It's an old battered hat, tired and worn, but I bet the stories it could tell you would leave you spellbound. Like the time in the yards he used it to beat a charging cow around the head, or the day it got blown across the lake as he skied behind his brother's boat at Christmas. It was an old battered hat, but it was also a diary of his life.
The day he bought it, it was hard and stiff, factory shaped and part of an identical stack. Now, the stiffness has faded with the years. The hat has been bashed, flattened, run over, and sat on so many times that it barely holds the shape he chose for it all those years ago. The colour gives way to sweat stains and blood spatters from all the lambs he's marked, and the fresh smell of leather has been replaced by dust and sweat and the occasional spritz of aftershave. What was once a good clean town hat now takes pride of place on the top of the cupboard, having worked its way through town to the paddock and into retirement.
