by Zoe Matthews
“We get to take the summer off? Yes!” Both girls gave each other high-fives at this news.
Sierra had made the decision to homeschool the girls until they were older. The closest school was located in Pinedale and the bus ride took over an hour to get there. Sierra felt that at five years old, they were too young to be making that trip every day just for a half-day of school. She planned on homeschooling them until they were a few years older. She had thought about continuing their studies throughout the summer so they wouldn’t get bored, but now that the family was going to embark on this new business, she immediately decided to try to finish their studies by June first so she could do her part in helping with all the changes.
Soon she was guiding them up the stairs to their rooms. She sat them down at their school table and helped them with their reading and math. Predictably, Ashley was better with math and Elysha read better, but they helped each other, and in a few hours they were done for the day. Sierra read a chapter to them out of “Charlotte’s Web” and then the girls had free time where they could do what they wanted, as long as it was something educational. Ashley started to color and Elysha pulled out a new storybook to look at.
There was a knock on the door and Kathy poked her head inside.
“I would like to plant some vegetable seeds in the garden today. Would you girls like to help?” she asked them, although she looked at Sierra for permission.
“Yes, can we Mom?” Ashley asked while Elysha started jumping up and down with delight at the idea.
“Yes. Both of you clean up here, and then you can go with Kathy,” Sierra gave her permission. The girls quickly put away what they were working on and left with Kathy.
Sierra sighed and bent to pick up a few crayons Ashley had missed. She straightened some books and then decided now would be a good time to read the letter from her father.
For some reason, she was not sure she really wanted to read the letter. She had not been very close to her dad. He was a good man and she felt he did his best with raising all six of them, but she also felt that sometimes his heart wasn’t with them. She suspected he had had a very difficult time when her mother died. Although she knew it must have been very hard to have your spouse die and leave behind six children, two of them newborn twin babies, she also resented the fact that he did not seem to like being around them. He had turned most of the raising over to Kathy and Jed.
Since Paul died, she understood the heartache that came with losing a spouse, but she never would have made the decision to turn over the care of Ashley and Elysha to someone else.
Since she was also curious, she slit open the envelope, and pulled out a single sheet of paper. The words had been typed with her father’s signature on the bottom. She found it peculiar that it was dated only six months ago. She immediately started to read the letter.
My Dear Sierra:
If you are reading this letter, then you will know that I am gone. Please don’t grieve too much for me. I am with your mother now and that is where I want to be.
I am leaving the ranch in good hands with your older brother. He might choose to make some changes that he had talked to me about before, and I encourage you to support him in his ideas and help him when needed.
You might be wondering why I have insisted that you all need to be together on the ranch for six full months to collect your inheritance. I did this for a reason. I feel that I did not do a good job in encouraging the six of you to be there for each other. Each of you have been through a large life-changing event within the last few years. The saddest thing about this is every one of you have felt you needed to deal with these events on your own. I know I was not a good father in this area. I think I probably encouraged you to stand on your own two feet and not inconvenience any member of the family with your problems or struggles. I know now that this was wrong on my part and I am hoping I can make this right by insisting that all six of you spend some time together.
I encourage you to get to know all of your siblings during this time and help each of them when they need it. Let them help you. When it comes right down to it, family is all we have to help us get through this life.
I want you to know, I love you very much. Your peacekeeping qualities were always a comfort to me. Please don’t grieve for me too much. I know Paul’s death has changed your outlook on love. He was a great husband. I could not have asked for a better son-in-law, a husband for you, and a father for my dear grand-daughters, Ashley and Elysha. But at the same time, I admonish you to not be afraid to move on and have a full life.
Love, your father
Sierra found herself wiping away tears as she finished the letter. If she didn’t know any better, the man who wrote this letter was a very different man than whom she had called Dad for 30 years. Something had made him change to make him write this letter almost six months ago, but what? It was almost as if he knew he was going to die. She thought back over the last few months and the few times she had interacted with her father.
To her knowledge, he had not seemed to be sick. He had been away from the ranch more than usual, preferring to turn most of the running of the ranch to Sheridan. He was always home on the weekends and he had started to insist anyone who was home to attend church in Pinedale. Sometimes she would go with him and sometimes she stayed home. They had not attended church as a family when she was a child, so this was a new change, but she had not thought much of it.
When her father was at home, he would interact briefly with his grand-daughters, Ashley, Elysha, and Brooklyn. Then he would spend quite a bit of time in his own rooms. At the time, Sierra had not seen anything different, but now that she thought about it, he seemed to spend long periods of time in his suite, far more than usual. Maybe something had been wrong.
