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December 2007 - Posts
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The cowboys of the old West are still a cherished legend in the USA. Many books, movies and songs have been written about these rustic characters that populated the western parts of our country in the wild old days. They reached their peak in the latter half of the ninteenth century. After the great civil war, several million head of unmarked and unclaimed cattle roamed the grasslands of Texas. There was a ready market for the beef in our eastern cities. Early entrepreneurs hired herds of cowboys to round up that cattle and to transport it to the railroad terminals in Kansas, Missouri and Colorado via massive "trail drives".
This era of the cowboy, was greatly diminished by the beginning of the twentieth century when the railroads were extended into the wilds of Texas, Oklahoma, Wyoming and Montana. It was no longer necessary for cowboys to drive cattle long distances to market. The railroads came to the west and were able to transport the cattle directly from the rangelands to the markets. Soon trucks, helicopters, ATVs and snowmobiles replaced the horses and the traditional cowboys in manging cattle on the ranches.
Today, there are only a few old-fashioned cowboys who ride the range and tend to the cattle from atop a horse. Many of them work on dude ranches escorting tourists on trail rides while tending a few cattle in the old manner as a live show for the visitors. Most of the modern cowboys practice their skills of roping, riding and steer wrestling not to work with cattle, but to compete on the rodeo circuit for money and prizes. Quite a few of them wear the fancy cowboy garb to the nightclubs and dance halls but never come close to cow. Those are the "rhinestone cowboys".
Despite all of this, the cowboys are not gone. They are still alive and well in many parts of the USA especially in the western states. The modern cowboys may not be on a horse riding the range and herding cattle, but they have that same cowboy mentality as the old-time legendary breed. They are the men, and a few women, that love the independance of working outdoors, that can't stand the confinement and the restrictions of civilization, that don't want the responsibilities of a traditional family or a career.
Many of these modern-age cowboys work at part-time, temporary or seasonal jobs so they can maintain their independance from the responsibilities and commitments of career positions. Some of them become tour guides, ranch hands or loborers on dude ranches or other tourist resorts, as that allows them to work outdoors during the pleasant summer seasons. In the fall and winter, they might work in construction, truck driving, stable maintenance or a myriad of other subsistence jobs. They seldom work in factories or indoor jobs that confines them. They seldom stay in one place for a long time.
I was driving through Colorado with my wife, and we stopped in a small mountain town a hundred miles or so west of Denver. She decided to go shopping in the quaint little "general store" near the edge of the single main shopping street. I decided to wait out front enjoying the fantastic mountain vistas and the very pleasant summer weather. "Take a load off a them feet and set a spell" came an invitation from the lone figure sitting on the long wooden bench in front of the store.
The man was of indeterminate age. His face was weathered and wrinkled as if he had spent many years outdoors, but his eyes were as clear and bright as those of a young boy and his body seemed fit and strong. He was dressed in a slightly-frayed flannel shirt and a pair of clean new jeans held up by a leather belt with a huge turquois encrusted silver buckle. He wore a pair of cowboy boots. Not those snake-skin polished boots you see on the dance-hall cowboys, but a scrufty pair of work boots with nearly worn-out soles. Tilted back on the top of his head was a well-worn beige cowboy hat with a permanently sweat-stained ring around the base of its crown. A large black dog slept at his feet while he carved on a chunk of wood with an old pocket knife.
His name was Bob. He worked off and on at one of the local ranches, taking care of the horses and guiding the tourists on trail rides up into the high country. Sometimes, he worked for a few weeks with the local road crew doing manual labor. He didn't think he could ever work in an office or a factory. To him, that sounded too much like being in a jail. He once spent nearly six months in jail in Oklahoma, and it nearly killed him. No way, he wanted to do that again. In the winters, he usually drove a school bus, and he liked that, because it only required him to work about four hours a day. All in all, he made enough money to get by. He had a small trailer parked behind Charlie Adam's barn. He heated it with firwood he chopped himself. He didn't need much money to get along.
That was his pickup truck parked in front of the store he pointed out. It was an old beat-up Ford much in need of new paint. In the back was a worn saddle and two mud-encrusted shovels.
I asked if he was born in the area. He said that he was originally born in Nebraska, but had not returned since he went off to the army as a teenager. He spent nearly ten years working on a ranch in Montana until the owner died and his widow sold it off to an easterner. He came to Colorado nearly twenty years ago and worked for a small gold mine until he grew tired of it and moved on. He was married in California and lived in a regular suburban home for four years until his wife could no longer put up with him and threw him out. Fortunately, they did not have any children, so the divorce was a welcome relief for the both of them. He returned to Colorado about six years ago, because he liked the country around here.
When he finished his work for the day, he liked to come sit by the general store with his dog blackie, because "you get to meet so many interesting people here."
My wife had finished her shopping, and it was time for us to continue our journey, so I bid Bob a farewell. "Take it easy, pardner." he cautioned me, and waved goodbye as we drove away. I believe I had met a real cowboy.
