A horse by any other name

December 18, 2020 William A. Gralnick

Gallop gets help from volunteers to walk with the horses as they provide lessons to people with disabilities. Eagle photo by Paul Frangiane

A horse is led through Prospect Park. Eagle photo by Paul Frangiane

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In the ’50’s (and before) cowboys were king. But their co-co-stars were in many cases their equal. Remember Trigger and Buttermilk? How about Silver and Diablo? Champion? Comanche? And don’t forget Tonto’s Scout. These were the famous steads that bore their famous riders, did tricks, came when whistled for, were sometimes listed as co-stars to their riders, and were always under the right overhang as their boss flew out the second story window needing a saddle to land in and quick get-a-way.

Indelible was the impression left by Silver rising up on his hind legs and pawing at the sky with his front ones as the Lone Ranger shouted, “Hi Ho Silver Awaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!” What could be more thrilling than seeing the manes of these horses fly in the wind during either a chase to catch or escape from bandits?

We watched with satisfaction as a horse bone dry from a long run in the desert, would be led to the water trough in town or as they calmly bent their hoof back onto the blacksmith’s lap as he repaired a cracked or lost shoe. We sighed with a settled calm as these great players repaired to their stalls and scarfed down their oats before retiring for the night.

These were happy horse memories. I had a few that weren’t so happy. I got kicked in the thigh by a quarter horse that I was trying to untangle from the line he was trapped in. I went, as they say, ass over tea kettle, and was astounded at the distance I covered before I hit the ground. For almost two weeks I had such a bad charley horse (no pun intended) that I walked around like Chester, unable to bend my right leg at all. More astounding was the black and blue mark that covered my entire thigh muscle. It was a masterpiece: black, blue, yellow inside the blue, red inside the yellow and a such a precise rendering of a horseshoe in the middle of it all that it could have been signed and sold at auction.

One day my brother took me riding out at Grave’s End. I was “eaten alive,” bitten multiple times by every blood sucking insect in the borough. Come to think of it I never saw Roy or Dale swat at a bug.But riding out there when there was little else out there was a treat now hard to find in our urbanized borough.

The worst memory however, was of a pony named Johnny. Gotcha! I’d go to the school yard and watch. For some reason Johnny on the Pony was played mostly in the late afternoon. One or two guys, usually the size of Trigger or Silver, would walk up to the wall of the school and bend over, head touching the wall. The “horse” would brace himself and then it began. Guys lined up, ran towards the horse, and jumped on his back. There was a bit of strategy. Sometimes the first guy in was the biggest or heaviest. He’d sprint towards his target and then take a flying leap like a cowboy hero leaping into the saddle at a dead run. The object was of course to smash “the horse” into the concrete. The other way was for Tony Two-Ton to wait ‘til the end and be the straw (oak tree?) that broke the horse’s back.

I would watch in awe. Sometimes the horse would brush off with some trashtalk whomever landed on his back. Sometimes he’d waver, sway, give a little, all with the appropriate groans and curses. But he held fast. Sometimes the pile would collapse after one or two jumpers but sometimes…piled high would be the description. Five, six, seven guys would pile up before an awful groan of effort signaled the collapse of the empire.

In my early teens I weighed between 110 and 130 libs. If I stood sideways, you’d be hard pressed to see me. Yet I wondered…Could I? Would I? Should I? Would the guys laugh me outta the school yard? These questions persisted for months on end. Sometimes a kid has “the right stuff.” Sometimes he’s tested for it. My test came on a chilly autumn day when fewer than usual players were around and someone spied me spying on the organizing of the game. That someone thought it would be a great laugh if I would be the horse. I wasn’t for this brainstorm, but they encouraged me. They encouraged me by grabbing me by the arms and dragging me to the wall. It was at this point I began to hope the wall would come with a firing squad. It didn’t. I bent over to find I was stronger than I, or they thought. Came the first. Plop! I was still there. Came the second and the third. I was straining with all my might, but I held on. Their strategy was to save the blast for last. Like Big Albert this guy came rumbling toward the pile. “Hey, hey heeeeyy!” How he got off the ground I don’t know. What I do know was I wasn’t that strong. He landed on the pile like someone had dropped a dead body from a hovering helicopter. I didn’t even waver. I went straight down with lord knows how pounds of humans coming down on top of me.

As I recall it was days before I stood up straight. I didn’t even bother to try and explain why to my mother. And today? I have back problems.

As Forest reminds us, “You can’t fix stupid.”