Riding Barranca

by Laura Chester

  We continue down Pettit Road to the old Buchanan driveway. The woods here are dense, and the deerflies nest in Booker’s mane, annoying him. They even bite my thighs, but I want to find that lovely riding trail that goes down to the lakefront and around the point.

  In the fall, the oak leaves here are a dazzling yellow against the autumnal blue. I find the hidden path and ride down to the lapping shore, still reluctant to canter, but I do get into a nice spongy jog. I don’t want Booker taking off with me so I keep him in check, but it is tiring holding him back.

  Heading home, as soon as we leave the Buchanan’s driveway and turn onto Pettit Road, a car goes racing by—too fast—unnerving! I’m glad it didn’t come up behind me just moments before and feel relieved to get back to the stable without a major incident.

  Gramma and Clovis

  The next day the funeral is held in a beautiful wooden chapel at the Nashotah Mission. Cia speaks about Mom’s Catholic/Jewish heritage, Ayler plays “Hallelujah” on guitar, and then Clovis, Gramma’s oldest grandchild, reads some amusing anecdotes from his laptop. But what I remember best is what Abigail wrote about Gramma’s last few days.

  When we brought Gramma back home, she lay facing the lake, her room filled with flowers. We would take turns sitting with her even when she slept, so that she was never alone. She recognized faces still, and would light up any time we would come in…“Oh, Abigail!” I remember her saying.

  One day, my giant Great Dane mix snuck into the room after me and stuck his big, wet nose in her face. I thought she might be alarmed and would shoo him away, but instead she laughed and gave his big, dark head a hug. “Oh my, but who are YOU?!”

  We spent those last days singing to her and reading to her and crying with her as she began to understand she was dying. It was an amazing thing to be able to grieve with her, tell her stories, paint her fingernails, and just sit by her side. I’m glad she was able to be at home. It felt like an appropriately dignified departure for Gramma. She got to go, watching the familiar light on Oconomowoc Lake, surrounded by people that loved her.

  MASSACHUSETTS

  Betsy and Laura

  Heat Wave

  Betsy and I amble up the ridge looking for a breeze. The morning warmth is comfortable, like loose swaddling on the skin, but we know in a couple of hours it will almost be inhumane to remain on horseback. Heat and flies coupled with high humidity is hard on the horses. Even now, they climb, and stop, and huff and puff.

  I wonder what it must be like to be completely covered in fur. How does the cool water feel on their legs and backs after a ride? I spray them down and scrape them off as Betsy mucks. Barranca whips me once with his tail and it stings my face. Does he think I’m another bug?

  The horses stay in their stalls all day to escape the heat and flies. Their urine makes the sawdust rank. That evening I run the horses down to the lower field in my golf cart—the lazy way of moving my herd. With Barranca and Peanut on lead ropes, trotting along beside me in the dusk light, the air is fragrant with honey-sweet hedgerows. Rocket barrels down the slope with his white mane flying and they fall into the pasture together, but there are still swarms of flies awaiting them. They run to take cover in the shed with its hanging burlap that shields them from these pests. Why is it so easy to fool a fly?

  Between Trees

  Love at First Sight

  I think about the abuse so many people inflict on poor, innocent animals, and how much affection I get from my horses and dogs. In choosing my animals, I have relied on instinct rather than rational pros and cons.

  I remember when I first saw Barranca in Scottsdale and how it was love at first sight. Sometimes, while riding, I swear he knows what I’m thinking without my giving him any commands. One day, going down the Alford Road toward our driveway, where we always turned to go back up to the barn, I had another thought—I wanted to ride past and go up a forest trail. I would have expected him to take the turn at the drive, but without my doing anything, he just continued going in the direction I had in mind. This would not have been so remarkable, except for every other time we had always turned in at the driveway.

