By the way, this dress is for sale….
During my growing years, my family spent every summer involved in the hobby of ‘Buckskinning’, or re-enacting the Fur Trade era pre-1840, by attending Rendezvous, a French word meaning ‘You – come’ during which trappers (Mountain Men) who had spent the winter up in the mountains trapping beaver would meet with traders to exchange the pelts they gathered for supplies for the upcoming winter.
This was also a time of celebration, music, merriment, and yes – drinking, lots of drinking.
These days, as Fur Trade enthusiasts, there is no need for all the hard work part – so pretty much we just showed up at arranged camps, set up our tipis, put on our period finery and partied. Yes, there were Muzzleloader Rifle shoots, tomahawk throws (yours truly was 3 time Utah Jr. State Champion, thank you very much, something that really irked the boys) and a trader’s row where you could trade for/purchase various and sundry goods. My dad owned a very successful trade tent; he’s always had a talent for coming across rare and wondrous things most others can’t find. He was also a bit of a clothes horse; he had one pair of leathers (pants) that were heavily fringed, and he had attached medallions and ‘gee-gaws’ as he called them, to almost every length of fringe. When the man walked around, you could hear him clear across camp; it earned him the nicknames ‘Tinkerbell’ and ‘Jingles’. My mother often would not allow him to leave the tipi in those pants until at least 9 in the morning so as not to wake the entire camp.
He also loved his billowy shirts; I often think my childhood with Mt. Men primed me for adulthood as a die-hard Pirate enthusiast. He had bright colored ones, ones with frilly cuffs, star-spangled and polka-dotted shirts, and my favorite, which I eventually cajoled him into giving me after years of begging, a spectacular purple paisley number with ruffles at the collar and cuffs. I wear that as part of my Pirate costume every Halloween….
But I digress. Rendezvous was a great time of reuniting with friends from all over the country that you only saw sometimes once a year; there was a sense of community that everyone’s kids were safe, everyone worked together, it was a super experience for me growing up.
Here comes the stepdad story. Mind you, this one may not be for the squeamish, as the title may have already insinuated.
One evening, there was a pot luck dinner going on; these were common at Rendezvous, you showed up with a dish and your plate (and possibly a bottle of something to pass around) and everyone planted on the ground and dug in.
Before I go any further with this story, I should tell you I was not present for this event, but was told later, and by several different people.
My stepdad happened to be dressed to the Rendezvous Nines that evening, with a nice pair of brain-tanned leggings complete with a full set of coup stripes down both legs, and a handsome embroidered breechclout. Yes people, guys wear that kind of stuff at Rendezvous and it’s perfectly normal.
The thing with that kind of getup is, you need to keep your breechclout snug, as you have nothing underneath it, and if it happens to sag, well… unfortunate things can happen. Until this event, I thought the worst of it was an embarrassing peep show. I stand corrected.
My dad filled his plate, and being a sturdy man who prefers a little back support when sitting on the ground, he sidled up to the sidewall of the nearest tipi and kind of, ‘plopped’ himself down.
My dad apparently failed to look where he was sitting first.
Tipis are very large and not exactly streamlined; there is a very heavy rope wrapped repeatedly around the crown of the tipi poles that is staked down in the middle of the tipi. Additionally, twenty to thirty heavy duty tent stakes surround the outside of the tipi skin, firmly securing it to the ground.
Most people use cast iron railroad spikes.
Now, I really don’t feel the necessity to go into a lot of detail here, we’re all adults and I’m sure you can put two and two together. Needless to say, my dad did not enjoy his meal. But God bless him, he was so focused on keeping up appearances he sat stock still and waited for my mom to get near enough that he could quietly enlist her help in lifting himself up and off his current predicament.
Later, when my mother was recounting this to me, I asked, “So, exactly what happened – I mean, did he cut his butt cheek, or…?”
This was my mother’s reply: “Honey, let’s just put it this way: If he didn’t already know he wasn’t gay… he sure as Hell knows now.”
The Nest 