Gather ye rosebuds while ye may
Old time is still a flying
And the same flower that smiles today
Tomorrow will be dying
~Robert Herrick
For mere mortals, time is the enemy.
And even though the professional rodeo cowboy leads an iconic, almost mythical existence, the brutal fact of the matter is this; no one escapes unscathed when it comes to the passing of time.
Then, as I stood quietly on the rodeo grounds in Eddyville, NE, it hit me. The reason rodeo cowboys–especially small towners–work so hard is because they are running out of time.
Indeed, for rodeo cowboys who are trying to make it to the show, time may be their single greatest adversary. In fact, so formidable is the ticking of the clock that it’s almost impossible to fathom the pressure that accompanies trying to make a living in an occupation where your entire professional worth is measured in eight second increments–not to mention the fact that you only have but a precious few years in which to master what, very well, could be the most difficult of all the sporting events.
Perhaps it’s this reality–even more so than the cowboy code and the craft itself–that engenders so much respect and admiration from an outside world. And as the rest of us find creative ways to enjoy the passing of time, the aspiring rodeo cowboy lives life not “somewhere down the road”–they live it fully present, in the here and now and they do it with an urgency knowing that their window of opportunity narrows as each day passes–even if that means competing until it’s dark
When I think about the prose penned by Robert Herrick, I now understand that his words were not written exclusively for scholars and philosophers, they were written for rodeo cowboys as well.
As the sun disappears into the western skyline, small town Nebraska cowboys compete in local events hoping one day to get their chance at making it to the big show.
What do you think?