Who is Rick Sanchez and Midnight?

Recently it occurred to me that I should share a little about Rick Sanchez since he is now living at The Ranch.  Rick was born in 1947 and spent his childhood in San Antonio, TX.  He attended Catholic school through the fifth grade and then attended public school.  He came of age during the Vietnam War, and since he didn’t know any Vietnamese decided he was not interested in going over to Vietnam to fight.  So he joined the Coast Guard where he served for four years.   On March 4, 1973 for the first time Rick heard and understood the gospel and turned his life over to Jesus.  His life has never been the same since.

         

During his lifetime Rick has worked in a variety of fields, everything from Commodities Trading, selling door to door, engineering, Real Estate sales, to construction.  He was ordained into the ministry in 1975 and served a senior chaplain in the jail system of Omaha Nebraska till 1983.  During that time he also pastured two churches.  After leaving Omaha he continued in ministry by preaching at parole offices, homeless missions, nursing homes, and anywhere the Lord opened up.
      

During the late 80’s Rick began working in situations that required him to travel to Mexico.  It was then that he first learned Spanish which has served him well ever since.  Around 1989 he moved to Mexico where he worked as a consultant helping many big companies solve their engineering problems.  It was with much remorse that he had to leave this very lucrative work, but a phone call from his father asking him to return to San Antonio to take care of ailing parents led Rick to do just that.  He would spend ten years of his life caring for his parents full time and working for himself as a handyman and remodeling contractor.  Rick’s mother passed away in 2006 and his father in 2011 at age 96.  Rick has three sons from different marriages, but no daughters.

      

I first met Rick at church in San Antonio.  At first he was just another person in my Sunday School class but circumstances caused us to start sitting together in church.  Slowly we got to know each other and soon were good friends.  Back in 2010 he helped me move all my belongings out here, driving the U-Hall truck and making several trips with me.  I will always be indebted for the help I received my first few months moving out here as he was able to help me with a number of problems I encountered such as water well repairs, turning on the electricity and propane tank, and a number of minor maintenance issues.  Several months after I moved out here his father’s health took a turn for the worst and Rick was unable to leave San Antonio again until after his father’s passing.

     

It was a Friday evening in November (2011) that I looked out my kitchen window and saw a goat.  That December Rick volunteered to come out and build me a goat enclosure.  Little did he know the job would be much tougher then he could imagine.  He has built lots of fences in San Antonio, all in soil.  There is very little soil here but lots of rock.  Rick assumed building me a fence would be a quick job until he got out here and started working.  Multiple trips out here later, Rick began feeling God was calling him to relocate to The Ranch and serve Him by helping me with a number of projects and ministering to others in Rocksprings.

        

Rick though is not the only new resident here.  Soon after I knew I was suppose to keep the goat that showed up in my yard last November, I named her Lawn Mower and started educating myself about goats and their care.  One of the first things I learned is they are herd animals and do best with other goats.  It didn’t take to many months before I knew Lawn Mower needed a friend.  God gave me one free goat; He could easily give me second goat for free, especially since this is goat country.  So Rick and I started praying for a second goat. 
     

Most ranchers breed their goats and sheep so they give birth sometime in the spring (February through April).  At times it has been tough to wait on God, especially as I have seen kids and lambs with their mother’s grazing in the fields and knew time was running out to find or be given an orphaned kid.  One day in mid April it occurred to me if I was to get a kid that very day I would have nothing to feed it.  So Rick and I drove to Kerrville and bought needed supplies at a Livestock feed store.  The Bible says faith without action is dead.  I had now put into action my faith that God would provide me a playmate for Lawn Mower. 

        
Not long after that trip a friend was given a 2 day old black Spanish-mix kid.  I will admit I was jealous.  This friend already had a kid that they had found wandering in the road and now they had two.  All I could do was pray.  If God meant one of these kids to come live here it would happen.  If not, I knew at the right time the right kid would show up.  I just had to keep believing God would answer my prayer for another goat.  Last Monday, April 30, God answered that prayer when my friend  called me and said the family had made a decision and if I still wanted a goat I could have their little black kid.  I immediately jumped into my car and went picked him up.  The kid did not officially have a name yet, but one of the names he was being called was “Midnight”, which Rick and I both liked and decided to officially name him.  Today Midnight turned 3 weeks old.

   

So now The Ranch is home to six: Rick and I, Little Bit and Tiger (cats), and Lawn Mower and Midnight (goats).

