Lee Pitts: 10 Places not to find a cowboy

If you want to catch a glimpse of a real cowboy here are ten places NOT to look.

#10 Mercedes dealership – Although I don’t hang around such places myself, I doubt a Mercedes is the cowboy’s dream drive. I don’t even think Mercedes makes a pickup, do they? Although I did write a story once about a cowboy who had a Cadillac. He cut out the rear seat, front right seat, and trunk so he could haul his pet Longhorn around. (I have the photos to prove it.)

#9 Accountant’s office- I have yet to meet a cowboy who has a personal accountant in order to employ tax avoidance strategies. A cowboy’s life is one big involuntary tax avoidance scheme. The portfolios of most cowboys consist of their boots, dog, hat, rifle, belt buckle and old truck. It’s a toss-up which is their most valuable asset… their saddle or their horse.

#8 Forbes 400 – Every year I buy the Forbes 400 magazine to see if I’m amongst the country’s wealthiest. I have yet to see my name, or that of any cowboy. Sure, I see plenty of folks on the list who own lots of real estate in cow country but I really doubt if any of them have ever sewn up a cow’s prolapse with baler twine or roped a wild one and tied it to a tree.

#7 Union meeting- I only know of one time when a bunch of cowboys tried to unionize and that was in a great novel by Elmer Kelton called the Day The Cowboys Quit. Generally, a cowboy doesn’t need someone to negotiate his paltry, unlivable wage. He can do that himself.

#6 Spa – Although I’ve never been to one myself, I really doubt that if I did go I’d find a cowboy under a heat lamp with pickles on his eyes. Although I haven’t seen many cowboys in Speedos the few cowboys I’ve seen in the buff had sun burnt hands, necks and faces and the rest of their bodies were shimmering white. And they don’t need to spend a month’s salary getting all slathered with mud because they do that for free when they have to pull out a boggy cow.

#5 Kanye West rap concert – If a cowboy wants to go someplace crowded and listen to some loudmouth rattling off a bunch of jabber words he’ll go to the auction market, thank you very much. If he goes to a concert it probably features cowboy poetry, Dave Stamey or Red Steagall.

#4 Next to a squirrel hole – A cowboy in Texas once told me to never spread my bedroll next to a squirrel hole because rattlesnakes like to live there. I never was brave enough to test his theory.

#3 Fashion Show in New York City – Your average cowboy does not wear clothes with designer labels, unless you consider Wrangler one. If he won’t listen to his wife, he’s darn sure not going to listen to some transgender New York City fashion editor tell him what to wear. You could say he wears a uniform to work and the only thing that changes might be his belt buckle, and that’s only if he wins a ranch rodeo.

#2 John Deere dealership – Most cowboys I know hate tractors. They are far more apt to collect Copenhagen lids than they are those miniature tractors that old farmers like to play with. Cowboys don’t wait anxiously for the new baler models to come out each year and given a choice between going to the dentist or the parts house, a cowboy will pick the molar mechanic every time.

#1 A vegetarian buffet at a PETA protest – My guess is it would be easier to find a cowboy enrolled in some Ivy League Grad school studying floral management, poultry science or Bassoon studies than it would to find a real cowboy protesting on behalf of animals that have repeatedly tried to kill him on a regular basis.

If you want to spot a real cowboy you’d have a better chance at COSTCO once every six weeks, church, sale barn, emergency ward, county fair, Big Bend Saddlery or waiting in line to beg for an advance on his measly earnings at the Big House once a month.