  I fell in love with Peanut over the Internet. When I lost Nashotah, my Selle Français, I imagined a young Tennessee Walker gelding, a caramel-and-cream-colored pinto. I didn’t even know if such a thing existed, but then there he was at a small breeding barn in Texas. He remained with his mother until he was weaned. Then, at six months old, he was shipped back to Massachusetts. People along the way fell in love with his amber eyes. He was a household pet for a couple of years before he was fully ground-trained. Then he became a docile and excellent ride.

  I also had a similar attraction to Tonka Waken at Big Sky Fox Trotters in Scottsdale. Was it just his long Indian-pony forelock and his stud-proud neck, his pale palomino coloring and perfect conformation? I only rode Tonka for half-an-hour before I decided that he had to come back to Patagonia with me. Am I a polygamist when it comes to horses? I’d be happy with Barranca as my only horse, but a solitary equine is rarely happy.

  While riding, memories so often surface and percolate. I wonder where these odd thoughts come from, similar to the musings of a twilight reverie, arriving like unexpected house-guests. Images arise oblivious to order, and family members appear as if to remind us that they will inhabit us forever.

  I remember Popi yelling down the hallway—“Who stole my scissors?” His large, warm hands and wide, flat fingernails.

  I remember Mom knitting me a dark blue sweater. There were many mistakes, but I was quite pleased with it.

  I remember him insisting on everyone ordering soup when he took us out to dinner.

  I remember her beautiful skin, the thick white cream she put on her face before bed every evening. I wondered if it got on her pillow.

  I remember Popi slapping my thigh when we would take off in the car. He’d raise his voice and say, “We’re OFF.”

  I remember the look of glee when Popi and Clovis released a bunch of piglets from the back of his Buick into the middle of a party down by the lake.

  I remember her thinking that the subject of horses was “totally boring.”

  I remember him teasing, “Who’s your favorite uncle?!” as he threatened to push a cousin into the lake.

  I remember Mom painting our names in the changing room, using her coral-pink fingernail polish.

  I remember coming into Broadoaks one morning, asking, “Where is Popi?” He was standing outside with three of his granddaughters, Abigail, Isabelle, and Daphne. There was a little black bat on the side of a tree, and they were trying to feed it bacon.

  I remember her helping me organize “sprinkler parties” for the neighborhood kids. Coming from the South, she let us drink Coke.

  I remember her saying, “Modulate,” when she wanted us to lower our voices.

  I remember his cutting our toenails, having us line up for “Dr. Chester.”

  I remember her loving to rhyme—“We don’t smoke and we don’t chew and we don’t go with the boys who do.”

  I remember him stopping at the “camel tree” on Buchanan Drive. The tree had a curved trunk and saddle bump, and he would let us play there for as long as we liked.

  I remember him feeding the Lipizzans sugar when the sign said clearly not to.

  I remember her sitting on the martini boat reading religious tomes, claiming she was now a Born Again Christian. That didn’t last.

  I remember her napping with all the shades drawn, and how it revived her.

  I remember him letting me steer the car when I was too small to reach the pedals.

  I remember how she cried when she dropped me off at college. I was surprised by her emotion.

  I remember him running in the dark, down the long white pier, diving into Oconomowoc Lake with a tremendous splash.

  I remember her telling us to be home when the streetlights came on.

  I remember him waking me early to see the herons at Horicon Marsh. The best part of the
trip was when the leader, Mrs. Oehlenschlaeger, gave me a miniature wooden chest-of-drawers.

  I remember her organizing a birthday party for herself and all of the guests were men.

  I remember her favoring my baby brother, David. He got to ride in a flimsy car seat with a plastic steering wheel.

  I remember Popi pretending to be out of gas, pumping the pedal, when he was taking a friend of mine home from the movies, telling Mary Allis, “You’ll have to walk the rest of the way.” I knew he was teasing, but she did not.

  I remember her cupboard of long, narrow shoes, how she hid her breasts if I surprised her in the bathtub.

  I remember him honking in the tunnel before the Pig n’ Whistle, because it made a nice echoing sound, and we encouraged him to do it—Honk, HONK!

