Kids Horses

Growing up there were a lot of horses who touched my life & I still think of them occasionally today. All belonged to kids, but today I wonder if they were truly kids horses.

GoGo was a liver chestnut gelding of unknown heritage, probably born in the late 1950s. I had been at the stable for a few weeks before I even noticed him. His stall was almost solid board fence & 6' high. It was said he was proud cut & his disposition sure indicated there was truth to that. In reality he was a cryptorchid. Without today's medical knowledge & facilities, it was common practice to just remove the descended testicle at gelding & forget about the one hiding within the abdomen. GoGo was mean & ornery, taking a bite at anyone who came within teeth distance. His owner was a young girl named Laurie & she was the only person GoGo liked. For her he was reliable, fun horse, running & jumping at her command. One day while racing through a bamboo tunnel he stepped on a branch that snapped & flipped up, impaling GoGo in the groin area. The vet came out, cleaned the puncture & said it would heal fine. A few weeks later it had still not healed, in fact it was draining with infection. For months Lori hosed, cleaned & doctored GoGo. The infection raged. At last GoGo was taken to an equine hospital where he died on the table from the anesthesia. On necropsy a piece of the stick was found embedded deep in his groin. To this day I cringe whenever I ride through deadfall & fallen branches. Whenever I ride debris laden trails, the memory of GoGo rides with me.

Sonny was a pretty, chestnut with white mare, an arab/Tennessee Walker cross born in the late 1950s. She was a spitfire who had raised three young sisters. By the time I knew her she was on the third sister, Karen. Sonny could jump & she could buck. She really taught those sisters how to ride. By the time Karen came along she'd mellowed some, but always put in a few snorts & kicks for good measure. Sonny was gaited like the Tennessee Walker but also trotted when she felt like it. It was fun watching her gait into a jump because she looked so different from the mostly Thoroughbred jumpers at the stable. One of the things that made Sonny special was that if you pointed her at someone or something & said "sic'em Sonny", she was like a rabid dog in her charge. Be it a person, horse, dog or sheep (there were many at the stable), Sonny would attack with her teeth bared. She really seemed to enjoy being given permission to be mean. One time she chased the stable owner all the way into his office. If you were riding her & reached around to pinch her rump, she would buck until you fell off laughing. Sonny was just ornery enough to be a young girl's horse, & her young girls grew up to be just as ornery.

High Voltage, aka Watts, was a fiery black mare of unknown heritage. She was probably part Thoroughbred & looked like she had some Saddlebred in there as well. She was born mid to late 1950s. She was owned & ridden by a girl we called Crazy Lori. I don't know whether Watts was crazy because of her owner, or whether Lori was crazy from riding Watts. I can still occasionally here her screeching voice yell Wattsy from across the stable. Watts was probably the highest jumper at the stable, but she was also the most inconsistent. Some days she'd fly & others she'd send her rider through the fence without her. That horse could stop on a dime when she decided she didn't want to jump. She only had one speed & that was full out gallop. Riding her into a jump was always scary because you never knew if she'd take off or slide stop. Eventually Lori traded Watts to another girl at the stable. It was unfortunate because the other girl got the worse of the deal. One day the new owner of Watts, Jackie, was jumping & all was going well. Then Watts did her infamous slide stop in front of a brush jump (solid tree stumps encased in wood with branches out the top). Jackie hit the jump head first & was unconscious for a few minutes. My mom had Jackie lay down in our tackroom until the paramedics arrived. In the meantime, Mr Harris had someone come get me to ride Watts over that fence. He knew I'd get on her. I used the whip on that mare all the way into the fence, sitting my butt tight, waiting to see if we go over or through. I didn't much care which as long as I stayed on. At the last second Watts lifted off & we soared over the jump. She must have known that I wasn't going to let her stop even if it meant crashing that jump. Years later I was to wonder if Mr Harris thought I was also crazy. Why else would he have had me ride Watts that day?

Royal Hassan was a bright chestnut, trimmed in white, 1/2 arab gelding who was born mid 1960s. His owner was Leslie, better known around the stable as SockItToMe. Hassan was very pretty as he pranced & danced when SockItToMe rode him. He sailed over jumps with no effort & could compete with the much bigger Thoroughbreds. He always had his tail flagging over his back while he snorted his way around the arena. Hassan was very pretty to watch, but not always fun to ride. He was the spookiest horses at the stable & he was very good at leaping 10' sideways as he leaped just as high into the air. I know of at least 3 times that he spooked SockItToMe off bad enough that she was unconscious & the paramedics were called. Only once did she go to the hospital & that was only because she was still unconscious when she was lifted into the ambulance. It would be many years before I owned & learned that not all arabs are crazy.

I've never been fond of ponies & am still convinced they are not the mounts for children. There were many at the stable when I was young & almost all were as mean & ornery as they come. There was the appy Indian pony who ran away every time her owner got on. It didn't matter if she was saddled or bareback, she would run away for 3-4 laps of the arena before she would behave. There was a chestnut & white pinto pony who would buck everytime he was ridden. It would take 5-10 minutes before he'd behave. The black & white pony was a kicker. It didn't matter who or what walked by him, he'd kick. Most of the ponies were in a perpetual state of pinned ears & bared teeth. Ponies were, & still are, the scourge of the equine world in my opinion. To be fair though, I'm sure most of the problems were because adults were too big to break them & young girls had too much fun teasing them. Still I've never owned a pony &, dare I say it, never will.