Reba: My Story (5 page)

B
ETWEEN MAMA
’
S PAY AND DADDY
’
S RODEO EARNINGS, THEY
began to build up a cattle herd. Daddy says that he raised
our family by rodeoing, but as he—and we—got older, that part of his life slowed down. With us there helping him, he was able to concentrate on raising cattle and putting together our place near Limestone Gap.

I can’t remember the first time I climbed on a horse, but I do remember that the first time I rode I had to be pushed up on the saddle, a fact that makes me smile today. I have quarter horses and thoroughbreds now, and riding is as natural to me as breathing. And, strangely, for all the ranching I did, I was never taught how to ride. Daddy just took us kids when we were little and threw us up on a horse. We stayed up. It was your basic survival technique.

Grandpap used to sit on his horse with one of his legs thrown over the saddle horn. He’d put the reins in his mouth and pinch off a plug of tobacco. Then he’d pull the reins out and put the tobacco in.

Us kids would imitate him and each throw one of our legs across the saddle horn. But if Daddy caught us, he’d grab us off the horse, kick our butt, and say, “Now get up there and ride that horse right.”

He didn’t go for any fooling around.

B
Y THE TIME I WAS SIX I WAS GATHERING CATTLE, AND DOING IT
from before daylight until after dark by the time I was seven. Some days we’d help Daddy gather the cattle to sell. Other times, we’d go to the “pole pens,” or corrals, at the top of the mountain and gather them up for pregnancy tests, or to ear-tag them, or to worm or to brand them.

It would be 4
A.M.
and still pitch-dark when Daddy would get us up for breakfast. Grandpap, Uncle Dale, Uncle Slim, our friends from Clarksville, Texas, Jim Clark and Bob Christopher son, and usually some neighbors would join us. It’s a wonder I can remember so much about the food, since I was like the other kids, usually half asleep when we ate. Daddy would fry bacon, then fry eggs in the bacon grease. The eggs would literally float in bacon fat. He never
blotted the eggs, just put them on a platter. They had so much grease on them they would slide right onto the plate.

We’d use paper towels to absorb the grease, but not Daddy. He’d eat the eggs, bacon grease and all. He made “cowboy bread,” which is a mixture of flour, water, and baking soda, and sometimes he made milk gravy. Talk about cholesterol!

Then Daddy would say, “You kids go get the horses,” and we would go whistle them up close to the feed trough because we didn’t have a barn back then. Then we’d catch them while they were eating. Alice, Pake, and I would saddle the horses, tie them up, and then go tell Daddy we were ready.

The sun still wasn’t up.

After Daddy gave us our instructions for the day, Grandpap would have to “translate” for us. Daddy was under a lot of stress when he worked the cattle, and that early in the morning, tempers ran short. When Daddy was in a foul mood, he would always interpret the mere asking of questions as back talk, so we didn’t dare ask him anything. If one of us did, he’d tell us to pay attention, or holler, “Pull your head out of your ass.”

I don’t know what we would have done without Grandpap, who was sort of our rescuer. We’d chase cattle all day in brush so thick you couldn’t ride through it. A lot of times we’d get lost. We’d give a holler that was an imitation of Grandpap’s special yell, and he would respond, and we’d go back and forth that way until he found us.

Many times, I had to get off my horse and pull his legs out of the briars. He’d take a step, get tangled again, and I’d pull him out again. I’d get scratches right through my clothes. Some days I spent more time on the ground than on my horse.

Alice was a better hand at working cattle than any man Daddy ever hired, and I’ve heard him say so. I’ve seen her ride a horse into brush so thick that she couldn’t see the steer she was chasing. She could only hear it bawling. But
she’d lean over on the saddle with its horn poking her in the stomach and press in headfirst. She might come out a bloody mess, but she’d come out with a steer.

Our land was that rough until Daddy finally had it “chained.” A chain big enough to anchor a battleship was strung between two bulldozers. The bulldozers were driven across the land, and the chain bent or uprooted everything. Then the bulldozers would push all the brush up in piles and later on Daddy would set it on fire.

O
UR LUNCH WOULD BE WHATEVER DADDY HAD IN THE TRUCK
. It was usually bologna on bread—no Miracle Whip or any other seasoning. We drank pond water from a glass jug. The water was as hot as the temperature inside the truck.

We’d choke down our food, because Daddy didn’t like to waste time. Then it was right back after the cattle.

We’d ride as far as fifteen miles away from the house until darkness forced us to quit for the day. Daddy would send us on home while he got the corrals ready for the next morning. Except for the moonlight there wasn’t any light for us to see our way home. I’d see sparks fly from the horseshoes hitting rocks as we headed for the house.

