On Cowboy Roy...

Waylon Jennings often comes to my mind when I think of my heroes. This is because My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys. (Good tune. Look it up, will you?)

I'm not making this up. I love cowboys. I love their confidence and their ability and their know-how. I love so much about cowboys that I really wish one who lives in close proximity to me would allow me to woo him with my charm, but I digress.

Cowboy Roy lives up the road from us here in CowTown. I hired him last time to get Zydeco on the trailer to go to his new farm. Our loading time was eight minutes. I'm still so shocked about this that I don't even have words.

I called Cowboy Roy last night and had a jovial conversation with him, in which he hassled me to hurry up and buy a decent horse (Decent being a quarter horse that works cattle. As opposed to a Thoroughbred who jumps fences.)

It was arranged that Cowboy Roy and Cowboy Dad should leave to pick up the ever-magnificent Zydeco (Floating bone chips and all, my horse remains magnificent) at eight a.m. I asked if my presence would be required. *Silence on the line* I'm sure that both cowboys involved would rather have their eyes seared out by branding irons than be accompanied by such a ... a wilting flower as myself.

I set my alarm clock for eight forty-five, thinking that would give me a good forty five minutes to ready myself for my horse's arrival. I mean, they were sure to have some trouble, no? The horse who takes an unGodly amount of begging to get on a trailer? Surely they wouldn't be here before nine thirty in the morning? An hour and a half to deal with a tricky horse seemed perfectly reasonable to me.

And then I found myself outside greeting my glorious Thoroughbred at five to nine. Did you read that? FIVE TO NINE. I'm going to bold it for you so you really can get the emphasis: FIVE TO NINE.

It took them fifty five minutes to get from here to the farm, get the horse bandaged and blanketed and onto the trailer and back here to The Ranch. God, I love cowboys.

I unloaded him myself. It took me a minute to figure out how to open the trailer and then I hopped in beside my horse who was snorting and pacing side to side. He was kind of scary and I wanted to leap out of the trailer.

But, it was the last chance I'd ever have to take my horse off a trailer. Wilting flower, be damned. I'm taking my horse back to where he belongs. I'm sure the cowboys could have done it a little more gracefully, but I wanted to learn this last little tidbit of horsemanship.

And he turned around and walked off like a prince, like the boy I love so much, quiet like a lamb.

Cowboy Roy ribbed me a bit before he left, offering me a few good horses he has for sale. This is the relationship I have with Cowboy Roy: I talk about my horse, he guffaws and then tells me about a 'real' horse I should buy. He is one of the few people in the world who does not offend me when he talks down on big horses who can't cut cattle. I'm ok with it.

I came home from work tonight and my heart leapt up into my throat when I saw my beautiful steed standing out in the pasture with Tia and Trooper. My boy. In all his shiny, knee-chipped glory. Eating grass, lazing about, soaking up the sunshine.

I have one recommendation to make here: If you are a wilting flower when it comes to handling your horse, you should really have a pair of cowboys around to assist. They are such jolly creatures, these cowboys.

And they always know how to get the job done.