  I remember her sitting on the green vinyl chaise on the screened-in porch, paging through endless magazines, waiting for my father to come home.

  I remember her taking us to the Okauchee Station where Popi would arrive by train, and we’d put pennies on the tracks to flatten them.

  I remember him stopping at Kit’s Custard when we drove out to the country on Highway 16. I always got a vanilla cone—my older brother told me that was not a real flavor.

  I remember the Magic Marker drawings on his emaciated chest, left there after radiation treatment.

  I remember her choking, repeatedly, getting the Heimlich maneuver, asserting, “I have a very small opening, Laura.”

  I remember him walking down the Grand Canyon when Clovis and Ayler and I rode mules. He weighed too much to ride. When he finally made it to Phantom Ranch at the bottom, he was wobbly from dehydration.

  I remember Mom taking me into the cabin bathroom at Pike’s Peak to show me a twelve-inch-long brown log in the toilet bowl. I was impressed.

  I remember him wiping the horses down with bug repellent, sponging them with warm water after a ride. He took such pleasure in it.

  I remember the picture of a naked girl on a horse he had hanging in the tack room. To see the nude, you had to flip the decent, dressed version around. Mom got rid of that, along with others of glamorous men nestling their wind-tossed Arabians.

  I remember his watch going off in church and him letting it buzz for a very long time. If he sang, he sang extra loud just to attract attention. He would rather have been out riding.

  I remember him saying that Mom had the most beautiful shoulders and that I had the Chester legs. Well, thanks.

  I remember her taking me shopping for clothes, picking out a brown print dress, which I loved.

  I remember him coming up the Carriage House steps, the bang of the baby gate, walking down the hall, clapping his hands together when he had a scoop to deliver, his hope for a good, strong cup of coffee.

  I remember the first llama he gave to my brother as a wedding present. It was incredibly soft, and we fed him from a bottle. The llama imprinted on humans and started knocking people down as llamas mate in the prone position.

  I remember her obsession for tennis and how she repeatedly told me, “You’d be so good if you only played,” even though we were already playing.

  I remember him hitting a ball so hard when I was standing at the net that it struck me in the forehead, and I was shy on the court ever after.

  I remember him riding in laced-up hiking boots with his feet dangerously deep in the stirrups, the cuffs to his blue jeans turned up high.

  I remember her knowledge of English antiques, and how proud she was of her store, though most of Milwaukee preferred reproductions.

  I remember him purchasing junk just to be buying something. “Supporting the economy,” was his excuse.

  I remember her large, pop-bead pearls, and her pink-and-green mumu. She looked very comfortable in it.

  I remember him in his red-and-blue striped sweater. He wore it for over a decade. After he died, I put it in the washer, thinking it was cotton, and it shrank.

  I remember her grinding up a huge array of pills with a mortar and pestle and eating the powder from a plastic container of apple sauce.

  I remember seeing the video of her singing “Happy Birthday” to herself a few days before her passing.

  I remember him saying, “Good morning pigeons.”

  I remember him almost blissful in death, very peaceful, a very graceful parting. It looked so easy. He made everything look easy.

  I wonder what they would remember and what I have chosen to forget.

  Close Together

  Burst of Energy

  I’m in a cleaning mood today and tackle the tack room, taking out the old coil rug and pug doormat, shaking them out, sweeping into all the corners, rearranging the baskets and buckets of horse medication, tossing out junk—all superfluous items—filling the water buckets after giving them a good scrub, doing some deep mucking (careful to bend my knees), tossing a layer of nice fresh shavings into the stalls, putting out fresh hay and sweeping up. It feels good to have everything so neat and tidy. But why can’t it stay that way?

  Bali and Cello

  New Trail

  It is a morning to hold your breath—that perfect—clear blue skies and radiant sun through cool, bug-free air. It is so good, so blissfully vibrant it is almost heart-breaking, like new love, when it hurts because it’s so terribly fleeting.

