I’d like to say it was the first time I’d seen Rosie with a shiner. I’d also like to say that I was in Sheridan on business. That’s what I’d told my wife, that I had meetings on Friday and Saturday and considering the forecast I might as well stay until Sunday, but in truth there were no meetings; I had simply gone there for a Sheridan fix.

In case you’ve never been there, Sheridan, Wyoming is about as sweet a place as there is on God’s green earth. It hasn’t been Californicated like other Western towns. The place has character, is what I’m saying. When you go there, you don’t have to imagine what it looked like a hundred years ago, it’s all right in front of you. Heck, there are even a few hitching posts left on Main Street, which, by the way, is a nice long street lined with establishments owned by folks who live right above them or just a few blocks away. There’s a post office right in town, too, and even a little college and an art gallery. And whatever direction you go outside town, there’s beauty. Not kiddie park or golf course or state-park-right-off-the-highway kind ofbeauty, but Wyoming beauty: huge expanses of brush and pasture, the Big Horns to the west, foothills shaped like teepees, Angus cattle, golden eagles, coyotes, foxes, and thousands, and I do mean thousands, of jackrabbits.

Read More: South Dakota Review