Arabians and Quarter Horses
Creating Passionate Users. We all have passion double-standards. Mine makes sense, yours doesn't. The time and money I spend on my passion is worth it, yours is a waste.
We meet some cowboys from Los Lunas on the rocky trail up to Beatty’s Cabin. They are decked out in full Old-West regalia—thousands of dollars of chinks, spurs, boots, scarves, gauntlets, old-time cowboy hats, 1800’s-style saddles. And I find myself admiring their gear, getting ready for a little on-the-trail conversation, thinking maybe I’ll even ask where they got those really nice saddles, until they start eyeballing my husband’s fine-boned Polish Arabian mare from astride their big buff quarter horses. As if Dennis is riding a goat or something.
I think I sense a smirk sneaking across their collective handlebar-mustached faces, as one of them spits a wad of Skoal into the dirt and drawls while pointing at Morningstar, “What kind of horse is that?”
Now some of my friends and extended family don’t understand why in the world I choose to spend the bulk of my spare time and cash on five (dirty, stinky, and dangerous is the part they usually manage to keep to themselves) horses. Fair enough. Their eyeballs glaze over when I start talking about my equines. Which is one of the reasons, I suppose, I have my very own horse blog. The big Sundowner trailer in my driveway boggles the brains of some colleagues who are golf zealots. I encourage them—Go hit those little balls with those little sticks, and drive your little golf cart! Have yourself a real bang-up spiritual experience! The Harley-Davidson rally rider might even diss my Percheron. (Althought that would be venturing into very dangerous territory.) I might retort, if I’m not in a particularly pleasant mood—Well, what kind of skill exactly does it take to sit on a dumb machine? And the fact that Dennis drove straight through to northwestern Utah last night (Matilda-the-tenacious-heeler and I slept very well, by the way) to pick up a Kubota tractor to clean up after our horse habit would probably have some city-dwellers scratching their heads.
OK. OK, all of those I can, to one degree or another, understand.
But here’s one I don’t—
The My Horse Breed is Awesome and Your Horse Breed is Lame thing.
Sure, it’s great to be passionate about a breed of horse. I just happen to be all over the map with an Arabian, Andalusian, Appaloosa, Percheron AND a Quarter Horse in the barn. I love them all! Some of us have stables filled with only Thoroughbreds (I had a beautiful one of those once) or Missouri Fox Trotters. And of course some breeds are just better at one thing or another. That’s fine. Speaking of zeal, I’m currently contemplating a big barn brimming with only jet-black Percherons. (But don’t tell my husband that. He may not return from Utah.) However, you won't find me saying anything disparaging about your Paso Fino, Belgian, or Trakhener. Go ahead, call me too sensitive, but the encounter with those rude goat ropers on the way up to Beatty’s Cabin left a sour taste in my mouth.
Not Dennis’s, however. The ever-cool-and-self-assured husband simply pats his hot-blooded critter’s shoulder after the encounter with the John Wayne wannabes with their dimestore True Grit aspirations. As Morningstar treks tirelessly higher and higher, navigating the wild and rough terrain with all the aplomb of the Queen of Sheba, I hear him tell the little horse, “We know who The Real Mountain Horse is, now don’t we, Starrreeeeennnnnnna?”
The arabian horse's brown doe eyes seem to widen in agreement.
Flickr photos by: bea2108