She blew her nose and then tucked the letter away in a safe place to be read again later. She knew her father was right about how she and her siblings did not rely on each other for help or support. Everyone basically lived their own lives, even those that lived year-round on the ranch.
She remembered her family had been closer to each other before the Ranch House had been built and they had lived in the small home Kathy and Jed now lived in. It only had three bedrooms and so the six kids had to share two of them. There was always someone to play with. She also remembered hating that her younger siblings were always getting into her stuff, sometimes ruining her belongings. When the large Ranch House was built, each of the kids were given their own set of rooms. It was nice to have so much space, but it had also separated them. It became the norm in the evenings for everyone to spend their free time in their own rooms.
Sierra decided she would take her father’s advice and spend time with her siblings. She would start with Sheridan, if she could find him.
****
Right after lunch, Sierra started searching for her brother. Kathy had thought he was somewhere in the Ranch House, so she started her search on the first floor.
Sierra actually loved the home their father had built. It was two stories and had been built in a U-shape. The kitchen and dining area were located on the first floor. Both were quite large. When Stella was home, she spent most of her time in the kitchen. This room had a stainless steel industrial-sized fridge and freezer. Stella loved to use the double gas oven. On part of a wall hung many sizes of well-cared for cast iron pans. A very large oak table sat in the dining area that could expand to sit approximately 20 people, although this room was rarely used. Most of the time, the family ate in a small nook off the kitchen.
To the left of the dining room was the Great Room. The middle of this room had a sitting area complete with a large screen TV and gaming equipment. On the far side was a pool table and an air hockey table, along with shelves full of board and card games. On the other side were wall-to-wall shelves full of books. This was Sierra’s favorite room, and when any of the family wanted to spend time together when they were not eating, they were in the Great Room.
In the back of the Great Room
were two suites of rooms and behind the kitchen and dining room were another two suites. Upstairs on the second story were another four suites of rooms, along with a large office used by her father, and now Sheridan, to run the ranch. This is where she found her brother.
Sierra peeked into the office through the half-open door. She saw Sheridan sitting at the large oak desk in front of a large window that overlooked the ranch and nearby mountains. He had his head buried in his hands for a moment. Then she watched as he sighed and started reading some papers that were in front of him. Sierra quietly knocked to get his attention and let him know she was there. He looked at her, smiled, and beckoned her inside.
“What can I do for you, Sierra?” Sheridan asked when she sat down on one of the chairs in front of the desk.
“I read Dad’s letter he wrote to me,” Sierra said quietly, looking down at her hands. “I really miss him.”
Sheridan sighed again and leaned back in his chair. “So do I, Sierra, so do I. But I guess life goes on. I am anxious to get started on our plans to turn this ranch to a dude ranch.”
“So am I,” Sierra admitted. “I would like to know what I can do to help.”
Sheridan seemed almost surprised at her words. Sierra knew she had never offered to help before, but in her defense, she had never been encouraged to help. He smiled at her.
“There is plenty to do. I’ve made a list.” He pushed a piece of paper towards her and Sierra started to read it.
On the paper was a list of possible jobs each of the siblings could choose from to be in charge. Some of the choices were cook, cattle, horses, activities for adults, activities for children, activities for teenagers, advertising, housekeeping, along with building and decorating the guest cabins.
“Some of these jobs will have to be hired out,” Sheridan explained while Sierra looked the list over. “Like building the guest cabins for example. I already have someone in mind for the jobs with the horses.”
“Oh, really? Who?” Sierra asked as she gave the list back to Sheridan.
“Logan Williams. Do you remember him? He and I went to college together. I talked to him a few weeks ago. He’s looking for a new job.”
“What does he do right now?”
“He is working at a ranch in Wyoming. He has been working with the horses there, but the situation has changed lately, and he told me he’s looking for another position.”
Sierra did not remember very much about Logan. She did remember that he had married because Sheridan had left the ranch for a few days to attend the wedding, one of the few times he did so. He rarely left the ranch for anything.
“If you think he would do well, then go ahead and offer him the job,” Sierra advised.
“I would like to offer him one of the cabins so he could live on the ranch with his family. It is too far to be traveling back and forth to Pinedale.”
“That would be included in his pay, right?” Sierra asked.
“Right,” Sheridan confirmed. “Do you think we can get one of those old cabins ready for him within the next week?”
“Probably,” Sierra said. “I can help with that.”
“Good,” Sheridan smiled at her and Sierra was glad she decided to find her brother. Turning the ranch into a new business was a family affair. They all needed to be part of this, not just Sheridan. This was no longer a one-man business.
“What else would you like me to do?” she asked, anxious to do more.
“Is there a job on the list that you would be interested in?”
