We lived close enough to the Sweetgrass Hills in Montana for my Dad to use them to predict the weather. They also provided a huge expanse for a fertile imagination to grow wild and free. Every coulee in our area of the prairies was a mystery for me to enjoy. Every living creature scraping a living through the dust, the mud, the blizzards and the blue skied “I can see for miles” warm spring days instilled my respect. I loved the prairies and still do. The few miles from our place in Canada across the border to the States held for me lands filled with outlaws, buffalo and ancient peoples all filling my childhood imagination with the magic that only wide open spaces can.

My dad said a lot of things to me in his life. One of them was “Never underestimate your audience,” which I thought was quite an amazing thing for a World War II veteran to say who only had grade 11 and had never been on a stage in his life. The other thing he said to me while I was busy trying to be an artist / musician and having doubts was, “Even the little Prairie chickens dance.” Another thing I remember him saying was “Go ye to the plains” … that was supposedly from the Bible. Now the first few quotes that I’ve mentioned I totally get, but this last quote has me stumped and I’ve been searching for where it says that in the Bible for most of my life and I haven’t found it yet.

In my musings, last issue I speculated to ask ‘could there be a relationship between our North Country artist friend, Lesley Schatz, and the mythic figure within Dylan’s North Country Fair?’ Then she emailed me, sent me these images of her important chicken paintings and explained about her music. Lesley is a wondrous treasure and just as complex as that suggests. We had a listen to what we could find of her music and it’s grand.

What is that mysterious magnet that keeps me happily stoking the stove and researching what farm critters will eat ticks? What type of chicken will do well against pine martins, weasels, raccoons, foxes, coyotes, occasional wolves, peregrine falcons, great horned owls, huge seagulls, snakes, cold and probably other creatures that I haven’t yet seen? I have lived on farms most of my life and as of today, January 1 of a brand new year, I have no inkling as to what lure keeps me here.

The old Déjà cabin owned by the King brothers in the Porcupine Hills had a beautiful bridge as an entrance. I was always so busy surviving there that I don’t have any pictures of it. At that point I had two children and was living there alone most of the time with my cat and dog. I often went to visit Raul and Morris King and took them honey from my beehives that I had taken up to the Porcupine lookout.

I could catch glimpses of this story as I walked through my dusty little farm; when I went past coulees full of dark moist places scattered with poplars and willow, chokecherries and sagebrush, causing my heart to ache… I wanted to explore that coulee forever. Sorting out the smells while flushing out prairie chickens and partridge. Listening to the wind blow through the fox and coyote smells as a horse snorts scents from his nostrils; I wanted to drink the water from the ever-flowing story well and discover all the moist, fertile grounds hidden in the dry prairie where I lived. So, first we follow the wind…