Published: September 10, 2009 07:34 am      

Really, there’s never a dull moment

I suppose it’s become clear that it’s never dull at the Carter house. Most of it is self-inflicted entertainment, or mom-inflicted that my family patiently endures. You know, suffering by association.

We spend a lot of time with horses and various other surprise-producing individuals of the four-legged persuasion.

We also live in a house that has approximately the same amount of character as our vehicles. It tends to be full of surprises, too. We (when I say we, I mean my husband and an army of good-hearted friends) had to do a lot of remodeling when we bought it, but, as a result of severe adult ADD (mostly mine), there isn’t a room that is finished. No surprise there.

We have a friend that dabbles in the horse industry, and is good at home improvement. He made a joke one day about me breaking a couple of his three-year-old colts last fall.

With my customary mental acuity, three days following his joke, I called him up.

“How about I break your colts and you help finish our house?”

Deal.

Before we took the time to rethink our agreement, he and his family showed up in the driveway with horses in the trailer and tools in the truck.

In no time, we (when I say we, I mean they -- I was at the barn) had trim around the kitchen island, in the living room, and new ceilings in the kids’ rooms. Not bad.

So I started his three-year-olds. We did lots of ground work, and it only took a week or two to convince them they shouldn’t drag me around the mostly round pen. Before long they were both standing tied with no issues, working on the rope from the ground, and stopping when I told them to. The yellow one just took a little more convincing than the sorrel. I should have realized that meant something.

Shortly thereafter, I was visiting with a neighbor who wanted to discuss techniques for teaching a horse to slide to a stop. I told him a little bit about what I do, although my stops are not necessarily sliding. They’re more like gearing down, eventually, but the colts I was working with were really doing well, and had developed nice smooth stops on command. He wondered, could he come and observe? Okay, but it’s not going to be that impressive.

Surprise.

With our little audience in place, we perfectly executed proof that, like children, horses will make a liar out of you and laugh while they do it. They drug me all around the mostly round pen, acted like they’d never heard the word “whoa,” and generally made me look like an idiot. We impressed them, all right.

My little audience went home.

I continued to wave around on the end of the rope as the yellow one played crack-the-whip.

Now painfully aware that we were not yet ready for RFD TV, the colts and I went back to work.

The next time the owner and his family came to work on the house, we were more prepared. They took a little break and we piddled with the colts a bit. We saddled them, stepped up on them, and rode them in some tiny circles with no trauma whatsoever. Owner was pleased, and we called it good for that day. They went back to work on the house while I concentrated on delivering puppies in the closet. I told you, never a dull moment. Not having ever functioned as a canine midwife before, that was a whole new adventure in itself for me, but I digress.

Before long I was riding both colts in the pasture, wisely following my husband’s advice not to ride them when no one was home. We were getting along swimmingly. I could ride them all over the pasture, work them in big circles, little circles, to the right and to the left. And, yes, they would even stop smoothly.

Soon it was time for their family to come and get them, but not before another home improvement session.

As my husband and our friends worked on the house, I figured I’d take one more spin on the colts before they left.

What is the point of waiting until someone is home to ride them, if no one is paying attention when one of them bucks ALL THE WAY DOWN THE HILL? He was on a pretty good roll, and the only thing that kept me on board was sheer determination to avoid abject humiliation. Well, that and the fact that my jacket was stuck on the saddle horn.

It was pretty tricky, trying to scope out a prospective soft landing strip among the rocks and keep an eye out behind me for whoever might be a witness at the same time. I needn’t have worried.

Three adults in the yard measuring boards, and not one of them witnessed the mother of all trick rides. Thank you for your support.

I got him stopped, and no, it wasn’t a sliding stop. It was a bone-jarring, haul-him-around-in-a-circle-like-when-the-power-steering-went-out-in-the-truck eventual stop.

We both paused for a brief moment of reflection. Then he got in trouble, and I decided if he had that much energy he needed to work some more, so we went on a trip around the pasture, one of us vowing to trot until we calmed down or passed out, whichever came first. Maybe then he’d remember what whoa means. He decided it was in his best interest to cooperate, so we were winding down when MIKE (yep, waited too long to get the suitcase out of the floor), who had finally looked up, cleverly hollered, “Give him a kick and let’s see if he’ll buck.”

I guess everybody’s a comedian.

My snappy comeback lacked punch after I delivered it three times because they couldn’t hear me from half way across the pasture and over the 30 mile an hour wind, so as I rode closer, I finally just said, “I already did and so did he. You missed it,” and carried on to the barn. I wish he could have seen the dirty look I threw his way, but by the time I got close enough, they’d all already lost interest.

At the end of the day, they took their tools and their horses and went home. I warned them to watch the yellow one. He bucks.

A few weeks later, I was completing my semi-annual vacuuming in the kitchen. I know, another surprise. I stubbed my toe on the little corner of the island trim that stuck out, and off it came.

It wasn’t long after that I got a phone call.

“That yellow horse bucks!” Told you.

I was so proud of myself. I didn’t miss a beat.

“He’ll quit when you come and put the trim back on.”

That was my one good one for the year, and it was only January.

In the meantime, the trim piece is still sitting on the counter ...

Contact Mandy Carter at 421-2027.