Tim Frazer works at The Ranch. He’s their gofer and all-around assistant to whichever boss might need him to do something. He’s in his early twenties, likable, and – according to the girls – good looking.
I thought he was a boss. It’s obvious: anybody who works for The Ranch, who wears clean clothes, talks with people, and has a pickup truck, has to be a boss.
The year is 1957, the month is June. It’s summer, and school is out, and my fourteenth birthday was a month ago.
A lot has happened since then: I’ve been to my first party, kissed a girl for the first time, graduated from grammar school, survived the mumps, stopped “going out” with my real father every Sunday, and I’ll be pickin’ up my first-ever pair of glasses in a few days. There’re other things, but these are the most important.
That’s it, my first month of being a real teenager. At thirteen, I wasn’t a real teenager. Thirteen is a teenager with training wheels.
Things have changed. Changes that I wish I could talk with somebody about, but who? There’s no one to tell these things to.
Still, it looks like it’s gonna be a pretty boring summer. I don’t know what to do with myself. I’m raring to go, but, I can’t find anything here at home that interests me − plus, it’s confining here.
Somebody just drove in the driveway. I can see from the front window it’s Tim Frazer. He works for The Ranch. Everybody around here knows him. There’re only a couple hundred people who live around here. So, everybody knows everybody else. We moved here when I was seven.
The moment my Dad and I drove under the train trestle on Canyon Road, in his 1940 Chevy pickup loaded down with all our belongings, I knew I loved this place and would always call it home.
Now, at fourteen, it’s my world, it’s my life. But I’m not old enough yet to do all the things I want to do − things I want to do so bad I can taste them − like: work at The Ranch, fight grass fires, and the one thing I won’t tell anyone − to be a cowboy.
Tim just drove up. Finally, something to do. I’ll go to the garage and tell my Dad. I run out of the house, jump off the back steps, and run into the garage.
“Hey Dad, Tim just drove up out front.”
“Ok, thanks.”
He grabs a cloth, wipes his hands, and then walks up the gravel driveway to the front.
I wait in the garage. It’s not polite to be standin’ around listenin’ to adults talk.
It’s been five minutes now, and he’s comin’ back.
As he walks into the garage he says to me, “Tim wasn’t looking for me. He said he’s here to see you.”
“Me! What for?”
First thing I think of is that the Old Man saw me and my two friends in that field in front of the school havin’ a tomato and horse manure war, with his tomatoes and horse manure − he’s sent Tim over to tell my Dad.
Dad says, “I don’t know. You’ll have to ask him.”
I run out to the front and up to his side of the pick-up.
“Hi, Tim.”
“Hi, Sam, how you doin?”
“Ok. And you?”
“Busy as hell.”
“You wanted to see me?” I’m sure he’s got bad news.
“Yeah, the Old Man told me to come by. Look, we could use you this summer at the ranch. Do you want to come work for us?”
I can’t believe my ears. “Me?”
“Yeah, we can use you, startin’ next week.”
“Ok. But I’ll have to ask my Dad first. I’ll be right back.”
“Ok.”
I take off for the garage at a dead run.
“Dad, Dad! Tim wants me to go to work for the ranch. Can I?”
He doesn’t look up. “If you want. It’s up to you.”
“Ok, thanks. Wow!”
I run back to, Tim, “He said it’s ok!”
“Good. Then you’ll need to go down to the post office and get your Social Security card. You gotta have that to work.”
“Ok.”
“I’ll come back next week and tell you when you’re gonna start.”
“Ok, Tim Thank you.”
“See you, Sam.”
“See you, Tim.”
I watch as he drives away and wave as he passes the house. Then I run back to the garage.
I don’t know what to say to my Dad, or what to do. I’m so excited that I can’t settle down.
He’s quiet for a long time, then he asks me: “Are you sure you want to do this? Your hands are going to get blistered, bloody, and full of calluses and dirt. You’re going to hurt all over from all the hard work: hoeing, lifting 60-pound lug boxes of pears, and bucking 250-pound bales of hay. You sure you want that?”
“Yes.” I imagine my hands all blistered and bloody and full of dirt. “Yeah, I’m sure.”
I hadn’t expected to work at The Ranch, not at fourteen. Years later, I wondered if my Dad had set this up. He was fourteen once; he must have had some idea of what I needed at this age. To get away from the house, to work, and learn. He never spoke about these sorts of things. He was intelligent – he must have known. It’s the kind of thing he would do and then disappear out of the picture. That’s the way he was. It was what he said in the garage after Tim left − he was testing me. Did he set it up? I’ve never asked him − and won’t.
I went to work for The Ranch − and that’s where another story began.
