Life In My Boots

Learning to Ride

Some background info : Where I lived and grew up was a rural area. It had a very friendly environment, everyone knew everyone and everyone were friends. All the kids played outside together, rode to each others houses on bike, no fear of anything bad happening...other than missing dinner.

    On a summer day, mid July, i was outside and had just got done mowing the yard when I saw my friend John come up the road on his bike. He lived about a quarter of a mile down the road where his parents had a small horse ranch. So he comes up to me and asks if I would like to go to his house. I had only been there once or twice to play in the creek so i was a little shocked to do something else. I've always wanted to ride a horse so I was excited to finally get the chance to. I ran to my garage and asked my dad if I could go over. He said yes and was happy to see me get the chance to learn how to ride. After getting the ok I hoped on my bike and started out to Johns house. When I got to his house I saw his sister and mom riding their horses. They had their own horse and a few others for guests to ride. 

   I ride up to the barn and John introduces me to a beautiful black horse with a small white splotch on his nose named Night Rider and a smaller tan and white pony named Teacup. He gave me the option to pick for myself with a fair warning that Nigh Rider was known to be rowdy. I had a good history with animals said to be rowdy and mean, every time I encountered one they would be a big ol' sweetheart to me, so I choose Night Rider. I got saddled up and head to the round course, a small circular course for beginners to learn to ride. They had me start of with a trot, after two minutes i wanted to sprint so I let Johns mom know and she tell me to just say "come on" and squeeze Night riders sides with my the heel of my boot, so I do.

   I'm now at a full sprint only 2 minutes into learning on a supposedly rowdy horse. It was the greatest sense of accomplishment and a even better sense of freedom to have this horse listen to me and be in my control. Just when I thought it couldn't get better I look over to the sister, her name was Devon, and saw her standing with her boots in the saddle and arms thrown in the air with the horse at a full sprint. Seeing her do that made me want to do it, so, with out telling anyone i was going to try to do it, I stand up and throw my arms in the air.

   Now, I'm standing on a "rowdy" horse at a full sprint. The sense of accomplishment and freedom grew stronger, and even stronger when i got off Night Rider and Devon came over in shock and said to me " How the hell did you do that?! It has taken me 2 years to do that and you did it 10 minutes into your first ride!". All I had to say was "I guess it's the Native American in me".