what country folk do for fun

My trainer lives out in Morgan Hill, far past the realms where city slickers dare to venture, and far beyond the roads where Jags and Porsches can drive without bottoming out in a muddy pothole. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve always been part of that britches-wearing, crop-wielding, velvet-helmetted set, but if my trainer hasn’t inspired a little bit of cowgirl in me, then I have no business calling myself a rider. I drove to her house on Sunday for a Memorial weekend barbecue, stopping at a makeshift plywood stand off the paved street to buy a three-pack of strawberries and continue on my way.

Her house is at the end of a narrow road of three houses, surrounded by crop fields and the golden backdrop of so many sun-blistered Northern California hills. As I pulled into the horseshoe driveway, I was greeted by the standard cowboy hat wearing tenant. “Where should I park?” I asked. “Anywhere you want,” he answered. I navigated through a mass of pickup trucks and parked in front of the horse trailer that I didn’t think would be going anywhere this afternoon.

My trainer had started renting this place several months before, and the owner had, not surprisingly, allowed them to build whatever they wanted on the property, including horse stalls and sheds and a round pen and an arena. This was my first visit to the house and I was amazed. In rollicking western flavor, my trainer had adorned the house with curio cabinets full of horse and cowboy paraphernalia — silver tooled stirrups, bridles, championship belt buckles, trophies, plaques, saddles, chaps, wool blankets and numerous other decorations. I entered the kitchen and was greeted by the regular crowd of random but entertaining crazies, including a woman I’ll call “Trinity,” (because she reminds me of her) whose passions also happen to involve two seemingly unrelated sports — horses and hockey (more on this strange connection later). Trinity and her blonde hockey playing friend were both standing in the kitchen, chowing down on melon slices and carrots with dip, when they saw me enter and immediately started talking hockey. The next thing I know, they’ve explained how they’ve quit playing everywhere else except for Ice Oasis, because everyone has an anger management problem. They begin to describe how they saw a goalie get arrested and taken right off the ice and put into a cop car during a scrimmage in Tahoe, because he hit someone across the face with his stick. I start to think back on my D league team that I recently quit, and wonder if I should add to their stories, but decide against it.

I wandered into the living room where my trainer’s dad is sitting in front of the big screen TV, mesmerized by a war flick and surrounded by at least four longhorn bull skulls and the ever watchful eye of an enormous buffalo head on the wall above the fireplace. I point at it and look back at my trainer. “Nice buffalo.” “That’s Elvis,” she responded, skewering cut peppers and laying them out on a napkin. “He’s from Las Vegas.” I looked back at the head. “When you carry something like that through the casinos, you get a lot of weird looks.” “No doubt,” I said. “You know, they’re all real heads, and they all have different expressions. Some look left, some look right, and one of them just looked stoned. We got this one because it was the best.” Elvis did have a quirky character to him. Pretty soulful for something without a body.

My trainer’s boyfriend appeared and hustled us out back, eager to show the work he’d done on the property. You’re welcome to browse the images page to see what I’m talking about, but in all, he’s done an impressive amount of work. From the hay barn to the tack room to the riding mower with the flames he’s painted to the Model A he’s building to the stalls, grill and picnic tables, round pen, and arena he’s started, it’s no small feat. He introduced us to Jack and Whiskey, the resident decrepit “fixture” horses at the barn that he and “Bull-Riding Pete” take for trail rides when drunk. Bull-Riding Pete isn’t this other guy’s real name, obviously, but I feel responsible for protecting the identity of a guy who’s landed one too many times on his head after getting bucked off by bulls, broncs, and probably, his own two inebriated feet. When you talk to BRP, his eyes go in two different directions and you aren’t sure which one to look at, or sometimes, if he’s even talking to you or your neighbor. Jack and Whiskey hung out in their stall together and looked at us dumbly.

When we returned to the house, my trainer told us we should go out and ride. Trinity’s hockey friend immediately volunteered, even though she’d only ridden two other times in her entire life. I’m of the belief I can teach any hockey player how to ride, but then, I have a bit of an ego about it too. I put my boots on and we saddled up Whiskey and Jack and placed her precariously on Jack’s back, then led her into the round pen. I rode Whiskey around for a bit then tried to help her navigate Jack around the pen without him running back towards his friend. She did reasonably well for someone riding in sneakers and jeans with the pant legs folded up.

By this time, it was three in the afternoon, and pushing 90 degrees with a dry wind. I went to dismount when I saw that one of the kids, Molly, was waiting in line to ride Jack. I watched as she tried to figure out the reins, then finally gave her some instruction. I tried to dismount again but saw that no one could figure out what to have her do. “Molly,” I said, “look right, then pull on the right rein.” I guided her to the round pen and we locked her in. The next thing I knew, I was at a BBQ giving a riding lesson. “Is the food done yet?” I screamed from the backyard. “Almost!” someone shouted from the house.

