Lara Richardson | Photo by Adam Williams
Overview: Lara Richardson is a rancher in Salida, Colo., and author of The Table, a memoir that dives into her and her family’s life on the ranch, growing hay and raising cattle, and connecting deeply as a multigenerational, extended family.
She talks with Adam Williams about The Table. They also talk about the daily risks and rewards of working on the ranch, and how constant learning and innovations are critical for ranchers to thrive. And about the dramatically increasing value of agricultural land – monetarily and otherwise – and the increasing pressures of land development. Among other things, including some eye-opening stories from Lara’s memoir.
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SHOW NOTES, LINKS, CREDITS & TRANSCRIPT
The We Are Chaffee podcast is supported by Chaffee County Public Health.
Along with being distributed on podcast listening platforms (e.g. Spotify, Apple), We Are Chaffee is broadcast weekly at 2 p.m. on Tuesdays, on KHEN 106.9 community radio FM in Salida, Colo.
Lara Richardson
Website: lararuthrichardson.com
The Table: lararuthrichardson.com/order
Once Upon a Trapeze: onceuponatrapeze.com
We Are Chaffee Podcast
Website: weareChaffeepod.com
Instagram: instagram.com/wearechaffeepod
CREDITS
We Are Chaffee Host, Producer & Photographer: Adam Williams
We Are Chaffee Community Advocacy Coordinator: Lisa Martin
Director of Chaffee County Public Health and Environment: Andrea Carlstrom
TRANSCRIPT
Note: Transcripts are produced using an automated transcription app. Although it is largely accurate, minor errors inevitably exist.
[Intro music, guitar instrumental]
[00:00:13] Adam Williams: Welcome to the We Are Chaffee Podcast, where we connect through conversations of community, humanness and well being. In Chaffee County, Colorado. I’m Adam Williams.
Today I’m talking with Lara Richardson. Lara Lara is a local rancher who in recent years graduated from the Master of Fine Arts program at Western Colorado University, where she pursued her interest in nature writing. As a result, she published The Table, a memoir that dives into her and her family’s life on the ranch, growing hay and raising cattle and connecting deeply as a family.
That life they share is fascinating to me. The family connections feel extraordinary to me. I’m curious about it all and in some ways probably even envious of some things about it. It’s just so rooted in American traditions and I mean human history for that matter.
There was a time in the 1800s when 90% of Americans were farmers. Today, only around 1% are. So, this conversation that I got to have with Lara, and especially was getting to read her memoir as well, it’s enlightening to me. And by the numbers, the odds are good that it will be for you too.
Lara has described her childhood as one of a suburban latchkey kid of the 80s and with divorced parents, but later she would marry into a family with deep ranching roots and would become best friends with her in laws. Her story weaves through the generations and and the strong family bonds that include her and her husband Andrew’s five kids, along with their cousins, uncles, aunts and grandparents. And it extends to the neighbors and the surrounding ranching community, even as this way of life that has already fallen to only 1% of us continues to face existential challenges.
We talk about the value of agricultural land, monetarily and otherwise, and the increasing pressures of land development. We talk about the daily risks and rewards of working on the ranch and how constant learning and innovations are critical for ranchers to survive and thrive.
We also talk about the vulnerability of writing such a memoir and putting it out in a small rural community where it’s common to say things like we all know each other. But publishing a memoir really is letting people in to know who you are, what you think, and what you have to share. Though, like Lara says, “It’s a gift to be able to share a story, and it’s a gift to be able to listen to someone’s story.”
The We Are Chaffee Podcast is supported by Chaffee County Public health. Go to wearechaffeepod.com for all things related to this podcast, including links, transcript and photos related to this episode and all the others in the archive.
All right, on we go with the gift of Lara Richardson’s story.
[Transition music, guitar instrumental]
Adam Williams: Your memoir was so enlightening. It was eye opening for me. I grew up in a rural town. I grew up surrounded by farm kids, and they went hunting and they raised cattle and grew crops and all these things, but that wasn’t my life. I was a town kid. So I felt like I could come into your book and have some idea what I might read.
And yet it was just still so eye opening because there were details and stories and the imagery and everything that just took me to places that I. I had no idea. So I think this was educational.
[00:03:47] Lara Richardson: Oh, good.
[00:03:49] Adam Williams: I want to know, I guess, then, how you came to be comfortable with some of these things, because I don’t think you grew up with ranching, right? You married into it.
[00:03:57] Lara Richardson: Yes. Yes. Yeah. My first experience, really, with ranching was a senior in high school. I did a program called Senior Field Studies from Bear Creek High School in Lakewood, and we had to go spend two weeks on a farm. And so I was down in Rocky Ford for two weeks on a cattle ranch, and I didn’t know the difference between a heifer and a cow and a bull and a steer and just anything. And we had to. We had to do everything. And so, yeah, that was my first experience. And then when I met Andrew, his family, his grandparents ranched, and so we spent some time on their ranch. But he was a landscape architect student when we met.
[00:04:37] Adam Williams: But he grew up with it. It sounds like.
[00:04:40] Lara Richardson: No. Well, with his grandparents, he did, yes, for sure. His dad was an engineer, so he lived just in the foothills outside of Denver his whole childhood.
[00:04:47] Adam Williams: Okay, so both of you grew up with childhoods that are very different than that of your children?
[00:04:54] Lara Richardson: Oh, absolutely, yes.
[00:04:56] Adam Williams: Was that difficult to step into that world and start learning so many things that you needed to know? And for Andrew as well, although he obviously had that exposure through grandparents.
[00:05:05] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:05:05] Adam Williams: I just feel like it’s so amazing how much work goes into all of this and how much knowledge you have to have and all the things you’re dealing with.
[00:05:12] Lara Richardson: Absolutely. Every year we learn something. You’d think after what, this will be our 26th year, that we’ve got it all down and. Absolutely not. Every year we learn something different. So we’re always learning.
[00:05:24] Adam Williams: Was it difficult for you to become accustomed to things like, for example, there’s an anecdote, a story that you describe in branding and castration day and what your role is in that even is. I mean, but actually, any of those roles, I think I Would find it hard for me to do. You know, your kids would have to lead me through. How does all this work? But you’re out there castrating these male cabs, right?
[00:05:48] Lara Richardson: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:05:50] Adam Williams: How did you ever get used to that?
[00:05:53] Lara Richardson: I think it just has to be done at the moment. And there’s a timeline and you have like 30 seconds to get in there. And so you don’t really think about it.
You just dive in. And it’s like you want to make sure you get it done correctly, because if not, you have a bull instead of a steer running around in your herd. And so you only want specific bowls. And it’s all just important work, but it happens really quickly and you want to do it right. But it’s fascinating, too. I’ll never forget the first chicken that we were slaughtering chickens one day, which we don’t do on a regular basis. But our neighbor has this cool contraption where you can. Well, you kill the chicken first, and then you hold it by its feet and you put it on this machine with these rubber fingers and it goes in a circle and it de feathers them. And then you open the chicken and you take all of its guns.
But inside the chicken was all these stages of an egg. So it was like today’s egg and then the next day’s egg. And it was just the stages of the moon kind of, but inside a chicken. And so they’re hard shells and then down to like where they start getting soft and then they’re tiny. And it was just so, to me, it’s all just fascinating how it works. I love it.
[00:07:04] Adam Williams: It sounds like, well, did you have an interest in science at all before that, or is that. Because that’s something that I think is fascinating. It could really make me think, like, I need to dive into this. This is wild. I had no idea these things were going on.
[00:07:16] Lara Richardson: I don’t think I’ve had much of a mind for science, but I do. And I mean, you’ve seen this in the book, but like, my faith resides pretty strongly in science, like in the natural world and creation, how things work. And I’m fascinated daily by things I learn or things I see or hear. And it just, it never gets old because you can’t ever stop learning something new. It’s exciting.
[00:07:43] Adam Williams: I’m going to call out one other story that especially it was. It was kind of stunning to me as a non agricultural, non-ranching person. And that was where you graft a calf that has lost his mother cow. And with a mother cow that has lost her calf.
And what was involved in this, as you described, which could feel graphic to somebody who’s really not used to this kind of thing happening, is where Andrew essentially takes the skin off of the calf that unfortunately died. But then it’s put to good use by tying this over a live calf in hopes that the mother, who was not his natural mother, would. Would take to him.
I’m not sure what my question is on that, other than, again, I’m really trying to get into your seat and understand when you were first learning that these things existed at all and what that was like, maybe to. To learn, you know, “You do what? This is going to work how?”
