* * * * *
Well,
Sirs, the tale of my Tony Lama boots—Teju lizard, peanut brittle color
now; tan Mojave lizard, I think, when I bought them—goes like this.
(This
tale was originally written as an entry in a Tony Lama cowboy boot
story contest, which I didn't win, an outcome that amazes me still.
Note: All photographs are by me, Gerry Dawes, and are copyrighted.)
Back
in the 1970s, when I returned from living in Spain and chasing the
bullfights for eight years, I went to see my Uncle Bob Minton, down in
Marion, Ilinois, where there was the Rusty Spur Western Store. He took
me over there because I had decided it was time for me to man up and
get me a pair of cowboy boots. Wow, I didn’t know what I was letting
myself in for.
Nearly
forty years later, eight pairs of cowboy boots—including four pairs of
Tony Lamas—and a slew of adventures in those cowboy boots (especially
in the Tony Lamas), I realized that I had become a cowboy boot addict.
The only thing that could have been worse would have been if I had been
able to afford to really indulge my habit.
Now,
I know that you want a story about old boots, so this one will be on
the nearly forty-year old pair mentioned in the paragraph above, and not
the black Tony Lama Teju lizard boots with the pretty white stitching
(bought in Weird Austin) that I only wear with a tuxedo to formal events in New York.
Gerry Dawes's Black Tony Lama Teju Lizard boots that he wears to black-tie events in New York.
Nor
will I enter the exceptional pair of Tony Lama shark boots with the
cream-colored tops that I can wear anywhere even if it is raining (water
and sharks go together); I got them at the Rusty Spur or when I came
down to visit Fall Creek Vineyards (in Texas Hill Country) when I was in
the wine business back in the 1980s and Susan Auler, the owner of Fall
Creek, first took me to Allen’s Boots on South Congress in Austin and my friend Weird-Austinite Dennis Cole (click on the link to read that truly weird tale) has also taken me to Allen's on a couple of occasions.
Gerry Dawes's Tony Lama Shark boots.
Nor will I enter the pair of Tony Lama peanut brittle colored ostrich boots on which I went and spilled some drops of Spanish extra virgen olive oil
on (I cook a lot).
Tony Lama Ostrich boots with Spanish extra virgen olive oil stains.
I was thinking about writing to you about to see if you could tell me how get the olive oil stains off those tall bird boots.
Tony Lama Ostrich boots with Spanish extra virgen olive oil stains.
I believe I got them at the Rusty Spur as well, but I may have purchased them at Weird Austin Allen's.
Allen's Boots on South Congress Ave. in Austin, Texas.
Note the big Justin boot over the awning. Justin owns Tony Lama Boots.
I
have this pair of Tony Lama Black Teju Lizard boots scouted out at
Allen's as probable purchase to become my front-line black boots to wear
to black-tie functions and also another pair of Tony Lama Peanut
Brittle Teju Lizard boots to replace the rattle snake-and-Thomas
Keller-reduction-sauce-bitten original vintage boots that are the
subject of this very true story.
Tony Lama Black Teju Lizard boots at Allen's in Austin. These are my Sunday-go-to-meetin' boots that I wear to black tie events in New York City.
The
only time that I bought a pair of boots in Texas that I didn't purchase
at Allen's in Austin was the time I went to Dallas and got a pair of
light peanut brittle-colored boots that are way too pretty to wear. Not
only do I rarely wear them, except under controlled circumstances (no
rain the forecast, no tapas bar hopping, no possible reduction sauce or
olive oil moments) because they are too pretty to ruin, they also have a
very narrow throat, which means that I can only wear them if my SE
(Spousal Equivalent) will be around to help me pull them off and at the
risk of inducing a hernia in one of us at that. Four years after I
bought them, as I was doing an in-depth full boot review so I could be
informed before I entered the Tony Lama Boot contest, I looked inside
for the brand and saw a stamp “For Export Markets Only,” something I
have not seen inside my Tony Lama boots.
That
leaves the boots in the photos that I am entering in your contest and,
well, as you might imagine, there is one Hell of a story behind these
boots. First off, I wore them out on the town in New York for many
years. I was in the wine business and sold some of the world’s greatest
wines to a slew of top restaurants. I was wearing this pair one night
when I went to Rakel, where Chef Thomas Keller, now of The French
Laundry, Per Se, Bouchon and God knows what other big-time restaurants
in Napa Valley, Las Vegas, New York and maybe Singapore (who knows?),
was cooking.
