A few years ago, for whatever reason, I got it into my head that I needed to own a cowboy hat. I am not a cowboy or a rancher or a high plains drifter. In fact, I have been on a horse exactly once in my life, so what was this call to own this iconic piece of headwear? (My hat hanging on the wall here https://amzn.to/48s8h66).

I guess it makes me think of a time that I never experienced, a time that was full of adventure, freedom, danger and the unknown. Who can honestly say they never thought about what it must have been like to trek through unexplored country and be among some of the first footsteps that drove westward expansion or what it would have been like to stake a claim and carve out a living from the soil beneath your feet? Or how about pulling one of the many iconic single action revolvers of the time and backing down some bandits on the trail?

It may be true that that era has been over romanticized by authors such Louis L’amour and Larry Mcmurtry (great writers though they are) and directors such as Sergio Leone, I harbor no such fantastical ideas about that time. In fact, it is the absence of so many of the creature comforts we enjoy today that makes me think about such men, women, and families who endured such hardships in pursuit of something new. Present day, we stand as a nation where most of us have not the knowledge, skills, or stomach to kill, butcher, and preserve an animal, a task that was undoubtedly required of them.

I do not much wear my cowboy hat anymore but it hangs on my wall as a symbol, a symbol of the American spirit, of American ingenuity, American individualism and the testicular fortitude it takes to jump without looking, to venture into the unknown with no certainty of success or even survival.