ON THE WILD FRONTIER
Daniel Boone, Davy Crockett, Lewis & Clark were all men on the wild frontier. These men were leaders of our westward expansion. They not only confronted adversity, but they challenged the unknown. They did not elect to stay in the comfort of their homes. They risked everything on the wild frontier. Today we are confronted with a different frontier. One of conjecture, innuendo, and a variety of pitfalls.
Have you ever noticed how many theorists there are and how few doers? In other words finding leaders is always difficult, but there are certainly a lot of folks that will tell you how it ought to be done. Have you ever been at the horse show and heard the discussion of how a horse should be shown, groomed, scored, or judged by someone that has never done it themselves? While I agree public events are open to scrutiny I am amazed at how many “experts” there are on any given topic. To understand my definition of “expert” you need to break down the word into syllables such as “ex-spurt”. Now “ex” means former, not current, past tense, and a “spurt” doesn’t amount to much. Now I guess you know who you are dealing with. It is like PETA protesting you showing your horse. They are not in the horse show business so why would they know anything about it. How would they know what ethical treatment for a show horse is? Pam Anderson is very good at taking her clothes off whether it is for PETA or Playboy and thank God she does, but how many cattle has she raised? Do you want to bet that she doesn’t own anything leather? I suppose she never sits in a limousine with leather seats either. These people lack commitment to their causes. I don’t care if she doesn’t want to eat meat, but how does that make her an “expert” on my raising cattle to eat? Does she know for sure that the green pepper she has in her salad doesn’t have feelings? I just may have to start the “Save A Vegetable” campaign. You vegetarians are just so evil. Don’t you know a vegetable is a living thing? While I’m rambling here how come Greenpeace and the Sierra Club never complained to Saddam Hussein when he dumped the Kuwaiti oil into the sea? Why don’t you see Al Gore driving a Prius and living in an efficiency apartment? Isn’t this world getting more ridiculous everyday? Hypocrites and sissies are getting more media coverage than the “good guys”. In spite of what you see and hear in the media, over 80% of us are just regular, sane, good working folks.
Okay, back to doers and theorists. There have been some great horsemen over the years. How about the Greek horse trainer Xenophon? He published the first book on horse training. If you read it you will find many of his methods still in use today, which is over 2000 years later. How about the Moors that wreaked havoc on the Christians for over 800 years during the Crusades? The Moors trigger reined horses made them superior fighting men over the Christians with their plow reined horses. The Spanish learned from the Moors which eventually led to California and the bridle horse. Along comes Tom Bass of Mexico, Missouri. He was born a slave and became a top showman and trained horses for presidents. Mr. Bass was famous for loping his horses backwards. Speaking of tricks, who knew anymore about training horses than Glenn Randall of California? From the antics of Roy Roger’s horse Trigger to movie horses too numerous to mention, Mr. Randall trained some of the world’s most famous horses. Hopefully you got to see the wild & exciting rides of Les Vogt winning numerous world championships. Today we get to watch the beauty and finesse of Bob Avila showing a reined cowhorse. All these people are just a few examples of “doers”. People that get up every morning working hard to become the best they can be. No matter what they do, right or wrong, it will always be discussed. That is human nature, but my point is this. As a horseshoer I’m not going to call up Mario Andretti and tell him why he hit the wall at Indianapolis in 1969 or advise President Bush on how to handle the Russians in Georgia. However, a news reporter would. You need to let people practice their respective professions.
One prominent item people need to recognize is that there are several different ways to do any one thing. If you have ever trained more than one horse you will realize that you have to have several different ways to accomplish the same thing on different horses. Many of the “theorists” feel there is only one way to accomplish things with horses, which happens to be their way. This is evident in the “cult” followings some of these “theorist” horse trainers develop. The theory is that you can convince masses of inexperienced followers that you are a great horse trainer even though you have never accomplished anything great in the horse world. This is the same theory a politician uses to get you to vote for him. It is an attack on your emotions. Once the politician stirs your emotions in a positive direction you will follow him. These so called “cult” trainers seem to down talk competition as if they are above it. Remember competition is the only way we have to judge talent.
Next time you see a news reporter remember that he is a theorist and don’t take him too seriously. If you are at a horse training clinic with a “cult” following don’t take it to seriously either. If you are at a horse show, rodeo, roping, etc. take it seriously as it is probably the “real deal”. When you are out on the “wild frontier” hang out with the good guys.