I, too, wish it were still so. There was a time, not so long ago, when we still had cattle grazing in open fields. Now, there are houses for as far as you can drive in an hour.
. . . some of the people who live in this rural community still consider squirrel and possum something good to eat (no, I'm not one of them).
I don't mind squirrel. Shot em, skinned em, ate em. But, possum? That is a nasty creature best left out of my cook pot.
The old ranches in my family are still small family operations lived on and run by my cousins, and are not for sale to developers or anyone else.
We live in an area of acreage lots on what was "throwaway land" on a huge ranch-the land is exposed bedrock in places and useless for growing crops or grazing stock, but it is on a bluff above water and has a beautiful view. The usable part of the ranch is at the end of our road and still operated by the family that has owned it for over 100 years.
We lived in the city for years and hated it-we finally decided to build a house out here, sell the one in the city and bite the bullet on the 40 mile drive to work-we have no regrets.