Today was a gorgeous day. A little breezy, in the 70s, the sun shining. I got to the barn around noonish.
I groomed Dusty first, giving him a long workover with the rubber mitt, really massaging his withers and shoulder and butt. He made the horse faces of appreciation.
I also wormed him, and he made the horse faces of disapproval: tense lips and chin, ears half-back, the hairy eyeball... completely disgusted. As usual, he would sniff but refused any and all treats for about 15-20 minutes afterwards. Shuffling carrot bits and Kashi Bar crumbs around in his grain bucket, he was a pitiable picture. But he got over it - they were gone when it was time to be turned out.
Tico'd been doing his usual jealousy faces at Dusty while I'd been giving Dusty attention, seesaw bucking in his stall: butt up, shoulder up, butt up, shoulder up, ears back, threatening to kick the wall (he's been seriously screamed at when he DOES kick the wall so he doesn't do it that often anymore).
He got growled at a bunch of times today, and each time - my attention now on him - his ears would go forward and he'd give my his angelic face, "Who, me? Wha?" and poke his nose out through the hole by the grain bucket, mugging for a treat. Brat. Sometimes, he got them. OK, most of the time. I'm a sucker for a cute face.
I put Dusty away and got Tico out. I brushed him, cleaned his feet, put on his leg wraps, saddled him up, coated him in fly spray, and headed outside. Of course, this all took more than an hour - I'm a slow groomer, and easily distracted - I like to play with him: tickle and kiss his nose, scritch his ears, make him move his legs by pointing at them, have him do silly tricks, for which he earns carrot bits, so he's a more than willing participant.
I mounted up in the indoor and we headed out the back door. About 5 steps out, he stopped.
Sometimes I indulge him. He likes to sight-see, so I sat still in the saddle while, head high, he gazed fixedly to the right. One of the trailers usually parked there was gone, maybe he was noticing that, I'm not sure. Then, turning to the left, he looked over in the direction of some of the turnouts, where horses were standing around, heads down, ignoring each other. Then again, to the right; then straight ahead.
I was getting a bit tired of the view, so I nudged him. He didn't budge. I nudged again. Nothing. I poked with the spurs and he woke up and started walking, just as Elaine, one of the other boarders, was walking towards us. "He's practicing to be a statue today", I said to Elaine, and she chuckled.
We wove on down the path between the turnouts, heading to the gate to the back field. The clover along side the turnouts was calling to him, I was preventing him from eating it, and so we sort of oozed along from one side of the path to the other, eventually making it to the back ring. Once there our path was a bit straighter - no grass to tempt him, and he knew that in that back field there was a lot of taller grass he could snipe a grab at walking along.
Have I mentioned that he's a pig?
Anyway, we got out to the back field finally, and started walking along. There are paths out there that go alongside the power lines, I was heading out to follow them. I had no other plan in mind - I considered going on the trails in the woods but I'd done that yesterday. I thought I might just take it easy - the view was wonderful, with some trees already turning red and yellow, and the taller golden stalks of grass waving with the easy breeze, the sun shining down... a perfect early fall day.
When we got to the part of the path that paralleled the power lines, I thought I'd ask for a trot. Tico willingly went into it, then up into a canter.
The wind was whistling by my ears, almost deafening, as he went into a full gallop. Wheeee! We galloped from the far end of the field up to where the path gets gravelly; that's where I asked him to stop. He did, eventually - my fat boy whose favorite gait is usually "whoa" had his head up, ears pricked, and actually pranced! He'd enjoyed himself.
I turned him around and we galloped off again, down the same path, until we got to where someone had dropped a tree across the path. I pulled him up (him still reluctant to stop), and we did it again. And again. Up and back.
I felt both afraid (he was, after all, the horse who helped me to invent the Superman Emergency Dismount) and super-alive. The wind whipped my face, stinging my cheeks. I know I'm 54 and shouldn't be riding like this. I know it's crazy and it's dangerous, and most importantly I know I'm mortal. The last time I rode a horse like this, I was an indestructable teen. And Dusty, in sedate hand-gallops, never felt this wild, this close to untamed.
