HI! HO! SILVER

It was March, 2006, and after leaving Montevideo City, I went to a ranch in Uruguay to experience—“Gaucho Life.” After helping shear a sheep, I enjoyed a traditional barbecue along with several glasses of wine that just kept coming and coming. I thought my adventure was over until two friends challenged me to go horseback riding. I hadn’t been on a horse since I was a very little girl (and I think that was a pony) but thought, “Maybe it’s like riding a bicycle. It will all come back to me,” but first I had to sign a release; “Horse riding at your own risk.” How hard could it be?

I climbed to the top of a wooden platform, and looked into the wild eyes of a very, very big horse who snorted at me when I mounted him—with the help of two Gauchos—one to hold the horse and one to flip me onto the horse’s back. It was then that I discovered two things: The thick saddle was made of sheep’s wool (probably revenge from the sheep I had just sheared) and the cinch was loose.

Before I could reveal my predicament, the Gaucho stepped back and slapped my horse on his rump.  At that, I shouted, “No Rapido!” Obviously, the cowboy hadn’t heard the “No” part and a whip snapped over my head.  I think he was aiming for the horse and not me, but at that I also realized that the horse didn’t speak English, because, when I shouted “Whoa,” he put his ears back and the race began.  I clung on for dear life as I swayed back and forth mounted on the thick, very loose saddle.  I was afraid I’d slip under the horse and end up looking at his belly. At that I shouted, “Remember what happened to Trigger!”  It didn’t help.

Finally, recognizing my plight the Gaucho rode up beside me, grabbed ahold of the reins, slowed down the horse and led us back to the platform— where I didn’t fall off but dismounted not to gracefully. The horse snorted in Spanish, “She’s got no horse sense.”

As William Shakespeare would have said, “May not an ass know when the cart draws the horse? That’s what the Fool said in KING LEAR. It means that a person does not have to be intelligent to understand basic facts such as: Don’t get on a Spanish speaking horse who wears a thick, loose saddle, and when you mount—stay mounted!

W.C Fields said, “Horse sense is the thing a horse has which keeps it from betting on people.”One day, my friend Lynn asked me, “Does a cart come before the horse or the horse before the cart?” Well, putting the cart before the horse is confusing, and it means you are doing things in the wrong order, and things can get out of hand.  Something like, “Your barn door is open.” In other words, zip up your pants before the horses get out.

Sometimes you can tell the age of a woman by how many botox shots she’s had in her forehead. Age in a horse comes straight from the horse’s mouth. You can tell if he is “long in the tooth.” As a horse gets older his teeth get longer. So, at Christmas gift time, you should never “look a gift horse in the mouth,” because you will seem very ungrateful when someone has given you a recycled gift you’ve given her last Christmas.

Some people have “horse sense,” and are smart and practical.  However, I have it “straight from the horse’s mouth,” that as we approach 2022, it’s a good idea to “hold your horses,” slow down, and sit tall in a saddle that fits. Be sure the cinch is tight, and ride as steadily and hopefully as possible into the New Year.

Esther Blumenfeld