No resemblance
Couple of weeks age, I was introduced to what I assumed to be a fairly new fan of the Hungry Horse News. After we had been engaged in a friendly conversation for several minutes, this fella up and says, “I can’t help but be curious, George. You don’t look like that caricature in your column.” That man is not the first alert reader to wonder about “now and then” difference. That is why we are referring here to an explanatory column written in October 1984:
Sometime in the late ‘60s, long before I bought the Kalispell Weekly news, I grew a broad goatee because it was the easiest way to conceal what seemed to be the beginning of a double chin. That is why the Frank Hagel caricature used here all these years, shows my naturally strong masculine chin and rugged determined jaw line, clearly defined by whiskers. Although I really liked the overall portrait, I couldn’t resist questioning friend Hagel about his making the eyes “sort of slanty.” He said, “A true artist simply records what he sees.” I replied, “Oh.”
After selling the paper in 1982 and sort of “dropping out” to work on books and just relax a little, I grew a full beard, which in certain deceiving light, began to show more white than black. That was acceptable for a few years, after a well preserved (slightly pickled) lady in a Lake Tahoe casino mistook me for Kenny Rogers.
But alas! All the brush south of the sideburns and mustache was sheared off right to mineral soil after the Montana Centennial of 1989, partly because a dumb little kid at Western Outdoor started telling me what he wanted for Christmas.
Related to all this in the late 1980s was an obvious diabolic plot hatched by “name brand” clothes, hair, jewelry and cosmetics designers to make men and women look more alike. The “androgynous” looking hairdo was “in” among numerous male and female rock stars and with most “high fashion” models. They appeared to be cloned from one sexless source.
After reading the annual “fashion edition” of Esquire magazine, I did not send in renewal money. Too many of the young men posed in the latest fashions had the appearance of being in good physical condition, but I somehow got the feeling that in an old fashioned donnybrook, they’d prefer going into the fray vigorously striking the foe with a velvet purse.
Time magazine carried photos of a British rock musician and his new American debutante wife. It is doubtful I could ever accept with calm demeanor a groom who rivals his bride for “loveliness” … even if they do have matching earrings.
The closest I ever came to falling victim to unisex promotions was when I guiltily tried a large dab of my wife Iris’ Oil of Olay. From the ads I’d seen on the telly, it could erase wrinkles overnight — even from a pickup fender — so figured it would do instant miracles on my neck. For all the good that expensive stuff did, I could have rubbed it on the truck.
Most of my male friends did not buy into those highly touted trends of the late ‘80s and early ‘90s to make males and females look more alike. I vowed to never surrender to any kookie fashions, and right to this very day, if forced by circumstances, would not hesitate to grow back the whiskers. I’d rather be mistaken for Santa George than Boy George, and I never want anyone, anywhere, at any place, wondering which bathroom I use at a service station.
There! That’s the story of the Trail Watcher caricature. To end this epistle, have dug up some nice old quotations you may have forgotten:
“The government is like a baby’s alimentary canal, with a happy appetite at one end and no responsibility at the other.” — Ronald Reagan.
“A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.” — George Bernard Shaw.
“A government big enough to give you everything you want is strong enough to take everything you have.” — Thomas Jefferson.
“Remember to drive carefully, wear your seat belt, and be kind to one another.” — G. George Ostrom.
G. George Ostrom is a national award-winning Hungry Horse News columnist. He lives in Kalispell.