Straight shootin’ advice for city councillors

Guidance gleaned during Albertan ranch visit feels relevant back here in Hamilton

Having just got home from the range where, literally, the deer and the antelope play, I’ve got some straight shootin’ “Code of the West” tips for our sometimes drifting city councillors.

I came across the advice on a poster in the grill-bar of the cattle/guest ranch my wife and I were staying at on the outskirts of the storied Cypress Hills, smack dab on the southern border of Alberta and Saskatchewan.

Adding a couple of extra days onto the long weekend, we’d flown into Calgary, rented a car and headed east for a few days of horseback riding at the 100-year-old historic Reesor Ranch.

Truth be told, I was well primed for the guidance contained in the aforementioned poster.

I’d already encountered other sage offerings during our road trip to the ranch.

Between Calgary and Medicine Hat we pulled off the Trans-Canada Highway into the small town of Bassano for a bite to eat at Rosie’s Roadside Grill, a friendly little prairie diner next to a gas station.

Cynthia pointed out a sign behind the lunch counter: “Be nice or get out.”

Entering the men’s washroom, I found another beaut above the urinal: “Please step forward it’s shorter than you think.”

That was the beginning. Before I knew it, I was mentally collecting all sorts of pointers and cautions.

“Horses are only scared of two things,” a ranch sign forewarned us. “Things that move and things that don’t.”

I’m happy to say the horses we saddled were as sweet as the rides.

We rode over sprawling grasslands, up hills, across benchlands, down coulees, along spruce and lodgepole pines, and past bawling cattle and old buffalo wallows. All under scorching blue skies, sometimes hazed with smoke from forest fires in British Columbia, Saskatchewan and nearby Montana.

In between horse riding we hit the road to see the sights in the sparsely populated region, steeped in the history of plains Indians, Métis, RCMP, and Sitting Bull and the refugee Sioux, who fled across the “Medicine Line” from the United States after the Battle of the Little Bighorn.

With no rain to speak of since June, what few vehicles there were on the gravel roads trailed clouds of dust visible for miles.

One roadside placard warned of “Danger” but failed to say from what. On the Trans-Canada another promised “Sandwiches” followed some distance later by the added enticement “Homemade.” Neither said where or how far.

In the Cypress Hills town of Elkwater, the camp store displayed that oldie but goldie warning to parents: “Unattended children will be given espresso and a free kitten.”

Instead of the familiar “bear wise” safety warnings of northern Ontario, we were advised to be “cougar smart.” Instead of “moose crossing” there were “elk crossing” warnings.

We saw a passel of “Texas gate” signs, indicating fixed metal grating in the road used to thwart cattle from passing over.

And there was a parcel of “stock at large” signs, reminding drivers that livestock was wandering freely.

Back at the ranch, I eyeballed the “Code of the West” poster and thought how helpful its tenets might be for our councillors now that the summer siesta is over and they’re saddling up again.

Like the Bible’s commandments, the code has 10 precepts: Live each day with courage; take pride in your work; always finish what you start; do what has to be done; be tough but fair; when you make a promise, keep it; ride for the brand; talk less and say more; remember that some things aren’t for sale; know when to draw the line.

I’m thinking No. 4 and No. 8 are particularly relevant. No. 4 for all members of council. No. 8 for a select few. No need to name names. We all know which ones like to take the long way round the barn.