Tony Lama boots, purchased at The Rusty Spur, Marion, IL, circa 1976. Note the darker area on the left-hand boot (right foot) stained by Chef Thomas Keller's reduction sauce at Rakel's in New York City.
The
particularly eventful night I went to Keller's Rakel wearing these Tony
Lama boots (the ones in the enclosed pictures) I was out with John
Williams, the owner of Frog’s Leap Winery in Napa Valley.
We
were having one of Keller’s fabulous dinners and trying to talk, but
there was a piano player at Rakel playing a pretty stepped up version of
jazz music, so much so that we were getting a little frantic trying to
have a conversation with this schizoid music going on in the background.
I
looked down at my Tony Lama boots and thought, “D-mn, these'r sum gd
lukin bts.” (I told you the music was making us crazy, and this was
before texting.)
Then,
with my hand in time with that rapido piano music, I lifted a fork full
of Keller’s food—it was a dish with a very dark, very rich reduction
sauce—towards my mouth and missed. A big drop of Keller’s sauce fell and
plopped right onto my beautiful Tony Lama boot, the right one to be
precise. You can imagine how I felt. I tried to wipe it off with my
napkin, but it had indelibly tattooed a dark spot on my Tony Lama boot
and God, I loved those boots.
Not
long after that spill that stained these beautiful Tony Lama boots, I
looked over at John Williams and said, “J—s Christ, I wish somebody
would tell that piano player to stop!”
John Williams, Owner, Founder, Winemaker and Philosopher at
Frog's Leap Winery, Rutherford, Napa Valley, California.
Photo courtesy of seacoastonline.com
Williams said, “Me, too!”
Right about then, the piano player took a break, much to our relief.
“Wow, what a relief,” I said.
John
Williams said, “Speaking of relief, I going to the pissoir. (He makes
wines with several French grapes, so he knew what a pissoir was in
French.)
I contemplated the disaster that had befallen my prized Tony Lama boots.
After a few minutes, Williams returned, a bit red in the face I thought.
“You
will never believe what happened, “ he said. “I was standing in the
pissoir taking a wiz and there was a guy at the urinal next to me.
He asked me how I liked the restaurant. I said , ‘Fine, but I wish somebody would shoot that piano player.”
The guy said, “I am the piano player.”
Chef Thomas Keller's reduction sauce stain from Rakel's in New York City.
For
years, I pestered Thomas Keller, who was a charter member of a club I
founded for chefs—The Chefs From Hell Acrobatic Unicyclists and
Winetasters Club (we didn’t allow acrobatic unicyclists at our
gatherings), to buy me a new pair of Tony Lama boots to replace the pair
that his reduction sauce had ruined. All these years, he has
steadfastly refused. (I just saw him in northern Spain in November and
he re-affirmed his refusal to buy me a new pair of Tony Lama boots.)
Three-star Michelin Chefs Juan Mari Arzak & Thomas Keller at San Sebastián Gastronomika 2010. Photograph by Gerry Dawes©2010.
That
reduction sauce stain was not the only thing that happened to these
Tony Lama boots. There was also the rattlesnake incident, which truth be
known was as much the fault of the boots (or Keller’s reduction sauce)
as it was of the rattlesnake. I come from Southern Illinois, which is
below the Mason-Dixon line and is full of hills, many of them made out
of huge boulders pushed ahead of the glaciers back in the Ice Age, so
where I came from is hilly while most of the rest of Illinois is very
flat.
Now,
rattlesnakes just love these hills for some reason, so much so that
Southern Illinois University, home of the Saluki Dawgs (Mr. Walt
"Clyde" Frazier of the New York Knicks played college basketball at
Southern Illinois when they won the NIT, back when the NIT was worth
winning), started a movement to protect the snakes down in the Pine
Hills area. When I was a kid, I went fishing down there with my
Grampy "Chig" Minton, and Uncle Bob.
On the way into the fishin’ hole, we stepped over a log that had a copperhead coiled under it (Uncle Bob killed it after me and Grampy had stepped over the log), then Grampy stepped on two water moccasins at the same time. We saw rattlers on the road and a whole bunch of other snakes swimming, sunning themselves and hanging from the trees that day down in the Scatters, which is what they call the swamps down there in the bottoms, or bottom lands, of the Mississippi River.
