A Horse is a Horse, Of Course, Of Course

I think most little girls go through a phase when they're obsessed with horses. I'm not sure what it is about horses that's so fascinating when you have two X chromosomes and are under the age of 10, but there you have it.

At five, my favorite show to watch after school was Black Beauty. (At least, I think that's what it was called. There was a horse. It was black. It may or may not have been the main character, but it came on after Today's Special, and that's what I called it.) I had many My Little Ponies in addition to a score of off-brand plastic horses that I also liked to gallop across the living room floor. I even did my own horse impersonation that involved neighing. (I can only imagine now how annoying that must have been.)

A few years later, my horse obsession still strong but no longer My-Little-Pony-focused, I was a dedicated viewer or Mr. Ed on Nick at Nite. I watched that crazy talking horse every single night, and every single night, I hoped for Wilbur's sake that someone else would just hear that horse talk. Oh, that wily Mr. Ed -- he was a stinker.

I dreamed of owning my own horse and brushing its mane. I wanted to be so good with horses that I'd be like one of those shaggy-haired dudes who played by no one's rules but his own but could tame a wild mustang like you would not believe. (I either wanted to be like that person -- but a girl, how crazy! -- or marry him. At eight, I was still torn.)

For years, I thought that I couldn't love anything more than horses. That was until, of course, I actually rode one.

It was summer camp, and horseback riding was one of the class offerings. I was beside myself. What color would my horse be? Could I feed him carrots or oats? How long would it reasonably take until we started jumping gates together? Three days? Four?

"You're up," the counselor called on the first day after a couple of girls had gotten on horses in front of me. "So, just swing that leg on over."

That was the first problem. Being less than five feet tall and all torso, it's not exactly easy to throw your leg over a horse's saddle -- even when a ladder is involved.

"That's OK," the counselor said after another counselor had to come over and help her pull me on top of the horse. "I'm sure you'll get it next time." While I appreciated her optimism, I also knew that two weeks was not enough time for me to grown another six inches. 

Once we had all mounted our horses, we started off down a trail. Everyone else seemed to have no trouble staying in line, but my horse had little interest in staying on the trail. So, not only was I hit with the occasional twig, I was also being reprimanded by my counselor for deviating from the path. (I did not like to be reprimanded at that age. I was the kid who thought that the lifeguard hated her for the entire rest of the summer if he or she had to tell me not to run around the pool. I much preferred to be the good one.)

And when I did try to tug slightly on the reins to keep my horse with the others, it threw its head back -- a gesture I found mildly terrifying. (Horses were far larger and more powerful in person than I had imagined in all my years of cartoon-viewing and neighing.)

My horse did the same extreme head-tossing when I tried to pet its mane. It seemed to me that my horse disliked human contact, and I can only imagine that the forced contact of having to carry small people on its back six hours a day, five days a week, was an indignity it did not want to bear in its golden years. 

I also didn't count on horses being so sweaty. Rather than being on an adventure in the woods with a beautiful and majestic creature, I felt like I was trapped on a large, smelly, overgrown thing that wanted nothing to do with me.

It was one of the longest hours of my life.

After that, I don't think I ever rode a horse again. I gave up any thoughts I might have had about the life equestrian and moved on.

I moved on to bigger dreams, dreams of theater -- musical theater to be exact. Surely, my Broadway fantasies would turn out better than the whole horse thing, even if I was tone deaf ...