On the final gallop, from the graveled area to the downed tree, I thought "I wonder if he's tired?" He's in better shape than he used to be, but if pressed to describe what kind of shape he was in, it's still pretty much "round".
I reached forward with the reins, midway up his neck, and leaned a bit forward. I never touched him with my legs; just the opposite, I was trying Very Hard NOT to touch him with the spurs at all.
He shifted into Sixth Gear. I could feel him both coil up and stretch out, close to the ground, flying. Oh. My.God. OH. MY. FUCKING. GOD!!!!!!! Yeah!!!!
About 20 feet before the downed tree, I started to yell "whoa" and sit back. He galloped on. I sat back more, really trying to grind my butt into the saddle, and took hold of the reins. We turned off to circle to the right, at a *slightly* slower gallop. I finally got him stopped about 20 feet from the gate back to the barn.
He walked a couple of steps, then jogged, and tried to go faster again. "No, no, we're done for the day", I said, and walked him on past the gate to the track on the other side of the field, to get him walked down a bit.
I let him stop and nosh a few times, too. He'd given me an incredible adrenaline rush, it was the least I could do. :)
Showing posts with label memories. Show all posts
Showing posts with label memories. Show all posts
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Jetty
I'm going to be skipping around a bit, I guess. I was just reading a post from mugwumpchronicles.blogspot.com about an old horse named Annie, and she reminded me of an old horse who taught me a lot, when I was growing up.
He was one of Buzz's horses, and named Jetty.
I've found the only photo I have of Jetty, me riding him. Karen is on Honey, the palomino.
He was actually much more handsome than this Polaroid makes him look. His head was not that huge, and his butt not that small. I remember being appalled at this when it was taken, but I'm glad now that I saved it.
Jetty was not in the usual string of horses we little girls were allowed to ride. To ride Jetty, you had to earn the privilege. I worked my way up the ranks, first with Zero the sociopath pony, then Oscar the ugly palomino (who taught me that a horse will ALWAYS run back to the barn), then Little Dick the hackney stud pony (who helped put me on Buzz's good side, winning him 6-packs of Schlitz from unsuspecting patsies), until I reached the pinnacle: I was Jetty's rider. No one else was allowed to ride Jetty but me.
Jetty was beautiful. He was about 16H. A big red bay with black mane and tail, his coat shone dark copper in the sun. He was also pretty old - Buzz said he was about 25, 26 years old. When you looked at his back, you could believe it: he had a prominent wither with a bit of a swayback. He'd had a bowed tendon at some point in his life but it was now fully healed; and though it didn't bother him, he would twist his left foot out to the side in a little flipper-like movement when he moved.
Leading him along, he looked like a regular old horse, but once I clambered onto his back, he become the quintessential "noble mount", head tucked, neck arched, flaring nostrils - bigger than life, awe-inspiring. This horse never walked. His slow speed was "prance", and after that we had trot, then an incredible extended trot, then canter and gallop.
And then there was the "canter in place": if I held him back and asked for a canter with my leg, he would - only we wouldn't go anywhere. He'd also switch leads at a touch of my leg, every stride if I asked.
Idiot that I was back then, I didn't realize that a lot of what Jetty did was dressage - and higher level, at that.
What Buzz told us of his history was this: he'd been a lead horse at the track, and had been owned by Billy Cash, a track blacksmith at Suffolk Downs (I think it was Suffolk, not Rockingham). Buzz said he'd bowed the tendon there, and Billy Cash was going to have him put down because it was a bad bow and he didn't think he'd be able to get him sound.
But Buzz, who'd been trying to get Billy Cash to sell him for a long time, persuaded Billy to give Jetty to him. He wanted to try to get him sound.
And this is what he did: he set up a big sling, and supported Jetty in that sling for weeks to keep the weight off his leg, while wrapping it every day, until finally Jetty walked off sound. And aside from the flipper movement to the side, you wouldn't have known the leg had been injured.
This all happened before I started going to Buzz's barn. I hung on every word as he described putting up the sling, and getting it around Jetty's belly, and how some horses can't be slung up like that because they panic but Jetty was a perfect patient and he brought him around. Then he'd give Jetty a beer.
