Knees, necks and nerves

I've always loved the soft touch of a warm animal. A bunny rabbit with its little fluffy feet. A big cat that can warm up your belly on a cold winter night. But, the moment you run my hand over the fuzzy velvet feel of a horse’s nose, I sweat. Beautiful as they may be, these things are dangerous.

When I fell in love with a woman and took her to Puerto Rico on my mom's credit card, however, I figured that enough time had passed. Let me be more specific. When I was eight years old, my cousins and I were usually dropped off in the wilderness for two months to make the most out of sticks and running brooks. I remember building a shrine at the bottom of a hill just to keep myself busy. I remember my tough Irish Uncle Marty chopping logs and convincing us to do work around the house with the promise of a special treat (which always ended up being “a hearty hand shake”). It wouldn't be out of the ordinary to see us kids go ballistic over a trip to the one store in town, the Gay Bull, to get taffy and load up on all sorts of sugary, shit candy. We relied on each other for excitement, which is why, when my Aunt Renee came in and said, "Today we are goin' horseback riding", I nearly flipped from excitement.

My horse's name was Lady. She was the size of a wall and had the manners of a drunk. All of us shouted that our horse was the best, and then we were told to file right behind one another as the man-like woman took us out into the "wild." While I was the last in line on the trail, the one trying to keep up, I could sense that Lady was getting restless. A couple of twitches and disrespectful facial expressions, but nothing to be alarmed by. I was in the moment and laughing at how awkward the girls looked on these crazy beasts…. I am pretty sure it was at that point that my horse lost its mind. She started to trot and quickly busted into a sprint, which eventually turned into a gallop. All the while, I was in shock. "This isn't really happening. I'm not really moving this fast on an animal fifteen times my size."

As I passed my entire family I noticed the look on the instructor's face. That's when I panicked. Never mind not knowing where Lady and I were running off to, what concerned me more was how it was all going to end. Eventually, I was clotheslined by a pine branch. The mini stunt show for my cousins ended in tears and embarrassment. At that moment the pain meant nothing to me, I could handle the pain. It was the idea that something went horribly wrong and it happened on my horse.

"Lady!", screamed the rough instructor with the straw hat. "She's never done this before."

She rode to my rescue and asked if I was alright. Yes, I had pine needles embedded in my neck and, yes, I did do a back flip off a horse and land on jagged rocks and, yes, I was alright. I was more than alright. I was relieved to have gotten off that goddamn beast alive. But I was scared. That’s where the emotion came in. The fear. I was terrified of horses after that, but not completely convinced that they were deadly.

Years later, Uncle Marty longed to recreate his boyhood memories of galloping in the fields of Ireland and thought it would be good for the entire family to take up riding. He took us to the stables one day and declared that he bought a horse named Louie and a pony named Firecracker.

"They're beautiful, wouldn't ya say?” in his thick Irish brogue.

Everyone looked at me to see if I'd actually go through with it. Uncle Marty tried to beat the fear out of me like a priest performing an exorcism. He thought it was best for me to keep riding even though I pleaded to be left alone. I hung onto Firecracker's mane while she spun in psychotic circles. I had close calls of falling off but managed to hang on with one hand as the family cheered me on. I wasn't getting hurt. But when Uncle Marty heard me scream, that's when everything changed. A boy scream? A boy who was supposed to one day grow up and be a man?

He pulled me aside and asked, "What's the matter with ya Chester? What do you got to be so afraid of boy?"
 "I'm afraid it's gonna jump over the fence and run out into the road and get me hit by a car. I was afraid of dying." I've always been a fatalist.

"Do you think the feckin' thing is dumb?” he asked. "Do you think this here little pony is gonna want to get its face smashed in now by some bloody truck? Eh? Do ya?"

I did, but I could never tell him that. The way I saw it was, if horses weren't completely stupid, they were still dumber than humans, and we got ourselves into accidents all the time.

A few years later I realized that Uncle Marty was right; horses weren't stupid and they weren't necessarily monsters either. They just needed a little positive attention. So that's what I did, I gave them some positive attention. I brushed them. I fed them and basically, I let them know that I was there for them. And that I could love them. That is until Louie kicked me in my knee cap and left me for dead. I had to fend for myself while I crawled in the mud amongst a mosh pit of infuriated hooves which, by the way, could have easily killed me. Firecracker had sniffed Louie's ass and Louie didn't like that, (I don't blame him), and so he went to buck and it caught my knee. Understandable. But as I slid my way back to the gate, I was sure I'd never be put in this situation again. And, to top it off, nobody cared. Nobody even noticed that I was tossed seven feet in the air or that I was crawling like a war hero to get out of the ring and, worse, when the dust finally settled, everybody told me that it was my fault.

"He only did that cause you're givin' him mixed signals", my smaller cousin said.

Fuck signals! I sat on him. Was that the wrong signal? And what did she know? She was born like a week ago! Even worse, when I arrived to safety from this stampede and could barely walk, everyone thought I was just being a pussy.

"You're fine", said Uncle Marty. "Now what you want to do is get right back on that horse to show him you're not afraid."

But I was afraid. What the hell was wrong with these people? This man was being downright neglectful. I was a child. Twelve...isn't twelve still a child?

