Mouthful of FEathers Essay

Keeping Up Appearances: Reflections on the Stetson

By Greg McReynolds, Guest Writer, 3-18-11

	Old photos of fathers pheasant hunting could never be "dorky." Or could they?

I always thought of it simply as a hat.

In the days of my youth ‘cap’ meant a ball cap, preferably with Texas A&M embroidered on the front.

‘Hat’ meant Stetson.

If worn stained, it meant shelter from the sun on hot days and protection from the sleet and rain of winter.

Clean, with sharp corners on the brim was for dances, dominoes and Shiner beers on Saturday nights.

Now, my hats are mostly worn and stained and reserved specifically for days afield. They are still just hats. At least until Chad Love rechristened them in a blog over at Mallard of Discontent.

Now, they are dork hats.

So, to defend how cool I am, I dove into my photos archives looking for proof.

I did find this cool old photo of my dad on a pheasant hunt wearing his dork hat.

Unfortunately, I personally was not vindicated. I found stacks and stack of photos of me looking like a complete and utter tool.

Dork hat indeed.

On a positive note, I did not find any photos of myself looking sunburned, cold, wet or otherwise more than mildly miserable.

So, I declare a hat victory for all dorks, not for coolness, but for utility.

I embrace my inner and outer dork.

Greg McReynolds is a hunter and angler with a passion for wild places. He lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where he works on conservation issues for Trout Unlimited. McReynolds writes the blog Shotgun Chronicle and also writes for Mouthful of Feathers, where this essay originally appeared.

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