We've had a few horses in our time, but none was as dear to my father as a little filly he named Fox because she was quick and clever. She came from a farm near us and was a sweet little thing who adored my father. She was more like a large dog than a horse, and often wandered around the yard free of both corral and tether. But she wasn't above making a fool of my father when the occasion called for it.
This particular day dawned bright and sunny. It was the end of August in 1992, making Fox a grand six months old. She'd always been a playful filly, which is why my father had chosen her when he could have had any foal from the herd. And she was especially playful on this specific afternoon. My sisters and I watched as she tried to engage my father in a game. He was gardening and kept telling her to stop stepping on his corn.
Even a filly as sweet as Fox eventually loses patience. As we three girls sat in the sand pile watching, Fox started to rip the corn out of the garden.
"Fox!" my father snapped. "Don't touch the corn."
The filly looked at him out of the corner of her eye and tugged another stalk out of the dirt, tossing it playfully across the garden.
At this point, my father was more than just a little annoyed. He stood and grabbed a lead rope. It was apparent to us girls that he was going to put her back in the corral. Fox was having none of it. She pranced away, keeping just out of reach. My father followed her relentlessly. My older sister started laughing at Fox's antics. My younger sister and I soon joined her, laughing until we rolled in the sand.
Almost an hour passed as my father tried to catch the headstrong filly. Eventually, he stopped and burst out laughing. The hilarity of the situation couldn't be denied. Fox, hearing his laughter and knowing all was forgiven, cantered up to him, sliding to a stop less than two feet in front of him. My father tossed up his hands in defeat.
As he did so, Fox reared, pawing at the air mere inches from my dad. Her hooves hit the ground and my father frowned. He raised his arms again and again she reared, whinnying as she did so. A few more repetitions and my father was laughing again.
"Vicky, go get the video camera," he called, throwing his arms up once more.
As the eldest, Vicky knew how to use the camera. She went running off and returned minutes later, video camera slung around her neck and our mother in tow. Fox was still rearing every time my father's arms went above his shoulders.
"Catch it on camera, and quickly," my mother laughed.
Vicky obeyed, readying the camera and holding it up. Once she had both Fox and my father in focus, she waved her arm in the air, letting Dad know that she was ready.
My father smiled and raised his arms. Fox just looked at him. Turning to the camera, my dad shrugged. He tried again. This time, Fox nipped at his sweater. He tossed his arms up a third time and Fox nickered in his face.
Our laughter rolled across the field and Vicky almost dropped the camera in her mirth. My father tried to entice Fox into rearing for another few minutes, then gave up. Vicky shut off the camera and handed it to Mom. As soon as she did so, Fox reared. Dad threw up his hands, she reared again.
We turned the camera back on, but Fox just wouldn't rear, not for the camera. As long as the thing was off, she reared each and every time. My father felt a little foolish, but we all had a great time that sunny afternoon.
To this day, we have the video of my father jumping up and down in front of Fox, trying to get her to rear. We play it for the entire family at gatherings, and when we want to remember our darling Fox, who died several years ago, we always get a chance to laugh.
After weeks of articles and facts, I thought I'd change things up a bit with a story about a horse I once knew. Every word of this story happened just as I say it does. I didn't have to invent anything here to make the story entertaining! Justin was entertaining enough for more than one story.
Justin was my older sister's Arabian and her very first horse. She adopted him from a ranch when I was 8 years old. My parents didn't pay much for him since he was aging and the ranch wasn't going to use him on trail rides anymore. He was grey and sweet and the center of my sister's world for many years.
But he was no angel and my mother was usually the one he caused problems for (usually ... but that's a story for another week). One hot summer day Justin, I guess because he was bored, opened the gate to his corral. Now, before you start thinking that my sister or my parents should have secured the gate, they did. They had it padlocked. The boys from next door, lovely neighbors that they were, snuck onto our property and cut off the padlock. We'd later find it in the grass next to the corral. The boys didn't actually open the corral, but removing the lock was more than enough for Justin.
