horses
my memories are full of them! when I was hardly more than a baby, someone photographed my beautiful cousin (she was in high school, I have no record of what she thought) holding me on the saddle in front of her while she sits on her horse. when I was a kid, I was sure she'd ridden her horse with me sitting in front of her. she was probably saner than that. when I was a kid, I lived in northeastern Brasil, a thousand miles (I think) from Texas where I might have seen her again and asked her. in one town we lived in, I could sneak away from parental guidance out to the edge of town, out to where a road led into town. I discovered that on Friday evenings, if I got there early enough and stayed out of sight, I could see vaqueiros (cowboys) racing each other on their horses, riding for town, yippeeing and hurraying and just having a good time. it was one of the few times I ever saw grownups having a good time. I also discovered that on Sunday evening - harder to get away from parental guidance, but all the more exhilarating if I could - I could watch the same cowboys (I just assumed they were the same cowboys) barely able to sit on their horses, dragging back to the ranchos. occasionally one would be singing some song that definitely wasn't a hymn. I think those vaqueiros gave me hope. being a grownup looked pretty dismal from my perspective. later in my young life, I hitched a ride on the back of the horse of the aguadeiro, the man who delivered water to our neighborhood. oh man! oh man! I was on a horse! in my version of the story, the aguadeiro kept wanting to put me back on my feet and send me home, and I kept convincing him to let me ride a little further. yes, I knew my way home. at the end of his working day, when he turned his cart in and left his horse in a stable, he lifted me off it and I thanked him and set out for home. it was much more adventurous than I expected. I knew I needed to walk that way a long time then walk that other way for another long time. I walked and walked and walked and not a damned thing looked familiar, so I walked and walked and walked some more. not a damned thing looked familiar there either, but (I think) a couple of women asked if I was lost. hell no, I wasn't lost. I was right there talking to them, and I was walking home! and I had ridden a horse! they laughed and thought I was cute. much later, I think, I encountered a dog who was bigger than me and wasn't going to let me pass. I stood there and looked at him and remembered not to act scared, whatever the hell that meant. the dog lost interest in such a dull playmate and wandered off, and I suppose so did I. eventually a pleasant man interrupted my walk and asked if he knew me and laughed when I didn't know. he asked if I was the son of Reverend Joseph Underwood, and seemed delighted when I told him I was, and that I'd ridden a horse! and now I was walking home! he suggested that I'd misunderstood my directions since I was way the hell and gone away from my home. would I walk with him so he could show me the way? oh, okay, yes I would. good, but first we had to stop by and tell his wife we would be gone for a while. (you might need to remember, this was in the 1940s and in northeastern Brasil, a world long gone. people didn't have telephones or cars. everybody walked.) we did, and she invited me in for a cafezinho, a baby coffee, and I told her that I rode a horse! and what I'd seen since then. she marveled at my adventures and what a brave little boy I was. I thanked her. then her husband and I walked to my house, and he was right. I had been walking the wrong direction. I must have missed my turn. along the way he told me about interesting places we passed where people did incomprehensible things to keep the city running. finally we got to my house and the man and I were the only sane people there. my mother and father and everyone else ran around waving their hands in the air, hollering and screaming and carrying on. when they calmed down enough that they could be trusted, the man left me with them and, presumably, walked home. as soon as he was out of hearing, the fooferaw resumed. I didn't care. I'd ridden a horse and had adventures! oh man! oh man! there's so much more to tell about horses! but not in this paragraph. it's wandered on and away and around like a Los Angeles Times sentence, and probably has as many facts. but it should make clear: I do appreciate horses.
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