The color in my face was gone and I was losing consciousness, possibly passing over to the other side, but all the while I was to stop my whining and take the blame for not being able to control a furry fit of rage with two leather straps. I was completely misunderstood. Nobody would take my side. Why didn't they come to help me? When it reared up like Long Silver I screamed, “My knee!”

“Didn’t anyone hear me?” I later asked.

My dazed older cousin, the elder of Ms. Know-it-all, and a tomboy in nature, shook her freckle-covered face and muttered, "I thought you said, "Yippee."

In the end, after much convincing, I got a ride to the hospital and, sure enough, I was legitimately hurt. I'm not sure exactly what gave it away. The elephantitis of my joint or the crackling sound that was heard from every step I took. Regardless, I was now convinced that I would never ride another horse for as long as I lived. And this time I meant it!

But, still, maybe enough time had passed? Besides, I was with my lady friend, and I did feel a need to overcompensate. In the passing months, I ballooned from stress. I gained ten pounds and I was already shy about what my horse would think when I sat on it. And here in the beautiful rolling hills of Puerto Rico, I was sure these horses weren’t as high strung.

I told the guide about my hesitance, and so she stuck me with Fernando, a horse that looked like it was counting the days to retirement. When I mounted him I felt the usual guilt. Why should this poor horse have to drag me up and down the path just so I can say that, "Yes, even though I'm fat, a horse can still carry me?" Who was being tested? The horse or myself? When I felt that it was able to move with me on its back I, surprisingly, went to a very nice place. Maybe with the extra weight it would bring things down a notch. And it worked. There we were, slowly walking through the local neighborhood, with the locals all waving with coconuts and smiles. There was a nice man sitting on his porch with a parrot that made the sound of horses and everybody giggled, even me. Fernando was calm and I couldn't have been calmer. My girl looked back at me to make sure I was okay. And I was. I really was. This was destined to be my best experience yet.

Now, my old self would have disapproved of a pile of people on horses walking on the side of a small windy road – and a real road, not a dirt one, a real road with lanes – but I couldn't tell you what I was thinking. I guess I just felt up for the adventure. “If the locals could do it, so could I.” What I wasn't aware of was that this wasn't your average ride. We were to embark on a three hour trail of beaches, roads and brush. My ass felt bony and sore which paled in comparison to when I slipped up and accidentally sat on my balls. It wasn't until the lady in front of me couldn't get her horse to move while we were moseying through thick high grass that I got a little nervous. Since my horse's face was sitting directly in her horse’s ass, I decided to just...I don't know, lift my leg out of the way to avoid a potential knee injury? I must have looked like a real renegade. A one legged cowboy that was in-con-trol. I lifted my leg pretty high. Higher than a man in my state should have been allowed to.

Finally, we were instructed to go around the still creature and wait on the beach for the guide before we were to continue on. This is when, what I like to call, "Shit Happens", happened. At the first chance he got, Fernando rushed to the tree line and used my bloated body to make a path. It was as if I jumped into another world. For some reason I thought about Vietnam (don't ask me why). I was surrounded by jungle animals and felt the Viet Con were waiting for me in the grass. But then I started going to that bad place after enough pulling to the left and tugging to the right didn't do anything. We went up small hills and found our way back to the path, but, Fernando, the smart horse that he was, threw himself back into the bushes and trees, this time prickers, and there I was busting out of the wilderness, back onto the beach with sticks and shit covered in my wild hair, just in time for everyone to ask, "Why did you do that?!" After pulling a stunt like that I would have normally gotten off, but since we were in the middle of nowhere, I had to carry on. Plus, it gave everyone a good laugh. Not the worst person to be.

The sun was down, we were back on the windy Puerto Rican road, where drunk driving wasn't a big deal (I was guilty of it myself) and where morons felt the need to honk their horns as if I wasn’t aware that I wasn’t supposed to be in the middle of the road on a stallion. I was stressed. I was stressed that all of this commotion would prompt this animal to lose his shit and make a run for it. That was about the time a fellow rider tried to pass us. I learned that the golden rule of what not to do in horseback riding is to try passing another horse.

"Fernando was threatened", the guide told me. Of course, this is what all horse lovers say to justify the need for the animal to go from 0 to 60 with a paying patron towards oncoming traffic. Uncle Marty tried so desperately to convince me that horses weren't stupid, but I had my doubts that they understood the rules of traffic. In my mind they wouldn't be aware that behind those bright shiny lights was a body of metal that was moving fast enough to smear the both of us across the intersection.

I was planning my escape. Maybe it would jump the car. They did seem to have little cars in Puerto Rico. Maybe we could jump it and I would then be able to run into another tree branch. All I know is that I was flailing like I'd been kidnapped and everyone saw me at my worst. The last stretch was unacceptable. My mouth made that funny face that people make when they are falling out of planes and my woman described me as an Indiana Jones stunt man. I passed the little parrot that made the stupid fucking horse noise and we arrived back at the camp before I shit my pants. At that point I was convinced I was already going through post traumatic stress. The reigns were dangling off both sides and I would have let Fernando do anything, just as long as he didn't run.

The guide came over to help me down. "That's funny", she said. "Fernando's never done that before."

If she weren’t helping me off of hell I would have strangled the life out of her for making such a stupid comment. I would have cut her up into little Puerto Rican pieces and fed her to the stables. Because the truth is…she did know. And so did Fernando. Everyone knew. And now I know. "Too bad for them", I thought. "They just went and lost a good customer."