You’ve seen him. Maybe sitting on a bench at the feed store or the co-op. He wears a cowboy hat, blue jeans and a well-worn long-sleeved shirt. Something is caked on his boots, most likely excrement from some mammal he has worked with. He might be chewing on a toothpick or just working at a chunk of meat caught in his teeth. He is obviously a cowboy who has a penchant for ruminating. In today’s society, a person will be bored for about three seconds before they pull out their phone to watch stupid cat videos on TikTok. The human of today is terrified of silence and the opportunity to just think. This silence and boredom are the foundation of a cowboy’s existence.
A cowboy, or anyone with the luxury of silence and time, is a thinking person. Don’t mistake him for being thoughtful … he is not. And don’t assume a thinking person is educated or even smart. But they have bounced the ideas of life around their cranium in the same way a cow works over a bolus of cud. And they will think about any topic – politics, religion, transcendental meditation, you name it, he has thought about it. And ask any cowboy his opinion of any subject and you will get a response. Again, a thinking man is very different from an educated man, so said response could range from uniquely insightful to ridiculously naive. But as sure as the moon chases the sun, the cowboy will tell you his opinion.
The outside circle is an old cowhand reference. As the crew musters first thing in the morning, the cow boss will ask, “Who wants the outside circle?” In any pasture there will be a far corner, or an out-of-the-way place that requires a horse and rider to travel farther than the rest. Sometimes there is a volunteer. Someone riding a fresh horse will prefer an outside circle instead of a bronc ride. I used to have a long striding 16-and-a-half-hand horse that really liked to step out. I enjoyed the outside circle on this horse. If you’re riding drag, there is usually at least one other cowboy who will engage in sporadic conversation, but when you are on the outside circle, there is nothing to distract you from pondering the niceties of life.
Cowboys aren’t the only class of people that are afforded this opportunity. Loggers, miners and farmers can also be thinkers – although farmers as thinkers may be in jeopardy. I read that a paramount issue with broadband in the Midwest was maintaining enough bandwidth to run all of the information systems on an autonomous tractor and also stream Netflix to entertain the operator. When I learned to run a baler in the 1980s, my father didn’t allow a radio because you need to listen for faults in the machine. “The machine will talk to you, if you listen.” That is true, but after eight hours in a baler, everything starts talking to you. The field mice, the crows, the bales in the field … everything.
But without Netflix, or even a radio, the cab of a tractor can be an amazing place to think. Those early balers also lacked air conditioning, so the heat stroke and fatigue-induced hallucinations tended to spice all of those thoughts into intensely interesting flavors.
Everyone really should carve out some thinking time, and it’s really quite simple. Next time you drive to work, shut off your radio, turn off your phone and just soak in the silence. Your mind will begin to wander, and just wander with it. With all of the thoughts swirling around your head, you typically end up in the rumble strip wondering who has been driving for the last five miles, but think about all of the amazing thoughts and opinions you have formulated.
Or the next time you get in your favorite workout, accidentally on purpose leave your earbuds at home. With all of that quiet and blood flow, the idea synapses in your brain will most certainly fire. It’s really that simple – a little silence and let you mind roam, and then you too can offer an opinion on almost any topic.
The editor of this fine periodical asked if I was willing to share my opinions in this column. Like any cowboy who is asked to opine, I was more than happy to accept the invitation. What can you expect from this page? My editor explicitly forbade discussion on three topics … politics, religion and transcendental meditation, which of course are my three favorite subjects. I will instead cover my fourth favorite topic: the mundane. I write about the mundane parts of rural living that amuse me, in the hope that you will find it amusing too. Will the thoughts I put on paper be funny? I think that’s unlikely. Will my thoughts be informative? Most certainly not. Will they be offensive? I haven’t ruled it out as a possibility, but know that is never my intention.
I will continue to ride the outside circle, or spend time in a baler, and I will continue to think about my opinions. And I know my horse is grateful that I have a new venue to share my opinion. I’m sure he’s tired of hearing from me.
Gus Brackett lives and works on his family ranch in Three Creek, where they raise cattle, horses and kids (little humans, not little goats). He is married to a saint and they have three wonderful children … and the other one. His family wishes to remain anonymous because they are certain they will be the subject of one of these columns, and they want to see if the column is any good before they put their name on it. The ranch is marginally profitable, so don’t worry about their well-being. He’s not trying to support a family with his writing.
