Hang on, cause this is gonna be a long one...

There's something about having your ass handed to you - or at least being knocked off your pedestal...especially by someone you don't have a lot of respect for. Probably why it stings that much more.

And the funny thing is...to just sit there, listen and take it. I can take criticism, constructive and otherwise. I give the visual cues - I get it. But this feels different. Maybe because I care so little about the outcome of this work...

and there in lies the problem.

Last night - while fighting my recurring insomnia - I was watching Eastwood in Hang 'em High and wishing I was back on a horse. I began "serious" horseback riding and training at 8 (or 9) on a Paint horse called "Patches." Patches didn't like me much, but I don't think he liked anyone much. He was older and was not enthused about going through the paces of horse training with a greenhorn like me.

During a particularly difficult training day – Patches was fighting a roping exercise. My trainer had come in, trying to give me some direction and made a move for his belt…silly, silly man. Patches responded by going up on his hind legs and kicking with his front. I fell off, had my wind knocked out of me and landed head first 3 inches from a metal pole. Oh course, he was probably more scared than I was…

I got back on Patches…dazed and determined and finished the day. Later that week, I rode barrels and did respectable…but far from first. If I remember right, that was “Rockdale Fair” week – I did even worse in the BMX race. Wrecked out on the 3rd turn with 6 other kids and we all got into a fight. My nannie (grandmother) has a picture of me, close to the front, with the dust flying. If I ever figure out how to post pictures on this site...that will be the first.