OPINION? EVERYBODY HAS ONE

I'm suffering from shrinkage

— Someone is shrinking my business! I am about to get riled up about the whole dang thing. My business, my physical being, all kinds of stuff is being shrunk. Is that a word in Mr. Webster’s book, that shrunk word? Well, it makes good sense to me so it is a word in my book.

I have been wearing the same size britches since I turned about 18 or 20 years old. I do not shop for new trends or colors or anything like that. I just buy the same size pants in the same style and go home happy. Sometimes my close relative thinks I get to looking a little ragged and she will buy me some Levis out of the goodness of her heart, the same size and the same style as always. Makes both of us happy.

I do not want my britches legs to drag the ground. I need the material to stop about an inch from dirt and make a little fold on the foot of my boot. That is the perfect length for me. I like no drag, no messy bottoms to the legs and always looking good. Neatness is one of my attributes, I guess. Well, I think so even if others don’t agree!

Who the heck made my legs shorter? And when did it happen? I can drag out my tracks with the new pants I bought yesterday! I bought them, not the close relative or one of the offspring, I purchased the same size and style as I have for the last, well, a good many years, and they are too long! These wash and shrink pants did not shrink in the length as they have been doing forall those previous years! My close relative washed them as usual, dried them as usual and ironed the creases in the legs as usual. I pulled them on one leg at a time as usual and they drag the ground!

Now do this test yourself. Turn slowly and look at your calendar. Squint your eyes so you can get a real tight look. What do you detect on yours? I see on mine that the month of July is more than half over! Who is fooling with time? They, whoever they are, have rushed through July and it is just about three quarters as long as it used to be! Shrinking in time, shrinking me, things are getting more weird by the day!

I went to work for a dollar a day when I was a towheaded kid. That isn’t exactly right. I never was light haired and I madeabout 80 dollars a day back then. But I could buy a bunch of stuff, tires for my pickup, seat covers and fill the gas tank without causing my bank account to flatten out like a flat flitter!Someone has shrunk our buying power too! It costs me as much to fill the gas tank as new tires cost me back then! See, shrinkage!

It is my opinion, and everyone has one, I do not think we as simple cattlemen and cattlewomen, Ma and Pa operators, are ever gonna be able to do a thing about this problem. Shedding tears, pulling out our hair, tiptoeing ain’t gonna help. We are bound to shrink, time is shrinking, money has done shrunk and even the serving size of my victuals has shrunk!Whoever heard a steak oughta be the size of the palm of your hand?

All this makes me want to blow up and yet I can’t! My pants are still dragging out my tracks! They won’t do it for long ‘cause I’m going to give them to some tall feller and buy me some that are shorter! And do not sleep late, you will miss the rest of the month as fast as it is going down!

Bill is a pen name used by the Gravette author of this weekly column.

Opinion, Pages 6 on 07/27/2011