  Always thrilled to find a new place to ride, this morning Elizabeth and I follow an offshoot from the Mountain Road Trail. Taking a right uphill, we ride for miles through pure Berkshire forest. Oddly, apples are already falling from the trees, and the horses know it. Goldenrod is up, everything coming early this year. I hope that means an early winter and that I will get to ride in the snow before returning to Patagonia.

  We follow the trail as it begins to descend, eating blackberries as we go, plucking the dark ripe fruit from thorny vines. Suddenly, there is an opening, and we have a glorious lookout over the Alford Valley. I assume that we will end up on West Road, but as we continue, almost down to the valley floor, the trail bends to the right and begins to mount again.

  We hear the hoot of an owl deep in the woods, and it sounds so lonely, haunting.

  Both dogs are with us today, and it is turning into a very long ride. I wonder if this is too much for ten-year-old dogs. Marcello is slightly pigeon-toed so it can be more difficult for him to keep up. Bali is my athlete.

  “You’re lucky your dogs don’t go racing after squirrels,” Elizabeth says. “They’re being awfully good.”

  “Do you hear that, boys? You’re being awfully good!”

  But then, as we head up a smaller path that will loop us back to the beginning, I realize that Marcello isn’t following us. He is nowhere to be seen. Maybe, he took a shortcut back to the trailer. We turn and try to find him, but then in the thick of the forest I hear a pack of coyotes howling over a kill. I am horrified. Have they attacked Marcello? I call out for him, over and over, but no response.

  We head back to the gravel road that will take us down to the trailer, and there is Marcello standing with a group of people and two stopped cars. They chew me out for letting my dog run loose out on the road, but I am so happy to see him, I only say, “Where in the world did you go?”

  Riding with Betsy Spears

  Riding the Same Loop Backward

  Barranca is showing signs of the slobbers, and Betsy is appalled. “I’ve never seen anything like this,” she says, as he drools some more. “Do you think it’s safe to ride him?”

  The slobbers can dehydrate a horse—that is the main risk. It is often a reaction to a fungus that is found on clover. I am suspicious of the new hay we just received, but it could also be something in our own fields. Slobber!

  I think he will be fine, as long as he has plenty of fresh water to drink along the way, and the trail we’ll take has a rushing stream coming off the mountain.

  Betsy has to get to a doctor’s appointment by one o’clock so she follows me over to the trailhead in her own car while I drive the truck. We are going to take this ne
w path in reverse to see which direction we prefer. As we get on our way, Betsy points out sprays of tiny purple-black elderberries, and we talk about making jam.

  As we continue climbing up the trail, Barranca throws a shoe. I hear the telltale clink of metal and hop off to collect it, yup, his right front shoe. I check my cell phone to see if there is any reception up here, and I am able to contact Kacy, who calls Keith, my farrier. He can come over later this afternoon. What service.

  Back at the trailer, I take everything out of my saddle pack— unlock the truck and load the horses. Betsy takes off in her car, and suddenly I cannot find my keys. I do not see them anywhere. Will I have to ride Barranca home leading Peanut all the way? And what about the dogs on the road? People drive so fast and don’t slow down for animals. I begin to panic, climbing back in with the horses to check the saddle pack— empty. I dump out the contents of my purse—nothing. Then check all around both seats, front and back and under, until… something clicks—my keys are there in the door to the truck.

  Emily Rose

  Fallen Timber

  I take my mother-in-law Em a glass of lavender lemonade. She is sitting in her library asleep, but she awakes at my arrival and takes a sip of the drink. Immediately she makes a sour face—not for her. So I drink the rest of it down, yum, and remind her that her birthday is right around the corner—only ten days away. On the fifteenth of August she will be one-hundred-and-one years old, and we will have a big family potluck in her honor.

  I have already ordered her white orchids with little butterfly -shaped blooms, but this afternoon I pick her a bunch of pinks and yellows and blues from the garden. When I present the bouquet, she says softly, “I will enjoy this forever.”