We all accepted Buzz's story because we were kids, and it sounded good to us. And it was all "a few years ago", we couldn't conceive of the possibility that Jetty's history could go back further. It's only in retrospect, thinking about the way that horse could move, that leads me to believe there had to have been more.
He was a good horse.
We would ride down to the Old Airport in Billerica: me on Jetty; Karen on either Honey (a palomino mare Buzz had brought home one day from the Shrewsbury Auction) or Heidi, a grade mare Buzz told us was Little Dick's daughter; Cherrie on either Heidi or another horse (I'm having trouble remembering all their names, sadly).
The ride over, Jetty would start to lather up: he never stopped prancing, you see. Karen would sing - usually "Skippy, the Bush Kangaroo", really loudly and really off-key. We'd laugh and joke, talking about family and boys and school and everything else. The ride down Aldrich Road always seemed both shorter than expected and longer than it was the day before, because we all anticipated what was to come. Even the horses would start to get excited as we approached the turn-off.
Turning in to a tree-lined path, we crossed through woods towards "the Pits". These were deep holes in the ground where we believed granite had been taken out years before, and that filled with water in the spring. There were often a bunch of older kids hanging out there, drinking and carrying on - it was always a bit scary passing them. But beyond them, we would arrive at the long, wide dirt path that went behind the abandoned hangar on Hopkins Street.
There, we'd race. Riding like indians and pretending we were jockeys, crouched over necks, their manes whipping our faces, our own hair streaming behind us and our grins wide and wild, we'd race until the dirt road ran out.
Then we'd turn around and do it again.
Jetty never won, though he tried. I'm not sure if it was age or that he'd pranced for nearly two miles, but I always was a little sad for him - I could tell he wanted to be fastest, he wanted to win, for me.
He was a good horse.
We had a lot of adventures over at the Old Airport. Hopefully I'll write about them sooner than I did this one.
He was one of Buzz's horses, and named Jetty.
I've found the only photo I have of Jetty, me riding him. Karen is on Honey, the palomino.
He was actually much more handsome than this Polaroid makes him look. His head was not that huge, and his butt not that small. I remember being appalled at this when it was taken, but I'm glad now that I saved it.
Jetty was not in the usual string of horses we little girls were allowed to ride. To ride Jetty, you had to earn the privilege. I worked my way up the ranks, first with Zero the sociopath pony, then Oscar the ugly palomino (who taught me that a horse will ALWAYS run back to the barn), then Little Dick the hackney stud pony (who helped put me on Buzz's good side, winning him 6-packs of Schlitz from unsuspecting patsies), until I reached the pinnacle: I was Jetty's rider. No one else was allowed to ride Jetty but me.
Jetty was beautiful. He was about 16H. A big red bay with black mane and tail, his coat shone dark copper in the sun. He was also pretty old - Buzz said he was about 25, 26 years old. When you looked at his back, you could believe it: he had a prominent wither with a bit of a swayback. He'd had a bowed tendon at some point in his life but it was now fully healed; and though it didn't bother him, he would twist his left foot out to the side in a little flipper-like movement when he moved.
Leading him along, he looked like a regular old horse, but once I clambered onto his back, he become the quintessential "noble mount", head tucked, neck arched, flaring nostrils - bigger than life, awe-inspiring. This horse never walked. His slow speed was "prance", and after that we had trot, then an incredible extended trot, then canter and gallop.
And then there was the "canter in place": if I held him back and asked for a canter with my leg, he would - only we wouldn't go anywhere. He'd also switch leads at a touch of my leg, every stride if I asked.
Idiot that I was back then, I didn't realize that a lot of what Jetty did was dressage - and higher level, at that.
What Buzz told us of his history was this: he'd been a lead horse at the track, and had been owned by Billy Cash, a track blacksmith at Suffolk Downs (I think it was Suffolk, not Rockingham). Buzz said he'd bowed the tendon there, and Billy Cash was going to have him put down because it was a bad bow and he didn't think he'd be able to get him sound.
But Buzz, who'd been trying to get Billy Cash to sell him for a long time, persuaded Billy to give Jetty to him. He wanted to try to get him sound.
