Open Road

[Picture of Stetson “Open Road”]

The pickup ghosts through the khaki evening, flowing carefully down the wide street, paved now, but the truck remembers dirt on Main Street. Twenty-two years old, but nicely kept, and nowhere near ready for pasture. A conservative blue and white F150 with good tires, 30% left, steel wheels, a brush bar. No rust, but some carefully patched paint and some mostly polished out scratches. The dogs look politely from the bed, heads turning, the truck swinging quietly into the diagonal parking place. Somewhere out west. Doesn't matter where, all the places blur together after this much time, blue mountains in the distance, white sidewalks, awnings. The dogs are silent, but eager. No barking. Just a hint of excitement in warm eyes, grizzled muzzles hosting flaring nostrils, eyes flitting from scene to engine. The engine cuts off, no sputter or backfire. It's a good truck.

The door opens, a boot swings out. Sometimes a nicely mink-oiled Chippewa, or maybe a good solid, not fancy – never fancy – working western boot. Not new, not old. A boot that sees dust and manure, gas pedal and stirrup. And jeans, not tattered or dirty. Or new. Maybe a bit whiter at the knee. Maybe a careful repair where a barb caught. And a belt, a brown leather one, medium wide, with a cautiously sized non-gaudy western buckle. Maybe, just maybe, a well-worn roping buckle. Maybe plain, maybe tooled, but never out of place. A bronzed arm with just a few age spots, sun wrinkled, bleached hairs, a few white scars, some ancient, some not so ancient. Sometimes a watch, a decent one, nothing gaudy, nothing digital, nothing that has three dials and three knobs. Sometimes not. There's always the sun for time. A gold wedding band, or the aching, longing lack of one, memory sadly persisting. The light-colored short-sleeve shirt, maybe a window pane print. No pearl snaps or gaudy yokes for this cowboy. No bolo tie flashing silver and turquoise. A Carhartt jacket, or a broken-in fleece when November's wind sheers in from the northwest.

Wrinkled throat, wrinkled neck, red-brown. Square face, lined. Not smile lines, not frown lines. Lines of the bright, distant horizon; of lonely days. Pale blue eyes squinting, the faraway gaze, eyes of many early dawns and late nights, of the long hours watching the fire, stars slowly sliding across velvet, coyote howls echoing off cliffs.

Right hand swings up and on goes the hat. Polished off white, medium brim, beaver felt, with the stock Stetson ribbon. Eyes meet, we nod, he's a serious fellow. Off about his business. Onto the curb, the dogs watching. A little hitch in his walk. Some youthful indiscretion. A rodeo. Or lots of roping, jumping off the horse, close encounters with scared bovines. Sometimes a little bow in the knees, long days in the saddle.

He's an Open Road man. Classic Stetson.