Saddle Sore

In 1972, or thereabouts, I was  working with a woman named Rose and we became good friends. In fact, later, we became lovers, but  that's another story. As we worked together day after day we got to know each other and when I found out she owned horses I knew that I wanted to become very good friends. I love to ride horses and, even though my  cousin had a horse, I never got to ride it. My aunt was  not a nice woman and she would not let me ride because I was overweight and she said I  was too heavy for the horse. Now I was only about 75 lbs. over weight. This was when I was 11 or 12, so I was about 185. A horse can carry 185 with no trouble, she was just a bitch. I really shouldn't say that about my aunt but it's true. So I never got to ride when we would go to my cousins house.

But I was planning to become friends and hopefully I would get to ride Rose's horses. Well we did  become friends and Rose finally invited me out to where she kept her horses. They had a barn and tack room combined together. They had all the stuff to feed and take care of the horses. Rose had 5 black and white pinto horses. She also had 3 daughters and a granddaughter. She was the nicest person I had met in a long time. She was also a generous person. She would always invite me to dinner at her house after riding even though she had her husband and her 3 girls to feed. They didn't have a lot of money but they would be generous enough to invite  me to dinner.

I remember the first time I went riding with Rose and her girls. It was a Saturday afternoon. I arrived before Rose and the girls. When they showed up, we went out to the pasture to catch the horses for riding. The horse that I was going to ride was named Chief. He was the biggest horse and since I was a big man, I needed a large horse to hold me. So Chief it was.

After running Chief down and getting a halter on him I brought him back to the barn and gave him some grain and started brushing him before saddling him. As I got him saddled  Rose asked me if I knew how to tighten up his cinch after you first put it on. Horses know how to expand their lungs when you put a saddle on them and then after you have them ready to go they exhale and the cinch strap would loosen and when you step in the stirrup the saddle will slip and you cannot get up in the saddle. So to tighten up the saddle you have to knee the horse in the rip cage and when you do, the horse will exhale and you yank up on the cinch strap and tighten it and the horse can't do anything about it. It's pretty easy it's just that you have to hit the right spot and hit it with just the right amount of pressure.You don't want to hurt them, you just want them to exhale.

Once you get the saddle tight and get everything else on it's time to go riding. I just love to jump on a horse and ride. I believe that there is nothing as exciting as feeling the  power of a horse between your legs. Nothing as strong as a horse. The only thing that feels stronger is sitting on a horse bareback. Sitting on a horse without a saddle is so much different, you can't imagine until you actually do it. Feeling those muscles against your legs and feeling those muscles  against your muscles. There's nothing like it. Rose said she was going  bareback riding the next weekend and I was welcome to join them. I was so excited and ready to go riding. But that was also labor day weekend, the first weekend in Sept. and my parents and my brother where going to Reno for a weekend of gambling and free drinks and pretty girls. So I had to choose between pretty girls, free booze and the chance to win money. Well I decide on horse back riding.

So after work on Friday I followed Rose to where the horses are and we take a nice long horseback ride before dinner. After our ride we go to Rose's house and have something to eat and we decide that I'll spend the night  so we can get up the next morning to go riding. We had dinner and watched TV that Friday night and we then went to bed and got up early Saturday morning and drove to the pasture.

After catching the horses we put reins on them so we could direct them and we got up on the horses bareback and rode them around. Just about noon time my mom and dad and brother stopped by on their way to Reno. They wanted to make sure that I hadn't changed my mind and wanted to go to Reno with them.
But this was the first time I had ever ridden bareback and it was great. The best time I had ever had on a horse. It didn't make my mom happy that I didn't go with them, but I didn't go.  I stayed in Fremont        and  had a great time.

Saturday night we had a great Bar B Que and had a few rum and cokes or should I say, we had a lot of rum and cokes. After the drinks I was poured into bed, or rather onto the floor, for a good nights sleep. It's a good thing that I don't get hung over because I put away some rum that night. But what I hadn't planned on was waking up saddle sore. I was so sore that I couldn't even get up off the floor. When I did get up, I was so sore  that I couldn't sit down, I couldn't walk I couldn't do anything, stand, sit, walk, anything. My muscles were just toast, they couldn't move. But when Rose asked if I was ready to go bareback riding again, I said "Hell yes!". I headed out to the motor home and we loaded up and went to the pasture, got on the horses and spent another day riding. Yahoo!!