Work Continues On The Goat Enclosure

According to the calendar it is still spring, but it already feels like summer.  Last week we finally gave up working in the afternoon due to the heat.  In case you missed the past few posts, we include Rick Sanchez and me.  After much prayer Rick decided God was leading him to move out here to help me with the many building projects that need to be accomplished and to minister to others in a variety of ways. 

        

Rick has been working on this first project for months now.  At first he thought installing a goat fence would be easy until he came out here and discovered soil is scarce but rock (including bedrock) is plentiful.  But after many months of work, talking to others in the area about local fence building techniques, and purchasing a lot of new tools, this week Rick finally dug his last hole.  He still has a few more support posts to weld and then he will be done with stage one of installing a fence for a goat enclosure. 

    

Up until this past week we were able to work outside most of the day, but our afternoon highs are now reaching into the 90’sF (32C and higher).  So starting this past week we have had to resort to indoor activities during the hot afternoons.  So our pattern has been to work all morning, come in for lunch and then rest and work inside until supper.  After supper the sun is no longer overhead and therefore not beating down on us, so we can resume working outdoors until dusk.

     

While Rick has been digging holes and then pouring concrete around pipe and t-posts, I have been scraping dirt off a slab of rock which will form the foundation of a goat shelter.  Once again this job proved easier said than done.  I purchased a flat shovel for scrapping up the dirt.  I would use a hoe to break up the dirt and then by hand push the dirt onto the shovel as roots and rocks often prevented me from sliding the shovel under all the dirt.  Due to abundance of rocks around here, roots are often very shallow and therefore make the project more difficult.  I also had to pick out anywhere from 10 to 30 rocks per each shovel-full of dirt.  That is no exaggeration.  The rocks ranged from large (requiring two hands to pick them up) to the size of a green pea.  Sometimes it feels like for every rock I picked out of the wheelbarrow, five more would spontaneously form.  

    

Stage one of building a goat shelter is to remove the dirt down to the bedrock and I too am nearing the completion of this stage.   I have a little over a foot more to go and then I too will be done with stage one.  Then Rick will anchor three 4 by 4’s to the bedrock.  Once he is done I will start hauling caliche to form the floor of the shelter as the floor must be elevated so when it rains the shelter will not flood. Goats do not like to get their hooves wet.  At first I thought about pouring cement to even out and raise the floor, but upon further study learned that cement is hard on goat hooves.  Caliche is dirt and rock made up of sodium nitrate and/or calcium-carbonate which occurs naturally in this part of the country and South America.  It packs down hard and is often used for shelter floors, dirt roads, and many other tasks.  For instance it was used to cover all the plumbing pipes to prevent freezes since it is impossible to bury pipes underground. 

    

We both are excited to see the completion of stage one of building a goat enclosure.  Stage one of both projects is the most time consuming part of the job.  The next stages should go much faster and in no time there should be a completed quarter acre goat enclosure for Lawn Mower to roam around in.  Once she is out of the garden, the plan is to head for Kerrville and buy vegetable plants.  If it was not for the goat I would have had a vegetable garden planted by March at the latest.  So I am eager to get one in the ground.

   

We may be spending a lot of our time outside working on the goat enclosure, feeding and taking care of the animals and other related tasks, but there is plenty to do inside during those hot afternoons that are now upon us.  Both Rick and I are busy studying various topics and preparing for the future.  We also have had lots of conversations concerning the future.  Alpha Omega Christian Communities For The Chemically Sensitive (AOCCCI) is about helping people, especially chronically ill homeless people.  In order to fulfill our purpose we need to build cabins and other structures; so many of our topics of conversation center on those topics.  This is a Christian ministry, so many of our topics of conversation center on God.  We have also been watching videos in the evening dealing with the topics of the brain, mind/body/spirit connection, and the occasional Christian movie.  We also read.  I just finished The Meat Goat Handbook; Raising goats for food, profit, and fun, by Yvonne Zweede-Tucker.  I enjoyed the book, especially the photos.  I did learn a lot about raising goats and can recommend this book to any novice interested in the topic.  I have another book on the topic of meat goats to read, but I think the next book I will read will be a Christian book.

      

This past week a potted  cactus and a prickly pear blessed us with beautiful flowers:

Texas Spring Wild Flowers

Changes At The Ranch

March was a very busy month. Not only was it very busy but a lot of changes have taken place.

A predictable change was the arrival of spring. Spring started showing up in February with warmer weather. Last year we were in a major drought, but the past few months we have been receiving regular rainfall. The rivers and lakes are still very low, but the land is seeing some rain. So when you combine warm weather and rain, nature starts sprouting everywhere. What were dry weeds and dirt only a few months ago is now land covered in lush green plants and an abundance of wildflowers.