[00:08:51] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah, that’s it. That does feel like a, it’s a shocking thing to see, you know, except for the fact that my husband and my sons have all hunted. Actually, my daughter, too, have all been hunting ever since we’ve been married. And so to see maybe, you know, your first elk being processed and the hide, you know, coming off. And so it wasn’t a foreign thing to me, at least early on in our marriage, you know, the first time I ever, you know, helped process and elk gets kind of like, oh. But then again, it’s fascinating to me and just amazing to see the muscles encased in this amazing fascia. And just. It’s just. It’s fascinating. It’s science, and I love that, for sure.
[00:09:36] Adam Williams: You point out, in the book, if I remember correctly, I think that Back in the 1800s, at some point, around 90% of Americans lived on farms.
[00:09:46] Lara Richardson: Yes. Yes.
[00:09:47] Adam Williams: And today it’s only around 1%.
[00:09:49] Lara Richardson: Yes. Yes.
[00:09:51] Adam Williams: So I think, even though I feel like I’m sort of stumbling through with naivete and ignorance in this experience of learning and having to acknowledge, even though I grew up in a rural area, all of this is foreign to me. Right. I go to a grocery store or a restaurant. I’m completely separated from these processes.
[00:10:09] Lara Richardson: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:10:11] Adam Williams: And so I think that that is probably the case for then, let’s say 99% of the people who are listening.
[00:10:16] Lara Richardson: Yes. And for me, too, I mean, I go to the grocery store still. I think about that a lot. I don’t milk our cows for milk. I buy milk. I buy a lot of groceries. We raise a lot of food. Beef, obviously, and then a garden in the summer and stuff. But I’m right there with you. We’re pretty disconnected from a lot of our food sources where, like you were talking about, long ago, people used to raise all of their food, really, you know, they. They’re they would go maybe to like a general store for. For some things like white sugar and, you know, go to a miller for flour. You know, I’d have it milled and stuff like that. But. But in general there. There wasn’t a thing of going somewhere for your food. It was a foreign concept, I think.
[00:11:00] Adam Williams: About those early ranchers who started out here. And there wouldn’t have been, you know, the towns that we have now, there wouldn’t have been the ease of those stores and they would have come out and been trying to, I think, learn how to do this at high elevation.
[00:11:15] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:11:16] Adam Williams: What do livestock need in order to thrive and prosper here? And for a business too. You also grow hay.
[00:11:24] Lara Richardson: Yes.
[00:11:25] Adam Williams: And I think I read, as I’m about to say this number, it sounds so big to me I feel like I must be wrong. But I’m thinking you said 30,000 bales.
[00:11:36] Lara Richardson: Yes. Yes.
[00:11:37] Adam Williams: So that’s right?
[00:11:38] Lara Richardson: Yes.
[00:11:38] Adam Williams: I can’t even picture. I don’t know how to picture that. That’s such a wild amount to me.
[00:11:43] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:11:44] Adam Williams: And those are 60-pound bales?
[00:11:46] Lara Richardson: Yep.
[00:11:47] Adam Williams: So that’s kind of the I picture or maybe three sizes of bales. Like are there small rectangles then maybe these 60 pound rectangles and then the large round bales that people would all recognize as they’re driving somewhere.
[00:12:01] Lara Richardson: Yeah. So we do put up large round bales now. We used to feed, when we had less cattle, we would feed small bales off the back of a pickup. But it becomes pretty labor intensive when you’re feeding hundreds of cows every day. And so we do have round bales now, and those weigh about 1500 pounds. And so we have a feeder that we pull behind a tractor and it just unrolls it like a roll of toilet paper of hay in the field.
[00:12:25] Adam Williams: Yeah, I think I’ve actually seen that once just in driving by somewhere years ago. That was kind of cool to see because again, even those simple things that are so basic to those who are doing the work for those of us who are so separated from it. Yeah, it’s. It’s just eye opening.
So I want to talk about when you and Andrew decided that you were going to start this life and this, I mean, I hesitate to use the word career. Right. It’s much bigger and deeper and richer than just a job that’s a career. But you came into this along with his side of the family.
[00:13:00] Lara Richardson: Yes.
[00:13:01] Adam Williams: And there’s so much to all of this, as you write about in the book, the intergenerational multiple generations involved Extended family, you know, that could be aunts, uncles, cousins. There’s so much that you’re involved in that is family oriented for work, play, church, and so much love.
And I, you know, it’s almost sad to admit, but I feel like that also feels foreign to me to have that sort of interdependence and the mentorship that it sounds like you got from your mother in law and your father in law and the closeness of everybody.
[00:13:43] Lara Richardson: Yeah, for sure. It takes a lot of people to run a ranch. And you know, when, when our kids were little, they weren’t super helpful, you know, and so therefore I wasn’t very helpful. And so my sister in law and I would, in the summer, for a couple weeks, just leave. We would take all between us, there’s seven kids at the time, and we would just leave for a couple weeks and go to California, to their grandmother’s house, to Andrew and Seth’s grandmother’s house and just go play. Because it was more helpful to take the kids away than have them home. Because what little boy doesn’t want to go sit on a tractor with his dad, you know, for all day, he says. But then after five minutes he’s bored.
[00:14:25] Adam Williams: Right.
[00:14:26] Lara Richardson: Kind of thing. And so, but as the kids grew older, they became really helpful and really necessary. And then also just Andrew’s parents and my brother in law and sister in law, Seth and Susie, who we ranch with now and then even my uncle Dan, who lives next door to me was bailing hay for a long time. You know, he’s 84 this year, so he’s not on a tractor anymore, but even he was out there in the summers bailing hay when our kids were little.
[00:14:56] Adam Williams: Was that just to help out because you didn’t come from your upbringing anyway where you were doing this work?
[00:15:03] Lara Richardson: No, no. He and my dad lived on a ranch for two years when they were little boys. And it’s the thing they talk about every day still. And so he said, hey, Andrew. He knew when you have a huge storm coming and your hay is ready and the field is full and you’ve got three balers but only two guys to run them. And he’s like, hey, I can remember how to drive a tractor. Just show me. And it’s like Uncle Dan was a stellar baler for years, so it was fun. He just jumped right in because he’s retired and so he’s watching these tractors and he’s like, I can do that.
[00:15:37] Adam Williams: I feel like what your kids grew up with, there’s, there’s this image of sort of an idyllic childhood and maybe even family life as well. And if we take that a step further, the community, you know, I mentioned the multiple generations. You have neighboring ranches, you’re part of something much larger, that is the ranching community and the neighborly friendliness where you will make meals for each other when it’s needed and you’re there in mutual support and all of these things. It really sounds like, like such a rich life that goes well beyond your own, you know, house walls and your own immediate family.
[00:16:13] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:16:13] Adam Williams: And it kind of had me feeling like there’s a sense of belonging that is not part of my life. Now, admittedly, I don’t participate in some of the same things that you do. I’m not engaged in faith in the way that I know is important to you. I’m not, you know, I’m not in that 1% that grew up with ranching and what that meant to family and how you have to be there for each other to share in that work. So I’m part of the large, I think, majority of Americans that are disconnected even from within our own families, let alone our neighbors.
[00:16:48] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:16:49] Adam Williams: Who, by the way, I don’t even know their last names.
[00:16:51] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:16:52] Adam Williams: For those, I do know a first name, I don’t know my neighbors’ last names. And we don’t know what they do, what each other does.
[00:16:57] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:16:58] Adam Williams: So your, your life in that way feels kind of idyllic.
[00:17:03] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:17:03] Adam Williams: And I don’t, you know, I’ll say old fashioned, for lack of a better word coming to mind, but meaning in a positive sense.
[00:17:10] Lara Richardson: Yeah. Yeah. Where your neighbors, you need your neighbors. Yeah.
[00:17:14] Adam Williams: Tell me about that. Tell me what that sense of belonging and how much that, you know, is significant in your life and your family’s life.
[00:17:23] Lara Richardson: Yeah. Well, we have. I’m thinking of two specific neighbors. Well, in our family, our neighbors. Right. Because we all live pretty, pretty near each other. And we do have, one of my son’s best friends from growing up is now working for us full time. And so he’s one of our neighbors, Wyatt, and we couldn’t do it without Wyatt. Now these days we’re getting older and our kids are in college or beyond.
