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Farley: More to being a cowboy than just a good hat and pair of boots
Published 6/1/2009 in Beef Empire Days : Columns
The cowboy boots are polished.
The hats — clean, white and stiff as a board — sit on the floor around tables and chairs, off cowboys' heads because they're indoors.
The men wear tighter, crisp blue jeans and collared shirts with variations of stripe or square patterns.
And the genuine leather belts are adorned with metalwork.
I have boots. They're not new — actually they're pretty worn. I got 'em at a garage sale. They don't look like much, but they're some of the most comfortable shoes I've ever worn.
My jeans are faded and not crisp or ironed. The pair has a hole in the back from where I climbed through a fence and came up short, with the fence taking a piece of my pants with it.
And my shirt is collared but a little wrinkled and doesn't have a pattern on it — just plain, tan.
But as I looked around the room at the group attending one of the Beef Empire Days' events, somehow I got the feeling that what makes a cowboy or cowgirl isn't really what is on the outside, but rather, on the inside.
You can spend a pretty penny trying to dress yourself as a cowboy. But I choose to believe that there's more to being a cowboy than just clothes.
There has to be more to the figure with the boots, hat and horse — someone like the Lone Ranger, who kids idealize and try to mimic.
I had a stick horse I would ride around the yard and house and make whinnying noises as I rode him. I'd also make whooshing sounds for when he and I picked up speed and kicked it into high gear together.
Then came Zorro. I loved Zorro and wanted to be him. My parents have pictures of me on my plastic horse that sat atop metal springs and would bounce up and down when I bounced. I had a mask and used one of those bath towels that fastens around your body as a cape.
But since I've been out here in western Kansas, I've heard a lot of talk of this western way of life — a description of not so much how a cowboy dresses but how he lives.
"Hats and boots are good," says Lory Williams, of KBUF. They're used for protection for the cowboy's feet and head, and have several uses.
But as far as what makes a cowboy, she said, he has a heart for the land, for the animals — cattle, horses, etc. — and he has a purpose or goal for whatever he's doing.
"They have a heart for what they're doing," she said.
And the cowgirls, she said, they're the same way. ... And they like the cowboys, she said, laughing.
Clint Alexander, chairman for grandstand judging and carcass evaluation contests for Beef Empire Days, said what makes a cowboy goes beyond the dress.
"It's what you do, how you do it," he said.
The cowboy is more concerned with the welfare of the animals than with his own wellbeing, Alexander said, adding that when cattle are calving, the producers will be checking every other hour or so how the animals are doing, regardless of whether it's in the middle of the night.
There are a lot of people who wouldn't be willing to do that, Alexander said, saying cowboys and the type of lifestyle is something they have to love to do in order to continue doing it.
Staff writer Stephanie Farley can be e-mailed at sfarley@gctelegram.com.
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