On the way into the fishin’ hole, we stepped over a log that had a copperhead coiled under it (Uncle Bob killed it after me and Grampy had stepped over the log), then Grampy stepped on two water moccasins at the same time. We saw rattlers on the road and a whole bunch of other snakes swimming, sunning themselves and hanging from the trees that day down in the Scatters, which is what they call the swamps down there in the bottoms, or bottom lands, of the Mississippi River.
I
was wearing my Tony Lama cowboy boots—the very ones in the
pictures—when I went back home to Southern Illinios and decided to drive
down there to the Scatters one day to show my ex-wife (she wasn’t my
ex-wife then!) how beautiful those hills and swamps were. I really
didn’t intend to get out of the car, because the area has been known to
shelter snakes (see above). In fact the geniuses (geniusi?) at the aforementioned Southern
Illinois University managed to get the road closings during rattler
mating season so them mean ole boys downtown wouldn't run over them in
their pickup trucks. But, since they didn’t have the road closed
through the Scatters for rattlesnake mating season, during which the
hillls are alive with the sounds of rattlesnake tail music!, I figured
it wouldn’t hurt to get out of the car and have a look at the swamps to
see if there was something interesting to point out to my ex-wife, like
snakes hanging from tree branches. Mistake!
I
got out of the car to have a look around to see if it was okay for my
then-wife to get out and I had gone no more than a couple of yards
alongside the gravel road when I heard a noise that sounded like a baby
boy with hyper-tension shaking a toy rattle. Oh, boy! I figured
right away what that rattle was attached to, but not before a
rattlesnake about ten-feet long lunged out from the side of the road and
struck at my foot. Now, I pretty well figured that my calves and
shins were protected—why do you reckon I wore by cowboy boots to snake
country?
That
snake struck a glancing blow at my boot and just snagged a bit of the
top of it on the right side, leaving a gash about an inch long. He
didn’t get a second chance, because I was out of there like a bat out of
Hell. I drove down to levee road, which was high enough above the
swamp and didn’t have all that many places for snakes to hang out.
My then-wife said, “Are you okay?”
“I think so, but I need to see what that snake did to my Tony Lama boot.”
I
got out and I asked her to help me pull off my right Tony Lama boot,
being careful not to get any venom—not to be confused with Keller’s
reduction sauce—on her hands. She had a little trouble getting the
boot off. Since the boots had always been a little tight and the throat
was a bit narrow, it was potentially hernia-inducing to get them off
without a boot jack (if you don't know what a boot jack is, stop
reading).
Once
she removed the boot, I examined it and saw the rip along the top. My
boot was now a wounded lizard. But fortunately the fangs did not
penetrate the boot and nail me in the foot, ‘cause by the time she would
have been able to pull that boot off and suck the venom out of my big
toe, I would have been dead, with just my (one) Tony Lama boot on.
Tony Lama boots, purchased at The Rusty Spur, Marion, IL, circa 1976.
Note the rattlesnake strike tear on the left-hand boot (right foot).
I
got to thinking about it on the way home. I figured that that
rattlesnake had one of two things on his mind. Either he had been
after Keller’s reduction sauce or, more likely, he had mistaken that
gorgeous lizard boot for another reptile, had taken my left boot to be a
female reptile—probably the scent. I reasoned that the snake had
fallen in love with my left boot--Tony Lama boots can cause more than
snakes to be smitten--and had struck the right one to get rid of her
boyfriend. Either way, because I feared that I might absorb some
venom by osmosis, I decided to retire those boots that had tightened up
further—shrunk with fright, no doubt--after their encounter with the
rattler.
Retired, rattlesnake-wounded, Keller reduction sauce-stained, Tony Lama boots.
Those
boots have been in the back of the closet for at least twenty years as I
went on to more boots, including those Tony Lamas mentioned above.
The rattlesnake-attracting qualities of my first pair did not deter me
from my long-term afición for Tony Lamas.
When
I saw that there was a Tony Lama contest on, I decided to pull out my
original boots and see what kind of shape they were in. I think you can
see by the pictures that these 35-year old something boots are in
pretty damn good shape for what they have been through—the Scatters, a
rattlesnake, New York City, a frantic piano player and Thomas Keller’s
reduction sauce. And I think the rattlesnake venom must have been
somewhat like a natural crazy glue, because the snake gash seems to have
healed somewhat—or maybe the lizard re-generated some skin.
So,
this is my story about Tony Lama boots, but if you should deign to
consider my boot story a winner, I have to tell you that I need two new
pairs of your boots, a replacement for the snake-bit, reduction sauce,
wounded boot and a new black pair to replace the ones that I wear to
black-tie events in New York City and in Madrid.
