Horse People

 

Several months ago, I saw a spat of unhappy X posts because “horse people” were judging a “cowboy romance” in which it was, apparently, very obvious that the author had never been around horses or horse people. “What is a horse person?” one angry book fan wrote. “As if that’s a thing.”

It is a thing, and not the elitist thing you’re thinking.

This angry author-defender likely had visions of spoiled private school girls in mind…and, even if some them are intolerable brats, most of them are horse people, too. But that’s not what I think of when I ponder on the term. And us horse people as a whole? We’re our own breed of weirdo.

My first request, at four-years-old, was for a horse of my own. I at one point said, at the laughing goads of relatives, that I’d trade my own dad for a horse. I wouldn’t have, usually, but it was this viscerally, enigmatic impulse I possessed from birth. I wanted to be a jockey (not eventually.) I wanted a horse of my own. A farm of my own. It was the only concrete thing, aside from a pickup truck, that I wanted with such a bone-deep, aching sort of nostalgia. (It’d be nice to have a husband, now, but that won’t happen.)

Why? I couldn’t tell you in specifics, despite being an author who’s pumped out something like ten million words.

Most little girls, and a fair many little boys, love the idea of having a pony.

But then there’s the horse people. It’s an addiction. It’s a need. It’s a phase that’ll never end.

I could write you a novel about why I’m a horse person, and why all the horses I’ve known and loved had reinforced that; why all the incredible, non-famous horse people I’ve known have reinforced it further.

But I think at its core, universally, across breed and discipline, that, for some of us, horses call to this deep, hard-to-touch longing that lives in some of us. The equestrian/ranching life sings to a personal, melancholy part of us that’s always looking toward sunrises and sunsets. It’s something bigger than us. It’s our communion with God. It’s the thirst for knowledge and the love of absolute beauty all rolled together.

In my experience, horse people love stories. We love legends – and legacy. It’s about something so much bigger than us, that will far outlive us. It’s history. Centuries of history.

I want to kiss my girls’ noses at night, but it’s so much more than that. We’re carrying on a tradition of the world that we hope won’t someday be lost.

It’s the most difficult thing I’ve ever had to describe, and maybe someday I’ll get it right.

(Also, don't hesitate to reach out to a horse person if you're doing book research! We're all over, but especially Facebook)