The only thing I like about Christmas is the days have been getting longer for three or four days. The sappy Christmas stories are off the TV and horrid Christmas music is no longer cluttering up the radio. Time to think about New Year’s resolutions and getting away for a few days to Arizona or some other place you don’t need long johns.

The problem with heading out for a couple of weeks is even if you don’t have stock to feed, you need someone to check on your place. Some friends of ours had really never had a honeymoon or really any other type of vacation and after they had been married for 17 years they finally decided to take a few days off and get away from the ranch and kids. Jim and Sharyn asked me and my friend Jim to check on the three boys, ages 16 to nine years old. They had been gone about a week when Jim and I remembered and made a trip to the ranch to see how things were going.

You know how some stories start out bad and get worse, this is one of them. About a mile from the ranch we ran into the two oldest boys fixing a fence. It was obvious there had been some kind of a wreck. It turned out Brent, the 14 year old, had taken his mother’s car to visit the neighbors and not being an experienced driver had slid off the road and wiped out 40 yards of fence. The car still ran but wasn’t what you would call road worthy. We sympathized and started to help unload fence posts. Jim commented it was a good thing they had the pickup for transportation. Blaine the oldest explained that wasn’t exactly true in that it was only good for off road ranch work for the present. We looked at the pickup and asked why that was. Well a few days earlier the three boys had loaded up horses and headed down to Cowden’s to rope. Unfortunately, on the return trip Blaine had neglected to release the emergency brake when they left and had burned out the brakes on the pickup. Felt lucky it hadn’t ignited and burned up. There was still front brakes but the rig wasn’t really road worthy.

I shook my head and commented that the boys had sure had some bad luck. Nine year old Kyle piped up and said yeah his mom and dad were sure going to be mad. Jim said yeah, both vehicles not functioning would do that. Kyle went on that there was more and was worried that he would also be in trouble for his contribution. Jim asked, “What could you wreck?”

“Well, this last weekend we had a junior rodeo in Livermore and since their pickup wasn’t capable of hauling their horses we borrowed Joe Vierra’s pickup to haul the horses to the rodeo,” he said.

When it was time to come home they discovered Kyle had accidentally locked the keys to Joe’s pickup in the rig. Not knowing how to handle that, the boys had jumped their horses in with some other kids that didn’t live too far away and rode home with them. When Jim and Sharyn got home from their vacation they had two incapacitated vehicles and a neighbor’s pickup 100 miles from home with the keys locked inside. They never asked us to watch the kids again.

Time for New Year’s resolutions. I am much better at making resolutions for other people, however unappreciated. Often I have a better perspective of how someone else could improve their lives. You would be surprised at how many people become upset when you try to help them. As for me, I try to set attainable goals and this year I have resolved to not drink whiskey in St. Louis or smoke cigars in Kansas City. With a strong willpower like mine I am sure to keep these resolutions.

Barrie Qualle is an all-around working ranch hand, author and ranch rodeo enthusiast. He lives in Wallowa County.