The
black pair are neither snake nor sauce bit, but after twenty years they
don’t look quite as new to wear just in case I get invited to a dinner
for the Queen of Spain again, and the toe is too rounded to be bonafide
chain link fence climbers. But, that’s a story for another time.
New York City Tuxedo Tony Lama Black Teju Lizard boots.
At
my age, having collected nine pairs of cowboy boots over a period of
fifty years (these boots are a great buy, since properly cared for they
last for ages), I only rarely cocked my eye towards any new
acquisitions, BUT there were two exceptions: One, at the Railyards
Complex in Santa Fe, New Mexico, Kay and I went to the Farmer's Market,
which is next to the Railyard Mercado, an enclosed indoor flea market,
where we met John Carrick, who sells used cowboy boots, plays in a band
called the Juke Joint Prophets and is married to a very nice, pretty real
estate agent named Linda Schulman. At their boot stand, a reasonably
priced pair, made even more reasonably priced after we became acquainted
with them and went to the Juke Joint Prophets gig at the market. I saw
this new used pair, the only used pair I have ever acquired, and
decided that these boots were a wise acquisition (translation: this
momentarily slaked my cowboy boot addiction).
The used pair of Tony Lama boots that I bought from John Carrick and Linda Schulman at the Railyards Mercado in Santa Fe, NM
For several years, I have had two acquisitions on my bucket list: A cape from Seseña in Madrid, with real silver Roman coins for a clasp and a pair of boots from the great Roy Flynn´s Boots & Boogie in Santa Fe, New Mexico. I had seen Boots & Boogie and talked to Roy Flynn on previous trips to Santa Fe, but the $10,000 blue bonnet-design was never in my wheel house, nor the $1299 minimum for a pair of Roy´s exquisite hand-made boots. A year or so ago, I returned to Santa Fe and did a series of programs for my Gerry Dawes & Friends radio program on WPWL Public Radio (Pawling, NY) based on interviews with Santa Fe Chefs James Campbell Caruso of La Boca, Mark Kiffin of The Compound and the godfather of New Mexico chefs Mark Miller, plus the great Native American flute maker and flute player Sky Redhook.
High on my list of interviewees was Roy Flynn, so I also visited him at Boots & Boogie and did this terrific interview. Roy had shown me the pair of rough-out boots shown in the interview video clip below. When we finished the interview, Roy, who has since sold Boots & Boogie, but still shows up there a few days a week, asked me to try on the $1500 roughouts. Magnificent boots!
"How do they feel?" he asked, a felt along the boot to check the fit.
"Great, they are beautiful!"
"Well, they are yours."
"What?"
"Yes, I want you to have them."
"Oh, come on, Roy, you can't do that!"
"Oh, yes, I can," he said, "At my age and stage in life, I can do what I damn well please."
My second night out wearing my bucket list Lugus Mercury (El Paso, Texas) roughout boots from Roy Flynn's Boots & Boogie in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The first time I wore them, straight from the box, they fit like a glove, no rubbing, no foot discomfort or weariness from wearing a brand new pair of boots. Second night, tonight, like a glove, the same. Incredible boots. Google Boots & Boogie.
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Roy
Flynn and the late Boogie, his Malamute-Wolf mix dog, with a pair of
his boots decorated with the image of the Virgen de Guadalupe.
High on my list of interviewees was Roy Flynn, so I also visited him at Boots & Boogie and did this terrific interview. Roy had shown me the pair of rough-out boots shown in the interview video clip below. When we finished the interview, Roy, who has since sold Boots & Boogie, but still shows up there a few days a week, asked me to try on the $1500 roughouts. Magnificent boots!
"How do they feel?" he asked, a felt along the boot to check the fit.
"Great, they are beautiful!"
"Well, they are yours."
"What?"
"Yes, I want you to have them."
"Oh, come on, Roy, you can't do that!"
"Oh, yes, I can," he said, "At my age and stage in life, I can do what I damn well please."
Through a miracle, the incredible generosity of this unforgettable gentleman, with mouth-dropping surprise, a key bucket list item was checked off my list. (I can only hope that Roy goes to Madrid and takes over the Seseña cape shop in Madrid.)
Lugus Mercury roughout boots from Boots & Boogie, Santa Fe, NM.
