By: Tracy A. Tucker

Campfires are truly amazing things. Not only are they beautiful to watch but build one and just wait to see whom it lures to its warm glow. Family, friends, even complete strangers find themselves drawn to the snap and smoke of a good fire. Even after all have gone to bed a few coals still burn, a ring of smoke still stretches to the sky hoping someone will pass by and stop to say hello.

I sit as close to the campfire as I can get without the soles of my shoes melting. The mid-September chill creeps in on my backside while the warmth from the fire penetrates my skin and warms my bones. I sit surrounded by family and friends; my Aunt Donna and Uncle Gary along with my cousin Darryl who came down from Minnesota for the weekend, my Aunt Mary and Uncle Terry who live only a few miles from home but whom we see about as often as the ones from Minnesota, Aunt Eileen and her fiancé Gary, Grandma and Grandpa who won’t stay much past dark, Craig and Beth, our frequent riding friends, my mom and dad, and my boyfriend Ryan.

The whippoorwills are singing and a family of raccoons is chattering from the woods across the narrow blacktop road. The sound of hay being ripped out of hay bags, horses’ stomping feet and swishing tails float on the breeze from the picket line behind the trailers. My dad and Uncle Terry are talking about the mare Aunt Mary bought awhile back that has a swollen leg. I smile inside when Dad gives his often-sought advice.

[private]Meanwhile on the other side of the fire the ladies are talking about the cupboards Aunt Mary chose to put in their nearly finished house. Grandpa and Uncle Gary are engaged in a discussion about what route would be better to take home, the river road or if they should go back into Iowa and take highway 52 north. The aunts break into a laughter that echoes through the treetops, their grinning faces illuminated and shadowed by the glow of the fire. As I watch my family gathered in a tight circle around the snapping and smoky fire, I remember what it was like when I was still at home.

Every weekend from the first warm days of spring to the first frost of the year our family spent camping and trail riding. Friday morning was always the same routine, wake to the sound of birds chirping out the open window, the gentle breeze brushing my cheek. The morning was spent loading the trailer with supplies and equipment, my mother, sister and I going back and forth from house to trailer step. The gear was carefully arranged in the trailer so the bouncing wouldn’t toss everything into an array.

We would have everything packed before Dad got home from a long week on the road. We heard the sound of the loud Cummins diesel long before he arrived in the driveway. As soon as Dad was home things really jumped into action. The horses needed to be brought in and brushed off. The tack was hauled to the trailer and the needed medical supplies, just in case, were put into the dusty red tool box and stashed in the tack compartment. The coolers were filled with ice and more than once someone got an ice cube down their shirt. The anticipation of getting on the road was heavy in the air. We would load the horses, jump in the truck and take off for three days on horseback.

The drive to the campground would normally be an hours worth of catching up on each other’s lives. Dad was an over the road truck driver and only home on the weekends. So the trip to the campground was always full of Dad’s stories from seemingly faraway places and strange people. Mom would share what the ladies at work were up to lately and us kids had little conversation to offer until school started up again.

It was three days of eating Mom’s lasagna and fresh baked apple pie from the grill. It was tromping through the woods with the sun on our backs. The sound of buzzing cars and offices were replaced with the sound of hooves, swooshing tails and the occasional whinny.

My companion on these riding excursions was a four-year-old Quarter Horse mare I called Snickers. She was a deep sorrel, my three-eared pony from getting it split down the middle on a barbed wire fence. Many thought she had a bad temperament my Dad especially. But the two of us clicked. For some reason she took to liking me and I never had any trouble with her. Won many a race down a straight stretch of trail upon her back, much to my dad’s dismay. Today Snickers is navicular and spends her time munching grass and making babies.

My dad however was always riding a colt he was breaking. Usually they didn’t stick around long; often they were sold in a few months after he started working them. When I was younger I never thought about breaking a colt, I had Snickers why would I have to train another horse? As I got older Dad taught me the basics of using your legs, the importance of groundwork and actually teaching a horse something.

The first time I rode a two year old I was scared. I knew Dad wouldn’t put me on anything he didn’t trust, I was more worried about not accomplishing my goal. The first colt I finished out was Snickers’ filly and I named her Candy. We sold her to a man in my hometown. Dad and I stopped on Easter Sunday to see her and my gut wrenched when my eyes fell upon her. She was skin and bones, her coat so full of mange it fell out with the slightest touch. I bit my tongue, held back the tears and pleaded with Dad to take her home with us. Walking away from that barn was the hardest thing I have ever forced myself to do.

Ever since I started riding I never really knew if I was doing it correctly; I sat in the saddle so my butt wouldn’t be sore for days afterward and I managed to get my horse to do what I wanted somehow. Dad would give me advice and tell me what I was doing wrong but I wanted to know if I was doing a decent job. We were in the barn, just finished chores and I was sweeping the alley. He reached into the tack room and said, “Here.” A jumble of leather and silver came soaring across the barn toward me. I dropped the handle of the broom and it crashed to the cement floor. I caught it by a strap and it dangled long in front of me; my first pair of spurs.

“You’ll need these if you’re going to keep breaking colts,” he had said as he turned and headed to the house. With that simple sentence Dad had approved my success and I was on top of the world. I knew had I proved my horsemanship skills to him, little did I realize how much I grew up from that experience.

Now I find myself perched on a camping chair with the people I love all around me. But rather than a nine year old girl in pig tails, I am twenty years old and embarking on my third year of college. I’m not able to make it home as often for the weekend camping trips and trail rides. For the longest time my Daddy always told me that school gives you book learning but something is said for life experiences. I never understood that when I was mucking stalls or pulling manes. Those weekend adventures on horseback helped shape my morals and values, teaching me things I was completely unaware of.

Now it’s not about the work it’s about the responsibility it taught me, it’s not about anxiously waiting for Dad so we could go home it’s about the life lessons I learned from his conversations, it’s not about spending another weekend with my family when I could be going to the movies it’s about knowing the strength and support of a loving family. . I followed the campfire smoke as it danced upwards towards the stars. It was then I realized that armed with everything horseback riding has taught me my possibilities are endless.[/private]