In his equine way, Justin loosened the latch and let himself out. He wandered for a while, as evidenced by the state of the yard and garden behind the main house. He kicked up his heels on the freshly-laid sod, even pulled some of it around the yard by his teeth. This would annoy my father when he returned home, but not as much as what Justin did to the garden. Forget the corn. Justin had eaten it. What he hadn't eaten he'd scattered as he galloped merrily through the garden. The peas (which were my favorite) were trampled. I'd cry about this later (give me a break, I was 8). The radishes were pulverized. Justin never did like radishes.
He never left the yard, but he didn't have to. He had his fun without setting one foot off our property. Besides the damage to the lawn and garden, our play structure no longer had a roof. It originally had a colorful tarp stretched over the tree house section of the structure. Apparently Justin didn't approve of the tarp. He tore it off and ran around with it, eventually depositing it among the straw in the corner of his corral. It had been quite soiled by the time we found it, so my father built us a wooden roof that weekend. Justin also pulled the chain link away from one of the sides of the dog run. Good thing the dogs weren't in there at the time.
We were lucky that Justin hadn't decided to go for a run. We weren't all that far from a busy highway and it was entirely possible that he could have been hit on the road. It would have been a tragedy, but Justin wasn't that stupid. Nope, he stayed close to home, slowly edging his way closer to the house as he ran out of things to do in the back.
He eventually found himself in my mother's flower garden which was right next to the house. She had a lovely garden. Honeysuckle grew at the back and ferns and other greenery graced the entryway. Wisteria covered the trellis and roses bloomed everywhere. At least, until Justin got in there. He rather enjoyed the roses and the honeysuckle. He must have, for he consumed most of them. He wasn't as fond of the ferns and the wisteria, but that didn't mean he left them alone. No, he tore the wisteria off the trellis and scattered the ferns to the four winds. He had a great time.
In fact, he was just tearing the wisteria off the trellis when my mother came outside to hang laundry on the line. She saw him there, standing beneath the trellis, wisteria clutched between his teeth, and dropped the basket of wet laundry. My younger sister and I heard her cry out and rushed outside, wondering what mouse or rat had startled her. No rat. No mouse. But one big horse.
Justin looked back over his shoulder at us and he looked ... guilty as sin. There's no other way to describe the look on his face. He stared straight at my mother the same way my little sister used to when she got caught sneaking cookies. Except this was a horse, just over 15 hands high, with a head as long as my mother's torso.
He might not have been a child, but he certainly acted like one as my mother's face turned red. She stared right at him at uttered one word, barely able to speak.
"Barn."
Justin gazed at her mournfully, as if insulted that she'd interrupted his fun. But he dutifully headed in the direction of the barn (I had originally typed 'bar' there, which probably would have been way more fun for Justin. It's almost too bad that I caught that typo.)
"No," my mother snapped. Justin stopped in his tracks. "Let. Go. Of. My. Plant." You could tell just from her tone and they way the syllables fell from her lips that each word was its own sentence.
Staring at her as if she was the rudest human in the world, Justin let go. You never could say that Justin was stupid. He knew what she meant. The wisteria snapped back into place, rather the worse for wear. And with a flick of his tail and a kick of his heels, Justin strode into the barn without another glance at my mother.
She followed him. And my younger sister and I, curious to the last, snuck up and hid behind the barn door so we were just out of sight. What followed was nothing less than a lecture. And to a horse!
"Did you eat my flowers?" As if she didn't already know the answer.
A nicker. And, according to my mother, a nodding of Justin's great head.
"Who told you you could go into my flower garden?" No one actually gave Justin permission to do anything.
A whinny. I think my little sister giggled, but if she did, she muffled it quickly.
"Keep your horsey ass," I gasped in shock here as I'd never heard my mother use profanity, "out of my flower garden." My mother slammed the door to his stall with a thump and dropped the latch into place. "And stay put."
As my mother stormed out of the barn to collect her laundry, my sister and I ducked behind a rain barrel. By this point, we were both trying not to laugh. But we sobered quickly on seeing the damage behind the house. Our father would no be pleased.
When my older sister returned from school that evening, she had an even longer lecture than Justin had received. Of course, this was before anyone had found the cut lock near the corral. But none of the damage was all that bad and everything went back to normal.
At least until the next time Justin decided to get up to more mischief ...
