My Little Pony

When I was maybe four, my father realized my every girl's dream: he bought me a horsey.

My parents were at the Pendleton Round-Up (which, if you've never heard of it, is quite the ado), enjoying the shows and competitions. My mother was something of a horse woman herself. When I was small she had a Pinto, the same one she had used when she led groups of juvy teenagers around the Three Sisters Wilderness. They rode the kids around in circles in those mountains until they were certain they couldn't find their way out, then led them into the summer camps where they did rehabilitative work.

At the rodeo, my parents were separated for some period of time, one long enough that my impulsive Papa purchased a wild Mustang. At their reconnection, he was excited to tell her that he'd, "bought a pony for the kids."



I couldn't honestly tell you that this was an atypical behavior on my father's part, but I'm not sorry for it, either. It's too amusing. Anyway, my always practical and common-sensical mater berated the fool. For what were they to do with the animal? Where to house it? And who on earth did he imagine would be busting that bronc?

He found a farmer who was willing to take the horse away, for one hundred dollars. That my father paid him.