And so I would say he’s a neighbor we can’t live without for sure on the ranch, but we have another couple neighbors, Jim and Gina Clark, who they have some cows and they raise some hay, but we ride with them all summer. They come along and they help because it’s fun. You want to get on your horses Your horses need to be ridden. It’s fun to go ride the forest in the summer and move cows.
But then, oh, our tractor breaks down right in the middle of the harvest. It’s like, oh, here, I’ll come help you. Or Andrew breaks his leg. I will never forget Jim bringing out a, like a chaise lounge kind of thing out to our barn. And he’s like, “Andrew, you sit in that chair, and don’t you get up.” Cause Andrew’s leg is broken, and Jim’s in there fixing his tractor for him, and he’s like, if you get up, I’m going home. You know, kind of thing. And so it’s just this. It just. You feel like people have your back, and hopefully they feel that that same way about you. So just one of our friends and Danae, just this last week, she was working cattle, and one of her bulls kicked her and broke both of her bones in her lower leg. And so to have.
And I’d say Danae is, like, very integral to their operations on the daily basis, much more so than I am. And to have her down with a broken leg is just terrible. So, you know, we talked last night with her husband. It’s like, well, that’s like. That’s on my list this week is to. To bring her dinner. You know, it’s something I can do because we’ve been there, and it’s so frustrating just to be laid up.
[00:19:23] Adam Williams: It sounds incredibly painful to take a kick like that from a bull.
[00:19:27] Lara Richardson: Right.
[00:19:28] Adam Williams: That’s another story that you describe, is when the bulls did not get fed one night, and at midnight, you were the one who went out to feed them because Andrew was sick and trying to get some sleep and how scary that was in the night with these big, powerful bulls. And the risks of doing that.
[00:19:48] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:19:49] Adam Williams: So to take a kick like that, that would break.
[00:19:52] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:19:53] Adam Williams: Both of the lower bones there. I can’t imagine the amount of pain.
[00:19:58] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:19:58] Adam Williams: And this is a daily risk, right, in terms of ranching, is that there’s always something, whether it’s with the mechanics, you know, tractors, if it’s with the livestock themselves, or, I mean, I don’t know, even encountering a rattlesnake out on the field, right?
[00:20:13] Lara Richardson: Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Every day. Well, whenever we go ride in the summer, just getting on these horses just feels very vulnerable because they’re big and fast and often unpredictable. And so when you come home at the end of the day and nobody got hurt, it’s pretty exciting. You’re a little amped up in the Morning. Because you never quite know what’s going to happen because the cows are unpredictable, the horses are, and the weather is. And when you’re riding and then all of a sudden, this huge rainstorm and lightning and thunder, everything’s cracking around you. It’s like. It’s just. It’s a kind of a crazy situation.
[00:20:48] Adam Williams: So in a movie, if I’m just home on my couch watching it, that all sounds really awesome and sexy to see, is like, wow, there’s this iconic thing, right. Of a cowboy out on the range, and they’re dealing with these things. But actually be out there and have to live these things is far more challenging in reality, I’m sure.
[00:21:09] Lara Richardson: Yeah. Yeah. And we’ve had those days where we do come home with a broken back or a broken leg or our neighbor. The neighbor I was telling you about, Jim. I mean, one day he broke his leg, he got thrown, and we were out at the pasture, and it was like, okay, we, for the first time, use the SOS function on our phone. I’ve never used it before, but it worked. It was fantastic. But, you know, so there to have the days, it just. That’s what makes the good days really good, is when you’ve had the bad days. And you know that, like, wow, this was a day of sunshine and no injuries. And we found the cows, and it was a good day.
[00:21:42] Adam Williams: You broke your back at some point, right? Was that related to work on the ranch or was that something completely different?
[00:21:48] Lara Richardson: I was getting on my horse. We were getting ready to go put. One of our dogs had just a stomach full of cancer and tumors, so we were getting ready to go put him down. So my husband had his gun and one pocket and a steak and a Ziploc bag and the other one. And we were going to take them for a last ride. His favorite thing was to go running along with us with our horses. And so it happened to be really stormy day, and we were just gonna go take him up our pond and. And put him down. But it’s like the storm came in, and then we had a certain family member living with us who was kind of working with, training a horse. And it was pretty skittish. And anyway, like, lightning hit and it flew up and reared up, and then my horse took off while I was getting on him, and it was my mistake, and my mind was, you know, with, like, sad. We were putting our dog down.
[00:22:35] Adam Williams: What you’re describing there, again, you’re not going to a vet. My experience with that is we need a veterinarian. To administer the shot that does that when it’s finally time.
[00:22:46] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:22:47] Adam Williams: And I imagine a lot of difficulty with that. You know, I assume, you know, Andrew still feels that in his heart and he’s sad and that’s a matter of. It’s a task that might be mercy.
[00:23:04] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:23:05] Adam Williams: And is necessary.
[00:23:06] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:23:06] Adam Williams: And yet again, for a non-ranching person like myself, that’s a foreign idea where I’m just like, oh, I don’t know that I could do that. Right.
[00:23:16] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:23:17] Adam Williams: I’m trying to look at where while owning my own, I guess, who I am. I mean, I don’t feel like I need to apologize for not being someone who has the skills and knowledge that you all do and that life. But it can feel like in our society there’s a gap of understanding between people who live in, say, cities.
[00:23:38] Lara Richardson: Yes.
[00:23:38] Adam Williams: Or just me, even in a small town growing up and those who are actually out engaged in these things. And it’s very difficult to understand what some of those details in your life are. And that it’s not done, you know, without compassion and the heart sometimes getting involved too. And man, that’s tough.
[00:23:59] Lara Richardson: It is tough. It is hard to have legislation happen by people who maybe don’t understand the day to day. We used to be pretty involved with Farm Bureau and we got to go to Washington, D.C. one time, the two of us, to talk to some senators about a bill that was being introduced about children in agriculture, which the heart behind it was awesome because it was a lot about migratory workers, you know, coming in for this harvest and that harvest. And but their kids were coming with them and they weren’t ever in school.
And so they were constantly moving around, which totally makes sense in that scenario. But it was basically meaning that our kids couldn’t mow our lawn, they couldn’t help with branding, they couldn’t be on a horse and move cows, they couldn’t. I mean, the details were so crazy when applied to our situation. And so we went and we’re just like, our kids are home baling hay for us right now while we’re out here to talk to you. And that would be illegal under this. And so they finally, they were like, oh, yeah, we got to make some changes to this. Because the intent of it was great with a great heart and stuff, but when you, when you apply it to a different situation, it was just completely absurd.
[00:25:08] Adam Williams: This reminds me of another story that you shared, and this was with calves who were born at the time of year where it still is cold, it’s wet, we’re transitioning into spring, but it’s not quite maybe the best conditions for that. And then you have a calf come out that is overexposed, potentially at risk of hypothermia, and you could lose them.
So what you do is take them into your family’s bathtubs to put them in warm water and try to, you know, massage them and revive them as needed. And that was a reason accepted at the school. Right? Just a regular understanding that ranch kids have work to do. And this is a dire moment where there’s livelihood and the lives of these calves at stake.
[00:25:54] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah.
[00:25:55] Adam Williams: And you just call and say this, you know, yeah, it’s a calving day and we’ve got problem.
[00:26:00] Lara Richardson: Yeah, we’ll bring them in when we can. They’re like, “oh, that’s fine.”
[00:26:05] Adam Williams: Yeah, yeah, that. That’s understood. Is. It’s just amazing to me. Well, I mean, first of all, let’s. Let’s go back to this story.
[00:26:12] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:26:13] Adam Williams: Because again, it’s in your bathtub. We’re talking about a calf. I mean, mud, blood, after birth, manure. And of course, I’m picturing all this and thinking that is a different– Like, I’m not real crazy about my wife washing our dog in the bathtub. Just, you know, that’s enough.
[00:26:32] Lara Richardson: Mm.
[00:26:32] Adam Williams: If I’m really honest about it.
[00:26:34] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it feels like the right thing to do in the moment. You know, you come in, you’re like, this calf’s gonna die if we don’t help it. So the idea, your clean bathtub just goes out the window. You know, it’s just like the hierarchy of priorities changes pretty significantly, and then.
[00:26:51] Adam Williams: You’re able to clean that well enough that you’re at least psychologically able to think the next time you take a bath.
[00:26:56] Lara Richardson: Yeah. Oh, for sure.
[00:26:57] Adam Williams: Which is clean.
[00:26:58] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah. Didn’t know that that’s what my day was gonna entail. You know, that’s. I think a lot of it. There has to be a lot of flexibility in agriculture because you can have your plans for the day, but they, more often than not, are way different than.