My second night out wearing my bucket list Lugus Mercury (El Paso, Texas) roughout boots from Roy Flynn's Boots & Boogie in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The first time I wore them, straight from the box, they fit like a glove, no rubbing, no foot discomfort or weariness from wearing a brand new pair of boots. Second night, tonight, like a glove, the same. Incredible boots. Google Boots & Boogie.
Gerry Dawes & Friends WPWL Pawling Public Radio, Dec. 11, 2018 Roy Flynn, Boots & Boogie Interview Video from Gerry Dawes on Vimeo.
Gerry Dawes & Friends Dec.11, 2018 Roy Flynn, Boots & Boogie, Santa Fe, New Mexico Interview Part Two from Gerry Dawes on Vimeo. * * * * *
Comments are welcome and encouraged.
Text and photographs
copyright by Gerry Dawes©2021. Using photographs without crediting Gerry Dawes©2021 on
Facebook. Publication without my written permission is not authorized.
* * * * *
Shall deeds of Caesar or Napoleon ring
More true than Don Quixote's vapouring?
Hath winged Pegasus more nobly trod
Than Rocinante stumbling up to God?
More true than Don Quixote's vapouring?
Hath winged Pegasus more nobly trod
Than Rocinante stumbling up to God?
Poem
by Archer M. Huntington inscribed under the Don Quixote on his horse
Rocinante bas-relief sculpture by his wife, Anna Vaughn Hyatt
Huntington,
in the courtyard of the Hispanic
Society of America’s incredible museum at 613 W. 155th Street, New York
City.
__________________________________________________________________________________
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36. Gerry Dawes's Spain: An Insider's Guide to Spanish Food, Wine, Culture and Travel
About Gerry Dawes
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36. Gerry Dawes's Spain: An Insider's Guide to Spanish Food, Wine, Culture and Travel
About Gerry Dawes
My good friend Gerry Dawes, the unbridled Spanish food and wine
enthusiast cum expert whose writing, photography, and countless
crisscrossings of the peninsula have done the most to introduce
Americans—and especially American food professionals—to my country's
culinary life." -- Chef-restaurateur-humanitarian José Andrés, Nobel
Peace Prize Nominee and Oscar Presenter 2019
Gerry Dawes is the Producer and Program Host of Gerry Dawes & Friends, a weekly radio progam on Pawling Public Radio in Pawling, New York (streaming live and archived at www.pawlingpublicradio.org and at www.beatofthevalley.com.)
Dawes
was awarded Spain's prestigious Premio Nacional de Gastronomía
(National Gastronomy Award) in 2003. He writes and speaks frequently on
Spanish wine and gastronomy and leads gastronomy, wine and cultural
tours to Spain. He was a finalist for the 2001 James Beard Foundation's
Journalism Award for Best Magazine Writing on Wine, won The Cava
Institute's First Prize for Journalism for his article on cava in 2004,
was awarded the CineGourLand “Cinéfilos y Gourmets” (Cinephiles
& Gourmets) prize in 2009 in Getxo (Vizcaya) and received the
2009 Association of Food Journalists Second Prize for Best Food Feature
in a Magazine for his Food Arts article, a retrospective piece about
Catalan star chef, Ferran Adrià.
In December, 2009, Dawes was awarded the Food Arts Silver Spoon Award in a profile written by José Andrés.
".
. .That we were the first to introduce American readers to Ferran Adrià
in 1997 and have ever since continued to bring you a blow-by-blow
narrative of Spain's riveting ferment is chiefly due to our Spanish
correspondent, Gerry "Mr. Spain" Dawes, the messianic wine and food
journalist raised in Southern Illinois and possessor of a
self-accumulated doctorate in the Spanish table. Gerry once again
brings us up to the very minute. . ." - - Michael & Ariane
Batterberry, Editor-in-Chief/Publisher and Founding Editor/Publisher,
Food Arts, October 2009.
Pilot for a reality television series
on wine, gastronomy, culture and travel in Spain.
Experience
Spain With Gerry Dawes: Customized Culinary, Wine & Cultural
Trips to Spain & Travel Consulting on Spain
Gerry Dawes can be reached at gerrydawes@aol.com; Alternate e-mail (use only if your e-mail to AOL is rejected): gerrydawes@gmail.com
Gerry Dawes can be reached at gerrydawes@aol.com; Alternate e-mail (use only if your e-mail to AOL is rejected): gerrydawes@gmail.com
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you enjoy these blog posts, please consider a contribution to help me
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