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Christmas began as a religious holiday celebrating the birth of Jesus. In the USA, it has evolved into a grand year end holiday season that spans most of the month of December. It has become a month of good cheer, a time of giving to others, a time to reflect on peace and charity. It has also become a huge shopping event where people spend a significant part of their paycheck purchasing gifts for their children, for their family members, for their friends and for less fortunate strangers.
The shops and stores all across the USA capitalize on this "season of giving" by promoting the purchase of their merchandise. This is most apparent in the numerous Christmas decorations that you can see in every store. Some of them are very extravagant and rather beautiful. Each shopping mall or large department store features its own Santa Claus dressed in fur-trimmed red suit and sporting a bushy white beard. Children stand in a queue awaiting their turn to tell Santa what they wish to receive for Christmas.
On a less commercial but equally festive note, the Christmas decoration on private homes are quite a spectacle. Most families in the suburban bedroom communities and in the small towns scattered across the country decorate their homes for the holiday season. This is especially popular in the northern states where winter typically produces beautiful white snow-clad landscapes. It is also popular in some of the southern states, but colored lights on palm trees and on cactus plants do not produce the same atmoshere.
I live in a suburban "bedroom community" near a larger city. In our neighborhood, about nine out of ten houses are decorated for the holiday season. Some of the houses have a few simple pine wreaths adorning their windows. Other houses have colored lights on their trees and shrubs or along the eves of their houses. A few of them have lighted figures of Santa, reindeer, snowmen or other Christmas caracters on their front lawns. At least half of the homes are decorated with multiple strings of colored lights with several thousand tiny bulbs.
As you drive down the streets of my neighborhood after dark, you are constantly entertained by this panoramic vista of decorated homes all sparkling with myriads of tiny colored lights. When the ground is coverd with a blanket of pure white snow, the community becomes a fantastic wonderland of light and color. It is an awesome spectacle.
Most neighborhoods have at least one fanatic that goes over the top in decorating his home for the holidays. We have one such fanatic living a few streets away from me. His house, the trees around it, the shrubbery on his lawn, his fence, and his roof are all decorated with strings of colored lights. There are at least twenty thousand tiny bulbs glowing around his home every night. In addition, he has giant lighted figures of snowmen, reindeers, christmas carolers and assorted characters festooned about his lawn. On his roof, he displays a full sized lighted replica of Santa complete with a sleigh filled with gifts and ten reindeer. From dusk until midnight, he blares christmas music from speakers.
His house has become a landmark for visitors from miles around. Nearly every evening, there are cars of families with children parked along the street ogling this colorful extravaganza. His electric bill for the month of December must be huge.
You might think that this is a unique phenomena. Only one such fanatic could exist in any city. Yet, I know of at least a half dozen similar houses scattered throughout various neighborhoods in the surrounding area.
I know this festival of lights has little to do with the birth of Jesus. It can be tacky and over the top. But I love this unique Christmas custom. It is a beautiful phenomena that occurs for only a few weeks during the middle of winter, then disappears for another year.
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One of the things I enjoy when exploring the less-traveled roads in the USA is eating in the local diners.
We have many fast food restaurants and chain restaurants all over the USA. When traveling, they can be very trusted and convenient places to eat. If you stop at a McDonald's restaurant in Montana, you are assured that you will get the same quality hamburger as you get at a McDonald's in New York City or in Miami Florida. The cleanliness is assured, and the service is uniformly good. These same standards hold true for most fast food restaurants and most chain restaurants. Unfortunately, they offer very little culinary adventure or dining excitement.
I prefer the smaller diners, frequented by the local residents, and offering only "slow food". These little restaurants are usually much more interesting than the fast food or chain restaurants. They offer "home cooking" that a typical family in the USA would prepare at home. The menu might include such favorites as: fried chicken, pot roast, meatloaf, macaroni and cheese, fish sandwiches, chili, and apple pie. Most diners also serve regional favorites such as, chicken fried steak and grits in the South, barbeque beef and burritos in the West, clam chowder and fish cakes in the New England States or steaks and ribs in the Midwest.
It is a bit more risky than eating in a chain restaurants or in a fast food establishment. You never know if the quality of the food will be good or not so good. On the other hand, you might just stumble into a local diner that serves some great "down home cooking" with a local specialty that you have never tasted before.
The atmosphere in these local diners can be quite interesting. I stopped at a diner in small town in southern Utah and had some succulent barbeque ribs. At the next table sat two cowboys dressed in their full working gear. They wore scrufty high-heeled work boots, worn faded jeans held up by wide tooled-leather belts fastened with giant silver and turquoise buckles. They both wore wide-brimmed "ten-gallon" cowboy hats that they did not remove during the entire meal. At their waists, they both sported finely made and decorated leather holsters containing, not trusty colt revolvers, but the latest high-tech cell phones.
The waitresses tend to be matronly local housewives that work part time while the "kids" are in school. They treat each and every customer with the warm familiarity of a close friend. Terms of endearment like darling, honey or sugar are liberally granted to every stranger. Don't be suprised when you are greeted with: "What can I get for you darlin?" or "How about some coffee hun?" or "Try the meatloaf sugah!". Eating in a local diner can be like eating home-cooked food served to you by your own mother.
We call it comfort food. It is not haut cuisine, but it sure brings a lot of comfort.