[00:27:13] Adam Williams: You mentioned a list earlier. You live by lists. You refer to those often in your writing and that every day, of course, has a list. And it’s probably a range of tasky, detailed, mundane sort of stuff all the way up to the bigger things. And probably every day that can get thrown out of whack.
[00:27:34] Lara Richardson: Oh, for sure. Yeah, yeah. Emergency can throw it out of whack or just, you know, something the Cows get out. I mean, you just drop everything. Doesn’t matter what you’re doing when you have cows out. Our cattle now in the summer, we have this awesome Forest service permit up near Buffalo Peaks.
And so when the sheriff calls you and says your cows are out on 285, I mean, doesn’t matter what you’re doing, you. You have to get up there and put them back in because people are driving 70 miles an hour, and if they, you know, those are people’s lives at stake. So not to mention the cows.
[00:28:08] Adam Williams: Do you take your cattle over to four Mile?
[00:28:12] Lara Richardson: So we’re on the opposite side of Buffalo Peaks, so, yeah, so it’s a like almost 50,000 acre permit allotment that we have with the Forest Service, and so we can graze all summer there. But yeah, so it’s just up and over Buffalo Peaks from Four Mile.
[00:28:28] Adam Williams: I sometimes encounter people’s cattle when I’m out there in the summer. You know, to me, that’s just interesting.
[00:28:34] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:28:34] Adam Williams: We’re sharing this land like that.
[00:28:35] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:28:36] Adam Williams: I’m out there for a. A trail run or I’m on a bike or something, or, you know, of course people camp out there and things like that.
[00:28:42] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah.
[00:28:43] Adam Williams: But. Yeah, I don’t know. I love seeing the cattle, I guess, and in part because it does call back to. To my childhood. And it’s sort of a story, I think, of what I didn’t experience and, did I miss out because all my friends around me again, they’re going deer hunting, and the teachers are writing on the chalkboard throughout deer hunting season, who got the biggest rack, you know, on a buck, and things like that that I couldn’t participate in because that wasn’t my life. So I think there’s always. Even all these years later, there’s a real fascination to me about understanding the work that you do and kind of maybe wishing that I had some knowledge of it, that I had been like your uncle and dad having at least a couple years when I was a kid to call back to that experience, and I just don’t have that.
[00:29:32] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it’s. It’s pretty awesome that we live in a place where you can still get out, though, you know, like, you’re saying you’re out trail running, and I think we can create expansion experiences for our kids.
They don’t necessarily have to be on the farm, but, you know, the Hutchinson Ranch has a summer program, a farmhands program, where kids can go and they can learn how to irrigate and learn more about agriculture, which is great. So there’s opportunities, but it is different than just living in it. Naomi, my second daughter, she called the other day and she said, mom, I’m reading this book, The Anxious Generation. Did you ever read that?
[00:30:10] Adam Williams: Yeah. By Jonathan Haidt.
[00:30:12] Lara Richardson: And she was like, I was just calling to thank you for our childhood. She’s like, I know it wasn’t perfect, but she’s like, thank you for the days in the fields, just picking dandelions with Ellie, you know, and just this openness and this outside. It was always just outside. It’s just being really important for kids, especially now with phones and.
[00:30:31] Adam Williams: Yeah. Yeah, for sure. In reading so much of. Of your book, I was thinking about the memories that they’re carrying going forward.
[00:30:39] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:30:40] Adam Williams: And it sounds like. I realize there’s a shaping of the story through what was shared in the book. And I would be curious to know about some of the lesser moments maybe, too. But I do think that their childhood memories have to be overflowing and that they will be grateful for having learned how to do hard things.
[00:31:04] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:31:05] Adam Williams: And having been part of hard work and learned how to. I mean, the driving tractors and. And trucks and whatever, probably at a young age, and horses and the cattle and just all of the things that, again, I mean, I’m gonna be the example for an awful lot of people. Just wasn’t part of it.
[00:31:24] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:31:24] Adam Williams: And I mean, I’m grateful that I. And I think it’s. It’s. We are part of the. A generation that was raised. You’ve described yourself as a latchkey kid of the 80s, and that sounds very familiar for me. And I’m glad that I am part of a generation that still pre foam. Pre Internet, had a lot of time outside, learned how to do a lot of things on our own. Learned how to be really responsible or independent or, you know, take consequences for what we got into. And your kids have such an abundance of that.
[00:32:00] Lara Richardson: Yeah. It feels like a really special time. They’re growing up, and the ranch feels really different with them gone. Esther’s at home still, but everybody else is in college and often careers. And so it feels really different at home now because they’re not all working. And, you know, there are those moments where, you know, Andrew’s like, all right, we’re going to Murdoch’s and everybody’s getting a pair of Wranglers. And they’re all just like, dad, we don’t wear Wranglers. Like, we wear skinny jeans. And we were. He goes. He goes. The minute you start fixing Fence and those skinny jeans you call him. He’s like, you might as well be wearing tights. He’s like, barbed wire’s gonna hit those. And there’s this conflict at the table.
You know, it’s like you have to wear long sleeve shirts and I don’t want to wear a long sleeve shirt. He’s like, well, you’re wearing a long sleeve shirt, you know, so there’s definitely those moments of growing up where they’re just like, are you kidding me? And we have to be down at 7 on a Saturday morning like, dad, you got to be joking me. Or, you know, so there’s, there’s definitely the, you know, the, the harder, you know, parts of, of parenting with that.
[00:33:01] Adam Williams: That makes me feel a little better actually, because, yeah, it, I kind of was feeling like, you must have the best family on Earth because it seemed like all the kids were so, you know, into the work together, that their relationships were so great together and with all of you together. And I guess I kind of thought, man, my teenagers aren’t really cooperative like that.
[00:33:25] Lara Richardson: I do have the best family on earth. I do have to say they are amazing. But none of us are perfect. No. I mean, our girls fought over clothes. Our boys got in wrestling fights on the fly. I mean, no, we’re just all people, right?
But it’s just a special time. But the one thing I do want to encourage people is just everybody’s gotta eat each day, you know, and you get to hopefully at some point in some meal, pick who you’re eat with and what you’re going to talk about and what you’re going to eat. And so it doesn’t matter what country you live in or where you live in or what your house is like, or, you know, if you have a card table for a table or no table or a big table like ours or whatever. It’s like, that’s the important part is sitting with your family, you know, and, and, you know, learning things together, doing dangerous things, having adventures. You know, I think those are all important. But it might not be ranching, but it’s, it’s being together and doing things together. I think that’s the important thing.
[00:34:21] Adam Williams: Your memoir is called The Table, of course. So it’s centered around this physical, actual table that you and Andrew built. And it’s sizable and it can accommodate, you know, a large family beyond even the number of kids and things that you have. Again, we have extended family of multiple generations. And if we go back to that, I want to come back to this mentorship aspect and the closeness that you had with your in laws, your mother in law, your father in law. That sounds like it was so full of love. And of course, it’s a tremendous loss in your family when each of them, in time, would pass on.
[00:35:02] Lara Richardson: Yes.
[00:35:02] Adam Williams: Both from cancer, correct?
[00:35:04] Lara Richardson: Yes.
[00:35:05] Adam Williams: Will you tell me something about that relationship and how you came into this at the time, new life of ranching, this new family with all these roots in ranching.
[00:35:15] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:35:15] Adam Williams: And how you were able to not only learn about all of that, but figure out how to blend in with that family and develop so much love and an openness to what they had to teach you.
[00:35:26] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah. No, it was amazing. You know, in the book I described that we got to live with them for a year and a half when we moved to Salida. You know, Andrew’s dad had retired and bought the beginnings of the ranch down here long ago, back when the prices were normal.
And to be able to live with them and to see what it was like to live with, you know, a mom and a dad that are married and have been married for a long time. I remember, you know, years of that up until I was about 6. So I have memories of that with my own parents. But then, you know, they were divorced, and so then it was a much different upbringing from there. And so to watch, like, older adults in a marriage was pretty fantastic. And that wasn’t perfect either. I mean, we all laughed the other day. We were going through some of Andrew’s dad’s things in the kitchen, and the. Oh, the pressure cooker was in there, you know, where you can, like, put potatoes in. And it’s kind of an older, you know, whatever. Some people like them, like, for canning.
[00:36:23] Adam Williams: Vegetables from the garden or something.
