a horse

May. 31st, 2023 09:49 pm
low_delta: (Default)
My dad was talking about a horse he used to ride. I'm not sure exactly when this was.

It was a 3-year stallion, 16-1/2 hands, that nobody else could ride. He was able to ride it though, but it was tough. He said he learned more than the horse. He had to cross the reins, and he had a leather rod that he'd whack it on the neck when he pulled the reins. It eventually learned to turn when he pulled the reins. It was very spooky, though. It would spook at the slightest things, like birds. Once, a bird flew and spooked it, and it turned abruptly. He had a stirrup in the dirt, but the horse recovered and ran on. It really loved to run at high speed.

It allowed itself to be ridden, but would take any opportunity to remove the rider. It would intentionally go under low tree limbs. Or move along a barbed wire fence. My dad said he'd raise his leg above the fence, and the horse would scratch itself.

He said he almost got killed a couple of times. Once he was going down a slippery hill. It was mud over frozen ground and he felt the hooves slipping. He got off to lead it, but the horse ended up sliding anyway. It slid and pushed him up against a tree trunk. He was able to wriggle free, or he might have been suffocated. Another time he saw a steep hill that other horses had gone up, so he tried it. near the top, he realized the horse was standing only on its hind legs. He threw himself forward against the horse, which pushed it forward so it's front hooves could get hold, and it made it to the top. He said if the horse had fallen, he would have been under it.
low_delta: (kid)
My dad entered an art fair in Virginia Beach in 1970. He loaded all his paintings and a display bin into his Ford Torino, and we drove to the east coast. That is, Dad, Mom and a three-year old, in a two-door car with a car-top carrier. Sounds like mom didn't enjoy the trip a whole lot. While she got to sit on the beach for a week, she had to sit on the beach for a week. With a three-year-old. Dad said he got sun poisoning. Even with an umbrella, the sun reflected off the boardwalk. His lips were all swelled up.

The art fair was one the boardwalk in the city of Virginia Beach. It was a mile long, with artists down both sides. I asked him how he learned of it, and he wasn't sure. Probably from a magazine, he said. He didn't really know what to expect, he just went. He had to carry his entire inventory five blocks every day for five days. He said a storm came in one day. He covered everything and tied it down, and watched other artists chase their paintings down the boardwalk.

He was chosen by the jury for, I don't know what it was called, special recognition. He didn't win a prize, but he was happy to be recognized. Sounds like that was a rather small group.

Being in that area, we were able to do some sightseeing. I remember seeing the Washington monument, and I know we saw some lighthouses. My dad likes to remind me that he carried me up to the top of the tallest one. That was the only time I've ever been in Virginia or Washington DC.

On a tangent... we talked about being able to pack all of that stuff into a car, and he mentioned how well his dad could pack a car. My dad said that at one time, his uncle was going on a trip, and couldn't get everything into his car. So Dad's uncle asked my grandpa to pack it for him. He got everything in, of course, but after the uncle got where he was going and unloaded, he couldn't get everything back in!
low_delta: (kid)
My Aunt Jeanette wrote in Fb:

We lived near Greensburg at the time and we would drive to Liberty to visit and watch TV. There were only 2 TV sets in Liberty then. Uncle Hayes had the 2nd one and his best friend bought the first one in town. The two families lived next to each other. It always looked like half the town was on that block. The TV was small with a round screen. The picture wasn't always clear but we didn't mind. We were watching TV!!! We always stayed late to watch Wrestling. Then we would drive home and Daddy still had to milk his herd of dairy cows. And we got up and went to Sunday School and Church the next morning. Special memories.!!!

QotD

Aug. 16th, 2020 03:44 pm
low_delta: (Default)
"My fifth grade teacher was killed in a car crash. I carried him into the funeral home. I was happy to do it - he was an asshole."

"He wrote in my yearbook, 'always sail low, because if you fall you won't have as far to fall.'"

.

my dad

Jun. 22nd, 2020 07:36 pm
low_delta: (Default)
We visited my dad for Father's Day yesterday. He told a bunch of stories. I've heard most of them, but my sister and her kids were there, and I'm pretty sure the kids hadn't heard them before. One that I don't recall hearing before was that when he was small, five or six years old, his dad would send him into the barn at night, to put straw down for the cows. He'd have only a kerosene lantern for light. The cows were big and scary, and the light from the lantern threw shadows that made them appear even larger in the dim light. Cindy said, "so you were more scared of your dad than you were of the cows?" My thought was of the fire hazard of spreading straw while carrying a lantern.
low_delta: (kid)
Thank you for the
money. I will
spind it for
something. Did you
have a nice Easter
? We did. I must get
to bed. Love Kevin

my dad

Oct. 24th, 2010 01:12 am
low_delta: (Default)
My dad was telling stories of his youth. I had heard about how he got a job on a Montana ranch, and the things he did that summer, and and the trials he went through. Tonight, I heard about his second summer going to the ranch.

He went to the ranch again, but it had rained for 30 days straight, and there was no work. Their veteran ranch hands were out of work, so they couldn't take him on. They said he should try for work out in Washington (he was from Indiana), so he went out there. Unfortunately, Boeing had just laid off a bunch of people, so any available jobs went to them - people with families. He applied for jobs at about 300 places. He finally went to Cincinnati (about 50 miles from home), and was hired at the first place he applied.

What did he say about that ranch... it was so big the north and south parts each had their own air strips. They had about 300 breeding mares, just to keep the ranch in horses.

my Dad

Feb. 1st, 2004 11:30 am
low_delta: (camo)
This is one of my favorite stories of my Dad's.

When he was in High School, he was playing a game called Splits with a friend. He was using his hunting knife, which was not a very large one - maybe a blade of five inches. The way it is played is the two opponents stand with their feet together, about three or four feet apart. One person throws the knife at the ground, and the other person has to move his foot towards the knife. The first person whose feet are so far apart that he can no longer stand, loses. The knife must land no farther from the foot than the length of the knife or it doesn't count - otherwise, you'd just throw it in the bushes and win.

You've already figured out where this is going, right? Sure enough, my dad got the knife in his foot. Through his foot, actually. So he pulled the knife out, and went into the school to find help. The coach was the only person there with any kind of medical knowledge, so...

Where's Coach?
Down there, I think.
Coach? No, he's not here. Try up there.


After not very long, the blood was bubbling out of the hole in the top of his shoe, so there was a bloody trail from one end of the school and back.

He finally found Coach. He told my dad that it was probably clean since it had bled so much, and he put a piece of butterfly tape across the cut.
low_delta: (unsure)
One of my grandma's brothers was killed by a train, when he was in his twenties. A neighbor needed a ride into town to attend a funeral. He was waiting for her, and walking on the railroad tracks. He heard a freight train coming and stepped off of its track, into the path of a fast moving passenger train.

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