That’s Not the Name on My Passport

Do you remember name tags mothers sewed on shirts and pants for their kids at summer camp

Photo by Charles Büchler on Unsplash

When I was a kid, I enjoyed movies that were sagas set in the American

West. I loved many of the old stars who shot their long guns first and explained later: The Lone Ranger, Hopalong Cassidy, Gene Autry, not to forget the faithful Tonto.

At around the age of 10 I teased my mother and father to finance a couple of weeks in my 6th grade summer at the Westbound Buckaroo Dude Ranch in Colorado.

They were uncharacteristically receptive to the idea.

My father and mother (to a lesser extent) said they thought it would make a man out of me.

It was a well-known fact verified by TV and many of the movies, most all ranch-hands had masculine nicknames: Wild Bill, Dirty Dave, Russell the Rustler, Bronco Bob….

My parents packed my clothes after school was finished for the year and sent me to Colorado and the Buckaroo Dude Ranch.

When I arrived at the ranch, I thought I was in heaven. There were horses, a few cattle, chickens, the whole bit. This was a genuine working ranch with adult cowpokes bearing rough-tough monikers.

Almost all of the kids I met those first few days were from the big cities in the Northeast and they were no less excited than I was.

However, these kids were savvy campers. Many of them had attended the camp or other camps like it in prior summers. Their parents were used to the inevitability for the kids to get their clothes mixed up with some of the other campers.

To combat this mistake experienced parents (mothers) sewed their little camper’s names inside the clothes they packed for the summer.

Of course my mother had never sent a kid to an overnight summer camp before.

She naively packed up what she thought would be enough clothing for the two weeks I was signed up for my Western adventure.

No name tags on my shirts, underwear, pants….how embarrassing.

Maybe that’s why the other kids thought my name was “Fruit of the Loom.”

Yippee Ki-yay! I’m full of shit….but I was almost a cowboy for two weeks as a kid.