Alberta Review: Stampede Dress
Notes from a contrarian
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The Calgary Stampede is a world-class rodeo and holds a sacred place in Western culture. The prize money, the human and animal athletes, and the length of the tradition itself create this sense of greatness.
Away from the rodeo, there’s the midway, music festivals, and, of course, the corporate party.
As a public affairs consultant, I tell our clients that Stampede is the most important political networking event in Western Canada - with the attention Alberta is getting lately due to separatist rumblings and a recommitment by the Prime Minister to oil and gas, it might be the biggest in Canada now. So, for my colleagues and me, it is two weeks of work that never really feels like work, but burns you out more than any other day at the office.
It has always amazed me how stodgy CEOs, ministers, and everyone in between all universally don Cinch shirts, Wranglers, boots and hats. It’s an unspoken rule; you just dress up.
As a natural contrarian, this has always irked me a bit. Not because I hate the communitarian nature and collective, distinctly Albertaness of it all. But because in my heart, it isn’t authentic the way it may be to a Southern Alberta rancher. And I know it’s not authentic for the bankers wearing a Stetson, either, but, again, that contrarian instinct kicks in sometimes, and I dig in my heels.
To be clear, I grew up immersed in country. I was a farm kid, played lead guitar in a country band where rodeos and small town dances paid the bills, and the family business for many years was with UFA (United Farmers of Alberta); I should be decked out in Cinch shirts and Wranglers, too, and not just during Stampede. It was how I was raised.
But I don’t know if it was just a particular moment in time, but when I still lived on the farm and was doing all of those things, not a lot of people dressed that way. Some did, for sure, but generally speaking, it was Fox Racing ball caps and Vans shoes. I wore Green Day and Led Zeppelin t-shirts, not button-ups. A lot of kids around me did, too. I didn’t start wearing cowboy boots every day until I moved to Toronto and Ottawa, taking on corporate jobs out east. I didn’t want to forget who I was or where I was from. Now, back in Calgary, I’m back to wearing Converse and the occasional wingtip work boots. My aesthetic is more English country professorial than northern Alberta farmer.
Of course, during Stampede, I can’t just wear a white Oxford, sneakers, and a cowboy hat. So I plunge a little deeper into my wardrobe for my favourite piece of clothing: the Aloha shirt. They’re cool, they’re flashy, and the existence of a pretty interesting Hawaiian cowboy culture means I can justify them to myself, and, sometimes, others.
Clothing is a social language. What we wear should align with what we’re trying to tell the world about ourselves. It is steeped in class-based history and has traditionally been a signal to the world of what we do for a living, where we were born, or to whom we were born. During Stampede, the collective cowboy cosplay is an extremely democratic event (making it distinctly Albertan in a prairie populist sense) because for a few weeks, our clothing doesn’t say those things. It says we’re all the same.
So, as a social language, I guess at Stampede I wear my Hawaiian shirts to remind myself to have a little fun, stand out in a crowd, and, more than anything, keep myself cool while doing so. And, also, because as any true Albertan, I’m QUITE the contrarian.
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