I haven’t taught lessons in nearly two years. I got really burned out after four years of it, and I have to say by the end of my days as an instructor I was far from pleasant to be around. The two years off did me some good. I was back to my old ways, with my affected speech patterns, drawling “Faaaabulous,” to Molly as she tried awkwardly to jog around the round pen without falling off. For a short time during my teaching days, there was a teenager who had tried to take over some of my lessons for me, and she could never get over my bizarre style of stretching out the word “Faaaabulous,” as people rode by me. She laughed inappropriately every time.

I later let Molly out of the pen as her father rambled on and on to me about how most horses hated him, how he was the youngest kid ever in his county to get a pilot’s license, how he rode cruisers, and so on and so forth. I took Molly riding around the property to escape him. “Do you teach riding lessons?” Molly asked as we ambled along the fence line. Whiskey bowed outwards nervously at the sprinklers. “I used to,” I answered. “You’d make a good teacher,” she said. I looked back over my shoulder and smiled. I guess, every now and then, it’s good to know not everyone thinks you’re a total failure.

We rode off the property and down the paved street a ways, and then onto a dirt road that ran alongside a planted field. Whiskey took the opportunity to spook at every piece of trash and green mud hole, while Molly giggled in a 12 year old fashion, oblivious to any danger or equine disobedience. Jack looked calm despite his buddy’s skepticism about being away from home. We jogged home when we heard the dinner call, tied the horses up and went inside and stuffed our faces. My trainer’s boyfriend showed me how to mix grenadine with Smirnoff Ice to create a drink I liked enough to get sick off of. I ate second helpings of salad and bread and cookies to try and dilute it, but I only succeeded in making it even harder to breathe.

When I was pretty sure I was going to die of an asthmatic reaction, the buzzing of small gas powered engines summoned everyone to the front yard, where the “older boys” were tearing up and down the street on a mini-bike, looking like bears in the Russian circus, and on a scooter with two orange plastic gas tanks attached to the sides of it. I watched for a while before the mini-bike was offered to me. By that point, I had had enough Smirnoff Ices to ride a wheelbarrow hitched to an emu, so the mini-bike was no problem (see pictures). I tried the scooter too, which was much faster but a lot less stable. It wasn’t long before one of the kids crashed the mini-bike and my trainer’s boyfriend, bored with the small toys, busted out his 650cc off-road Honda and roared up and down the side of the field, killing plants and pelting us with rocks and dust.

There’s always something else to do when the motorcycles run out of gas. We went inside and ate cake. Molly’s parents had created a three-person Napoleon style cake, with a left birthday section for Molly’s brother, a middle birthday section for Molly, and a “Congratulations on your divorce” right section for my trainer’s boyfriend, complete with chocolate dirt and candy tombstones. There was, of course, a combined candle-blowing-out ceremony.

The country is a great place for adults with attention-defecit disorder. When evening rolled around and we just couldn’t eat anymore, my trainer took us out to see the deck where her boyfriend was planning to install the hot tub. “There’s a possum living under here,” she said. “We can’t get rid of it.” She took a flashlight and peered through the wooden planks. We couldn’t find any sign of the possum. “Safari will find it,” she said, and called to the dog. A neurotic, bloated Jack Russell terrier came bounding out of the bushes, dashed around the boards where we were standing, then immediately darted to the corner of the deck and started barking and scratching furiously at the wood. “Get it Safari!” we shouted, egging the dog on. “There’s a place she can get under the deck,” my trainer said. She picked up the dog and took her to a yawning gap between the dirt and the floor of the deck, and let her loose. The dog sprinted into the darkness, and we shined the flashlight in but saw only the beams holding up the deck.

There was intense barking for a minute, and then a primal growl before the showdown under the deck. We waved the flashlight around wildly, looking for the dog. Everyone started shouting her name. “There she is!” I said, shining the light towards a beam. Safari had the possum by its neck and was shaking it viciously with all the fury of a German Shepherd attacking a fleeing criminal. People started freaking out left and right and running for the house, but I stayed and stared at it. Molly leaned in next to me to watch. “This is the best birthday ever!” she declared, and I turned to her, laughing in shock. That’s my kinda kid.

Safari eventually came out on her own, but not before the possum was extremely dead, and not before vomiting up a pasty red sludge that no one wanted to identify. Her collar was gone and she was completely soaked from the hose we tried to use to coax her out. My trainer immediately took her to the tie up and scrubbed her down with horse shampoo. Photos of the poor, soggy, deranged animal are available for your amusement. There’s nothing quite like a Jack Russell after the kill.

I spent the rest of the evening lying on the couch with the much more docile Australian Shepherd puppy, Cheyenne, reading Practical Horseman (a snooty English riding magazine), and struggling to breathe. I read an excerpt from a really interesting book that I might pick up, called A Day at the Races, which in chapter 8, makes yet another startling connection between horses and hockey! I kid you not.

If you’re ever in town for a visit, I’ll take you to my trainer’s place. She said come by anytime and ride the horses.