Hi! It's me again, your favorite cow horse, Shakespeare!
It seems that lots of humans have a dream of being a cowboy. Most people never get the chance to realize that dream. But sometimes, people get the chance to have a quick look at what it's like. We don't get many visitors, but Dad knows how to show folks a good time... and give them a little bit of the "Cowboy Experience".
I'm going to tell you about two of my Dad's friends who came out to visit the Rafter G.
First there was Jerry. He's a nice young man from Houston. He hadn't had a whole lot of opportunity to ride, but he knew most of the basics. One of his goals in life had been to rope a calf from horseback. Here's a guy who lived in the city, didn't have much access to a horse, and no access to calves. He'd bought himself a couple of lariats and a roping dummy, and spent an hour or so every evening roping this dummy in the hopes that one day he'd get his chance. When he came out to the Rafter G, he finally got his chance.
Dad's no dummy, and he's not going to let just anybody throw a rope at a calf. I'm here to tell you it can be very dangerous. There have been some pretty good cowboys hurt pretty bad in roping accidents... horses, too. And there have even been a couple of cowboys in our county who were killed. A lot of things can go wrong... I'll tell you about some of those incidents in another story.
Back to Jerry. Dad wanted to make sure he could ride okay before he let Jerry try to rope a calf. So we saddled up and went to check pastures. Checking pastures is a good way to find out if someone can ride or not. It's almost like trail riding in a lot of ways. Dad will be visiting about what he's looking for in the calves, how many calves are in that particular pasture. And sometimes he even talks about completely unrelated stuff. You'd think he didn't have any company all day long, the way he carries on when theres another human around. We'll walk, trot, and canter along, checking fencelines and such. All the while Dad's visiting, he's watching to see how his guest is riding.
Jerry was doing all right for a city boy... only problem was his posture and body language was all wrong. He was taught as most people seem to be... kick to go, pull to stop. But when he kicked to go, he'd lean back and his body was telling the horse to stop. Dad worked with him a bit, and he improved some. But even though he wasn't moving in synch with the horse and his body language was all wrong, the horse overcame it. You see, when a new person rides us, we feel out the person and adjust. Like when a cowboy gets on a new horse to "spin him around"... the horse is checking out the rider, too. We find out how the human rides, and make adjustments accordingly.
Well anyway, Jerry passed the pasture test and Dad took him to the feedlot to ride pens. Jerry had a ball. He'd never done any cowboy work before, and he was like a kid in a candy store. Then, when they had checked the pens for sick calves, Dad decided to help Jerry realize a dream. That's right, he was going to get a chance to rope a calf!
Dad cut a small calf out of a pen and put him in the alley. The alley is about 10 feet wide, and Dad shut a couple of gates, giving the calf about 30 yards to move in. Dad taught Jerry how to dally, and explained what the calf would probably do so Jerry could be prepared for it. And most importantly, Dad told him to just let go of the rope if he got in a bind. And, of course, Jerry was riding a horse who'd been roped on many times before. He would put Jerry in the right position, and keep him safe.
Jerry was excited... he was about to try to rope a calf! In the alley, the calf couldn't run very far or very fast and the situation was as safe as you could hope for. Jerry built his loop, cornered the calf, then let the calf run by him. He threw the loop... and missed! Roping is a lot harder than they make it look in the rodeos. So Jerry tried again, and again, and again. On his fifth try, he finally caught the calf! He was so excited watching the rope go around the calf's neck, he forgot to dally. Ever had a ropeburn? Jerry has! He calls it his battle scars. He tried one more time, roped the calf and dallied, and a boyhood dream was fulfilled.
I was glad to have been there. I didn't know humans could smile so big!
