Our good friend and neighbor Boogie lives and ranches miles from the nearest paved road to anywhere. At eighty-something, she's still going strong, although she would dispute that statement, protesting that her eyesight isn't what it once was and that she can't lift bags of feed into her pickup anymore. She drinks beer on occasion, smokes every chance she gets, eats like one of those colorful, flitty little finches she reminds me of.

And she's taught me a lot.

Boog pulls no punches. She likes you, or she doesn't. She doesn't squander a great deal of the time that remains her on folks she doesn't like. If she doesn't want to do something, she tells you, straight out. No pussy-footing around your feelings, no glib excuses. "Yes" is an answer. "No" is another answer. There's a choice. She uses it. Wisely. Therein lies a lesson for those of us who tiptoe around the feelings of others, often to our own detriment.

This tough-as-Longhorn-jerky rancher-lady with sun-freckled skin lives in a nice house with a nice dog whose hobby is biting men who strike her as suspicious or downright shady. She loves children, but has none of her own so she offers support, love and encouragement to those of others. Petite, straight-spined, her hair styled in a cut that a twenty-something would covet, she wears campy hats, eyelet blouses, scuffed boots. She dresses "just darling", as my grandmother liked to say. I feel confident that since Boog doesn't indulge in the Internet, that statement about being darling won't get back to her. But she really is. Darling. With a mind that rivals the computer she doesn't use. I wish I shared some of her genes.

The cut-through to Marfa closed several years back. Now she drives forty minutes, one way, to get her mail. Most days, she spends alone. No one who knows her would consider her a hermit, a recluse, or the least bit "odd". She's simply Boogie, a woman who has made a success of her life and who continues to enrich the lives of all the folks she bothers with, not limited to but including even the few shady characters her dog doesn't bite.

Once, when we were planning a trip to Lubbock, Jim called to ask her if she needed anything from "The Land of Stores" (as cities are both affectionately and disdainfully referred to around here, according to how badly you need something from them).  Boogie thought a minute. "You know," she said, "I can't think of a thing I can't get around here. And if I've done without it for three days, why would I need it?"

Talk about a lesson in consumerism.

When Boogie drives out to the highway on her dirt ranch road, her pickup disappears in a cloud of dust.

I hope the lifestyle she represents so elegantly never does.


LEAVING HOME    a 14" x 18" pastel on archival Wallis pastel paper by Lindy C Severns
$1800 available at the Museum of the Big Bend's
TRAPPINGS OF TEXAS 2008 Invitational Cowboy Gear and Fine Western Art Show and Sale 
opening February 28- April 2008   Alpine, TX

I thought a lot about Boogie as I painted this from several photos my husband Jim shot after visiting her.
                 Reaching the pavement isn't always what we should shoot for.