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We have a great highway system in the USA. Modern interstate highways and multi-laned throughways cross our entire land providing quick convenient access to many cities and attractions. It is hard to find any area of the USA that is not connected via good roads. I certainly use those highways when I am traveling on business. They get me to my destination quickly and safely.
When you travel the interstate highways, you can typically travel long distances with little wasted time. You can stop in the conveniently spaced rest areas to purchase fuel, to use the clean restrooms, to eat decent quality food, to buy snacks or drinks and to purchase gifts or souvenirs. All of this is available without ever having to exit the highway system. Yet, it is all so monotonous. A rest area in Florida looks and feels the same as a rest area in New York or a rest area in California.
When I am traveling at my liesure and time is not critical, I prefer to avoid those convenient modern conveyances. I prefer to take the "road less traveled" and to venture "off the beaten path". Some of our scenic byways in the USA, are much more interesting than the big modern thruways.
Route 66 was once such a road. It was constructed in a time when access to the western part of the USA via auto was difficult. Route 66 was the first great cross-country road connecting Chicago in the northern Midwest with California on the southern Pacific Coast. It became the "mother road" for countless immigrants from the East Coast and the Midwest seeking a better life in sunny California. It crossed mountains, plains, deserts and lands both forbidding and beautiful. The little towns along Route 66 soon learned to take advantage of the continuous stream of travelers by offering food, lodging, groceries, amusements and diversions. They built many unique and quirky structures along the road to entice travelers to stop and spend a bit of their cash.
Unfortunately, the original route 66 no longer exists. It has been replaced by modern interstate highways such as route 55, route 44 and for much of way by route 40. These new roads approximate the old route 66, but they have annihilated the original route 66 in many places and simply bypassed it in others. Driving these new interstates is not as interesting. There are a few surviving segments of route 66, and a few modern equivalents with that name, but you must search to find those surviving remnants along side of the new highways.
I prefer the lesser traveled roads that have not yet been replaced by modern highways. On some of those roads, you can still find the spirit of old route 66. Those roads pass through small towns, past farms and ranches and through spectacular scenery. The local restaurants and shops are still housed in odd structures and still display quirky signs in order to entice travelers to pause and spend money. You can meet many interesting people along those roads.
Highway 12 in Utah is one such road. It is just a bit over 100 miles in length, but it travels through some of the most spectacular scenery in the USA. It passses near Bryce Canyon National Park, through Escalante National Park and terminates just short of Capital Reef National Park. Along the road, you might stop for fuel and find yourself parked next to an Indian driving a pickup truck and towing a trailer with a pair of saddled horses. You might stop at a local cafe and sit at a table next to a family where the father is wearing tooled leather boots, a wide belt with immense jeweled buckle and a broad brimmed "ten gallon" cowboy hat. If you pause to chat with him, you will learn that he owns a cattle ranch nearby and works on it as a true cowboy.
There are still two old style roads of epic lengths that have not yet been annihilated by their modern counterparts.
The old East Coast Highway 1 still exists. It has largely been replaced by interstate 95 and other modern superhighways. It begins at the Canadian border in Maine and wends its way south along the eastern seaboard for more than 2,000 miles until it finally ends at Key West 90 miles southwest of the Florida mainland. Unlike its replacement, Highway One meanders through many seaport towns, beach resorts and smaller cities along its way. I have driven segments of highway one in Main, near Baltimore and Washington DC, through the Carolinas and in Florida. Driving it can be very slow and frustrating due to all of its meanders, its numerous traffic lights and its areas of congestion.
I fondly remember stopping at a "clam shacks" along highway one in Maine to sample succulent fried clams fresh from the nearby sandbars on the Atlantic beaches. I remember the many "crab houses" along the same road in Maryland far to the south, and the barbeque pits along the route in South Carolina.
I recently drove highway one south from Miami Florida as it crossed the ocean on bridges and causeways for nearly 100 miles to Key West. The old road was populated with small neighborhood restaurants, each claiming to offer the best fish sandwich in the Keys, Some sported giant seashells, elephant sized lobsers or cars adorned with rooftop shrimps. All this simply to attract the attention of the passing motorists. I saw hundreds of fishing charters, many dive shops, excursion boats and a place to swim with the dolphins. As I drove through the keys, I remember thinking, "This is what route 66 must have been like in its days of glory".
The West Coast of the USA has its own counterpart for highway one. It has old Highway 101 that begins at the Canadian border near Vancouver and wends its way south all the way to Los Angeles. It is supplemented by California highway one that diverts to some of the more scenic coastal attractions. Like its East Coast counterpart, Highway 101 meanders through countless towns and cities and past many great scenic vistas. It has been largely replaced but not obliterated by the modern interstate Highway 5. I have not found the opportunity to explore Highway 101 as much as I would like, but I am sure it too offers just as many adventures and nostalgic attractions.
Route 66 is now a legend that exists primarily in novels, films and history books. Only scant pieces of the old highway are still existant, and those are largely immitation replicas created for the tourists. Utah highway 12, Route One and route 101 are still very real, and still available to travelers that would like to take the longer, more authentic road less traveled.
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