Synopsis
Author and humorist Dan Burnett is a genuine rowdiest kind, an eleven year veteran of professional rodeo and a working cowboy for twenty five years. There is a laugh on every page as he recounts his riotous adventures with cowboys, clowns, out-laws, in-laws bulls and babes during the sixties. This book is guaranteed to make even the humor-impaired laugh out loud.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
The Introduction: They say all things come full circle. When I was only three or four years old sometimes my Ma would ask me a question like: "Did you throw rocks at the hens?" "No Ma. Lady did, though." "You know, Dan I can tell when you're telling me a story because you always close your eyes." Well, I showed my Ma. I started telling my stories with my eyes open and I have been ever since. Telling a story is what mothers call children's lies which are too innocent to cause any real trouble. There are four kinds of lies: storytelling, fibs, white lies and bold faced lies, storytelling being the least serious offense. Stories are generally about ninety per cent true, too. I admitted that rocks had been thrown at the hens. I just forgot which one of us did it. The second kind of lie is a fib which is usually also told by children. A fib is told with the knowledge that your Ma and Pa, and most other adults, will probably see through it anyway. It's a half-hearted lie, a sort of test to see how smart adults really are. For instance, when my Pa would come back from town and see his calves panting, wet, huddled in a corner of the pen, and me and my cousin Fred each with a rope in our hand, he'd ask: "Did you boys ride them calves while I was gone?" "No, Pa." The whipping that followed was a clear indication that we were the ones who failed the test. The third kind of lie is a white lie. A white lie is a bold-faced lie told as a kindness to someone else. It isn't the truth, but its purpose is to prevent hurting someone's feelings, like when my wife cooks a new dish and asks: "Honey do you like it?" "Boy do I! But you know, I just remembered I forgot to pick up feed. I have to run into town real quick. I'll be right back." After I pick up the feed I drive through McDonald's on the way home. When I get back she apologizes because the food is too cold to eat, and I tell her: "That's okay, Honey. I've had plenty." And she thinks I'm a helluva nice guy. The fourth kind of lie is a plain brown bag, generic, straight-forward, total fabrication called a bold-faced lie. It needs no further explanation and, just for the record, I reserve those exclusively for emergencies like when I'm in trouble with my wife. As long as I can remember, people have been telling me I should write a book about the stories I've told them. So, I decided to do just that. This book contains ten of those stories about the almost absolutely true adventures of me and my rodeo buddies. I had to change some names and places to protect the innocent, if in fact there are any. That accounts for the four white lies. There are also two fibs, which I'll let you figure out for yourself. However, there aren't any bold-faced lies because, as I mentioned, I reserve those for real emergencies. Which reminds me, there's something I need to tell my wife. "No, Honey, I did not cash in my life insurance policy to get this book printed." Just so there are no misunderstandings, all cowboys are not alike. The Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA) was first known as RCA (Rodeo Cowboys Association). And before high octane, high performance athletes, there were old-fashioned, hell-raising cowboys like me and my buddies. The addition of the word "professional was not without purpose and intention. The powers-that-be decided that cowboys needed a new image. I'm here to tell you, they not only got their new image, they got a new breed of cowboy to go with it. I'll confess, most of us on the circuit during the fifties and sixties had notorious reputations, and a description of our behavior would have included an interesting vocabulary. But it would not have included the word "professional." Now, that isn't because we didn't earn our living (meager as it was) from rodeo, or because we weren't damn good at what we did. No, it was because of the manner in which we pursued our craft. We were young, tireless and had an unsatiable passion for life and every experience we could chase, corral or capture. We rode everything with hair, drank from every watering hole, and cut every filly out of the herd that we could, because...well, because we could, I guess. A lot of folks would like to forget some of us ever existed. And a few folks have tried, which is why you haven't read about us before, or seen our pictures in the Rodeo Hall of Fame. It's not that we're not famous in our own right. It's just that what got us famous is considered out of style in today's sophisticated society. I'll be the first to admit that we lacked the professional attitude and manners that have made the PRCA boys so popular today. Now, I'm not saying that's bad or good. I'm just saying the way things are today don't sound like any fun to me at all. I remember the good times and the old boys who lived them. It's only right that they should be remembered. True enough about ninety percent of the guys I used to run with are dead now, which brings me to another point. There aren't many of us left and I hate to brag, but I always did tell the best stories, so, it's only right I should be the one to tell these. Me and my buddies rodeoed for a lot of reasons, but money wasn't one of them. The PRCA boys today make more in one show than all of us put together made in a year. It wasn't for the fame either. Rodeos weren't nationally televised or videoed, and rarely attended by anyone but the cowboys themselves, and the locals who lived nearby the rodeo grounds. You literally had to be there to experience it. The only way we got any recognition was by one cowboy telling another cowboy behind the chutes, by bartenders telling bankers, by farmers telling ranchers, by a few girls telling all the other girls, or by me telling anybody who'd listen. We didn't do it for glamour or glory. We didn't have sponsors, crash helmets, flak-jackets, personal trainers or custom-made rigs. If we were lucky, we had a loan from a buddy drunk enough to be congenial, a starched white shirt and a clean pair of Wrangler jeans, a volunteer ambulance driver, and a beat-up old pick-up. We didn't do it for the fans either, although we sure liked the applause. We did it for fun, adventure and the dance. Bob Wills was king back then, and any man who could two-step was almost as popular as a cowboy who made the whistle. If you could do both, you could pretty much pick any filly from the herd. Now, If you've never heard ole Bob play then you've never been to a real dance. When he started up, he never stopped except for the boys to make a pit stop. Brother, you had better come to dance when Bob Wills was playing. A sweet-smelling woman who melts in your arms and Bob Wills playing a two-step...well, it just doesn't get any better than that. And another reason we rodeoed -- we did it to keep from doing something distasteful like getting a real job. We knew that dreaded day would come soon enough and we weren't about to hurry it along. I feel sorry for any man who's never had a chance to rip and run with his buddies. There's been a lot of talk about this male bonding thing, and I believe in it. You're supposed to trust another man enough to tell him your feelings, and do man things together. But that ain't nothing new. When you sleep eight to a room, scrape the mold off what's left of a pound of bologna, slap it between two slices of stale bread and then all take a bite: if six of you share one bottle of aftershave; if you're willing to sit on another cowboy's lap in an over-crowded truck to get to a rodeo, and you trust another ole boy to pull your bull rope...now that's male bonding. Male bonding ain't for everybody, though. Take Jerry for instance. He was a good ole boy but he just wasn't cut out for the kind of intimacy us cowboys were used to. Buzz and Delbert didn't quite get the hang of either. We weren't all cut out to be cowboys, but we all went along for the ride just the same.
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
