By: Linda Hren

“I am getting a pony for Christmas!” I screamed as I darted into the kitchen and back into our living room on the last day of school before Christmas vacation.

At our house, Santa often left some item early to remind us that he was checking on us and making sure we were on our best behavior.

My grinning parents and brothers and sisters followed me into the living room where I was dancing around the Christmas tree with a manure fork sporting a big red bow.

[private]Santa always exercised his practical side at the Hren house and never was it more evident than that day in 1968.

“Read the note,” My father suggested and I tore open the envelope and read the message inside aloud.
“Linda,

“If you really want a pony you’ll have to learn how to use this.
“Love, Santa.

“P.S. I couldn’t fit this in my sleigh with everything else.”

I was ecstatic. I was sure this would be the year I got a pony for Christmas. My father reminded me of Santa’s warning. A pony would be a lot of work. Was I prepared for that kind of commitment?

“Yes!! Yes!!!” was my resounding reply.

All I saw in that manure fork was a bright-eyed pony that loved me as much as I loved it already. Santa however, could see road-apples and wet straw that were just out of my sight.

I wanted to take the manure fork to school but my mother tactfully explained that pitch forks were not allowed on school buses for safety reasons. So I settled for telling everyone at school that I was going to get a pony for Christmas because Santa had left a s- – - (manure) fork beside our Christmas tree. No one believed me of course and Mrs. McCarroll informed me that the vernacular term for manure was considered a swear word not to be used by 8 year-old children.

Undaunted, I counted the days until Christmas. I knew I was getting a pony.

I couldn’t sleep on Christmas Eve. I heard hoof beats and sleigh bells: a pony’s whinny and a reindeer’s snort. I smelled hay and sweet-feed; carrots and apples. I couldn’t wait for morning and the night dragged cruelly toward daybreak. Finally, as a last resort, I squeezed my eyes shut.

A moment later I heard sleigh bells for sure and bolted out of bed and rushed to the window. Nothing. Only the first hazy light of dawn and the aroma of coffee coming up the stairs. ‘Santa’s been here.” My father called up the stairs and four more sets of feet hit the floor.

That year I was the first one down the stairs. Ahead of both older brothers. In mid-flight to the living room I realized the door was closed.

It could only mean one thing. There was a pony in the living room.

“We are going to go to church before we open any presents this year” my father explained sternly. “This is one Christmas we are not going to be late for Mass.”

My mother was at the stove smiling over my head and I knew Daddy had winked at her.

There definitely was a pony in the living room!

We were early for Mass – the longest Mass in the history of the Catholic Church. All I could think about was that poor little pony standing all alone in our living room with a big red ribbon around its neck, waiting for me to come home.

I sang the last hymn as loudly as I could so everyone would hurry up. People walk faster after they sing real loud. I pestered my father to “step on it” all the way home and when he pulled into our driveway I could hardly wait to jump out of the car. My pony wasn’t in the living room. She was in the yard!

Her name was “Lucky” and to this day the word causes chills to run up my back. She was a brown and white pinto taken straight from the cover of a Marguerite Henry book.

There was a saddle and bridle under the Christmas tree and my parents said I could ride Lucky as soon as I changed my clothes.
Ten minutes later, apple in hand, I was prepared to ride off into the December sunset with my pony, Lucky. I settled into the saddle like a pro, all smiles and pride. My brother led me around the barnyard once before he let me go solo.

As soon as his hand went slack on the halter, Lucky ducked her head and lit into one of the finest bucking horse exhibitions our valley ever witnessed. With a hearty kiss-the-sky-eat-dirt rhythm, she sent me sailing back to solid ground. Really solid, frozen ground. When I started breathing again and crawled to my feet, I got back on.
Any cowboy worth a worn out latigo will tell you that only those who never ride, never fall. Well, I rode that Christmas. And I would have done my father proud had he been a bronc rider himself.

I climbed back into the saddle five times and five times that loco pony bucked like a champion and sent me back to earth in a heap. I would have kept climbing back on too, if my parents hadn’t called time.

The following day I learned that ponies kick and bite too. The gentle mare my parents bought turned into a terror.

When I limped into class after New Year’s, I told everyone that my pony was from Chincoteague and still a little wild.

Two weeks later, Lucky’s old owner took her back. It turned out Lucky was homesick for her old family because her sweet nature returned as soon as she stepped off the trailer at the place she knew as home. The man’s children rode off to pasture with only a halter and lead rope. I have never felt so betrayed in all my life.

I disowned Lucky as my first horse and bestowed the honor on her successor, Star, who was a scrappy down-on-his-luck black Shetland with a sense of humor. Star only nipped and rubbed me off on trees occasionally. He preferred “slamming on the brakes” to bucking and always nuzzled my neck to make sure I was okay if I happened to mysteriously appear on the ground.

He much preferred teaching me the finer points of horsemanship by embarrassing me with a well-timed refusal to move. He never forgot the way home when we were wondering the woods and I got lost, either.

Star was not a perfect “dream” pony, but he ignited a passion for horses that still illuminates my life. He remained a beloved member of our family his entire life. And while he never made it into the living room, he spent some summer days standing on the front porch. Star was a real pony, the road-apples-and-wet-straw kind of pony Santa knew I wanted when he left that manure fork beside the Christmas tree in 1968.

As for the manure fork; I still have it. It is still on “active duty” with no plans to retire and I tie a red ribbon on it every December.[/private]