Top 25 Reasons to Be a Cowboy | #18: Life on a Ranch

Ever since the average American left the field to participate in the Industrial Revolution—and the subsequent fallout of a more urbanized economy and society—we’ve been trying to get back to the country.

Think about it: where do many average Americans go on vacation? National Parks. They spend 50 weeks cooped up in the city then two weeks trying to refresh themselves in nature.

The agriculturalists, the ranchers, and cowboys never left the land. The daily life of a rancher is special—part of that being the outdoor nature of the work—but ranch life is more than just being outdoors. Ranch life is not segmented in the way modern life can be. While urbanites move from one air-conditioned space to another for home, work, and entertainment—only sometimes interrupted by a trip to a communal park—cowboys work, live, and recreate all in one seamless, contiguous piece of property.

A cowboy will rise in the morning, walk to the barn, feed his stock, maybe catch a horse and check on cattle. After the noon meal, maybe there’s some wrenching to do in the shop, or office work back at the house. In the evening, a cowboy might saddle a horse and rope some steers, or take the family to the fishing hole, or on a weekend go camping at the back corner of the ranch. If he or his family is industrious enough, maybe there’s even a garden. Of course, on a ranch there’s always a freezer beef, so in some ways and some seasons, there’s almost never a reason to leave.

This is the kind of life only cowboys—and other folks of the land—can enjoy. To live, work, recreate, and in some cases even feed yourselves, completely from one place. Not that long ago, all ranches ran this way and a trip to town was a rarity. Maybe a monthly trip for supplies and certain groceries and a summer Fourth of July celebration or county fair was the extent of town exposure.

Now, I’m not one to say there’s no value in a trip to town. Culture, community, and convenience are much more easily realized where more people gather. Take, for instance, the World Championship Ranch Rodeo—perhaps the best reason ever to go to any town.

So, while there’s some drawback to the remote life on a ranch, I think the way so many aspects of life are seamlessly satisfied by life on a ranch makes that way of living worth anything we’re missing in town.