Never One of the Guys

 So, my horse Sawyer has been staying in training with trainer, who we will call Cox, after famous, multi-million dollar earning cutting horse trainer Lloyd Cox. One afternoon I asked Cox if I could be "more involved" and that lead to today, which what Cox would describe as a "buddy system," I work for him, he trains Sawyer for me at a discounted rate. Make no mistake, a discount at $800 a month, and I'm losing money because the ranch is an hour away and I burn my discount in fuel costs driving that old Tahoe back and forth. 

"I like you," he told me the last time I was out there. We were in the pen that was set up with the mechanical cow (makes sense if you're a cutter). I was on top of Sawyer, who was puffing dramatically. He was practically yelling it. "You ride really good." More yelling. "If you broke Sawyer, you did a really good job because he is not an easy horse to get along with. He's a hard horse." I wasn't the only one who rode Sawyer. My friend John spent 60 days on him to make sure Sawyer wasn't going to buck me off, but still, I did most of the work. I didn't correct Cox. He was on a roll, and whenever he speaks, I let him speak and I don't say anything unless asked a direct question. I play dumb. It's better this way. He doesn't know that I started riding two-year-old horses when I was eight or nine-years-old, and that I started cutting at the NCHA level when I was eleven. I could have done something but then I stopped. I didn't finish what I started. 

There was an NCHA horse show at the local event center. My job sucked. I was expected to clean stalls at the ranch without any help. Ten stalls took me three hours. After cleaning pens, I headed over to the cutting, but the rest of the help had everything handled and there was nothing for me to do. So, I just watched the show most of the time. One day, we were all at a picnic table, Cox, his assistant trainer/loper and his farrier, who oddly enough works also as a loper. He introduced me to a woman who was sitting nearby as part of "his crew" (he made references to this fact that I'm part of the crew in his speech last time I saw him). 

When I was younger, ten and eleven years old, just learning how to cut, I was in love with my horse trainer. Praise or criticism from him fostered deep and lasting impressions. He was a god walking on earth. Any disappointment from him would be searingly painful for me. I was young and vulnerable then. 

I didn't tell Cox that I liked him back. It seemed to be inappropriate. He does have a girlfriend, but she is hardly around. Sometimes I get the sense from her that she doesn't want me around, and some days, she seems more at ease with the situation. Women, in general, have a difficult time in the cutting horse world. You can never be one of the guys. There are a lot of loper girls, but few female trainers. 

 The conversation got started last Friday because Cox wanted me to consider selling Sawyer to find another prospect that would take the training better. Cox talked about how to train Sawyer to be a cutting horse, he would have to "break his spirit." 

"I don't want it to get ugly," I said, referring to Cox training on Sawyer.

"It's already gotten ugly," he admitted. 

There's a way to train a horse besides beating them up.