[00:36:25] Lara Richardson: Yeah. But they would always put potatoes or in there, and. But they. They always fought about this pressure cooker. And it was like a. A metaphor for their relationship. Like, it’s gonna blow in a minute. Right. And so it’s like, hey, does anybody want their pressure cooker? And it’s like, we’re all like, no, nobody wants their pressure cooker. Because it’s like the memories from that were, like, not always, you know, fun. It was kind of stressful. So, you know, they’re. They’re just normal people. But to have this home where they. They welcomed me into their family and just the unique relationship I was able to have with either of them.
And Ruthie and I switched off cooking each night, every other night when we moved in, and that was so fun, and it was. It was terrifying. Because I was like, I didn’t really know how to cook very well. And you know, she’s, she was an amazing cook. And you know, my father in law was pretty, you know, opinionated about things. And I remember one night I was making dinner and the whole entire kitchen was a disaster. I think I’d used every pot in the house and, and he’s like, you know, Ruth has a really great way of like cleaning up as she goes or something or like, or like not using every pot in the kitchen basically, or whatever. And I was kind of like, oh, so. And it was, so it was this a little bit of like, I want to, I want to impress my in laws, you know, that I want to be capable and, and all this, but. Oh, I just feel like I made so many mistakes. But looking back now, they became my best friends. So it was definitely a growing relationship. And yeah, to have lost them is a tremendous loss for sure.
[00:37:53] Adam Williams: You even helped with your father in law at the end in significant ways, right?
[00:37:58] Lara Richardson: Yes. Yeah. So he lived 10 years, it’ll be 11 years this summer that Ruthie passed away and he lived for 10 years past her. She died of lung cancer. And he changed during those 10 years. He became softer and we got to know a side of him that I don’t think we would have necessarily even–
[00:38:19] Adam Williams: Andrew, too?
[00:38:20] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he just always said yes about anything, adventures, river trips, hikes, anything trips, just whatever. He was up for it and came over for dinner a lot to our house and then also to my brother in law Seth and his wife Susie’s house. And just, you know, he just was all about family and it was fun to watch him grow as a person during that time. And so yeah, he, in December of this last year, he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. And yeah, I was in the emergency room with him when he got the diagnosis.
And that was, that was a tough day. And I just remember him looking and he’s like, the hardest thing is, is that I’m just gonna miss you, you know, like this. He just loved his family ferociously. And so I don’t think he was too sad necessarily about going. You know, he was 81, lived a really full, great life, but it was just the, the relationships were going to be the thing. So we moved in with him.
My husband and I and our daughter Esther moved in with him for the last two months of his life and so just took care of him through that whole process. And there were some really joyful days and some really hard days for sure, but it was a really special time.
[00:39:29] Adam Williams: You had previously described that as an inspiration in watching how he handled this process of dying, essentially knowing that this. This is the end.
[00:39:40] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:39:41] Adam Williams: Can you share more with me on what you saw as inspiration and in maybe what you learned, Anything you might have learned about how he handled this, you know, this. This circumstance and knowing that this family that means so much and the ranch and everything here, I think it’s, you know, certainly not everyone who gets to know that that end is coming and prepare.
[00:40:05] Lara Richardson: Yes. And to have that time to say goodbye and, boy, he’s. He was just a trooper. I think the one thing that hit me was that, you know, you spend a whole lifetime acquiring and working and saving and, you know, just. And then to watch somebody die and that you take nothing with you, you know, that you leave everything here, all of the material possessions, the land, the.
Everything you. You don’t take it with you. And so I feel like so much of our focus in life is on all this stuff and all of the experiences and. And things, and then to just. We. We leave the way we came, you know, and it feels very spiritual and intentional. You know, you almost. It is like a full circle to watch, you know, a birth and then to watch a death. And they feel very, very similar, I would say. And he was fascinated with the process of dying. Just the actual physiological, like, wow, so this is this happening in my body. You know, one of his legs, he had tons of fluid in his legs. And just to have one of them be heavier and more filled with fluid. And the hospice nurse said, “oh, that’s because the left, the opposite side of your heart is failing. So it’s always the opposite. And so it’s not moving the heart fluid through your body.”
And I’m like, what heck has heart fluid? Like, it was just so. It was fun to, even though it was this terribly sad time, he was still, he was a learner till the very last. You know, it’s just. He was like, “oh, that’s really interesting, isn’t it?” And I think he just wanted to know how it was going to work. And just a great shout out to the hospice nurses and Salida. I mean, they’re just fantastic. And we’re straight shooters and compassionate and kind, and I couldn’t have done it without him.
[00:41:51] Adam Williams: That’s an incredible way to handle, you know, what otherwise would be just bad news.
[00:41:57] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:41:58] Adam Williams: And whatever you’re observing about your body every day is, oh, hey, here’s something else that is different. Doesn’t feel right.
[00:42:04] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:42:04] Adam Williams: Things are getting worse. To actually approach it with such a curiosity and fascination, to say, I want to learn about this thing.
[00:42:12] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:42:13] Adam Williams: And carry that all the way to the last is. That is inspiring.
[00:42:18] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:42:19] Adam Williams: That is impressive.
[00:42:19] Lara Richardson: Yeah. Yeah. And it just makes you. To watch somebody’s body slowly stop functioning, makes you really thankful for your body that’s functioning. I mean, I know, you know, we all have stuff that’s, like, not working right or whatever, and people are in different stages of dying, and I don’t want to discount that, but, I mean, just there’s so many systems happening in our bodies right now as you and I are talking, and it’s just miraculous. And then to watch those systems start to shut down is. You just. I just. I think we really take for granted our days, for sure.
[00:42:53] Adam Williams: You also got to gather your family and kind of have a memorial or a funeral or something for him while he was still present for it, Right?
[00:43:03] Lara Richardson: Yeah.
[00:43:04] Adam Williams: So basically getting a chance to share with him what he meant to each of you and to all of you.
[00:43:10] Lara Richardson: Yeah. Yeah. It was really special. Christmas Day. It was our last Christmas with him. Just this morning, we have a journal for our family. That’s our Christmas journal. And we write every year, you know, what we did for Christmas. And I was just. I hadn’t done it yet, and so I was killing time before seeing you today, and I was just writing in that. It was just. It was a special time, you know, so my husband was like, all right, guys, we’re gonna. You know, you don’t want to buy papa anything. Like, doesn’t make sense. Right. You know. Yeah, we all stress out about Christmas gifts and, you know, all this stuff. And it’s like, it was just a real, like, wow, what really means something to someone. And so he’s like, you know, maybe write a verse, you know, a poem or Bible verse or a story or whatever. Just if you want to say something to him. And so that was a super special time. Yeah.
[00:43:55] Adam Williams: If we talk more about the ranch and ranching, you know, it strikes me as simultaneously this. I mean, history, long human history, long skill set and knowledge and way of being, and simultaneously, it is something that you have to be innovative and constantly learning and best methods change. And you mentioned before, you know, weather patterns and different things affect what’s happening and climate change, and we’ve got wildfire, risk and drought and all the things that can change up everything you think you know about it. And right now, today or this season, we have to figure out a different answer. Right. So it’s this constantly living experience while also being rooted in something that’s so fundamental to humans throughout history.
[00:44:42] Lara Richardson: Yes.
[00:44:43] Adam Williams: And that’s amazing to me. I would like to talk about the things that you see as especially important right now in your experience as a rancher. I know that land development is an issue, and please share whatever you want about that or anything else that you see as, you know, what’s on your mind, what’s maybe a threat to this way of Life. As the 1%, you know, went from 90% down to 1%, you know, that’s a trajectory of we’re losing this.
[00:45:15] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah. I think that, I mean, ranching on its own, just without the outside influences, is a pretty challenging lifestyle. Farming and ranching. And then to have kind of the outside influences. Oh, just for example, if we’re moving cattle from one field to another, and we have to go down a couple county roads, you know, and you have a couple hundred head of cattle in the middle of the road, and people get mad, you know, and they’re honking their horns or they drive right through fast, and, you know, just stuff like that where it’s just like, if people could just, like, slow down and take a deep breath and, you know, just not be mad about something like that.
But it’s hard because we live in a fast world, you know, we don’t have a lot of margin in our lives, and we do, too. I mean, it’s the same thing. It’s like, we’ve, like, you talk about the list, it’s like, oh, we gotta do this and this and this, or, you know, we’re racing up to south park if our cows are out, so, you know, we can be in a hurry, too. So it’s not that we’re isolated from that, but just maybe trying to work a little bit more with people in ag would be super helpful. And, you know, just there’s a lot of, you know, opinions and stuff about the, you know, the wolves being introduced into Colorado, and there’s so many different, you know, takes on that.
