For eons, the Canadian River has flowed eastward from the Sangre de Cristos, etching along the northern scarp of the Llano Estacado and depositing its sand and silt to points downstream.
And, for just as many eons, the west winds have scoured the dusty surface of the Llano, carrying seedpods and soils aloft and dropping them once again to earth over what are now the Plains of Oklahoma and the eastern Texas Panhandle.
Over the millennia, Nature has sculpted and contoured the land of Lipscomb County, Texas. Bluestem grasses and sage carpeted the sandhills, punctuated here and there with dwarf yucca and wild plum. Lightning-sparked range fires burned out the trees and less-hearty invaders, leaving the native growth to recover quickly and thrive.
Less than two centuries ago, the bison roamed here, as did the Kiowa and the Comanche.
Only 3,000 people reside within its 932 square miles, and, for the most part, they have chosen to leave the land as they found it: An austere example of wild and rolling frontier beauty.
Here, as afternoon storm clouds ride a February west wind, the 6942 stares down a yellow approach signal as it rumbles gently across the grasses of Lipscomb County, the bluestem wearing its seasonal rust color, the sage dry and muted, and the dwarf yucca sprouting from the red sandy earth; an earth that in all likelihood was transported grain-by-grain on the west winds from somewhere up on the Llano.
Now, only Angus and Hereford roam behind barbed wire fences, and GEs and EMDs are confined to twin steel ribbons on a roadbed hacked out of the sand by horse-drawn implements over a century ago. And rubber-tired traffic on adjacent Hwy 60 is mostly local in nature and sporadic at best.
While the pace of life in Lipscomb County might not be defined as ‘leisurely’, it is decidedly less than ‘bustling’.
Most residents prefer it that way.