“Yes, actually,” Sierra admitted. “I would like to be over the activities for the children and teenagers.”
Sheridan smiled again. “I kind of figured you would want that job. You will do great at it, with your experience as a teacher.”
Sierra spent the next thirty minutes discussing her new responsibilities with Sheridan. While they talked, she admired the way he listened carefully to her ideas. He liked most of them, and when he felt she needed to think through an idea more thoroughly, he gently led her in that direction. Sierra took quite a few pages of notes, writing down all the ideas they talked about. She felt a peace inside at this new direction her life was taking.
Chapter 5
After her talk with Sheridan, Sierra decided to find her daughters and see what they were doing. She had left them with Kathy after lunch so she could find Sheridan.
She walked outside and started to look around. She immediately felt a calm come over her as she walked towards the vegetable garden located behind the Ranch House. She loved the ranch. It was named Majestic Mountain Ranch for a reason. The ranch was one of the largest in the area with about 2500 acres, surrounded by federal land. It had been in the family for over 150 years. It was located high in the Rocky Mountains at about 6500 feet.
Even though it was already mid-May, there was still some snow on the ground. The main part of the ranch was located in a large meadow with forest surrounding it. The Ranch House was located in the middle of the meadow. The house that Kathy and Jed lived in was behind it, near the vegetable garden. In front of the Ranch House located some distance away were the four run-down cabins. At the edge of the meadow was a runway her father had used for his plane, a Cessna 210, complete with a small hanger.
A river that flowed from the nearby mountains ran along the edge of the meadow. Sierra’s great-grandmother had named it Pine River because of the multiple pine trees that grew along its banks.
The ranch had earned its name when her great-grandfather arrived in the meadow. He felt the mountains were majestic, just like God. He had often hiked to the top of the closest one. He had been known to say, “This might be what God sees when he looks down from heaven.”
Sierra knew what he meant. She had climbed many of the mountains that surrounded their land throughout her life and she always felt closer to God whenever she made it to the top of one of them.
Sierra found her daughters with Kathy in the vegetable garden. She saw Ashley bend over and carefully place a seed into the ground. Elysha then covered it up. They were very intent on their work. Their three-year-old cousin, Brooklyn, was also there. She was sitting in the dirt at the edge of the garden digging with a small shovel. Sierra was glad Kathy was around. She was great with the girls.
Kathy and her husband, Jed, had been with her family since before she was born. They were hired when Sierra’s parents were first married and Sheridan was born. At the time, Kathy had been hired to help with the housecleaning and cooking. As more children were born, she also helped with their care. Jed had been hired to help manage part of the cattle operation.
After Spencer and Stella were born and their mother died, Kathy stepped in to help raise them. As her father became more and more absent from the family and farm, Jed took on more responsibilities until he basically was running the ranch. Kathy was a sweet woman who rarely let anything get to her. She was the most even-mannered woman Sierra knew. Jed, on the other hand, was rough and gruff. He only talked when he had something to say and then it was short and to the point. He rarely smiled and he grunted if that was all that was needed to get his point across. If someone had just met him, they would think he didn’t want to be around anyone. But Sierra knew he was just a softie at heart. He loved the Collingsworth siblings as much as his wife did. In fact, there were many times he guided her two brothers when they were growing up and needed a consistent male figure in their lives. Sierra didn’t know what they would do without Jed and Kathy.
She knew that Sheridan had already talked about the changes with Jed and Kathy. He probably had talked to them before he had even talked over the ideas with his siblings. She also knew without asking that Kathy and Jed would help and support them in this new endeavor.
“How is the planting going?” Sierra asked as she approached the vegetable garden. Her daughters looked up as she stepped around the fence. A high fence had been built around the garden to keep the wildlife out, as much as possible anyway. Ashley grinned up at her while she was squ
atting and Elysha used that time to playfully push Ashley over into the soft dirt.
“Hey,” Ashley protested. Sierra could tell she was getting ready to retaliate, so she quickly asked, “What have you planted today?”
“Lettuce, spinach, and peas,” Elysha offered, showing a package of seeds in her hand.
“This garden looks larger than it was last year. Are you planting more than you usually do, Kathy?”
“Yes, I thought it would be good to allow guests to pick and eat fresh vegetables right from the ground. They could also help prepare some of it for salads if they wanted,” Kathy answered as she brushed some dirt off from her gloved hands.
“I want to plant corn, but Kathy says it’s too early,” Ashley said matter-of-factly.
“It still might snow again. We don’t want the corn seeds to die,” Kathy explained to her patiently.
“Kathy says pea seeds like snow but corn seeds don’t,” Elysha explained to Sierra.
