The Stetson and the Nurse

  • Posted on
  • By John D. Yates: writer, JFH customer, hat wearer
  • Posted in cowboy hat, hat, stetson
The Stetson and the Nurse

The Stetson and the Nurse

My father was a hat guy. Not the "all hat and no cattle" guy. Farming and cattle were his life, hogs too but nobody was selling hog hats, so he wore a Stetson or Resistol or Ryon cowboy hat that went with him as he worked cattle on over 700 acres of prime grazing land and, one day, went with him to the doctor's office.
You see, dad had a horse, kind of a mean horse. They got on just fine but this horse had come to dad from a man who had been less than kind. He'd hit the horse and as a result, the animal spooked easily. So on a hot Oklahoma day, sweat dripping off his noggin, dad took off his hat and raised his arm to wipe his brow. The stallion, glimpsing the raised arm holding the hat, reared up and threw dad into a corral fence breaking his arm. Amazingly, dad got up and finished that day's work.....and two more. When the pain didn't go away, he got his mother to take him in to the doctor, who called his nurse in to shoot some xrays.
The nurse, a black-haired beauty, was less than thrilled to leave her date to come in to work on a Sunday. "It's broken" she told dad. "When did you do this?" "Three day ago" he told her. I raised my hat and it spooked my horse and he threw me" Even more flustered, she asked "And why did you wait till today to come in?"  Dad shrugged. "I had work to do and I figured it'd stop hurting but it didn't"
Arm set and cast, dad and his mother went back to the farm. A week or so later, dad and his best friend were goofing off in town when they spotted the nurse and her best friend window shopping. Dad told his buddy, "See that black-haired girl? That's the girl I'm gonna marry"
And so, despite a rocky start. that's exactly what he did. He got the girl....my sister and I got the world's best mom....and I got the hat.