The Cowboy and the Tamper; A short story.

[TheWhale13]

Imagine you're a lonely traveller in the snowy Wyoming hills one cold night. It was the year 1899.

For 5 days I've trekked across these unforgiving lands, lodging to lodging, from cabin to cabin. It has been tough with the cold biting into my aging joints, the snow making eatch step a bothersome ordeal.

The horse and I've been hurrying these past hours, we are only a days trip away from mommas house, but the light is escaping and the cold is biting me more every minute. The funeral is at noon, and I can't be late, not for this.

But now it's almost completely dark, so I tried up the horse to a little tree here, the only one in a few hundred feet. The tent went up easily enough, and the last thing I've got to do is to light up my old pipe. Just a few minutes to relax before I'll sleep, and get in with tomorrow.

The last light is slowly being extinguished behind the ridge, and with the horse finally being relaxed. I pick up my trusty old pipe and fill it with my most favorite blend. A fine mixture of something called latakia and good old American virginia. It's always a good way to end the day.

Finally the pipe is lit, and I can enjoy myself. But, the only thing that I can manage to say, Oh Fuck No.

I left my tamper at the last cabin... The night is ruined.

________________________________

Now I see something out of place in this story, do you think he would be so destroyed over this?

I don't think so.

This is all a little rant regarding how a lot of people nowadays seem to imagine that a tamper is in any way a necessity. Which it isn't. This hardened old fellow wouldn't cry because his favorite blue tamper was lost so he couldn't smoke. He would just tamp the shit down with his calloused sausage fingers.

If someone managed to read through this, I am sorry and I hope you enjoyed it somehow. Does anyone share my thoughts?

 

[Chasing Embers]

I've got many matching tapers for pipes but usually use my fingers.

 

[workman]

I can manage with a finger, but I prefer a czech tool, as my fingers get wet and dirty when I'm working.
Tampers aren't necessary, but neither are most of the other things we have in our lives.

 

[bullet08]

I thought he was gonna say.. "Oh fuck. Zippo's out of fuel."

 

[cosmicfolklore]

He could of just picked up a stick.
Using a finger is probably best, depending on how he is dressed or mannered.
But, when I read this, I think about how cowboys except when time to take the heard to the train station, probably didn't spend a lot of time just riding their horse. They were busy branding, roping, breaking, birthing, or separating the heard. This is probably why the cigarette became iconoclastic for the cowboy. Just not enough time for a long smoke. Busy busy busy. Whereas the rest of society would have been the ones mostly traveling by horseback. And, the gentleman in the his tweeds, might not want to get scolded by the misses for getting ash all over his bests.

 

[jpmcwjr]

"The night is ruined'! And a blue tamper- on a cowboy? That's fishy, too.

Fingers, a stick, (not likely he'd have a golf tee in his saddlebag!), a (horse)shoe nail are all fine tampers.

 

[burleybreath]

I rarely use a tamper, even when one is lying next to my hand. Kind of a subconscious thing, like much of the rest of pipe smoking after a few years. The cowboy could just use a revolver round. Hope he uses the right end. A little lead never hurt anybody, and might enhance the flavor of 1899 tobaccoweed.

 

[warren]

A tent? A tamper? No attention given to his horse before anything else? Maybe "The Dude and the Tamper." Dudes might have tampers and they might, I doubt it, mistreat the their horse. But, then again, a dude wouldn't be riding the chuck-line either. So as usual . . . I'm bemused.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

Yeh, it seems like somewhere I heard that the guy with the pipe was always the cook, driving the chuck wagon, because he was one of the very few who had time to smoke while riding, where as the rest would have been busy.

 

[TheWhale13]

A tent? A tamper? No attention given to his horse before anything else? Maybe "The Dude and the Tamper." Dudes might have tampers and they might, I doubt it, mistreat the their horse. But, then again, a dude wouldn't be riding the chuck-line either. So as usual . . . I'm bemused.

I don't know if I got my point across

I meant to make fun of dudes, but there's nothing wrong with a tent?

 

[cosmicfolklore]

I meant to make fun of dudes

If you listen and think about what he is saying... it is the best song I've heard making fun of cowboys.

 

[anantaandroscoggin]

Sorry, but my fingers are fresh out of calluses these days. They kind of went away from the lack of use any more.

 

[mso489]

A tamper wouldn't have occurred to someone traveling by horseback in 1899. Even a gent with smooth hands could have used his fingers, or any number of items on his person, horse, or in saddlebags. Part of writing is working at putting yourself fully in the character and his mindset and time. This guy is unlikely to have owned a tamper.

 

[mortonbriar]

Don't tamper with history!

 

[frozenchurchwarden]

When the temperature is below freezing I tamp with my fingers to warm them up.

 

[TheWhale13]

A tamper wouldn't have occurred to someone traveling by horseback in 1899. Even a gent with smooth hands could have used his fingers, or any number of items on his person, horse, or in saddlebags. Part of writing is working at putting yourself fully in the character and his mindset and time. This guy is unlikely to have owned a tamper.

I'm sorry, I must have wrote this whole thing bad. The purpose of this story was to point out the ridiculousness of a tamper, and the fact that a tamper is a non necessity.

 

[didimauw]

The tamper to me is nice but is not necessary. The pick on the other end however, is more of what I worry about when I forgot my tamper. I've had not many, but a few stubborn, densely packed ash piles that wouldn't come out nicely.

 

[burleybreath]

I'm sorry, I must have wrote this whole thing bad. The purpose of this story was to point out the ridiculousness of a tamper, and the fact that a tamper is a non necessity.

That's a bit of overstatement. There are occasions when one is called for. And I use the spade, or whatever it's called, quite often. I just wish the tamper part had a larger diameter.

 

[kcghost]

It truly amazes me how often I go to the pipe shop to enjoy a bowl or two and end forgetting a tamper. I must have 20 of the damn things in the house from $100 to a $1 but I can't be bothered to remember I'll need one. Half the time I use my finger and half the time I just buy a pipe nail.

 

[anotherbob]

Personally I think while not necessary a tamper is a fine tool. I can use my finger. But a tamper gets the job done more efficiently. Oh and you want to talk about unnecessary? Well life is totally superfluous and pipes are (excuse me while I look up what they are...) a luxury.