And this is what he did: he set up a big sling, and supported Jetty in that sling for weeks to keep the weight off his leg, while wrapping it every day, until finally Jetty walked off sound. And aside from the flipper movement to the side, you wouldn't have known the leg had been injured.
This all happened before I started going to Buzz's barn. I hung on every word as he described putting up the sling, and getting it around Jetty's belly, and how some horses can't be slung up like that because they panic but Jetty was a perfect patient and he brought him around. Then he'd give Jetty a beer.
We all accepted Buzz's story because we were kids, and it sounded good to us. And it was all "a few years ago", we couldn't conceive of the possibility that Jetty's history could go back further. It's only in retrospect, thinking about the way that horse could move, that leads me to believe there had to have been more.
He was a good horse.
We would ride down to the Old Airport in Billerica: me on Jetty; Karen on either Honey (a palomino mare Buzz had brought home one day from the Shrewsbury Auction) or Heidi, a grade mare Buzz told us was Little Dick's daughter; Cherrie on either Heidi or another horse (I'm having trouble remembering all their names, sadly).
The ride over, Jetty would start to lather up: he never stopped prancing, you see. Karen would sing - usually "Skippy, the Bush Kangaroo", really loudly and really off-key. We'd laugh and joke, talking about family and boys and school and everything else. The ride down Aldrich Road always seemed both shorter than expected and longer than it was the day before, because we all anticipated what was to come. Even the horses would start to get excited as we approached the turn-off.
Turning in to a tree-lined path, we crossed through woods towards "the Pits". These were deep holes in the ground where we believed granite had been taken out years before, and that filled with water in the spring. There were often a bunch of older kids hanging out there, drinking and carrying on - it was always a bit scary passing them. But beyond them, we would arrive at the long, wide dirt path that went behind the abandoned hangar on Hopkins Street.
There, we'd race. Riding like indians and pretending we were jockeys, crouched over necks, their manes whipping our faces, our own hair streaming behind us and our grins wide and wild, we'd race until the dirt road ran out.
Then we'd turn around and do it again.
Jetty never won, though he tried. I'm not sure if it was age or that he'd pranced for nearly two miles, but I always was a little sad for him - I could tell he wanted to be fastest, he wanted to win, for me.
He was a good horse.
We had a lot of adventures over at the Old Airport. Hopefully I'll write about them sooner than I did this one.
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Oscar the Palomino
I grew up watching Rex Trailer a local TV "Cowboy". Rex had Goldrush, a gorgeous palomino. And of course there was Roy Rogers and Trigger, and let's not forget Mr. Ed. All beautiful palominos.
Oscar was a palomino, too. Well technically. He was kind of yellow, with a kind of beige-whitish mane and tail.
That's as far as his resemblence to the aforementioned palominos went.
Not to put too fine a point on it: Oscar was butt-ugly. He had a big head with a roman nose. If you've ever read the Terry Pratchett Discworld stories: Oscar was the equine equivalent of the Igors, without the stitches and scars. He looked as if someone threw horse parts in a pile, then asked a bunch of preschoolers to pin the pieces together to make a horsie.
However, Oscar had one HUGE thing going for him: he wasn't Zero.
Oscar was a bit over 15 hands, too - we'd graduated to a horse! We still sometimes had to ride Zero if someone else (actually his eventual owner) was riding Oscar - but we'd managed to advance a grade in the Buzz School of Equitation, which was heady stuff.
Not to say Oscar was well-trained. Nope, no one would ever have said that. Oscar was pretty typical of Buzz's herd of little-girl-dream-crushers: like Zero before him, he often seemed to be striving to destroy all the horse-as-magical-creature fantasies we might have had the misfortune to entertain.
We were stubborn little sods, though. We. Loved. Horses. And Oscar was certainly more... something, granted not magical, than Zero. Bigger? Less homicidal? Something...
Oscar lived in a straight stall - you don't see them much anymore. When he wasn't being ridden or let out to graze, he basically stood there. His manger was in front of him; he could twist around a bit; he could move forward and backward a few feet. It's possible, though I don't remember it, that he could lay down - I've seen some horses manage it in a straight stall.
The ponies were also in straight stalls; but being smaller they were able to turn and look out into the aisle, watch what was going on. For Oscar it was just too narrow for him to turn around.
