Introductions
- Abbie
- Feb 21, 2017
- 3 min read
Hello all,
My name is Abbie. I am a wife, dog mom, volleyball coach, amateur photographer and blogger. This blog will be about my experiences of being married to a 'Buckarooman'. My buckaroo's name is Taylor. We met "technically" on a dating app in September of 2015, but we officially met when we were set up on a date by a mutual friend in November that same year. Our "blind" date was to dinner and a hockey game. This particular date was one I was really nervous about. Mind you, I am a very outgoing person who doesn't get nervous for dates. So I knew he was something special right off the bat. He was shy, I was nervous and the ride to dinner was a bit quiet. But after a few awkward conversations fizzling out, we finally got comfortable with each other. The hockey game was a blast and I fell asleep sitting in the middle seat of his truck on the way home. Something I still apologize to this day about, but he says he thought it was cute that I trusted him enough to fall asleep next to him on the first date. We officially began dating in December of 2015, were engaged in February 2016 and married in June 2016. Whirlwind. That's the only word that comes to my mind when I think about Taylor and I's relationship. But I wouldn't want it any other way.
When Taylor and I were dating, one thing that quickly became apparent to me was his passion about anything related to ranch work. He always talks about horses, cows, roping, branding, etc. But you know what? He's introduced me to a whole new world that in all honesty, I had no idea existed still. Hence the name of this blog "A Dying Breed". A colleague of mine actually sparked this idea for me because those are the exact words she said to me after seeing a Facebook post of mine. It was a picture of Taylor roping at one of the team doctoring ropings my father-in-law puts on during the winter. She asked how often my husband is on horses and I said, "Well in the spring, summer and fall, he is on basically every day." She responded with, "Wow, that is so cool. They are definitely a dying breed." And for the rest of the night I just kept thinking about how that statement was so true. The lifestyle of a cowboy, buckaroo or vaquero is something that is slowly fading into the distant past of the Wild West. When in some people's lives, like mine now, it is a definitive part of every day life.
What exactly is a buckarooman? Well, if you were to ask my husband it would go something like this, "A real cowboy" or "The ranch cowboy who works seven days a week on the back of a horse." I googled 'buckaroo' and this is the picture that came up.
This picture pretty much sums up what my husband will be doing here in about a month. Right now they are just feeding all the hungry mamma's who are ready to give birth to those shaky-legged little calves.
They feed with a tractor and trailer at the first of the season. But now they will use their Percheron draft horses and a feed wagon to do that work. I asked my husband a while back why they decide to pull a feed wagon with horses and his answer was, "It's just more enjoyable than feeding with a tractor. It's something not very many people do anymore."
I find anything related to the buckaroo lifestyle to be very intriguing. My father-in-law, who builds saddles for a living on top of doing the ranch work, instilled in his kids to love this work as much as he does. And my husband would do anything to make ranching his full-time job. But because of cattle prices and other factors, it is a little tough to make a living. So Taylor works part of the year as a mechanic and the other part as a cowboy.
I am not a great writer, but that is something that I hope I can improve on while I continue doing this blog as well as hopefully bringing along my photography. I appreciate any feedback from people who know what they are doing with either!
That's about all I have for this first post. I have included some pictures I have gotten so far this year.
With love,
Abbie
The Buckaroo's Wife
