A couple of months ago I bought a really nice horse. He’s just seven years old and they’ve roped on him quite a bit. He hasn’t been hauled to many ropings, but he can run a hole in the wind and stop like a bad check at a banker convention.
It wasn’t long after we brought him home that he sprained a front foot. So, we laid off him and gave him a good chance to heal up. We doctored his leg and fed him really good, he gained some weight and looked as good as any Breyer horse model that’s ever been made.
I decided he needed to be rode and eased back into shape. So I began riding him after the kids roped. I just walked him around a bit after they roped. After about four evenings of walking I began trotting him and loping him a little. I was worried his sprain might not be healed up. He was doing fine and not acting sore at all.
One evening I saddled him in a hurry and tied him to the arena fence. I don’t use a breast collar on my calf horses, I’ve always wanted the saddle to kind of move to where it goes. I think people tend to saddle horses with the saddle up on their shoulder blades, this really gets a calf horse to dreading the calf hitting the end of the rope.
So anyway, when the kids are done roping I go over and cinch him up pretty tight. I noticed the back cinch was just a hare too far back, but I was in a hurry and I stepped up on him.
We went about sixty feet down the arena and this horse explodes. He starts bucking, I mean he’s putting on an NFR eliminator pen performance the first two jumps. I decide this ain’t for me and I try stepping off the left side. This danged horse launches me like a rocket. I don’t just float up and then come down gently. No way, I mean he flings me off like what happens when a deer gets hit by a semi on the interstate. I hit the ground with velocity, I immediately hurt in my legs, back and head.
The wife wanted to call the ambulance, my son was petrified and I wasn’t sure how bad I was hurt. It’s the only time my vision went black like I was looking down into a tunnel. I laid in the arena dirt for a good bit.
Finally, I was able to be sat up in a chair. My wife brought the side by side out in the arena. It took awhile but I was finally able to get in. She was adamant I needed to go to the emergency room and get checked out.
So, I gave in and went to the ER. I was worried I’d broke my pelvis or my lower back. It didn’t take them long and I was CAT scanned from head to toe. The doctor came in after the results came back and he said, you’re one heck of a tough guy. Nothings broke, but you’ve got to be sore after being walloped like that. Most people don’t walk away after getting dumped the way you did.”
He asked me what went though my mind after I hit the dirt. I told him the first thought I had was that danged horse don’t know how bad he just screwed up. The doctor walked away laughing his head off. I heard him tell someone, “only a cowboy gets walloped and then wants back on.” I thought to myself, that’s just normal in my line of work…..
James Lockhart lives near the Kiamichi mountains in southeast Oklahoma. He writes cowboy stories and fools with cows and horses.