Like, is this even good for the wolves themselves that have been reintroduced and, you know, obviously the ranchers and, you know, that whole conversation? But just the other day we had Andrew’s dad’s dog, you know, when he passed away, and so he inherited his dog, his best friend. And we were outside working on corrals and. And all this, and all of a sudden we hear this calf in our back corral who is lame back there because he had a hurt leg, and we hear it just screaming and It’s a. It’s a very distinct sound to have a calf. It’s not just a normal bawling of a calf. It’s like this desperate plea, you know, And I was like, “what is that?”
We go over there and his dad’s dog is chewing on this calf and just tearing into it. And he, you know, running over there and, you know, yelling at him, trying to pull him out, you know, kicking him as hard as he can in the ribs, like, five times, like, would have, you know, just meander’s just like, get off that. And the mom comes over and she starts, like, hitting him, the. The dog, and he won’t let go. He’s got his teeth on this. This calf, and he will not let go. And then there’s, like, about six other moms come, and they finally did this, like, awesome herd mentality that I’ve never seen before. I’ve seen one cow be very protective, but to see, like, a group of moms come over and. And just lay into him and he, I mean, they basically threw him, you know, but it’s. It’s tough.
And I mean, Andrew put him down, you know, immediately he’s like, “you can’t have an animal like that around your cattle.” Like, it’s just you and obviously we have kids and, you know, other animals and stuff, but it’s. It’s not just like the wolves. It’s just. It’s. You’re protecting your animals, you know, and so even if it’s a dog, it’s so. But that’s tough, you know, to have his dad die and have to go bury his dog.
[00:48:15] Adam Williams: Yeah. And I want to get into the land development piece a bit, I guess, because as I think about this, so much has changed. You mentioned when Andrew’s parents started buying some ranch land. I think this was back in the 90s. Okay. So prices were. I think. I don’t remember how you said it, but basically they were much more rational.
[00:48:36] Lara Richardson: Yes.
[00:48:36] Adam Williams: –than where we’ve come to be with, you know, the housing market and land. How is this impacting your work? Aside from the fact that, again, if we look at the disconnect, the gap between people who understand what your life is out here and what it means to the community, and then they’re out there riding bikes on the roads that go by your ranch, or they’re driving too fast or they’re impatient because you’re moving a herd.
Yeah. That all rolls into one. That. What we’re talking about is there’s been a big, big shift in population in the past few decades. And there’s been a big shift in what it means to have a ranch and be able to protect its. Its future against things like land development and, I mean, all the reasons people want to get a hold of your land.
[00:49:24] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We were just on a walk the other day, and Andrew’s always got a shovel when we’re walking, and. And he was kind of irrigating along the way, and I just, like, the soil is amazing. It is just dark and beautiful. And he was like, “why would a community ever allow land like this, soil like this to be developed?”
You know, it’s because we get our food from other places. But he’s like, the moment that our community didn’t have access to food outside of it, we would be like, wow. You know, because there’s not. All the land in Chaffee county is this beautiful soil that can be used to grow things. You know, it’s very rocky, it’s very, you know, river rock everywhere. And so, you know, we’re looking at this soil, and then you can hear in the distance, you know, the machines working, getting ready to put in this big subdivision to the east of us, and they’re, you know, putting in close to 70 houses over there.
And you do the math and, you know, you add those lots up and it’s like over $17 million for that land, you know, and then you’re irrigating and having cattle and stuff, and it’s like, it’s. It’s a very glaring reality, you know, to like, wow, there. There is this value, but then to realize that there is this value of, like, the things that you’re talking about, you know, heritage and family and land, and yet we have this new generation, right? And currently none of them are ranching right now, you know, and so it’ll be interesting to see what happens.
We love it, and they loved growing up here, and so, I don’t know, we’ll see what happens. You know, the county, I feel like, has taken steps to kind of move away from the high density subdivisions on agricultural land just with the new zoning and things like that. So, I don’t know, it is my hope. I would love for the land to remain as it is and yet still have our kids be able to come back and build a house if they want and that kind of thing. So I don’t know.
[00:51:33] Adam Williams: Do you feel like that you are kind of in a position that you might not even want to have to be advocates basically, to Protect that land beyond your family’s own future. You’re part of a smaller population, and it gets smaller and smaller as families end up selling the land for one reason or another. Maybe they don’t have another generation to take it over. Or those dollar signs can be really attractive. Right? You’re sitting on millions of dollars of land, but you’re not millions of dollars rich in your pocket.
[00:52:06] Lara Richardson: And it involves a lot of people. It’s not just me, you know, it’s a big family, you know.
[00:52:11] Adam Williams: Yeah. And. Well, in the. Again, the future, you don’t know when one of your kids, they all have these roots, might want to come back and continue this. But does that make you sort of feel like you have to almost be this warrior on behalf of the land and agriculture and sustaining a way of life that there’s so much kind of encroachment on because of things like, let’s develop a neighborhood here instead?
[00:52:36] Lara Richardson: Yeah. You know, I don’t feel like that. I feel like we still have, you know, rights as property owners, you know, and it’s kind of what we’re going to choose to do with it.
I’m more excited just to see what the kids can come up with, you know, and the cousins and all that. And it just. It is exciting to think about them being able to go and do other things, too, that they don’t have to ranch. And so I guess I feel maybe a little bit more hands off and just hoping that they’re inspired to something great other than maybe just selling out, but maybe being creative and thinking about things and how to preserve this heritage, but also to gain something. I don’t know. It’ll be interesting.
[00:53:24] Adam Williams: A way to preserve the land even if they choose not to continue with ranching.
[00:53:28] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah. I mean, there’s different ways to do things, you know, maybe. And there are a lot of new kind of conservation ideas about helping ranches still continue on, and yet people getting some value from that. And it seems like there’s a lot of people trying to think through instead of just so quickly being like, wow, this is worth a lot. We’re just gonna sell it and move, you know?
[00:53:50] Adam Williams: Are you talking about something like conservation easements?
[00:53:53] Lara Richardson: Yeah. Yeah. But even more so, there are conservation easements with, like a working side to them. Like, you’re talking about where younger people who want to be an ag but don’t come from an ag family and because you can’t just come buy land in Chaffee County and be like, I’m going to be a farmer, and make it, I mean, that’s just not going to happen just because of the price of the land. And so sometimes pairing, you know, just pairing that with a conservation easement and then people being paid, you know, different things. I don’t know all the ins and outs of them, but I know that there are a lot of people trying to work on, on different things.
[00:54:32] Adam Williams: So with those easements, you wrote that the average cost for that is around $70,000. And I, I know nothing about how they work, but that sounds like such a significant investment and it might not even end up coming through.
[00:54:48] Lara Richardson: Right.
[00:54:49] Adam Williams: A Rancher could put in $70,000, give or take, into this process and then have whoever all is involved with the government and whatever that, that give and take is, might decide, “no, this isn’t the way we’re going to go forward here.”
[00:55:03] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah.
[00:55:05] Adam Williams: So that, yeah, that seems like an iffy proposition at best. And, and I don’t know, is that worth spelling out maybe what an easement is meant to be when it does work?
[00:55:16] Lara Richardson: Yeah, I do think there is more funding available now than there used to be to help agricultural families with those easements to where they can basically still own their land, but in a way, sort of sell the developmental rights to a conservation program.
And so you get, you get paid good money to just not ever develop your land. You can still work it, you still own it. But it does help families where maybe you have some siblings or something who live in another state and aren’t interested at all in ranching, but they, they’re like, hey, like, this land is worth this much. You know what you get? We need to sell the ranch. And then you’ve got the people working it, being like, oh my gosh, like, that’s our livelihood and we live here and we love this and we don’t want to sell it. And so a conservation easement is a great tool for families to use where it gives some cash to the family.
[00:56:12] Adam Williams: And, you know, so those siblings who are detached from it might feel like they’re getting something out of the. Having the land. It kind of maybe staves off the idea of “let’s cash out.”
[00:56:22] Lara Richardson: Yeah. Or a lot of, a lot of ranches are doing, you know, wedding venues and stuff. So maybe a conservation easement helps build like some great infrastructure for something like that or, you know, thinking a little bit more outside the box of like, how can we use that money to, to make money, you know, that kind of thing too. So I think people are hopefully going to be getting creative.
