Patience.

My Cowboy is not easily frustrated. He is an 'even keel' kinda guy. Which is a good thing. As my mom would say, he 'takes everything in stride'. And he does. Example: Last Tuesday, he had to do some machinery transferring, from one ranch to another. I forget the details, but I know that him and another cowboy had to drive a tractor, and a truck/trailer over to the Monolith, which is maybe 15 miles away. Well, I know the truck/trailer got back, cause I seen it sitting in the ranch yard. But that evening, when I asked the usual: "how was your day?", My Cowboy said: "Well, it was a rather unproductive day. We have machinery scattered between here and town." "What happened?" I asked, wonderingly, in my mind's eye, I was imagining a tractor every quarter mile, for 20 miles.

"Had some flats." He answered, calmly.

I thought: 'OK, so they had a few flats, no big deal.' and went back to making my supper. Later that evening, when I went to Bible Study with my friend, who happens to be the other cowboy's wife, we passed the machinery along the road. First the tractor, then the bale buster. We both chuckled, but after talking about the incident with her, I realized again that My Cowboy really does take things very calmly. Even though he was in charge of the day, and had two (if not more) breakdowns, he wasn't even upset about it. It was just a part of life. It wasn't his fault, he couldn't have prevented it, so why get stressed? Sure, It made more work for the next day, and sure, its a pain when you have two pieces of machinery sitting by the road with flats, when you need them the next morning to feed yearlings, but hey, that's life. Roll with the punches. He is not gonna let it ruin his evening at home, he will just think about it later. When he needs to.

Which reminds me of one of the first times I actually noticed him... My family was driving to Central America. We were going to a tiny country called 'Belize'. To get there, we had to drive through Mexico. (That was before all the crazy drug violence you have now.)

Anyways, so after driving four days and three nights through, everyone was very ready to get there, and wash some dust off, and quit bumping along pot-holey roads. Well, not more than an hour or so from our destination, we have a flat on the van. I clearly remember Cliff getting down and changing that tire. I have a picture to prove it. But the remarkable thing to me, and the reason I noticed him, was that he just did it. He didn't say one word of complaint, or utter one groan of despair, or anything negative. He just rolled up his sleeves and went to work. (well, maybe his sleeves were already rolled up. We had no AC in our van, and we were in the tropics) Anyways, I just remember the irony of the situation; Here it was our van, our trip, our family, he was just along for the ride, and yet he was the one doing the hot, dirty work, while we all moaned and complained. Well, some of us complained. I forget who did and who didn't. And I think my brother or my dad helped with the tire, some. But it was Cliff's coolness under pressure and a difficult situation that won my heart. And his cute grin. But don't tell him that I said that - He doesn't think men are supposed to be cute! :)