It was however, wide enough for a girl or two to squeeze in next to him and brush him - which is what Cherry and I did one day. I was on Oscar's left side, near his shoulders; Cherry was on his right, near his rump. Karen being late to the party, was straddling the half-wall separating Oscar's stall from the next horse (I think it was Little Dick) on the same side as I, behind me and to my right. The wall to the right was a full wall - his stall was next to the tackroom. Oscar was probably dozing - I think life in the straight stall didn't offer him too much to get excited about.
I don't know why, but Karen apparently decided that she couldn't really brush him from the wall, so decided to hop on his back.
Her plan, not well thought out, was of course poorly executed. Squatting, balanced on the balls of her feet, teetering, with her left hand holding the post that the stall door was hung on, she tried to launch herself onto his back and swing her left leg over him.
But she was off-balance: instead of her leg going over his back she kicked him - pretty hard - right in the kidneys.
A horse generally will try to run away from anything scary or painful. Oscar, dozing only moments before, found himself being attacked - probably soon to be disemboweled - with nowhere to go. His only choice was to defend himself; jaws agape, he turned towards the monster on his left side.
And there I stood, happily currying his shoulder, humming.
A huge bug-eyed, curled-lip, bared-teeth, roman-nosed yellow head snaked at me, a blur of fear and anger and of course, teeth: I know I'm repeating myself with the teeth thing, but they were pretty memorable. He bit me right in the cheek. On my face. If I look for it I can still find the scar.
My mother was appalled: to add insult to injury, she made me get a tetanus shot.
It was a while before I forgave Karen for that incident.
I have at least one more Oscar story before I move on to Little Dick and Jetty. If you read this earlier, and you're confused about the new title: I decided to change it since this story doesn't even mention Buzz. The next Oscar story will.
Oh, by the way:
Just in case you don't realize it: we were doing a really stupid thing. We did a lot of stupid things. When I look back on it, it's a wonder I survived some of the stupid things we did.
Just saying.
Oscar was a palomino, too. Well technically. He was kind of yellow, with a kind of beige-whitish mane and tail.
That's as far as his resemblence to the aforementioned palominos went.
Not to put too fine a point on it: Oscar was butt-ugly. He had a big head with a roman nose. If you've ever read the Terry Pratchett Discworld stories: Oscar was the equine equivalent of the Igors, without the stitches and scars. He looked as if someone threw horse parts in a pile, then asked a bunch of preschoolers to pin the pieces together to make a horsie.
However, Oscar had one HUGE thing going for him: he wasn't Zero.
Oscar was a bit over 15 hands, too - we'd graduated to a horse! We still sometimes had to ride Zero if someone else (actually his eventual owner) was riding Oscar - but we'd managed to advance a grade in the Buzz School of Equitation, which was heady stuff.
Not to say Oscar was well-trained. Nope, no one would ever have said that. Oscar was pretty typical of Buzz's herd of little-girl-dream-crushers: like Zero before him, he often seemed to be striving to destroy all the horse-as-magical-creature fantasies we might have had the misfortune to entertain.
We were stubborn little sods, though. We. Loved. Horses. And Oscar was certainly more... something, granted not magical, than Zero. Bigger? Less homicidal? Something...
Oscar lived in a straight stall - you don't see them much anymore. When he wasn't being ridden or let out to graze, he basically stood there. His manger was in front of him; he could twist around a bit; he could move forward and backward a few feet. It's possible, though I don't remember it, that he could lay down - I've seen some horses manage it in a straight stall.
The ponies were also in straight stalls; but being smaller they were able to turn and look out into the aisle, watch what was going on. For Oscar it was just too narrow for him to turn around.
It was however, wide enough for a girl or two to squeeze in next to him and brush him - which is what Cherry and I did one day. I was on Oscar's left side, near his shoulders; Cherry was on his right, near his rump. Karen being late to the party, was straddling the half-wall separating Oscar's stall from the next horse (I think it was Little Dick) on the same side as I, behind me and to my right. The wall to the right was a full wall - his stall was next to the tackroom. Oscar was probably dozing - I think life in the straight stall didn't offer him too much to get excited about.
