Joseph L. Kagle, Jr. Peace Essays

“Every so often, just to keep yourself sane, you have to be silly. My grand daughter says to me (in her seven-year old wisdom): ‘When are you going to stop being silly?’ and I answer, ‘Maybe never!’ And she giggles because she really likes me being someone who she can play (really play) with. I know it is silly to go on a peace journey. We may never make it if all the serious people are right about ‘mankind is just like that; brutal and at war’ but I am just silly enough to still believe in magic, goodwill toward mankind, service above self, Christmas and peace. In fact, I made up a song about ‘charitable wannabe cowboys’ from Texas.”

A song for the charitable wannabe cowboys

     Bubba Jay the Third and his wife, Hummingbird Rose, were dancing the Texas two- step to the guitar playing and singing of his brother, Bobby Joe Jay. It was a striking scene backlighted by the morning sun's rays shimmer­ing off the Brazos River. Gosh, the remarkable image was enough to take one's breath away.

     "Hi, y’a11," I said, when the mu­sic stopped. "What is the cele­bration?"

     "Life is short; art is long," smiled Hummingbird Rose. "And Bubba has written a new cowboy song for the '90s."

     "I just received an invitation to Neiman Marcus' Texas gala, called The Crossroads. It is a fund-raiser for the arts endowment, held in Dallas and Hous­ton," said Bubba. "The invitation reads, 'Black tie and Boots,' at $250 per person. Sooo, I wrote a song about all the `wannabe cow­boys.' In Waco, it is the Cattle Baron's Ball; in the state, it is Neiman Marcus' gala. Want to hear it?"

     Before I could answer yes or no, Bobby Joe Jay was strum-min', Hummingbird Rose was hummin' and Bubba was in full song, singin' a variation of the Os­car Meyer wiener commercial.

Boots and a hat

     “I want to be a wannabe cow­boy

     Dressed in the best wannabe style.

     I want to be a wannabe cowboy

    With my boots, my hat and a smile.

            I want to be a wannabe cowboy

     Goin' to the Cattle Baron's Ball.

     I want to be a wannabe cowboy

     Like big John, six feet wannabe tall.

    I want to be a wannabe cowboy

    Ridin' the Frigidaire range.

    I want to be a wannabe cowboy.

    Not real, not cattle-driven, not strange.

    I want to be a wannabe cowboy

    Answerin' the fund-raisin' call.

    I want to be a wannabe cowboy

    Fixin' to ride tall at the mall.

   I want to be a wannabe cowboy

   Dressed in the best wannabe style

     I want to be a wannabe cowboy

 With my boots, my hat and my smile."

 We were all silent when the song was over. It was sort of like sitting beside the Brazos before the unveiling of the Sistine Chapel ceiling with Charlton Heston in his artist smock.

     I shook my head in amazement and asked, "Are you making fun or paying homage to wannabes?"

     "Yes," said Bubba enigmati­cally, "one moment I get an invi­tation and the next, I get my act in gear since nobody's here."

     "You're a poet and don't know it," I said, speaking words from my childhood, "but your feet show it, they're longfellows." It was the only reply which seemed to make sense at that cross-minded fraction on time. Later, as I drove away, I thought about all the wannabe events which I had attended and the playful, bit­ing wit of my friend Bubba.

     Aren't most successful fund­raising events in the category, of "wannabe"? I marveled at all the good that raising $300,000 to fight cancer through a Cattle Baron's Ball could achieve in Waco. Joy­fully, I made up one last verse to Bubba's wannabe song and sang it at the top of my voice:

     "I want to be a wannabe cow­boy

         Goin' to the Cattle Baron's Ball.

         I want to be a wannabe cowboy,

         Thank you, Bubba; thank you,

        Bubba, thank all!"

“Yes, silliness is serious stuff. I like the sound of ‘S’s’ at silly time (which is whenever the world is too serious and we think, ‘time out’). Silliness certainly helps a fellow when the heat of Texas is too much.”

Silliness beats the heat

 Being silly takes mind off of the high temperatures

Dipping one bare foot into the Brazos River sends a luke-cool message up my branching system to a mind crying out, "It's hot. Hot. Texas hot."  My friend Bubba Jay sits cool and composed. His face is a reflection of the coolness which the water foretells.

     "How do you do it on these super hot days?" I ask. "You look like Buddha instead of Bubba. A Buddha on an Alaskan iceberg, not wicker-sitting in the Texas heat."

     Bubba ponders my question and smiles: "Summer and heat force me into my silly time. I think of something silly and it dissolves the surrounding furnace and humidity. Don't you know that when the body is uncomfortable or the mind is in stress, it is silly time in Texas?

      "You can be silly or violent at this sweltering time of year," he continued. "I choose silly."

     Before my baked body allowed my mind to answer, Bubba said, "For instance, right now I picture myself before the television box. I see a man doing the twist to open a Miller Lite. It is a silly commercial. But the blatant stupidity of the act, of a man twisting before an open window and in front of a bottle of beer because it reads 'Twist to open,' cools me and makes me smile.

Cohen of the realm

     "I had a friend from New York City named Cohen," Bubba said. "He called himself Realm as a shorthand for 'real man.' He was 6 feet 8 and could reach ledges in a single bound. Everywhere within a five-block area, he placed a quarter on a window ledge. Then he would bet friends and strangers that he could find a dollar within that area. I think his silliness kept him cool in the summer and probably propelled him to a rich man today."

      "Cohen of the realm." I grimmaced at the bad pun. Bubba was in his silly zone and I wanted to play along.

     "I love Monty Python's Flying Circus and its Bureau of Silly Walks," I told the water at my feet, allowing Bubba to overhear. "Want to see the silly walk that I perfected?"

     "Yes," said Bubba. "Silly walks would be such a pleasant break from the silly talks that I tune into concerning all those silly people who make their living out of presidential gossip, innuendo and selected fact. I twist in front of the TV to see if it will change channels and attitudes. It is open season on `Zippergate.' Now, there's a silly image."

Organized silly time

     We talked about how all of America is reacting to organized silly time. On television, a big thing gets made about Seinfeld's much-ado-about-nothing series leaving our airways. We mulled the ways the corporate world brainstorms every day for silly new ideas.

     "Thinking out of the box" is the ladder-climbing phrase for the 1990s, which makes silly the serious stuff of tomorrow's business world.

Silly has always been cool, as long as it makes money. Ah, yes, the coin of the realm.

 Dumb and Dumber is everywhere. We see cor­porate executives, which Bubba and I call Men in Black (men who take silly to new highs and lows), twisting before Aladdin's lamp of silly ideas.

     "Twist to open," we greet each other ceremoniously.

     We silly-talk and silly-sing into the hot, Texas sunset.

     Surprisingly with all this silliness and silly-think, I have forgotten the heat and the sun. When I dip both feet into the cooling Brazos this time, I am already cool inside. I know the difference between a duck and why sometimes it is really smart to twist to open.