We get a steer, “The Big One” to jump into the stocktrailer and go off across the pass to Willcox, for the pastoralists’ dilemma that this life requires us and the animal we raise to see our way through psychologically and emotionally. The day is spectacular, one that makes us grateful for our days unseamed by clocking in and clocking out though we are imprisoned by beauty, and duty. The rolling hills and wide bajadas are green, and on the flattest middle reaches of this splendid Summer range, the whistles of Cassin’s Sparrows reach into the cab of the Silverado with its windows open, an unlooked for positive side of the air conditioning not working for years. One bird’s voice grows the louder as we pass, then fades behind us, and just when it disappears as we roll slowly along so as not to break a leaf spring another comes to be louder and that one fades. This happens four times, it is the year of the Cassin’s.