I don't know why, but Karen apparently decided that she couldn't really brush him from the wall, so decided to hop on his back.
Her plan, not well thought out, was of course poorly executed. Squatting, balanced on the balls of her feet, teetering, with her left hand holding the post that the stall door was hung on, she tried to launch herself onto his back and swing her left leg over him.
But she was off-balance: instead of her leg going over his back she kicked him - pretty hard - right in the kidneys.
A horse generally will try to run away from anything scary or painful. Oscar, dozing only moments before, found himself being attacked - probably soon to be disemboweled - with nowhere to go. His only choice was to defend himself; jaws agape, he turned towards the monster on his left side.
And there I stood, happily currying his shoulder, humming.
A huge bug-eyed, curled-lip, bared-teeth, roman-nosed yellow head snaked at me, a blur of fear and anger and of course, teeth: I know I'm repeating myself with the teeth thing, but they were pretty memorable. He bit me right in the cheek. On my face. If I look for it I can still find the scar.
My mother was appalled: to add insult to injury, she made me get a tetanus shot.
It was a while before I forgave Karen for that incident.
I have at least one more Oscar story before I move on to Little Dick and Jetty. If you read this earlier, and you're confused about the new title: I decided to change it since this story doesn't even mention Buzz. The next Oscar story will.
Oh, by the way:
Just in case you don't realize it: we were doing a really stupid thing. We did a lot of stupid things. When I look back on it, it's a wonder I survived some of the stupid things we did.
Just saying.
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Buzz
When I was around 11 or 12, a fellow-horse crazy friend named Cherrie told me about this old guy who had horses and ponies, and who would let you ride them if you cleaned the horse and it's stall. It happened that he was renting the barn that belonged to another friend, Karen's, grandmother.
This was tantamount to heaven on earth for a horse-poor daughter of clinging-to-lower-middle class parents.
And so I came to meet Buzz.
Buzz had prepubescent and pubescent girls fluttering around him like bees around apple blossoms. Before you jump to any conclusions: he wasn't a pedophile - unless pedophiles endear themselves to children by saying things like "Hey, chicken legs - where the hell do you think you're going with that horse, did you brush his tail?" or "Get back on that goddamned horse, you goddamned farmer!" He loved his horses; young girls on the other hand - with their high-pitched voices and daily dramas - he sometimes barely tolerated.
I think of him as a New England cowboy - and a real oldstyle horseman. He didn't ride any more by the time I met him, but was keeping around all his old horses because he owed it to them, I think. Occasionally too, he would add to the herd after trips to the Shrewsbury auction on tack or supply runs. He didn't have a trailer, he'd just toss the horse into the bed of his pickup and bring it home.
Days he worked as a meat packer at the Finast Supermarkets, unloading sides of frozen beef from trucks. He'd start work at 5AM, and then he'd come to the barn around 3-3:30 in the afternoon to open up - the door was padlocked shut.
He liked his beer, and after a six-pack or two he sometimes would tell us stories of his riding days. One that I still remember was about his beloved Harry the Horse, a big paint he'd ride to the Oaks, a bar in Billerica. He said he and Harry would both get shitfaced drunk - apparently they served horses there. Then he would laugh, and say that one time, when riding home along the Shawsheen River after an evening at the Oaks, he and Harry tipped over and fell in. He'd laugh, take a sip of his Schlitz, and say "Harry was a hell of a horse..."
In hindsight, I have to say that he had a pretty sick sense of humor: "Harry the Horse"? "Little Richard" (a stud hackney pony he usually referred to as "Little Dick")? But it all went way over my head back then - I was pretty naive.
Every afternoon when Buzz arrived, speeding up the dirt drive in his Chevy pickup, we'd be waiting. The horses would be too: we could hear them nickering their greetings from inside. He'd unpadlock the bolt and slide the two doors wide, letting in the fresh air and sunlight.
Then they'd be set free: he'd go to each stall, open the stall door, take them by their halters to the opened door and let them go, standing back to watch each one of them gallop out into the unfenced field, tails up, manes streaming, nostrils flaring.
There was about 15 acres of land, and those horses and ponies never wandered off it. The newly-added horses would stay with the herd, and he never had to chase down a horse who'd gone walkabout.
