Chapter 1: When We Were Young

I think I was six years old when I first met Myrna, perhaps I was seven, but I couldn’t have been much older, and I think Myrna was a year younger than I was, but I’m not even sure of that. I do know that I was already going to a one room country school while she hadn’t started yet. Her family was new to the neighbourhood, having bought the farm just down the hill from ours, so since they were new neighbours, my folks had invited them over for coffee and a chat.

Because we were both young and didn’t have a lot of patience, Myrna and I got sent outside to play, just to get us out of the grownup’s hair. Like all kids, we were shy of each other at first, then I suppose I did something to show off since she was so pretty and I imagine I wanted to impress her. It was probably something silly like doing a somersault or trying to stand on my head, some dumb stunt or other. It doesn’t matter, what does matter is that it broke the ice so before very long we became friends.

About that time I recall my cat having a batch of kittens and I remember the day I gave her one. She wanted to take it home with her right then, but my father took the time to explain to her that it was just a baby, and that it had to stay with its mother until it was weaned. He did say that she could come and see it any time though and I remember that she embarrassed me something fierce that day. Before she and her folks went home, she threw her arms around my neck and kissed me, which made my big sister giggle like mad.

That kiss may have embarrassed me, but it didn’t stop me from liking her. We were best friends from that day on and since we lived so close, we used to see a lot of each other. It started because she wanted to see that kitten every day, so she’d come over as soon as I was home from school. Then after the kitten was old enough and she had it at home, she used to walk over to play with me or I’d walk over to her house to play with her.

Another big happening in our lives developed when my family got an old quiet horse for me to ride to the country school when I started second grade. Before that I’d been riding behind my sister on her horse. Shorty, my ‘new’ horse, was old, but he’d been trained extremely well. He could be ridden bareback, with a saddle, or he would even pull a cart.

Of course the very first thing I did after he was unloaded from the horse trader’s truck was to hop onto his back and ride down the hill to show Myrna. It’s a good thing that horse was old and patient, because inside of seconds she was climbing up behind me and we were riding double. Almost instantly we were a laughing screaming pair of hellions, bent on having fun.

Since we rode that old horse without a saddle, if we got too carried away, we fell off. We got bumps and bruises and scrapes, but it didn’t matter. That old horse gave us an independence that children nowadays don’t really get until they have a car, yet in those days of innocence, our families trusted us as long as we were together. I’m not sure they should have, but they did, and their trust led to our lives developing the way they did.

Of course as time passed, things changed. Myrna started school and since she insisted on riding to school behind me on old Shorty, I got teased by the older boys about my girlfriend. I started to get upset, but Myrna quickly managed to defuse my anger.

She took my hand firmly in hers, looked the biggest of the bullies in the eye and said, “So what? Are you jealous?”

That probably only had an effect because it shocked him, but the fact that she was so pretty might have counted as well, since it probably meant that he really was jealous. Of course we still got ribbed and teased, but somehow I managed to keep my temper, at least most of the time. If I started to get riled, Myrna soon calmed me down and I learned to sluff it off, then even to turn their teases back on the bullies. As a result, in a very short time everyone accepted that we were just extremely close friends.

By the time I was ten, we’d found a private swimming hole in a local creek, and of course on hot days, it was just much too much temptation to resist. At first we tried keeping our underpants on when we swam, but after trying to ride home in wet underclothes a time or two, we found that wearing wet underwear while riding bareback on a horse wasn’t such a good idea. The solution was simple. We took off our underpants and went skinny dipping.

Now don’t get any ideas that at ten years old we were having sex, we weren’t, but we certainly knew what each other’s bodies looked like. It’s funny, but when we were naked, we never touched each other. I remember I thought she was the prettiest thing I had ever seen, but somehow I felt if I touched her body that our friendship would be ruined. I suppose she knew that if she touched me, I’d have an unspoken permission to touch her in return. So for a few years, we found ourselves looking, but not touching each other when we were naked.

We made up for that when we had clothes on though. Sometimes we’d hug or cuddle, but at other times we’d tussle and roughhouse with each other.

I think we were in our early teens, and we were wrestling in fun, when I accidentally touched her on the chest harder than I’d meant to and she screamed in pain. I’d felt a hard little lump under my hand and I knew it was her developing breast. I felt terrible because I’d hurt her and made her cry, but I didn’t know what to do.

Since I was a healthy active teenager, I developed an erection at the drop of a hat, and because I knew what I’d unintentionally done was somewhat sexual, I’d instantly developed a rock hard boner. Myrna had dropped to her knees and bent over clutching her breast, but was trying to hide it from me. In my sorrowfulness at having hurt her, I put a hand on her shoulder and started to say that I was sorry, but she reacted in pain and annoyance. She swatted her hand back to push me away and since she was hurting, she probably swung far harder than was really needed or intended. Her fist drove the metal zipper of my blue jeans against the most ultra-sensitive part of my anatomy, at least in that area of my body.

It was instantly my turn to fold over in pain.

Needless to say, that day changed our lives and our attitudes toward each other forever. We both said we were sorry before we each went home, and I don’t know about Myrna, but I felt lost. I know we both did our best to stay away from each other for several days.

Then I was out walking one day in one of my favourite spots and as I walked around a clump of willows I met Myrna coming the opposite direction. We both stopped, and then both started to speak at once. Seconds later we were in each other’s arms. Before we went home that day, we’d kissed and cuddled to make up, and I’m fairly sure that was the first time we said we loved each other.

