Rock Solid Everything Horse
- March 7, 2024
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- Jan Swan Wood
Posted in: Featured, Ranch Life
We were at a local roping held over Labor Day weekend. My son was going to rope and I was going to
keep the grandboys occupied. They were really little. Carson was three and Taygen a year and a half old.
I’ve always figured the best and safest place for tiny people when at a horse related event is to be on a tall horse. So, my faithful saddle horse Rush was along for the day to help me babysit the little boys.
He’s a big horse. At 16 hands, he’s also thick and, that year, maybe a little chubby. Their saddle looked
like a toy on him. While Colin was getting his horse saddled, I was letting Rush graze the green grass by
the trailer. The little guys were busy picking fistfuls of grass and feeding it to him. Between mouthfuls,
they’d pet his face, neck and front legs. Rush was soaking it up like a sponge.
Carson, apparently overcome with love for Rush, suddenly wrapped his arms around Rush’s head,
above the eyes and below the ears, and was giving him a big hug. Before Rush could hardly react to that, Taygen reached out and poked Rush’s eyeball firmly with his finger. Mind you, this happened in the span of seconds. Instead of jerking his head up over having it squeezed or his eyeball poked, Rush held his position, never flinching, while the hug was finished and Carson stepped back. Then he slowly lifted his head, his eye watering, and looked at me, probably wondering why that little bitty one had tried to poke his eye out.
He resumed eating grass out of their hands and grazing, no apparent harm or resentment present.
When Colin left to go warm up, I put both boys up in their saddle together, with Taygen in front. I lead
Rush and we started along the road that went around the arena and parking area. They were having a fine time being up there where they could see everything.
We’d gone past a set of bleachers and were walking along behind the vehicles parked against the arena
fence. Suddenly, from between the vehicles ran two cowboys, one chasing the other. The first guy was
looking back and laughing and didn’t see the wall of horse ahead of him, and plowed into Rush hard
enough that the guy fell down, legs and arms tangled with Rush’s legs. Rush had stopped dead still. The
second guy barely got stopped before running into Rush, and helped the other guy up. They apologized,
and since no harm had come, I visited with them both for a minute before moving along.
That Rush hadn’t blown up, run sideways, or even faltered, was just amazing to those guys. I’m sure
he’d never had two grown men, laughing like maniacs, ever run at him from between two vehicles, but
you’d have thought it happened four times a day, every day. He just wouldn’t falter with those little guys
on him. He was doing his job and no silliness by humans was going to make him mess up.
He’s rock solid. Whatever the job is, he’ll do it without fail. Rope a bull? You bet. Drag a cow into a trailer. He’s the guy. Outrun a bunch of horses? Yep. Sort in a gate. Of course. Plus, he’s broke every time you saddle him, with no funny business. But, his best work, to me, has always been his patient care of my grandkids. I just wish he was young again.
Posted in: Featured, Ranch Life
About Jan Swan Wood
Jan was raised on a ranch in far western South Dakota. She grew up horseback working all descriptions of cattle, plus sheep and horses. After leaving home she pursued a post-graduate study of cowboying and dayworking in Nebraska, New Mexico, Montana, Wyoming and South Dakota....