The first spring I lived here I only saw two tiny Bluebonnet plants on this land. Last spring I saw none. This spring Bluebonnets are sprouting up everywhere. The Bluebonnet is the Texas State flower and loved by everyone. But they are not the only wildflowers to be popping up. The landscape is covered in wildflowers making it almost impossible to walk around without stepping on them. I am really enjoying looking out my windows at all the beauty surrounding the house.

The second change to occur at The Ranch was not so predictable; the spare bedroom now has a full time resident. I have mentioned my friend Rick before. He has been coming out here for the
past few months to work on a goat enclosure for me. This job has been a lot more difficult than
he ever imagined, as he has never had to build a fence in such rocky ground before. What would have taken him a few days to accomplish in San Antonio or anywhere where soil is deep, is taking him weeks of hard work here. Rick is making progress though.

Rick has made many short trips out here to work on this project since January. A few of those
trips included weekends, so Rick went to Church with me. During this time God started working on Rick. For the past year (or longer) Rick has been searching for ministry opportunities. He has preached at the San Antonio Rescue Mission, the Parole Office, and several nursing homes, but he longed for more. In the past Rick has pastured a church and worked as a Jail Chaplain. Rick just knew God had more for him to do then just preach once in awhile, but it seemed most doors were closed to him. Then Rick started attending my church with me and fell in love with the people there. He fell in love with Rocksprings. And he fell in love with the countryside out here. This place is peaceful and the more he was out here working on that fence the more he longed to remain out here. After much prayer Rick decided it was God’s will for him to move out here and help me with my work full time and minister to the folks in Rocksprings. When Rick told the Pastor at my church and several deacons of his decision, they all had the same response—“this is an answer to our prayers”. Rick is bilingual and he has already been asked to teach the Spanish language Sunday School class Easter Morning as the regular teacher will be unavailable.

Rick moved into the spare bedroom a couple of weeks ago. He has been very busy every since. His main role here will be in construction/handyman work. His to do list is growing daily and he hasn’t even finished the goat fence yet. When he is not outside working he is studying how to make solar panels and other how to manuals for the many projects that need to be built, such as cabins for people to live in. I have also provided him with literature on Multiple Chemical Sensitivities. If he is going to live here and help in the growth of Alpha Omega Christian Communities For The Chemically Injured, he needs to be educated on what this ministry is all about. Step one is to learn about the disease. His education has begun.

If taking care of cats and a goat, building a fence, along with many other jobs, and helping someone move out here was not enough to keep me busy, I also added two children to the schedule. Rick is good friends with their mother who is in the army. When spring break arrived
she was in need of someone to watch the children during the day. I said it would be okay and she drove them out here. The children spent part of the week out here ‘helping’ us work. The children again returned to The Ranch last Friday morning. Their mother needed to go out of the country for a week so we agreed to take the children again. This weekend we used the solar oven to make pizza and s’mores (graham crackers, melted marshmallows and chocolate). The children loved the food and learned all about passive solar power. We have also been teaching the children about Jesus. Sunday evening Rick took the children back home where he is babysitting
them when they are not in school. There is no school on Friday and so Thursday evening he will bring the children back to The Ranch for another lively weekend. Their mother will come pick them up Sunday evening.

South Central Texas/Texas Hill Country Weather

If you read the last few blogs it would be easy to walk away thinking it is cold in South Central Texas/Texas Hill Country, unless that is you live in North Dakota or somewhere else where it actually is cold in the winter. Not wanting to leave you with a false impression, I have decided to spend a little time on weather. It is true January 12 and February 12 were very cold days here, unusually cold days in fact. If you live in other parts of the world and want to keep close tabs on the weather here, the nearest big cities to follow would be San Antonio and Austin. Austin is in the middle of the Texas Hill Country, about 160 miles (258 km) to the east. San Antonio is about 120 miles (193 km) southeast. The local news stations that I have access to all come out of San Antonio, so I am much more familiar with their weather and how it compares to mine, then I am of Austin. Generally speaking though, there is probably not much difference between Austin and where I am, compared to San Antonio and my location. It does get colder here then San Antonio and the due to geographical conditions, snow is much more likely here then it is in San Antonio. And based on my observations over the past decade, it appears IF it is going to snow in the Texas Hill Country; it seems it more often snows where I am compared to other parts of the Hill Country. But that does not mean I live in a really cold climate, because I do not. The simple fact that it has snowed two years in a row here is very unusual and even one of the San Antonio weather forecasters remarked how unusual that is. And when it does snow here, folks often drive to where the snow is so their children can have the experience of seeing what snow looks like.

