I just bought a rolling bag and put inline skate wheels on it so I can walk to work in quiet, just the softened thrump, thrump, thrump as the bag glides over the sidewalk joints. Every time I walk to work, it's like rushing to catch a plane.Makes me walk with purpose. Yesterday I took 10,013 steps and was feeling grand.
Today I can barely move, old horse injury that flares up every time I push at life too hard. Twenty five years ago I got on a horse, a young stallion who had spent all winter out of the saddle. None of these details mattered to me, because the sun was shining, the California air smelled sweet like velvet and hay, and the next day I would be turning twenty five. A quarter century and still alive, why shouldn't I mount a stallion?
For one, I usually ride nearly crippled nags. And when I say usually, what I mean is almost never. And, as it turns out, winter-wild horses can be frisky and a little sneaky. The one I rode took a big belly of air while we saddled him up, a horse trick for keeping the gear loose and comfy. That's the sneaky part. A smart horse person knows to ride a short while and then get off to tighten the straps, so the saddle doesn't slip to one side or the other.
After walking the horses for a bit, the young man I was riding with suggested we gallop across an open field. Here comes the frisky part. Just one tiny heel tickle from me and this horse took off. He ran past the young man who I think was galloping his horse, but I just saw a blur. Speed is not my thing, even back then. I don't tilt my head back and laugh at the world in times like this. I become consumed with terror.
Maybe it was my roller skating instincts that saved me. When I needed to stop while skating, I'd turn rather than brake, dissipating the energy going forward by converting it to angular momentum. That's my C-in-physics explanation. I yanked the reins right and back and eventually the horse pulled up into a turn and stopped.
This is my plea for following your gut.
My gut said get the hell off that beast right this instant. It is way more horse than you can handle. But the sun was shining, blah, blah, blah. And my smiling young friend promised not to gallop any more. So we wandered the horses toward the shade of the oak woodland that draped a hill. With my stallion's nostrils flaring and his muscles twitching with the memory of his great dash across the open field, I entered the quiet shade of the trees. Maybe a twig cracked under his hoof. Maybe he was just young and full of adrenaline, but the horse took off at a gallop. By now the saddle had loosened and began slipping to the left, taking me with it. We were headed for a tree on the horse's left. He intended to scrap me off on the tree trunk. I had just enough time to guard my head with my arms before colliding against the tree.
I fell to the ground and lay on my back, unable to move. I could see the lovely blue sky through the oak canopy and hear the stomping and snorting of the horse trying to fight out of the saddle. I thought he was coming back to finish me off, but I couldn't seem to look around to find him. So I just lay breathless and still whispering "help."
I snapped three transverse processes (the little wings off the vertebrae in my lower back) and cracked a rib, and needed a few stitches over my eye, but was otherwise fine. Spent the night in the hospital having morphine-induced hallucinations that my mother was calling me to say happy birthday.
Ever since then, if I begin to think I can mount life like a wild stallion, my back reminds me that speed just isn't my thing.
Today I can barely move, old horse injury that flares up every time I push at life too hard. Twenty five years ago I got on a horse, a young stallion who had spent all winter out of the saddle. None of these details mattered to me, because the sun was shining, the California air smelled sweet like velvet and hay, and the next day I would be turning twenty five. A quarter century and still alive, why shouldn't I mount a stallion?
For one, I usually ride nearly crippled nags. And when I say usually, what I mean is almost never. And, as it turns out, winter-wild horses can be frisky and a little sneaky. The one I rode took a big belly of air while we saddled him up, a horse trick for keeping the gear loose and comfy. That's the sneaky part. A smart horse person knows to ride a short while and then get off to tighten the straps, so the saddle doesn't slip to one side or the other.
After walking the horses for a bit, the young man I was riding with suggested we gallop across an open field. Here comes the frisky part. Just one tiny heel tickle from me and this horse took off. He ran past the young man who I think was galloping his horse, but I just saw a blur. Speed is not my thing, even back then. I don't tilt my head back and laugh at the world in times like this. I become consumed with terror.
Maybe it was my roller skating instincts that saved me. When I needed to stop while skating, I'd turn rather than brake, dissipating the energy going forward by converting it to angular momentum. That's my C-in-physics explanation. I yanked the reins right and back and eventually the horse pulled up into a turn and stopped.
This is my plea for following your gut.
My gut said get the hell off that beast right this instant. It is way more horse than you can handle. But the sun was shining, blah, blah, blah. And my smiling young friend promised not to gallop any more. So we wandered the horses toward the shade of the oak woodland that draped a hill. With my stallion's nostrils flaring and his muscles twitching with the memory of his great dash across the open field, I entered the quiet shade of the trees. Maybe a twig cracked under his hoof. Maybe he was just young and full of adrenaline, but the horse took off at a gallop. By now the saddle had loosened and began slipping to the left, taking me with it. We were headed for a tree on the horse's left. He intended to scrap me off on the tree trunk. I had just enough time to guard my head with my arms before colliding against the tree.
I fell to the ground and lay on my back, unable to move. I could see the lovely blue sky through the oak canopy and hear the stomping and snorting of the horse trying to fight out of the saddle. I thought he was coming back to finish me off, but I couldn't seem to look around to find him. So I just lay breathless and still whispering "help."
I snapped three transverse processes (the little wings off the vertebrae in my lower back) and cracked a rib, and needed a few stitches over my eye, but was otherwise fine. Spent the night in the hospital having morphine-induced hallucinations that my mother was calling me to say happy birthday.
Ever since then, if I begin to think I can mount life like a wild stallion, my back reminds me that speed just isn't my thing.
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| P.S. I did get back in the saddle ten years later on a horse named Lips whose lust for fresh lupines kept him at a constant strolling pace. |
