I'D CHOOSE HORSES

by Randy Reynolds

1960, Covington, Louisiana. A huge baby-faced man named Alex Jenkins stops by to get acquainted with his new pastor (my dad) and sees me riding a stick horse in the yard, playing cowboy with my younger brother. "Would you like to have a real horse?" he asks. My heart almost leaps out of my throat.

Would I like to have a real horse? I, who've read Black Beauty, National Velvet, My Friend Flicka, Fury, The Crooked Colt, everything written by Will James and Zane Grey; I who watch cowboy shows on TV just to see the horses--Trigger, Buttermilk, Silver, Scout, Diablo--would I like to have a real horse?

Brother Alex convinces my dad that his Tennessee Walker, Mac, is gentle enough for kids and so he brings the big sorrel over and we stake him out on a rope in the front yard like a dog. We have a horse! A real horse! Borrowed, but he's ours for a while. Yes, Randy, dreams do come true!

At dawn the next day, with my unsuspecting parents still sleeping, I stand on a five gallon paint bucket beside Mac, grab a handful of mane and struggle aboard, bareback. I reach down for my younger brother's hand, pull him up behind me and we head across the highway into the woods for an all day ride.

Brother Alex eventually reclaims Mac, but takes my daddy to a livestock auction and lends him $37.50 to buy a one-eyed bay that I name Ranger. (In our family, the dog, the cat, and all six children have names that start with R, so the horse gets an R-name, too.)

Through the years, I grow up (to some extent,) get married, have a family, pursue a career in a cutthroat business (radio,) and move 59 times. Whenever possible, I have a horse, even when it means I have to rent stable space and pasture or, on occasion, keep horses and ponies in my back yard in the suburbs.

Ranger, Beauty, Kawliga, Sugarfoot, Trigger and Prince carry me through my teen years. In my 20's and 30's, Abadon, another Trigger, Brandy, Dusty and Amber take most of my free time and extra money. In my forties, Baby and Luke are my last two horses. Both are beautiful--a quarter horse and an Arabian--but injuries I receive from them cause my doctor to ground me in 1991.

In 2007 I say to a well-to-do neighbor, "I wish I had every dollar I ever spent on horses." He replies, "I still do." Touche'!

But then I remember how the world looks from horseback, and suddenly I'm longing for the wind in my face again, the thunder of pounding hooves, the ripple of a thousand pounds of muscle beneath me, the speed, the danger, the total concentration required to anticipate the sudden jolts and turns, and I know that if time circles back again and I have a chance to choose the money or the horses, I'll choose the horses.

END OF THE TRAIL
by Randy Reynolds
(first published in Australian Horseman)

When he was a wild-eyed pony And I was just a kid
You could never imagine the foolish And dangerous things we did.

I tried to make him a jumper, Practicing higher and higher,
Till he panicked and ripped his chest And forelegs in the wire.

We pretended to be in the Derby.... With a blacktop road for a track.
Then we met a bus on the backstretch And the pavement met my back.

We were Roy Rogers and Trigger,
Only he didn't know any trick
'cept biting the hand that fed him....
And showing me he could kick. ...

Now you run to the house and hurry To fetch my bullets and gun
And you take him way down in the pasture Where you know what has to be done

While I recollect him as Trigger.
And pretend again that I'm Roy.............
And cry for the wild-eyed pony........
That I loved so much as a boy. ...............

OLD DEAD-EYE
by Randy Reynolds

He lived at the end of a rope.
We couldn't afford any fence,
With him costing thirty dollars
And fifty-some-odd cents.

It was never known before .............................Here, you're expecting corn,
'cause I never cared to tell .............................And although he was the worst
Of the times that I got thrown ......................You think I'll say I loved him
Or sometimes simply fell. ..............................As you always love your first.

Old Dead-eye had my number. ......................Well, I'd slap my knees in laughter
He wanted me to die. ......................................But both of them are in splints.
I could tell it by the evil .................................Be quiet! The auction's startin'!
Gleam in his one good eye. ..........................."Now here's a bargain, gents!"