So what is normal winter weather for South Central Texas and the Texas Hill Country? The simple answer is there is no such thing as normal. The best description for the weather here is variety. To give you an example, Sunday February 12 it was cold. The temperature was 27f (-2.77c) when I got up that morning. There was no precipitation when I drove to church. But half an hour later there was snow and sleet coming down hard. When I got out of church it had stopped snowing and though the streets were covered in an icy mess, the drive home was not bad. Around 2:00pm it started raining and continued to rain all day and all night. Sunday’s high was 32f (0c). To my surprise the ground remained covered in snow turned to ice all day. Usually the ground is to warm for anything to stick and with all the rain I fully expected it to melt, but it never did.

Monday morning I was up and dressed by 5:00am, as I had promised to drive some married friends to Fredericksburg (84 miles/135 km) for routine medical screening tests (the kind they put you to sleep while they conduct them). When I got up the temperature outside was 34f (1c) and there was still a thick layer of ice everywhere. Once on the county highway, it is only a little over 3 miles to the east before reaching the next county. It seemed as soon as we drove into the next county the road conditions really improved. The ice disappeared and except for some dense fog, it was easy driving. We never again saw ice. It took us a little over an hour to get to Kerrville (64 miles/ 103 km) and by then the temperature had risen to 39f (3.8c). It was about 2:00pm when we finally got home and by then it was sunny and getting warm. I had a sweatshirt on and outside I was a little too warm (I left my coat in the house).

Tuesday morning it was cool and I did put on a coat when I went outside to feed the animals around 7:15am, but it did not take long to warm up. It was sunny all day and sunny days mean it will warm up quickly. By 9:00am all I had on was a sweatshirt. It was already to warm for a coat. I know the high temperature here was 72f (22c).

It is now early Wednesday morning. The sun has been up for less than an hour. The temperature outside is 58f (14c). It is cloudy with a chance of rain, but should be clearing out by noon and sunny this afternoon. We are expected to reach the low 70’s (21c-23c).

So there you have it, typical South Central Texas/Texas Hill Country weather is never typical. It can be freezing one day and hot the next. So if you hate cold weather and it is a cold day here, it won’t be cold for that long. And while folks in the northern states are just dreaming of when they can plant their vegetable garden, those of us here are already preparing. There is still a chance of a hard freeze so it is still a bit early to plant that garden, but many of us have already started the process.

(It is easy to cover these pots with some sheets when freeze warnings are issued.)

Update: Around 8:30am I decided to take a break from writing and go outside to get a little work done and let the goat graze. I wore only a long sleeve shirt; it was just too warm for a coat. Clouds did move in and it got breezy but rain never appeared. It is now closing in on 2:30pm. It is 68f (20c) outside, but passive solar heating has heated the house to 75f (24c). I learned a long time ago that the sun actually feels hotter here then it does farther north. So I know 68f is actually warm enough for short sleeves. No matter what, 75f is a short sleeve temperature. So there you have it.

Sunday morning it snowed and three days later on Wednesday I am wearing a short sleeve top. Now that is typical winter weather here.

Winter On The Ranch

A week ago my friend Rick came out for another week of working on the ranch. The current project is to build a goat enclosure. That requires a fence, which is easier said than done. Soil is at a premium here and rocks are plentiful. We rented a jack hammer and started digging holes. After 3 days of hard work and sore muscles we got a good start on half the holes. Rick is use to building city fences where there is soil. So this has been asking people a lot of questions, observing fences along the highway, and learning a lot. Saturday he went home, but it should not be long before he returns to continue the work.

It doesn’t happen often but occasionally the temperatures drop to the freezing range. It did so today (Sunday). To make this event even rarer, it came with precipitation. Here are a few photos I took today when I got home from church.

The fence posts are the beginnings of Lawn Mower's new enclosure. She will have about 1/4 acre to roam.

Lawn Mower was probably born last March or April. So this is her first snow. I gave her some more alfalfa upon returning home from church because what I gave her this morning is covered in snow/ice.

The snow is not fazing the cats at all.

The Spare Bedroom

It is hard to believe that I am living in the last few hours of the first month of the year. Where did January go?

When I purchased this ranch I did so with a purpose in mind, to help those individuals who are ill, homeless, and seeking God for healing. That is still the goal even though it seems more of my time is spent these days taking care of animals then my other tasks. The truth is all is important.

