Little Pleasures of Life

There are so many big things we take for granted in this life. The things we take most pleasure in, we often appreciate the least. One of my biggest pleasures of life are the incredible landscapes i see in the country side. And I've realized... my biggest pleasure in beholding a rolling green landscape with a big white farm house and an even bigger red barn is what most people just skip right over. However abstract and just plain weird, its this little detail I've come to appreciate and admire. It is the fence.

I don’t remember exactly when my love affair with fencing began. Perhaps it started while surveying our handiwork after an afternoon building fence on my parents’ property in rural Montana. Perhaps it was watching all those rotten cedar posts pulled out, not once but twice, to eventually make way for vinyl. Perhaps it started while watching scores of animals brush against, rub against, and lean against all types of fencing, noticing which ones withstood the wear and which ones caved. Whatever prompted my fascination, the fact remains: all it takes is the sight of a straight, good-looking white fence to make me swoon about a property . . . and for my husband to say with his wry grin, “Oh you and your fences.”

If eyes are the windows into one’s soul, then fences, for me, are the windows into one’s home. We are taught not to judge a book by its cover, but I routinely and with no remorse judge a property by its fence line. Although acres of white vinyl against a backdrop of green lush pastures make me an invariable goner, even a strong line of cedar planks or treated pine boards can be equally enticing.

As a young couple recently moved to the area, we have logged innumerable hours driving around the Sandhills in search of our own slice of heaven. Although both my husband and I appreciate the same kind of rustic beauty in the old farm houses sprinkled liberally around the area, for me it is always the fencing that prompts me to either crane my head for one lingering look or dismiss the property as “just ok.”

I’ve come to realize, it isn’t so much the fence’s purpose that intrigues me. Instead, it is the invitation a fence can offer. It is the invitation to imagine what lies beyond in all its mystery and its potential. Vinyl invites big dreams—dreams of Wonder, my bay quarter horse filly I sold in high school to finance my year studying abroad; dreams of galloping bareback through the thick pasture grass knowing the only thing to harness either of our abandoned elation would be the corner property line; dreams of big red barns and shadowed stalls filled with the aroma I once told my mother I wanted to use as perfume.

Although partial to the crisp lines and contrast of white vinyl, it isn’t the only fencing that makes my head spin with a slew of images and possibilities. Dark wood rail fencing invites dreams of a sprawling ranch home, of a John Deere tractor under the lean-to and a big chocolate lab on the front porch. Long stretches of hot wire or pipe fencing invites thoughts of vast acreage, of hidden ponds and wallows thick with brush and wildlife. Even barbed wire can be inviting in the right setting. I think calves and cowboys with wide-brimmed hats. I think of life 50 years ago and wonder—yet again—if perhaps I was mistakenly born in the wrong decade. But then again, vinyl wasn’t around 50 years ago.