Horseplay

I was seven or eight I guess, when the neighbor kid picked me up and tossed me into their stock tank.  I came up out of the water spewing and covered with slimy moss and what seemed to be cow slobber. 

Traumatic event?  My little psyche bent forever?  Not a chance.  This was horseplay, orneriness, stuff that boys did on hot summer days whether one was the victim or the perp.  But I wish I knew at the time that satisfaction would come a few weeks later with the help of a horse. 

She was a gentle old mare who let us ride her bareback.  So when I saw him coming out to the pasture with a long length of rope and a wheat shovel I was puzzled at first.  He tied one end of the rope to the shovel handle and looped the other around her neck.  “We’ll take turns,” he said. 

She didn’t like the rope.  I’d never seen her so skittish.  He laid the rope out on the ground, squatted down in the wheat shovel, whipped the rope hard and she took off. 

Horse going at full gallop… Kid hanging on for dear life whooping and hollering… probably didn’t notice right away that she was heading for the pond. 

I’ll never figure out why he didn’t bail out.  She went around the edge of the pond and the long rope took him right through the water.  I still remember his head just above the surface, moving through like the periscope on a submarine.  When he came out the far side, she stopped. 

It took him a while to gather up the rope and the shovel and make his way back to where I was standing.  We didn’t exchange a single word all the way back to the barn, but while he was hanging the rope up, I couldn’t hold it in anymore and burst out laughing.  I just howled with delight. 

He chased me halfway home before giving up.  I learned there that I could run faster scared than he could in a rage and trying to hold up his soggy trousers at the same time. 

Catch me God when I run to my distracted life.  I want to be immersed in your cosmic love.