What's a Cowgirl Cocktail?
Probably not what you were thinking. I'm talking about a cocktail of ideas.
Saddle-up and Join Me!
Cowgirl Cocktail is going to be a lively mixture of cowgirls of the Wild West, combined with western history and some personal reflections. You’ll also find links to websites and conversations, books and videos, and a bit of cowboy/cowgirl lingo.
Best of all, it will slide right into your inbox every two weeks, usually on Thursdays.
My interest in the little known Wild West cowgirls began when I owned the newspaper in my small town for 27 years (lots of stories there!) and I wrote several articles about a cowgirl who had performed with Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show and had retired to my town. After I sold the newspaper, I started writing books. My first book was about that cowgirl (The Last of the Wild West Cowgirls.) After that, I wrote six more books, and so far, all of them have been in the non-fiction arena, but I recently decided to branch out and try my hand at fiction, so you might hear some about my writing process too.
I’m hoping you will want to read more about my take on the history of the American West—especially the part the cowgirl played in that history. And I hope you will participate when you can—I always love hearing from my readers and other writers.
Let’s start with this:
From the time my husband told me he wasn’t taking a nap, he was just checking his eyelids for pinholes, I’ve been fascinated by cowboy lingo. (Not that my husband is a cowboy, but sometimes he talks like one.)
Since then I’ve collected phrases that tickled me, and often refer to Cowboy Lingo, A Dictionary of the Slack-Jaw Words and Whangdoodle Ways of the American West by Ramon F. Adams.
Pithy, terse sentences were expected of the cowboy, says Adams. “In a lively group the conversation sometimes sparkled with a quick, slangy wit.“ A cowboy’s lingo “fits his calling and is his ‘mother tongue.’ It is a part of him, a part which modern civilization has been unable to despoil.”
I’m so grateful that ‘Cowboy Lingo’ has survived modern civilization because it gives us insights into the everyday life and minds of the no-nonsense cowboy (and cowgirl). The fact that it’s often witty is a bonus. You can expect a bit of ‘Lingo’ in every Cowgirl Cocktail.
This week’s Cowboy/Cowgirl Lingo
See About – To attend to, to consider.
As in “I hope you will see about joining me in this Substack adventure.”
