My almost 9 year old son Lincoln just finished a two-week stint at a horseback riding day camp. They have a ton of things to do there besides ride horses, but they pretty much do some riding every day. Well, on Friday morning - the last day of camp - parents were invited to attend to watch their kids do some riding in the ring. Andrea and I both played hooky from work for a bit so that we could see it. Lincoln was in a group of about 7 kids his age or a little younger, all of them pretty new to horseback riding. Three of them were riding ponies.

So the kids and their mounts are riding in line around the ring for a bit. Then they take turns doing a lap, some kids doing a little posting and trotting, others content to simply walk. On Lincoln's 2nd day at camp he was bucked from his horse, so he was understandably in the latter group.

Near the end of the session things got interesting. One poor boy was trotting with his horse and then I think the horse started to canter. As they took a turn they unfortunately travelled in paths of dissimilar turning radii; ie, the horse turned, the boy didn't. He hit the ground very hard on his side.

Now I don't think he was seriously injured in any way, but for the next five minutes or so he screamed like mad. He was hurting and quite scared, and he just screamed and screamed inconsolably. He wasn't answering any questions about where he was hurt or if he understand what they were saying, he just screamed. Amidst it all the poor guy even peed his pants because he couldn't hold it.

While the trainers and camp councillors tended to the poor boy, the rest of the kids sat on their horses, all more or less in line still, but without any of the camp handlers nearby. They were right in front of us, though, and we could hear their dialogue crystal clear. Group panic was setting in. It went something like this:

"I don't think I wanna ride anymore."

"Me neither!"

"I wanna get off. I wanna get off my horse!"

"I don't even want to be a cowboy!"

"Why does anyone even live in Texas anyway?"

One child's on the ground screaming bloody murder, and I was ready to bust a gut laughing at that last remark! All I could think of was my friend Nita from the Marine Corps Marathon forum, who is from Texas!