[00:56:45] Adam Williams: Does it feel strange to you at all, that you have this memoir out in this small community. And so now, for anybody who has picked this up and read it, and for those who will, there’s an awful lot for them to know about. Not only your family, but I would say even, you know, as someone myself who is a writer and who expresses publicly in various ways, including this podcast, there’s vulnerability in that. And you have let people into sort of your interior world of how you think about things, how you feel about things.
Do you feel at all sort of vulnerable? That in this small community, your neighbors, your friends, the people who know you are like, wow, this is her story. This is much more than we even knew.
[00:57:27] Lara Richardson: Yeah, definitely it is. It’s a vulnerable feeling for sure, that. Well, there’s been a couple of book clubs that have read it, and they’re like, hey, can you come? You know, we’re gonna have dinner and talk about your book. And I’m like, oh, okay. Yeah, that sounds great. Fun, terrifying, you know, and you walk into a room, and these women look at you with these sweet faces, and they’re like, we feel like you. We know you so well after reading your book. And I was like. And it’s just weird to be like, I don’t know any of your names, you know, But I think if it would inspire people to be more vulnerable with each other and maybe a little bit more honest and share stories, and that would be great.
[00:58:09] Adam Williams: Before we’re done, I want you to read a section that you write in the book related to the value of us sharing stories. And I think that is so relevant to. We are chaffee as a community storytelling initiative. So we’re going to come to that. I just want to say that while I’m thinking of it so we don’t forget.
[00:58:25] Lara Richardson: Okay.
[00:58:27] Adam Williams: I feel like the memoir overall is just such, you know, a wonderful distillation of the value of ranching, of this life of being in a rural community, of preserving and protecting things that matter and have value that are beyond those dollars, those millions of dollars. In this kind of case of family, you know, we haven’t dived into your faith, but that is clear in what you’ve written and. And shared, too, that this is a thread that runs through the family.
There’s just so much, I think, that is. Is amazing of what you shared in that. And I mean, I’d be happy for you to share anything else you feel like is important that we haven’t touched on here, because there’s an awful lot in that book that we and the rest of life, of course, that we haven’t gotten into. I mean, you and your family have lived a lot of stuff.
[00:59:16] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah. I guess the thing that I hope people would take from it is that at the end of the day, it really is the people in your life who are the most important, you know, And I know we get busy and you know, even ranching. Andrew and I are trying to figure out how to have some boundaries with the ranch because it’s pretty all encompassing, but I think any job can be that way. I got to teach at the high school for a year and it’s just, it’s hard to leave work at work sometimes. Well, especially when you live where you work. But just maybe having some boundaries in life and whether that’s boundaries with, you know, our phones and actually sitting down and looking at somebody face to face and having a conversation.
We’ve been trying to close our evenings with reading out loud as a family. And it’s Esther and Andrew in me at home right now. You know, there’s, there’s eight of us now with my, my new son in law. So that’s fun. But when it’s just Andrew and Esther and me just to, at the end of the day just sit down and take turns reading from a book out loud, like it just sort of slows life down and it just. Those feel like special times just to, to be together and I don’t know, maybe turn off the tv, put the phones away and do something a little bit more intentional.
[01:00:30] Adam Williams: I think it’s worth noting that while I have highlighted, because I’m acknowledging the fact that I don’t know your way of life. Right. So there’s this gap between that, that way of being and all the many millions of people I represent who haven’t got a clue about how to work a ranch. We also have a lot in common. And I’m sure the more we talk, the more we would find.
But if we look back at. You and Andrew were both rafting guides, your family goes to Monarch and skis, you Nordic ski, you run, you bike. There’s a lot of those sorts of activities that a lot of us come to this valley for and, and, and we have this in common. And I guess that just hit me. I, I think it’s worth noting that we’re not only talking about how we’re so different and things. It’s actually to me, that we have an awful lot in common.
I just am appreciating getting to learn from you the things that are totally new and Like I said at the very beginning of this, it’s so eye opening to have you describe so much in the book of what it was that I didn’t know.
[01:01:36] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah. No, we’re just average. I mean, we’re just. We’re married. You know, we have. We have good days in our marriage, bad days in our marriage. Same with parenting, you know, where you just throw up your hands and we’re like, well, there’s another therapy session for our kids when they’re older. You know, like, we really screwed that one up. Or, oh, this moment, like, just look at this for a minute. You know, everybody’s doing this, you know, or the first time we got all of our kids on skis at Monarch for the first time and we were all going down the slope and it was just like, this is exciting. I’m not home with somebody while Andrew takes everybody else. And, you know, just those little moments of.
Of growth and change or, oh, my gosh, you know, we’ve just. One of our sons is graduating from CSU this next week, and it’s like, wow, another one set sail. You know, I don’t know. Those are just. Those feel like exciting things that are in common. You know, it’s not all weird, ranchy things.
[01:02:30] Adam Williams: Someone had pointed out to me a while back that when we’re talking about where we have differences with people, and especially if we look at what’s going on in our world right now, where it can feel like we are so opposed or divided, I think it becomes. From not knowing each other’s stories and recognizing what we do share.
I lost the rest of my thought there, but I do think it still serves as a segue. I’d like. I’m going to hand you the couple of paragraphs that I have pulled from your book, and if you would please share that because again, it’s relevant about the value of us sharing stories with each other.
[01:03:06] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah. And I think that’s where the idea of the table comes is. Because if you can sit around the table and it’s just a place where everybody eats and drinks, and that’s what we all have in common. Right. We all need those things. And so it levels the playing field.
And so then to be able to learn how to listen and ask questions and share stories, and there’s been some heated conversations around our table where people have gotten up and are just like, I can’t believe you. But in general, I think it’s a gift to be able to share a story, and it’s a gift to Listen to somebody’s story.
[01:03:44] Adam Williams: You reminded me of where I was headed with my train of thought there, too. And that is if we focus on the values that we share, what are the values we have in common and family and those opportunities like you’re describing, sitting around the table together and being with each other. And we do have so much that connects us if we focus on that, right?
[01:04:04] Lara Richardson: Yeah. All right, here we go.
“My family and I have been sanded, stained, and shined by our stories that come from the different seasons on the ranch and from the different seasons of life. Everyone has a story to tell.
“Sharing our stories with each other allows us to learn from one another’s failures and successes. Aren’t we all right now, on this day, whatever season it may be living stories that are crafting and refining us into something hopefully more beautiful and useful than we were yesterday.
“This is the hope that we are always growing and learning. No matter the season, our stories, both good and bad, should not be wasted. Instead, as our experiences shape and refine us, we can share them at the different tables where we sit, allowing them to teach and inspire and encourage others to live a more abundant life.”
[01:04:52] Adam Williams: Thanks for reading that.
[01:04:53] Lara Richardson: Sure.
[01:04:54] Adam Williams: So the book, of course, is called the Table. Is that available at the Salida bookstore?
[01:05:00] Lara Richardson: Yes. So it’s at the Salida Books downtown and also at the Once Upon a Trapeze in BV and then also online with Book Club Salida. You can buy it through them if you go to bookshop.org, you can pretty much put in any independent small bookstore, and then a percentage of the sales go to that. It’s on Amazon. It’s.
[01:05:20] Adam Williams: You know, I can include links for all of this with the show notes. Okay. So that will help people get there. But of course, if they know the local spots here, I’m glad that it’s available there. You know, what we didn’t touch on was that this book came out of you being an MFA student in nature. Writing was the focus, right?
[01:05:41] Lara Richardson: Yes.
[01:05:41] Adam Williams: At Western Colorado University in Gunnison.
[01:05:43] Lara Richardson: Yes.
[01:05:44] Adam Williams: Okay. So. And that’s also who published the book.
[01:05:46] Lara Richardson: Yes.
[01:05:47] Adam Williams: So this is a local, homegrown thing, through and through.
[01:05:50] Lara Richardson: Yes, yes, absolutely. So, yeah, Western Press Books is the university’s sort of publishing house. It’s distributed through the University Press of Colorado. But yeah, so it was an incredible. Looking to get an MFA doing creative writing. It’s a fantastic low residency program that I highly recommend amazing professors and get to read a lot of really good books. And they have you write a lot.
[01:06:16] Adam Williams: Do you feel like when you went into that program that your writing was somewhere around the level of what you have showed in this book. Did that grow out of your experience in that MFA program, or did you bring this into it?