We’d be so tired, it was a good thing the horses knew the way back. Pake would run his horse way past the rest of us, get off his horse, and sleep on the ground until the sound of our horses’ hooves hitting the ground would wake him up.

W
HEN I WAS SIX AND SUSIE WAS FOUR, I REMEMBER HELPING
Daddy castrate some young bulls. Daddy would buy one- and two-year-old cattle in Florida, Mississippi, or Texas and have them trucked to our place in Chockie, usually in January or February. Most of them would be bulls. Daddy thought that the cattle would grow faster, wouldn’t have the
“stag,” thick-neck look, and wouldn’t mess around as much if they were castrated as soon as they got to our place.

I would stand behind the bull and hold his tail while Daddy sliced the sack and cut the cord that let the testicles fall. Daddy would pass the testicles to me and I’d put them in a bucket. Next I’d hand Daddy the penicillin to inject the “bull turned steer” with, to prevent infections; when I got bigger I’d draw the medicine myself. Then I’d hand Daddy the knife so he could slit the steer’s ears. This was called “ear marking.” It was a way to identify the cattle as ours, like branding.

Many times when we were done, I helped carry that bucket of testicles to the house and Susie, Alice, and I would sit outside the back door and clean them. We called them mountain oysters. Then we’d take them in to Mama and she’d slice them thin, roll them in flour, and fry them in hot grease in a huge cast-iron skillet. I was literally raised on mountain oysters.

There wasn’t any pampering in the pens. One time, Daddy and I were there, worming and branding, and it was getting close to 11
A.M.
, the heat of the day. There wasn’t a breeze at all. I was standing real close to the fire that kept the branding irons hot.

Next thing I knew, my legs went out from under me and I was out. I guess I had heatstroke. When I came to, Daddy was taking a drink out of the water jug. He saw I was coming to and handed the jug to me, helped me to my feet, and we finished our job.

I’
VE BEEN KICKED AND RUN OVER BY CATTLE, BUT I
’
VE KICKED
them too. I got so mad one day when the cattle wouldn’t go in the chute like I wanted them to that I rared back, cussing, and threw the Hot Shot, or cattle prod, at the wooden fence. It flew into ten pieces and came back and hit me in the forehead. Mama and Daddy didn’t say a word. Getting my head cut open was punishment enough for cussing.

I’ll never forget once dropping a big bottle of worm medicine at the cattle chute and breaking the glass. It cost thirty-six dollars, and I sure felt bad. Daddy didn’t say a word that time either. I got another bottle out of the box and went on giving the cattle shots. I guess he thought at least I was trying.

But usually, Daddy didn’t accept any excuses, no matter how politely they were given. He kept a buggy whip above the door frame and he’d get it down and snap it across one of us kids’ behinds if he thought we needed it. He never warned us. He never even told us we were getting on his nerves. He just let us have it.

The idea of disobeying Daddy never crossed any of our minds. We did what we were told, when we were told.

There’s only one time I remember going against him. We had a dog, Tag, who got into a dangerous habit of chasing deer instead of cattle. Most cattlemen will shoot such dogs on the spot because they’ll turn other dogs on to it. Daddy was going to punish Tag and told me to hold him while he trained on him. I refused. Daddy hit me across the back with a coiled rope that was used to rope a steer. I took off running and fell. I hit my knee on a rock, and by the time I came back Daddy’s temper had cooled.

Some of this may sound cruel, but the cowboy life is harsh. It’s an ongoing struggle with nature—against the weather, predators, disease—with the constant threat of poverty if your cattle somehow don’t make it to market in good shape. It’s not a life for the sentimental or the weak.

The last time Daddy disciplined me was after I was married and had recorded one or two records. I had my own horse, Sonny, and Daddy mentioned that he needed some help the next day gathering cattle.

“I’ll help you, Daddy,” I said.

I loaded up Ole Sonny and drove over with Daddy to Ashland, at a place Daddy had leased. I was cinching up my horse when Daddy said, “Come on.”

“I’ll be there in just a minute.”

I loped up beside Daddy and he said, “Don’t talk back to me, young lady.”

“Okay,” I replied, and we loped around and found some of the cattle.

“You see them over there?” he said. “Go get them and bring them to the gate.” Which I did.

By the time I rode back to where Daddy was, he and Pake were into a serious cussing match. I don’t know what sparked it, but they were angry.

“You dough-bellied son of a bitch,” Pake said. “You can’t rope ’cause you’re too fat.”

“Why are you even trying to rope?” Daddy fired back. “You can’t rope.”

I rode up beside Jim Clark and said, “I got chewed out just for saying, ‘I’ll be there in just a minute.’ ” I rode back to the house with Jim and never went back to gather cattle with Daddy again.