Earlier this year my family moved from the sand to the sticks. We knew we were in for some adjustments leaving the desert Southwest for the badlands of eastern Montana, but we figured the changes would be mostly climatic. Now, nearly nine months since our move, we are beginning to discover just how in-over-our-heads we actually are.
The culture is quite a change from what we are used to. I, for one, am a normal old guy. I don’t mind getting dirty but I clean up nicely. Sometimes I am good for jeans and a t-shirt while other times I’m a little more, shall we say, metrosexual? It just depends.
However, there is no room for my fashion fence sitting in our new town. This here is cowboy country. Wrangler jeans, shirts with snaps, ten gallon hats, boots with actual manure on them- it’s the real deal. In fact, my next door neighbor just recently retired from the professional rodeo circuit.
My new town, claiming a modest population of about five thousand, draws twice that number when it plays host to an annual event called the “Bucking Horse Sale.” Townsfolk told me about Bucking Horse, with its parade and carnival-like atmosphere, soon after I arrived with my family. My response was, “Mister, what you do with your horses when you are lonely and tempted is your own business, but a parade is where I draw the line.”
There are a few things that have taken some getting used to. For instance, there are dogs here that are large enough to be “training horses” for young buckaroos. Just slap a saddle on the mutt and spur it ‘till your legs give out. You’ll learn to ride. Another thing- the one and only time I visited the doctor I found myself walking out of the office with an industrial sized salt lick and a Cabela’s 
catalog. Oh, and last week I was stunned to see the lifeless eyes of a freshly shot deer staring back at me from the top of a minivan I was following on the highway. I had to turn on the wiper blades to clear my windshield of blood spatter.
Lastly, there is one other troubling thing about my new home. I’m a redhead, you see. Most of my childhood I bore the burden of schoolyard shame and ridicule because, as you would agree, my scorching crimson dome resembles the inner region of a bulls eye. In most populations red heads are freckled sparsely throughout a sea of blondes, brunettes, and whatever you call black-haired people. Italians? I don’t know. Anyway, it isn’t very often you see red heads roaming in herds, except for in places like Scandinavia, maybe, or Hell. Oh, and Montana.
I don’t claim these red heads. They are creepy. If their greasy scarlet hair doesn’t give them away, you can generally pick them out with their dirty overalls concealing bullfrogs in bib pockets, bare chests and mud caked feet. Their freckles are so dense you have to connect the dots in reverse. Their tight lips are nearly always pursed, revealing buttery teeth whittled to needle points. They are always watching, always waiting.
Apparently most of these red heads are related because I am frequently asked whether I am kin (gag me) to the “Clements.” The conversation usually goes something like this:
Wal-Mart Clerk: “Aren’t you Old Man Clements’s second boy’s boy?
Me: “No.”
Wal-Mart Clerk: “Are you sure?”
Me: “The test results are inconclusive, but I’m betting not. We will find out next week on Maury.”
Wal-Mart Clerk: “‘Cause I thought you was the one in those pictures with the sheep and the ladies britches and the corn husker.”
Me: “I am.”
Wal-Mart Clerk: “Well I reckon you’re a kin to ‘cause you look just like ‘em with your red hair and all.
Me: “Excellent . . . On what isle might I find bleach? What about a hypodermic needle? Thanks.”
I guess it wouldn’t be so bothersome to be thrown into the bunch with the Clements clan, except they won’t have anything to do with me. To them I am an imposter. A phony. For one thing, I bathe; I don’t own a four wheeler, and not once have I offered a yellow carnation to a “purdy” cousin at the Clements’s family reunion.
The vibe I get from chance encounters with the Clements is quite unsettling. All over town I think I am being watched. I expect that sometime soon, while I am getting ready for bed, an army of ginger kids will emerge dramatically from backyard vegetable gardens across town, like the Children of the Carrots, to march on my home.
I’m ready. I’ve armed myself with gallons of turpentine and veggie scrubbers attached to broomsticks. I will, at least, put up a good fight. Until that day comes, I’ve decided to blend in to my new surroundings. So if you see me pass through your neck of the woods, sound your horn for me, your friendly neighborhood Honky.
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