All the Pretty Horses
September 1st 2006 05:13
It is Friday, and if you stroll through the equestrian centre in Sydney you can feel the weekend is close. Owners peel out of the woodwork like silkworms, the horse at the end of their lead rope well oiled to the routine. ‘The public’ peel away from Centennial Park with young children to come and watch the horsies, their appeal as fascinating to them as it still is to me twenty-five years into my life. Little girls come dressed for weekend lessons, with a bounce that could only mean there is a pony on their mind! And I wonder when I see all these things that the weekend brings… when the people that are with their horses everyday mingle with those that are not… what is it about these large and noble animals that feeds the fire of so many?
Think about all those images on TV screens. John Wayne and Clint Eastwood posing in dirty sunlight on an even dirtier cow horse. The headless horseman from Sleepy Hollow? Alexander the Great might not have been so great without Bucephalus, and can you remember the woman and stallion scene in Hot Shots! The wise rider accepts that it is borrowed power, but it is power nonetheless. A human on their own is not so regal, but on a horse… then the image tells a different story.
Horses are beginning to peter through everyday life into more and more children thanks to the likes of stomach churning The Saddle Club, and if children do still read they would be enchanted by My Friend Flicka and Steinbeck’s The Red Pony. I see little girls in cosmetic cowboy boots and jodhpurs showing up for lessons full of images from TV and without the guidance of horsey parents and I think how wonderful that is, that maybe a pony can keep them untainted and wholesome!
And so through the next few blogs in The Tack Room I will take you by the hand through some of the famous horses and people in the equine world in search of the common ground between us and you that I see every weekend.
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Comment by Anonymous
Love your website, but to be pedantic, silkworms eat mulberry leaves, not wood.
Comment by JessO
The Tack Room
It's wonderful to have your comment on my site, so thank you.