about that - this is what he could do - what he could do right now - what he could control right now, that put him a little closer to his goal, and that meant something.

He never did get those horses, but he did get the ranch, a modest 35 acres in Southpark, Colorado, and he even had contractors dig out part of a hill accent to where they dug the foundation of the house for the horse stable and corral.

When he passed, they sold the property to use the money to take care of grandma. That hole was still there waiting for its timbers, rails, and horses, and it makes me sad sometimes that it never fully came to be

Yet I always knew that for him it was about the journey - the quest - about the getting there - and that meant something.

After he passed and the family was going through things, asking if anyone wanted anything, like happens - I wasn’t much interested in keeping anything, but after some time I decided to take a buckle - a small silver square adorned with a bronc rider loosely resting atop a silver intricate scrollwork

I took his .22, which he, as he would say, regularly carried for snakes and other critters - although I suspect he just liked carrying it, it was a part of him as much as anything else, and I took a pair of his boots, an old dusty pair of regular cowboy boots that were the last boots I ever saw him wear.

I keep them by my desk to help keep me grounded and connected to him.

Today I turned on an old country album and cleaned and oiled them while I listened, because it meant something.

While life for many of us is upside down and all sorts of sideways right now, I encourage you to do something today that you have control over that moves you forward as a human and as a parent, and it doesn’t even matter if it solves something bigger - you're a little closer to where you need to be, and this means something.