South Dakota Wildflowers Paint the Prairie

The first year Jim and I were married

there were several blizzards

that left my little teal 4-door Geo metro buried

and our house surrounded by snow drifts

so deep that I did not use

the stairs of my deck nor see my yard fence

for 3 months.

Instead, I walked over the fence straight onto my deck

on snow.

Then, for the first 12 years of living here on the ranch

we had a drought.

Summers were a dreadful brown.

In fact, in the summer of 2006,

we were afraid of any storm cloud.

Because clouds meant lightning

not rain.

All of my life, I had been taught

to stay away from hilltops

when there was lightning.

That year, night storms

meant Jim would get up and sit on a hilltop

watching for the glow of a fire.

Day storms

would be a time for Ann & me

to gather up our four kids

and sit on a hilltop watching for smoke.

Ready to call our husbands

away from another fire if lightning struck

close to home.

That summer the Black Hills were burning

and the prairie was burning too.

My parents evacuated their house in the Black Hills

and we moved several neighbors out of their homes

because the flames were headed toward their house

Here on the prairie.

Weather went from extreme blizzards

at the start of our marriage

to a drought that drifted into dry winters.

So dry that our kids would take plastic sleds

and slide down brown grass and cactus covered hillsides.

Sledding winter, spring, summer, fall on dry ground.

I had no idea then

that the prairie could be

so beautiful.

I had no idea

that wildflower seeds lay dormant

waiting to explode in color

and paint the prairie.

Photos & text 2010 Jodene (Jodi) Shaw.