I occasionally get contacted by someone with MCS looking for housing or someone who knows someone with MCS who is homeless. The spare bedroom is still available but so far no one has made the decision to come live out here. It amazes me how many people are terrified of being in the country. Before buying this property I knew a lot of folks with MCS were living in the woods or camp grounds because of MCS, and so I expected it would not be long before someone (or many folks) would request to come out to the ranch. But that has not happened. The only explanation I can come up with is that folks living in the woods or desert do not have access to the Internet, where folks living in the city do. Also, most of my friends live in the city and so when they contact me about someone, that person is already in the city and may not want to leave. This month alone two separate friends contacted me about someone they are currently helping who has MCS and is homeless. I told them the spare bedroom is available, but I have not heard back. In the end, I know God will send just the right person at just the right time.

Since no one is currently living in that spare bedroom, it is available for friends and volunteers to stay in. This month my friend, Rick, used that room during eight days of volunteer work. He came out here to do a few maintenance repairs and help me build a goat pen. Once complete, the goat will have a nice home to hang out in. The first step in building a goat pen is to clear the area of cedar trees so we have a place to put a fence. We borrowed a friend/neighbor’s chain saw and started cutting down Mountain Cedar trees. No one likes Cedar trees, which are actually in the juniper family. They suck tons of water out of the ground, prevent other trees and plants from growing, and cause bad allergies. We started cutting down trees Wednesday afternoon and finished Friday afternoon. While Rick sawed the multiple limbs/trunks of each tree, I dragged and carried the branches away. By the end of the week I had formed six huge piles of cedar to burn. Even though all the cedar piles are green, we did succeed in burning one pile. The other piles refused to burn, but their day will come.

Rick had to return home that Saturday but he is planning on returning in February for the next phase of the project, building a fence. This land is very rocky and one does not need to go very deep to hit bedrock. So digging holes for the fence poles will probably require renting a jack hammer. Rick has built many fences in his life and is spending this time at home doing research on how best to build a fence in this type of terrain. Hopefully the pen will be finished in time for Lawn Mower the goat to be removed from the garden so I can once again plant a spring vegetable garden in there.

Besides building a fence, Lawn Mower will need shelter from storms. I have scraped dirt and rocks off a large sheet of rock that will make a nice floor to her shelter. The plan is to build her a shelter using available materials, rocks. There are rocks everywhere here so why not build a shelter using those rocks, instead of going out and spending money on wood. In preparation every time I spot a good rock I pick it up and relocate it to where her shelter will be built. Thankfully garden wagons make that task a little easier.

You might be thinking to yourself why am I going to all this work and expense for a pet goat? Why not just get rid of her. Yes, Lawn Mower is clearly a pet. She is very attached to me and acts more like a dog then livestock. The reason is simply, God gave her to me. Not long after Lawn Mower showed up I started receiving offers from folks happy to take her off my hands. When it became clear I was not going to find her original owner, I started praying to God about what to do with her and the message came back loud and clear that she was mine. So at the urging of a friend I named her. I also started learning about goat care. If I am going to own a goat I want to take proper care of her. I know from talking to experts she is receiving proper nutrition. I can tell she is happy. But I also know she is lonely. Goats are herd animals and she needs a friend. I have put the word out that I am willing to take a kid that has been abandoned by its mother (or the mother had triplets and therefore is unable to care for a third baby as goats only have two teats). Ranchers like to breed their goats so the babies are born in the spring and so I may have two goats in a few months.

I have also learned there is a lot of money in goats, especially boar goats, which is what Lawn Mower is. Boar goats were developed in South Africa as a meat goat. I have been told I could possibly get $150 for Lawn Mower at a stock show. I have a lot to learn still but the idea of breeding Lawn Mower and selling her kids has crossed my mind. That would help recoup the money I have spent on her. Also, there is the possibility of goat meat being on the table in the future when more folks are living out here. Lawn Mower will never be sacrificed, but maybe she is the beginning of something bigger. Only time will tell.

So even though no one is currently living here except for me, that spare bedroom is getting used. Anyone else desiring to spend a few days in the country and do some work for the Lord is welcome to come out, just let me know. I will also entertain renting the room out to someone who just wants to be out in the country for a few days of peace and quiet. And when the time comes that someone needs that room for housing, there is a twin bed in the office, the couch folds out into a double bed, and I have air matters that can be blown up and thrown down on the floor for more beds. So if a family wants to come out and volunteer for the weekend, just let me know. There is plenty to do out here, besides building a goat pen.