It never occurred to me at the time that any of this was odd - the fenceless turnout, the horses locked up tight until 3 or 3:30 in the afternoon - I was a kid, it was what it was.
The horses didn't seem to care, either - or not that I remember. Maybe I'm just romanticizing it: knowing what I know about horses now, I can't imagine there NOT being a lot of neighing and kicking and carrying on to be let out FIRST.
Instead what I remember is feeling an incredible thrill standing next to Buzz to watch them running, kicking, bucking, and cavorting with each other. We were blessed to witness it, and we knew it: young and old, they drank in the glorious smells of grass and trees and flowers; they channelled their inner wild horse - and we got to watch.
It was and continues to be a sight that takes my breath away.
As for letting us ride: Buzz had a rule. Well actually, he had a lot of rules and some of them we actually followed - at least when we were within his eyesight. I'm pretty sure he knew about our transgressions too, but he never let on. We really were brats.
But this one rule was one we couldn't bend: no saddles - he didn't want us falling and getting our feet caught in the stirrup and dragged.
The "falling" part was a given; the dragged part was what he was interested in avoiding. So we all rode bareback.
That wasn't to say he just said "Here, clean this horse - clean his stall - you're good to go, have fun!" Nope. You had to *earn* the right to ride one of his animals.
Buzz had a system to cull out the dilletantes in his gaggle of horse-crazy sycophants: It was named Zero.
Zero was a paint pony of about 13hh, with the attitude of Godzilla with a hangover.
Zero hated little girls. While grooming him, he'd try to bite you, kick you, and stomp on your feet. Once you'd finished, and after Buzz had inspected him for cleanliness and an untangled tail, the real fun began.
This was the routine:
Lead Zero out to the driveway, keeping his teeth an arms distance away from your body. Gather up the reins, grab a hunk of mane, and face his back.
Block his attempt to bite your butt. Watch his hind leg for a muscle twitch heralding an attempt to kick you in the leg.
Chase Zero around as he does spins on the forehand, all the while trying to cow-kick your knee.
After about 10 rotations, launch yourself at his back.
If you're lucky you get on and don't flip over his back to the other side, because he stops spinning the moment you're airborn, and he'll stomp you if you're on the ground.
Wrap your legs as tightly around his fat belly as you can and hold on to that hunk of mane, because the next thing that happens is you're on a pony who's galloping across the field bee-lining for some trees to knock you off on, meanwhile tossing in a few bucks and crow-hops just to let you know he can.
Zero was the great equalizer.
I'm proud to say I survived him - many fell by the wayside - literally and figuratively - and were so disheartened they were never seen at the barn again.
Those of us who managed to survive Zero and kept coming back - and that's not to say we didn't fall by the wayside literally ourselves, we just were too stubborn to give in - were offered another mount after a couple of weeks.
For Karen, Cherrie, and myself, it was Oscar.
I'll continue about Buzz in another post.
This was tantamount to heaven on earth for a horse-poor daughter of clinging-to-lower-middle class parents.
And so I came to meet Buzz.
Buzz had prepubescent and pubescent girls fluttering around him like bees around apple blossoms. Before you jump to any conclusions: he wasn't a pedophile - unless pedophiles endear themselves to children by saying things like "Hey, chicken legs - where the hell do you think you're going with that horse, did you brush his tail?" or "Get back on that goddamned horse, you goddamned farmer!" He loved his horses; young girls on the other hand - with their high-pitched voices and daily dramas - he sometimes barely tolerated.
I think of him as a New England cowboy - and a real oldstyle horseman. He didn't ride any more by the time I met him, but was keeping around all his old horses because he owed it to them, I think. Occasionally too, he would add to the herd after trips to the Shrewsbury auction on tack or supply runs. He didn't have a trailer, he'd just toss the horse into the bed of his pickup and bring it home.
Days he worked as a meat packer at the Finast Supermarkets, unloading sides of frozen beef from trucks. He'd start work at 5AM, and then he'd come to the barn around 3-3:30 in the afternoon to open up - the door was padlocked shut.
