Stories of Ourselves: "The Contest" by Annie Proulx

Toward the end of March the count of semis tipped over by the wind fails to amuse and driving the long way around to anywhere – Angle Iron Pass is closed even in a mild winter – has become an odious chore.

The propane gas route man pitched in ten but said he’d forgo the chin grass.

Twenty-seven contestants, from fourteen-year-old Kevin Cokendall to octogenarian Len DeBock, signed up.

Kevin Cokendall’s father, Wiregrass Cokendall, told the kid he didn’t have the chance of a pancake in a pigsty, but Kevin was determined and bought hair restorer with his allowance to help the nascent whiskers along.

Deb Sipple’s, as crinkled as ramen noodles, came in black with streaks of grey down each side, and Wiregrass Cokendall showed thick and fiery red bristle in contrast to the anemic blond hairs of his son, Kevin.

Shortly after Valentine’s Day it was clear that three or four men had forged ahead: Darryl Mutsch, Wiregrass Cokendall, Willy Huson (color of mashed sweet potato), and to his father’s chagrin, Kevin Cokendall, whose few whiskers made up in length what they lacked in profusion.

Shortly after Valentine’s Day it was clear that three or four men had forged ahead: Darryl Mutsch, Wiregrass Cokendall, Willy Huson (color of mashed sweet potato), and to his father’s chagrin, Kevin Cokendall, whose few whiskers made up in length what they lacked in profusion.

‘No, best way is to go down to Saratoga or over to Thermop to them hot springs and let the waters come up to your nose, then skedaddle for the barbershop before them whiskers dries up and hardens. The sulfur in the water sort a rots the hair or at least softens it up,’ said Quent Stipp.

Although the contest started out with jocularity, it turned cruelly competitive.

Amanda Gribb tired of bar arguments that beards were or were not good protection against bronchitis, that vegetarians favored beards more than creophagists, that beards inspired political radicalism.

Beard talk made a change from speculation on the whereabouts of Darryl Mutsch’s missing dog, Cowboy George, but none of the questions raised could be answered.

After several hours she discerned some kind of order in the groupings of dusty books and she was briefly hopeful when she found something titled Haircults.

No one could quite understand what the author, one Reginald Reynolds, was saying as it was written in an abstruse and sarcastic style freckled with irony and untranslated Latin and French.

The author also favored maze-like circumlocutions and assumed his readers possessed profound knowledge of history, literature, seafaring, religion, military strategy, dialectic, nursery rhymes, and philosophy.

The author also favored maze-like circumlocutions and assumed his readers possessed profound knowledge of history, literature, seafaring, religion, military strategy, dialectic, nursery rhymes, and philosophy.

The author also favored maze-like circumlocutions and assumed his readers possessed profound knowledge of history, literature, seafaring, religion, military strategy, dialectic, nursery rhymes, and philosophy.

Still, the Pee Wee regulars sifted enough wheat from the chaff to make perusal of Beards worthwhile.

Still, the Pee Wee regulars sifted enough wheat from the chaff to make perusal of Beards worthwhile.

Enlightenment did not emerge but curiosity flowered as they read of ancient bearded horse eaters, of a certain abbot who believed that eating too much was the cause of beards and thus explained why the American Indians, who lived on frugal diets, did not have beards.

Enlightenment did not emerge but curiosity flowered as they read of ancient bearded horse eaters, of a certain abbot who believed that eating too much was the cause of beards and thus explained why the American Indians, who lived on frugal diets, did not have beards.

Adam, they discovered, had no beard in the Garden of Eden, the hairy growth punitively linked to the expulsion.

There were many examples of beards as fashion statements – metal threads worked in, dyes and gold dust, the pointed beards of Arabs, the rectilinear faux beards of the Egyptians, the curly extravagances of the Assyrians, the Hittites’ square-laced beards, plaited beards, immensely long beards that could be parted and looped around the ears, but tempting as these arrangements sounded, no contestant dared sacrifice length to style.

The beard growers combed through the Wal-Mart pharmacy in Sack looking for unguents and lotions that would impart vigor to hair.

The beard growers combed through the Wal-Mart pharmacy in Sack looking for unguents and lotions that would impart vigor to hair.

The beard growers combed through the Wal-Mart pharmacy in Sack looking for unguents and lotions that would impart vigor to hair.

By late April most of the beards were thick and bristly.

Then, two springs back, he had developed a crush on Amanda and brought her the kinds of presents that Game & Fish employees believed superior to chocolates and flowers – an untenanted hornets’ nest, a wolf scat, the pelvic bone of a sharp-tail grouse, the miniature tape measure.

The two troublemakers drank, hunted, fished together, and talked about the possibility of quitting their respective services and setting up a consulting business, though who would consult them and on what subjects was vague.

There was another bond: both of their greatgrandfathers had done time in the territorial prison at Laramie; Cephas Bucklew, a plasterer from Ohio, had stolen a horse blanket from a Cheyenne livery stable, and C. C. Alkerson, a ship’s carpenter from Boston imprisoned for perjury when he tried to claim bounty money on three nonexistent wolf hides, enlivened Creel Zmundzinski’s maternal lineage.

There was another bond: both of their greatgrandfathers had done time in the territorial prison at Laramie; Cephas Bucklew, a plasterer from Ohio, had stolen a horse blanket from a Cheyenne livery stable, and C. C. Alkerson, a ship’s carpenter from Boston imprisoned for perjury when he tried to claim bounty money on three nonexistent wolf hides, enlivened Creel Zmundzinski’s maternal lineage.

It took the two friends most of one night to get the vehicle out with a heavy-duty tripod and winch.

Creel was nonplussed to find identification from Rhode Island, a state he imagined the size of the Wal-Mart parking lot.

I went to Princeton, graduated summa cum laude, did my graduate work in ergonomics, married, divorced, one daughter, taught for thirty-two years at various eastern ratholes, and last week I retired.

‘He’s movin a Elk Tooth,’ said Creel morosely.

‘That might just be the best part of it,’ said his friend enigmatically.