Worth Getting Up For

20” x 16”
Oil on Canvas
2026 

Life on a ranch teaches you to get up early whether you feel like it or not. The cattle need feeding, the fences need checking, and the work is waiting long before the sun comes up.

Most mornings begin the same way—coffee, cold air, and a horizon still hidden in darkness. But every now and then, the prairie rewards those early hours. On this particular morning, the sky exploded into bands of gold, orange, and crimson, turning ordinary hay bales into monuments of light.

The winds that sweep down from the Lewis Range are part of life here. They shape the grass, the snow, and sometimes the clouds themselves. When the conditions are right, they create sunrises that last only a few minutes but remain in memory for years.

I stopped to take a photograph because I knew the moment would soon be gone. This painting is my attempt to hold on to that brief gift—a reminder that even on the hardest mornings, there are things worth getting up for.

— Bob Parsons