Tall Grass Ranchette: Echo of Dreams

Resurrection

2011-02-26T17:07:00.000-08:00

~ An End to Winter ~

There are robins outside in the yet-to-bloom quince...I await its intense salmon-pink blossoms...the sparkly green hummingbird has returned to the garden and reconstruction has been taking place on my website during these deep dark wintery nights of aught-10 and aught-11...no big splashy changes really...more just subtle shifts....re-envisioning....invisible reconstruction in the bones & blood....sprucing up...cleaning down deep...clearing out...readying for emerging springtime.

As part of the deal...I'm reviving my blog: Tallgrass Ranchette:Echo of Dreams and it's now incorporated into my website redesign (www.nancykdillon.net).

What to say ?? I've got some ideas ;-) and I may re-post some things from far-flung reaches of cyberspace like my old MySpace Blog and my NoDepression site....time to tighten and lighten things up now...simplify...hit the 'reset' button...stay tuned !

New !! BandCamp Site !

Autumn Leaves Should Be Crisp

2009-10-19T16:25:00.000-07:00

Autumn Leaves should be crisp. I remember walking in the woods in Oklahoma. My dad always used to call it "tromping in the woods". I didn't realize that other folks called it "hiking" until I moved to Washington State....lol ;-) Well...I use the word 'woods' in a general sense. In Central Oklahoma are the Cross Timbers...a narrow swath of scrubby-looking oak trees cuts the state in half. We called them 'blackjack oak' or 'post oak'. These look nothing like the spreading oaks you find in Northern and Central California....they are puny looking things by comparison. But they grow thick and twist into wonderful shapes. And...best of all...their leaves when they fall to the ground are crisp !! Crisp leaves are hard to come by in Seattle... ;-)

So....the Cross Timbers form the Eastern boundary to the Great Plains and run from the Flint Hills in southeastern Kansas through central Oklahoma down to the Texas Blackland Prairies. The EPA has designated the Cross Timbers as Ecoregion 29, a Level III ecoregion. Wikipedia has this to say about the Cross Timbers:

The short, stout oaks that grow in the Cross Timbers were no good for timber and those that were not cleared for farmland constitute one of the least disturbed forest types in the eastern United States, with some 890,000 acres (3,600 km²) of old-growth forest scattered throughout the region.^[6] These old-growth forests contain millions of post oak from 200 to 400 years old and redcedar over 500 years old.

Who knew these trees were so old ???? Who knew they were so useless to everyone but the birds and squirrels ??? My mother's favorite part of the house that my parents built brand new in Edmond, OK in the mid-70's was the tiny stand of post oaks which occupied what most people would have turned into a lawn. She called it 'the copse' and loved it to bits. She didn't realize she was engaging in ecological preservation at the time....she just loved her copse.

Growing a regular lawn of grass in that red dirt was a joke ! Even the neighbors who managed to get a lawn put in spent major bucks on keeping it watered during the summers. I think my dad must've planted two dozen lawns in the small flat-ish area in the front of that house which was cleared for the house. Every last lawn he put in got washed out in the torrential rains. But the little stand of post oaks stood strong and, if not tall, at least intrepid and provided homes for birds, insects and animals and privacy for anyone sitting looking out from the living room through the huge glass-paned picture window.

So today I am listening to Eric Taylor sing about drinkin' streams and whooping cranes and yellow stones. Somehow this put me in mind of walking in those Oklahoma woods full of blackjack oak and my mom's tiny forest in the front yard. Thinking about the sound of walking in crisp leaves and the feeling of winter coming on.

I bought Lyle Lovett's new record, Natural Forces, today for $3.99 (one day only !). He covers Eric Taylor's song, Whooping Crane, in very Lyle-esque fashion. It was the Eric version that set me off thinking about the Cross Timbers. But Lyle's new record is pretty good too.

"Then they paint your face on a penny" ~ Whooping Crane, Eric Taylor

Dust Devils & Tumbleweeds

2006-06-21T12:58:00.000-07:00

Wow... things have sure changed around here... The grass is thigh-high and there are dust bunnies everywhere! Guess it's time I got back over here to the old Ranchette and did some tidying up... the snakes are happy though, sleepin' in the sun listening to the grasshoppers and cicadas. Maybe, I'll just leave 'em all to snooze through another hot dreamy day and wait til it cools off a bit before I clean up.

In the meantime, the action is goin' on over at MySpace... check out www.myspace.com/nancykdillon for some tunes, pictures and all the latest.

xoxo, Nancy K

Snake Bit...

2005-07-29T16:31:00.000-07:00

She ain't no snake-handlin' woman...

In May I got to visit the Dancing Bean Ranch(ette) near Pawnee, Oklahoma.

Bobby and Bill put me up in the bunkhouse. Bobby told me a story about a big black snake plopping down on her back patio trying (& failing) to get at a bird's nest in the eaves. Needless to say, I kept my eyes peeled low and high for snakes after that.

She sent me an e-mail this week describing her recent ordeal:

"Just thought I'd let you know I had the ultimate okie experience and was bitten by a copperhead Sunday night. It hurts like hell, I feel like s**t, and am under a blood clot watch because the venom went so deeply (he bit me twice, but the second time I was moving so only one fang went in. Either that, or it was a three-fanged snake).

[I was] on the patio off my bedroom, watering plants. I turned on the light and looked for snakes, but not carefully enough, obviously. I just worked up the nerve to open the door and peek out there, and there is a coil of extension cord in brown, from the sprayer I use on the roses, and a curled up soaker hose. Clearly, the thing was hidden and I stepped on it.

I'm clearly not cut out to be pentecostal, and have been thinking how grateful I am that I'm not a Christian Scientist, as much as I admire the Monitor."

Then, there was this rest area sign in the Texas panhandle out past Lubbock:

Definition of "Ranchette"...

2005-03-03T17:26:00.000-08:00

ranchette • \ran-CHET\ • noun

1 : small ranch
2 : place of dreams

Example sentence: I had always dreamed of having my own ranchette.

Dept. of Cool Websites:

Merriam-Webster Online (includes Word Games, Word of the Day, Word for the Wise): http://www.m-w.com/

"The Dreamer Saves Herself"

2005-01-21T19:31:00.000-08:00

~ in which the dreamer saves herself from the belly of the fish.

Today's collage is about the integration of opposites. I was inspired to finish it this morning after Wednesday night's show at Mr. Spot's Chai House. http://www.nancykdillon.net/concertinfo.html

We were old/young, from far/from near, male/female, Northwest/Southwest, rural/urban, Eastern/Western, dry desert tunes/lush forest tunes, White America/Native America, children/grownups, old-time fiddle/graceful violin, canyon music/mountain music, the sacred & profane all mushed together in a swirl of synergy. We were all there....

Wheat Field of Dreams

2005-01-21T18:21:00.000-08:00

If I build a Ranchette, will anyone come? What is a Ranchette? What the heck is the Tall Grass Ranchette?

A ranchette is a small ranch, something my girlfriends & I used to fantasize about having. Now, Chris and Bobbie both have their very own ranchettes on the tall grass prairie with actual bricks 'n mortar buildings including bunkhouses & art studios.

The Tall Grass Ranchette is quite literally an echo of dreams. I was inspired to build this virtual ranchette as a sort of "Back 40" to my website. A place of interactivity, I hope. I envision the structure as collage-like. I'll post dreams, artwork, lyrics, musings and whatever else I think of. You can post also by punching the comment button. Please play nice.