He liked his beer, and after a six-pack or two he sometimes would tell us stories of his riding days. One that I still remember was about his beloved Harry the Horse, a big paint he'd ride to the Oaks, a bar in Billerica. He said he and Harry would both get shitfaced drunk - apparently they served horses there. Then he would laugh, and say that one time, when riding home along the Shawsheen River after an evening at the Oaks, he and Harry tipped over and fell in. He'd laugh, take a sip of his Schlitz, and say "Harry was a hell of a horse..."
In hindsight, I have to say that he had a pretty sick sense of humor: "Harry the Horse"? "Little Richard" (a stud hackney pony he usually referred to as "Little Dick")? But it all went way over my head back then - I was pretty naive.
Every afternoon when Buzz arrived, speeding up the dirt drive in his Chevy pickup, we'd be waiting. The horses would be too: we could hear them nickering their greetings from inside. He'd unpadlock the bolt and slide the two doors wide, letting in the fresh air and sunlight.
Then they'd be set free: he'd go to each stall, open the stall door, take them by their halters to the opened door and let them go, standing back to watch each one of them gallop out into the unfenced field, tails up, manes streaming, nostrils flaring.
There was about 15 acres of land, and those horses and ponies never wandered off it. The newly-added horses would stay with the herd, and he never had to chase down a horse who'd gone walkabout.
It never occurred to me at the time that any of this was odd - the fenceless turnout, the horses locked up tight until 3 or 3:30 in the afternoon - I was a kid, it was what it was.
The horses didn't seem to care, either - or not that I remember. Maybe I'm just romanticizing it: knowing what I know about horses now, I can't imagine there NOT being a lot of neighing and kicking and carrying on to be let out FIRST.
Instead what I remember is feeling an incredible thrill standing next to Buzz to watch them running, kicking, bucking, and cavorting with each other. We were blessed to witness it, and we knew it: young and old, they drank in the glorious smells of grass and trees and flowers; they channelled their inner wild horse - and we got to watch.
It was and continues to be a sight that takes my breath away.
As for letting us ride: Buzz had a rule. Well actually, he had a lot of rules and some of them we actually followed - at least when we were within his eyesight. I'm pretty sure he knew about our transgressions too, but he never let on. We really were brats.
But this one rule was one we couldn't bend: no saddles - he didn't want us falling and getting our feet caught in the stirrup and dragged.
The "falling" part was a given; the dragged part was what he was interested in avoiding. So we all rode bareback.
That wasn't to say he just said "Here, clean this horse - clean his stall - you're good to go, have fun!" Nope. You had to *earn* the right to ride one of his animals.
Buzz had a system to cull out the dilletantes in his gaggle of horse-crazy sycophants: It was named Zero.
Zero was a paint pony of about 13hh, with the attitude of Godzilla with a hangover.
Zero hated little girls. While grooming him, he'd try to bite you, kick you, and stomp on your feet. Once you'd finished, and after Buzz had inspected him for cleanliness and an untangled tail, the real fun began.
This was the routine:
Lead Zero out to the driveway, keeping his teeth an arms distance away from your body. Gather up the reins, grab a hunk of mane, and face his back.
Block his attempt to bite your butt. Watch his hind leg for a muscle twitch heralding an attempt to kick you in the leg.
Chase Zero around as he does spins on the forehand, all the while trying to cow-kick your knee.
After about 10 rotations, launch yourself at his back.
If you're lucky you get on and don't flip over his back to the other side, because he stops spinning the moment you're airborn, and he'll stomp you if you're on the ground.
Wrap your legs as tightly around his fat belly as you can and hold on to that hunk of mane, because the next thing that happens is you're on a pony who's galloping across the field bee-lining for some trees to knock you off on, meanwhile tossing in a few bucks and crow-hops just to let you know he can.
Zero was the great equalizer.
I'm proud to say I survived him - many fell by the wayside - literally and figuratively - and were so disheartened they were never seen at the barn again.
Those of us who managed to survive Zero and kept coming back - and that's not to say we didn't fall by the wayside literally ourselves, we just were too stubborn to give in - were offered another mount after a couple of weeks.
For Karen, Cherrie, and myself, it was Oscar.
I'll continue about Buzz in another post.
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