I had a visit the other night from an old mate, Bruce. Some of you might recall Bruce from a story I wrote a long time ago where I described the first person to ever ride a horse and being responsible for domesticating horses and starting this whole gig of riding them. Well, that was Bruce. As you can imagine Bruce is several millenniums old but looks better than fellows half his age. It has to be admitted Bruce looks good for a bloke born during the last ice age. And he still has a sharp mind – clever, insightful and ornery.
Bruce is the bloke that we all have to thank for having the hair-brain idea that a person could catch a foal, raise it and try sitting on it someday. It was crazy at the time, but now everybody does it.
Bruce only appears in my life for a fleeting time every few years or so. I don’t know where he lives, where he has been or where he is going next. He just shows up. He always appears in the wee hours of the morning. I don’t know how he gets into the house, but he is like Houdini and can seemingly walk through walls. I use to think Bruce was a figment of my imagination. A dream. But I’ve come to accept him and his eccentricities as part of my life, even if he is only in my head.
I hadn’t seen Bruce for a while, so there was a lot to catch up on. He asked about these new fangled ways of transport called horseless carriages and why would anybody want to be pulled around by something without a horse in front of them. He didn’t seem to understand the purpose and certainly didn’t trust them. I guess he had a point since cars kill more people than horses. I didn’t dare tell him about planes.
After the small talk had concluded we got around to discussing horses like we always do. I told him I was teaching horsemanship nowadays to amateur and professional riders.
Bruce’s response was not exactly supportive, “Blimey mate, where are you going to find people to teach who know less than you do about horses?”
I tried to explain that since the horseless carriage arrived on the scene there were a lot of people who know less than I do. In fact, in certain circles I am considered quite knowledgeable and experienced. I even showed him the nameplate my wife bought for my desk, “I’m Kind Of A Big Deal”. Bruce seemed unconvinced and unimpressed. I made a mental note to myself that I need a better quality of friend.
I said, trying to hide my crankiness, “You may know it all, but I do okay at helping a lot of people with their horses.”
Bruce replied, “I am far from knowing it all. As old as I am, I am a rank beginner.”
“Oh come on Bruce. You know more than anybody else I know. You’ve worked more horses than most people have seen sunrises. There can’t be much you don’t understand.”
Bruce said, “Mate, this is what I have learned and the only stuff that I am sure about. The first 500 horses taught me how to stay on. The second 500 horses taught me how to be good at getting a horse to do stuff. The next 500 horses taught me that if I don’t get in the way of what a horse wants to do, they all seem pretty happy.
But right now I’m working on the next 100,000 horses and hoping they’ll teach me how to get them to go along with my idea. And then learn how to not screw that up by getting in their way.”
The next 100,000 horses!! I didn’t know what to say. Bruce was right, I don’t know much at all. It was a slap in the face that reminded me we are rarely the teacher and always the student. We ended our visit and I hoped it would be a long time before I saw Bruce again. I don’t think my fragile ego could take another visit for a while. I went back to sleep.
Bruce late night visit.