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"Never kick a cow chip on a hot day."
"If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop diggin'." When you hear talk like that, you sure don't think of a guy in a three-piece suit - you think…cowboy. Rough and rugged. Tall and lean, well-worn blue jeans, preferably Wranglers, that mold the backside like no other jeans can, dusty boots, long sleeved shirt, grubby cowboy hat. Why do we picture that sort of cowboy? Because a cowboy is a working man and working men get dirty. But "cowboy" also brings to mind the traits of honesty, integrity, diligence and frankness. Maybe that's why cowboys have such an appeal for me. Some characters are complicated, with many layers, and you have to pull them apart, like an onion, to really see what motivates them. Cowboys ain't like that. In novels, from romance to westerns, cowboys tend to take over the story, calling a spade, a spade. (Of course, in Western novels, they’re supposed to take over the story!) Cowboys, for the most part, are also pretty basic--what you see is what you get, which sure makes for interesting storytelling. A cowboy has a talent for saying a whole lot in a few words, which gives him more character. "How deep do you reckon this snow is?" one cowboy asked another, who replied, "What the hell difference does it make? You can't see nothin' but the top of it no how." Kind of cuts to the bull, so to speak, doesn't it? Cowboy speech uses all of the drawling, Indian, Spanish, profanity and ironic humor of their original ancestral folks. These days, he may not be packin' a peacemaker or ridin' drag behind a remuda, but chances are good he's still hell on wheels-colorful lingo that immediately sets his speech apart. Folk beliefs and superstitions of these rare breeds run rampant. A rodeo cowboy's lucky talisman might be a hatband made from a busted bronc. Using brand new ropes, eating popcorn before or during a rodeo, or using the north entrance of a rodeo might all be considered taboo. A cowboy might wear a lucky, beat-up, old hat to every rodeo event, but a brand new would bring the worst type of bad luck. Something as mundane as putting your hat on the bed would assure you a run of bad stock followed by no luck. All of these begin as folktales retold in oral tradition, dating back to the campfire, just as most tales begin.
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The copyright of the article Cowboy Way of Thinking and Doing in Rodeo Culture is owned by Diana Rowe Martinez. Permission to republish Cowboy Way of Thinking and Doing in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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