My dog, my old truck and my saddle are at the top of my list of prized possessions. According to country music lyrics, that’s a pretty good start toward a guy being a cowboy. Then there’s the list of things I’m not crazy about. Like real hard work, for instance. I’ve never managed to get excited about that. So ranching and cowboying don’t show up on my job history.
The saddle I’m so proud of was passed down to me from my grandpa George. He was a fine horseman, by all accounts, and passed that on to my mom. I’ve been told that Grandpa and I share a lot of traits, and somehow I figured the horse gene got passed along with the rest of the DNA. The time I’ve spent in and – more importantly, leaving – the saddle makes me wonder.
My buddy Travis Craig grew up in Summerville, Oregon. His uncle Steve made Travis a deal that if he could break two spunky horses, Travis could go ahead and keep the younger of the pair. I offered to help. Travis called his new horse ‘Bucksnort’ and the naming turned out to be the one part of the whole operation that went well. I have a real vivid memory of being in the air, wishing both boots were in the stirrups instead of just one, noticing the angle of how the saddle horn and I were about to meet and wondering if I might ever have children. Bucksnort pretty well broke us, and if the contract had been worded differently, I believe Travis and I would rightfully belong to the horse instead of the other way around.
Travis and I later found work on a Colorado dude ranch during a summer in college. We were shooting for wrangler jobs, but those were all filled and we had to settle for being maintenance guys. Our buddy Fargo is a better liar than us and managed to convince the ranch they couldn’t possibly pass up a cowboy with his experience. Fargo got the wrangler job, hung up the phone and asked Travis if he would mind giving him a refresher course on horses. We walked down to put a saddle on Bucksnort and Fargo said he had that part pretty well figured out. He came up on the starboard side instead of port, though, and things went downhill from there. Bucksnort had his way with Fargo, which was painful for all of us. Fargo got banged up and Travis and I both pulled something in our stomachs from all the laughing.
There’s nothing wrong with Fargo’s memory, and that summer at the ranch whenever Travis and I had time to go riding, somehow the only horses available had definite Bucksnort characteristics. I got stuck with ‘Sheik’ every time, an Arabian walleyed swayback that spoke with a lisp and needed a psychiatrist more than a trainer. Sheik wasn’t interested at all in wet feet and would only cross the many creeks across the trails by jumping. The saddle that went with Sheik was a medieval device with a steel plate for a seat that was either designed to be used by eunuchs, or for creating them. I didn’t get bruises ‘on’ my backside. It was a bruise. All of it.
We got a check for $500 a month from the ranch owner. Not $500, but a check with $500 written on it. The bank teller actually laughed the first time I tried to turn that piece of paper into cash. She apologized for laughing and said she would sure take a look at the ranch account and see if there was anything in there. There wasn’t. She said come back and try again.
The owner came back from a trip to Denver with the shiniest new Dodge truck you’ve ever seen. A real beauty. He was sure proud of that rig and I was sure interested what account he used to get it. On my way out, I offered to trade him the checks he’d given me for that horse of his, Sheik, and directions to the nearest glue rendering plant. He would have done it for another month of labor, but I figured I’d better move on and let my bruise start healing if I ever wanted to sit again.
~ Originally Published in the Chieftain. Jon Rombach is a regular columnist for the Chieftain who still does his typing standing up. He can be reached at jonrombach@gmail.com.
