If you didn’t know what time of the year it was, or what the weather was like, you could tell simply by eavesdropping at the philosophy counter of the Mule Barn coffee shop. Let’s give it a try.
“Good to see you here, Doc,” said Herb Collins. “That warm water on the battery trick work for you?”
“Thanks, Herb. Yep. I tried it this morning. What’s that you got there?”
“Travel thingie. You know it’s more than 80 degrees in Guatemala … right now?”
“Saw a deal on TV,” Dud said. “They’re water skiing in Florida. You can go fishing down there all year round.”
“You going to Guatemala, Herb?” said Doc.
“Maybe. Been thinking about it. I don’t know much Spanish, though.”
“All you need to know,” said Dud, “is ‘Hace mucho calor,’ Herb.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Sure is hot!”
“I was just thinking yesterday,” said Doc, “of the unsung beauty of sweat. You know, we take sweat for granted in summer. Heck, we even dislike it and go swimming to wash it off.”
“That’s a fact,” Dud said.
“But I think it would be kinda fun to sweat right now. You know, just sit in a hot sun and bask like an old lizard and sip iced tea…”
“… and wear dark glasses,” said Herb.
“ … and watch girls in bikinis,” said Dud.
They looked at him.
“Around here?”
“Well, no. I mean, Guatemala or Florida, you know.”
“Yeah,” said Herb. “Guatemala.”
About that time Loretta came up. “You boys want your coffees topped off, or should I just turn the hose on you?”
They shoved their cups forward and grinned.
“Sale on snow shovels down at the hardware store,” said Doc.
“Heard that,” said Dud.
Brought to you by Slim’s award-winning advice book “A Cowboy’s Guide to Growing Up Right,” at http://www.nmsantos.com/Slim/Slim.html
Newspaper columnist Slim Randles, who writes the weekly Home Country column, took home two New Mexico Book Awards in 2011.
His advice book for young people, “A Cowboy’s Guide to Growing Up Right,” took first place in the self-help category, and “Sweetgrass Mornings” won in the biography/memoirs category. Randles lives and works in Albuquerque.
Home Country reaches 1.8 million hometown newspaper readers each week.
Slim Randles learned mule packing from Gene Burkhart and Slim Nivens. He learned mustanging and wild burro catching from Hap Pierce. He learned horse shoeing from Rocky Earick. He learned horse training from Dick Johnson and Joe Cabral. He learned humility from the mules of the eastern High Sierra. Randles lives in Albuquerque.
Randles has written newspaper stories, magazine articles and book, both fiction and nonfiction. His column appeared in New Mexico Magazine for many years and was a popular columnist for the Anchorage Daily News and the Albuquerque Journal, and now writes a nationally syndicated column, “Home Country,” which appears in several hundred newspapers across the country.