More time passed and during junior high and high school my old horse was retired since we were being bussed to a small town school each day. Suddenly it wasn’t so odd for us to be seen together at school or on the street and now that we were older, it was okay that we were boyfriend and girlfriend. Our relationship was gradually changing all the time.

Since we were going to school by bus, I eventually realised that I really didn’t need a horse anymore and I decided to sell old Shorty. I loaded him into the back of our farm truck and took him to the auction, then I made the mistake of staying to watch as he was sold.

Shorty was old, but over the years his reputation had spread around the community. Tales were told about how gentle he was, how patient he was, how smart he was, and so on. There were people who wanted a horse like him for their young children so the bidding was fast and furious and I was astounded at the price he eventually brought. Then I made a second decision that changed my life.

I was in a great mood, the auction was exciting, and I stayed a while longer. The next lot up for auction took everyone by surprise. It was two halter broken, but untrained horses that were being sold as a pair even though they looked totally mismatched. One was a tall and rangy gelding with a roman nose and jerky gait, while the other was a short and sleek mare with a finely chiselled head and a motion that was smooth as silk. The only real similarity was their colour, and the fact that each horse had a star on its forehead. Both of the horses were chestnuts, though the mare was somewhat darker in colour than the gelding.

The auctioneer explained that these were two horses bred from the same mare by different studs. Then he announced that they were so close to each other that they created a fuss if they were separated, so the owner was asking that they be sold as a pair. On top of that, neither horse had ever been broken to ride. It was soon clear that people didn’t like the idea of buying a pair of unbroken horses, so bidding was exceptionally low.

Somewhere in my head, a bell went off about then though and in an instant I was imagining Myrna and I riding together once more, only with each of us on our own horse. I bid just once, a very low bid, far less money than I had just received for my much older horse, but to my absolute astonishment my bid won out. I had gone to the auction with one horse and went home with two.

Of course my family thought I was totally nuts until I told them that I wanted to break the horses of being together all the time, then I wanted to give the smaller and prettier horse to Myrna for her birthday, which was coming in a month’s time. Since my whole family liked Myrna that idea threw a completely different light on the subject and suddenly everyone wanted to help.

We started that night by putting the gelding in one box stall in the barn and the little mare in the stall next to him. The next day we’d take one horse at a time outside to graze near the barn. Part way through the day, we’d swap which one was outside and which one was inside. Each night we gradually moved them into stalls that were further and further apart and grazed them slightly further away from each other as well.

While we were getting them accustomed to being apart, Dad helped my sister and me to break horses the way he felt was right. That wasn’t to force the horse to accept someone jumping on their back and riding them while they bucked and fought. Instead we made friends with them, then trained them to want to please us. It wasn’t long before they were trying to please us by doing what we wanted and being fussed over when they did.

By the end of the month, we had those horses trained to be separated without making a fuss and to be ridden as well. I was proud as punch. My family surprised me though. The morning that I was going to ride the two horses down to give the one to Myrna, I found my family were all in the barn. Somehow Dad had found an pair of used, but matching saddles and bridles at an auction. After he’d repaired them, Mom and my sister had cleaned up the old leather until it shone. That morning, they’d gone out early, cleaned up the horses, then saddled them for me. There were tears in my eyes when I hugged each of them and thanked them from my heart.

I was in an almost ecstatic mood when I rode down the hill to see Myrna. When I knocked on their door and Myrna came out demanding to know where I had been hiding, she never even noticed the horses for a moment. Then I gave her the reins to her new horse and said “Happy Birthday.”

It’s a good thing that we’d trained those two horses to ‘ground tether’ because in just seconds we’d both dropped the reins as she wrapped her arms around my neck and kissed me. I guess our folks had been talking, because when we broke the kiss, her parents were standing on the porch, looking on and laughing in delight at Myrna’s happiness.

Of course she had to go for a ride and she ran inside to change while I talked to our folks. When she went to get astride her little mare, I found that my Dad and my sister had planned a little extra surprise for both of us.

Whenever Myrna rode horseback, she had a habit of wearing a skirt over a pair of jeans. Dad and my sister had trained that little mare to reach forward with her right foot, then to drop down by bending her left foot into a kneeling position when someone in a skirt went to ride her. After Myrna was in the saddle, the little mare stood back upright again.

While she’d been getting in the saddle, my horse had been a bit edgy, but it didn’t really worry me. As Myrna swung her little mare and rode away, I flipped into my saddle and followed. That day we rode until we had sore bottoms, then went back to Myrna’s place to have a marvellous birthday party with both of our families.

I wish I’d paid more attention to my horse’s likes and dislikes though. After we’d eaten and Myrna had opened her other presents, she wanted to try riding my horse to see what he was like. That’s when we found out that he hated skirts. When she swung her leg over his back, he bucked and threw her. She landed on her already tender fanny. Of course when my horse started to buck, her horse panicked a bit and I had my hands full just holding her horse, then catching mine.

Both of our Moms and my sister ran to help Myrna and to check if she was okay while our Dads came to help me. By the time we had things under control with Myrna’s horse put away and mine tied to a post in the yard, the women were all inside. Myrna didn’t really seem any the worse for wear except that she was walking gingerly. She complained that it was the first time she’d ever gotten her birthday bumps from a horse, which brought a chuckle from all of us.