[01:06:29] Lara Richardson: No, no. I feel like I learned so much if I look at things that I wrote early on versus what I know now. And I think a lot of that came from just reading really good books. But also the professors who are also writers, authors themselves, you know, award winning authors, they go through every page, every word with you. And then you have a writing cohort who does the same. And so everything you write, everybody analyzes and gives you, you know, perspectives like this is really confusing. And what you. Your tenses completely switched in that for some reason, the tenses are just really hard for me, that’s the tough part.
[01:07:07] Adam Williams: Of the experience, isn’t it? When you hand it over, we give some authority to those who are professor, editor, things like that. And so we feel like, oh, they’re qualified to judge me. But when you hand it to a peer and then they’re tearing it apart, the ego can get a little damaged and be resistant to that. Right?
[01:07:25] Lara Richardson: Yeah. And yet it’s really helpful. But it is. It feels very vulnerable. You get to know the people in your program really well, and then they’re also at the same time submitting their writing to you. And so it’s a great relationship because you both understand how vulnerable it is. Like, something you write is just, you know, it feels like a very part of your soul out there, you know, so. And, you know, there’s still the first round. The first edition of this book came out, and I found all these mistakes in it. I mean, I read this thing hundreds of times, and so. And many people had the copy editing class at Western. You know, it’s just still, you know, there’s still mistakes and, you know, you kind of go, like, cringe or, you know, and then they, you know, correct it on the next printing and stuff like that. So it just. It’s kind of a. It’s a really fun process. And I felt super grateful to Western for. For publishing it. That was. That was a huge honor.
[01:08:19] Adam Williams: Something I was wondering the whole time with all of this ranching life. I mean, it’s kind of 24 7. You’re on call anyway. Long days, especially during particular times of the year. How did you fit in an MFA program and writing a book?
[01:08:37] Lara Richardson: Yes. Okay, well, let me just make a disclaimer. First of all, I would say Andrew is on 24 7, and his brother Seth And Wyatt, I mean, they are on. And the 24 is definitely them. I am, you know, I do the bookkeeping. I help with like a lot of the fun things and I can be a little bit more selective. Whereas they are like, they are on. And so I don’t want it to come across that I’m, you know, doing that all the time. I do, I do help substantially, but not. I mean, they are. They’re the main.
[01:09:15] Adam Williams: I can appreciate and respect that clarification, but so that somebody listening doesn’t think it swings too far to the other side. Again, if they read your book, they’re going to learn that you are very hands on and involved in a lot of that. I hesitate to say real work, but, you know, like, hands on the bowls. Hands on every aspect of it. It feels like pretty much. So. Okay. Yeah, with that in mind, you still have your lists and you have family and you had a lot going on.
[01:09:44] Lara Richardson: Absolutely. You find time to write. Everything we do, everybody has to play their part, you know. Yeah. So definitely not sustainable to do more than that. Two years, I would say it took a lot from our whole entire family. You know, most of our kids were home at that time. And so a lot of it fell on Andrew and he was amazing. And, you know, it was kind of his idea too, which is great. You know, we sat one day, we took a little break for a couple days and went to Ouray and we were camping and we were just laying in the forest at our paco pads laid out. And we were both just reading and. And we were just talking about how reading is so awesome and how it’s so powerful and relaxing and how books can inspire you.
And he’s like, you really need to write a book. And I’m just like, oh, yeah, right. I don’t have time for that. And I don’t know how to do that. And he goes, no. He’s like, you need to dream. He’s like, I’m living my dream. Ranching is a dream. I mean, it’s hard and stuff, but he’s like, this is. I love what I do every day I wake up. And he’s like, it’s. I just love this, you know? And he’s like, but what? Our kids are getting older. What’s your dream? And I was like, well, I would like to write a book and I’d love to teach. And anyway, so it’s all his fault. But anyway, so no, he was amazing. I mean, he just picked up. He and the kids picked up a lot of like, Making dinners and a lot of things, you know, went by the wayside kind of thing. But it definitely up really early and up really late.
[01:11:12] Adam Williams: Are you saying dark, dark, early morning? Because when I think of your life, it surely starts. Yeah, yeah, it starts early anyway. Right, so for you to get up even earlier.
[01:11:20] Lara Richardson: Yeah, yeah, just an hour even before. Just gave me just a little bit of time to write or do something. And you know, when you have a deadline, when you have assignments, you have to do it. And so I don’t know, I guess I haven’t written where you just sort of have your time and then when it’s done, it’s done. It really was helpful to have an assignment and a deadline and then you just get it done. And I found it was really hard to ever write during the day unless I left the house I would get. My father in law had this house up on Shavano, kind of like a little family cabin thing. And he was like, go up there, get out, get out. And that really helped. So some days and Andrew would just be like, don’t come back until you have that paper done. Like, just stay. Don’t just feel the freedom to just go.
And that made it easier for me because then I could really go and just be there and not have the phone ring or the cows get out or, you know, he’s like, I’m not going to call you. You know, if the cows get out, like you’re, you’re on your own, like. And that, that was a huge gift.
[01:12:21] Adam Williams: That sounds amazing too because as you probably are aware, there are writing retreats and things that people do and they try to find, you know, such. Again, I’m going to use the word idyllic because it sounds so amazing to be in a cabin in the mountains and to just have space and time to write and not be bothered by, you know, the regular details of life. Yeah, there are writers all over the country who are like, wow, that sounds exactly like what I want.
[01:12:48] Lara Richardson: Yep, it was great. I would go, I set my alarm, I’d write for three hours and it would fly by and then I’d go walk for an hour, hike up to the Colorado trail, come back three more hours and then because it just goes. And you need a good chunk, you know, to be able to write and to get into the groove. I think at least I did. You know, the one hour in the morning was good because you could plan or get some ideas and stuff, but you really do need a solid chunk of time.
So I think you need to have that as a writer, one of my professors was very calculated with her schedule. And she would be like, I wake up and I write during this time, and I don’t have my phone. Nobody, nobody bothers me. And she’s like, that’s because she’s a professor plus an author. And so I was like, how do you. How do you do this? You know, this whole professorship is a lot on its own. And she’s like, well, that’s because I plan time to write. So you make time for the things that you want to do.
[01:13:39] Adam Williams: Have you continued writing?
[01:13:40] Lara Richardson: Oh, goodness.
[01:13:42] Adam Williams: Or is this more of an accomplishment that, Yes, I did it. Thank you. Now I’m moving back on to life.
[01:13:47] Lara Richardson: I write usually every day in my journal, just about what’s going on in life and what’s going on on the ranch and just reminds me of things. I make my list. My husband’s next to me, journaling, making his list and stuff. So I would like to write again in the future, but I haven’t written anything creatively lately. But, you know, it just seems like there’s been a lot going on. But I think there’s always a lot going on.
[01:14:13] Adam Williams: It feels like. It feels like that is life. If it’s not one thing, it’s another.
[01:14:18] Lara Richardson: And, you know, I would love to write one day, maybe, I don’t know, maybe in the mountain mail or something like that, but just to help people be a little bit more attached to ag, like maybe write once in a while about, you know, what’s going on, what we’re doing in that season, you know, or things that are confronting us or, I don’t know, that would appeal to me to do something shorter pieces like that.
[01:14:43] Adam Williams: You could have a series of those that eventually you bind up and you’ve got another book.
[01:14:46] Lara Richardson: Yeah, there you go.
[01:14:48] Adam Williams: Well, this is a treasure of a memoir and I think a book for all of us locally. But of course, there’s so much, again, that was eye opening for me that the 99% that don’t live on a farm or a ranch can learn from. And so I really think it’s a tremendous piece of work. That is. I’m so glad that for you and for your family as well to have this time capsule. It’s just amazing. So thank you for sharing it and thank you for coming on here and talking more with me about it.
[01:15:16] Lara Richardson: Yeah. Thank you for having me.
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[01:15:27] Adam Williams: Thank you for listening to the We Are Chaffee podcast. You can learn more about this episode and others in the show notes at wearechaffeepod.com and on Instagram @wearechaffeepod. I invite you to rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. I also welcome your telling others about the We Are Chaffee Podcast. Help us to keep growing community and connection through conversation.
The We Are Chaffee Podcast is supported by Chaffee County Public Health. Thank you to Andrea Carlstrom, Director of Chaffee County Public Health and Environment, and to Lisa Martin, Community Advocacy Coordinator for the larger We Are Chaffee Storytelling initiative.
Once again, I’m Adam Williams, host, producer and photographer for the We Are Chaffee Podcast. Till the next episode, as we say at We Are Chaffee, “Share Stories, Make Change.”
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