Rodeo

Seven teenage girls allegedly wrote me down as their “supervising sponsor” and signed out of their 4H barn duties and rushed to find me. “Take us to the rodeo, won’t you please?” they begged, tugging on my clothes and bouncing eagerly.  They really didn’t even have to ask. I would go to the rodeo every night if I could.

Kettle corn, cotton candy, drinks, and tickets in hand we took off across the fairgrounds, leaving a wake of giggles and our little bubble closing into the crowds around us. The stands were packed and we climbed over the laps of local cowboys, Indians, babes and babies before we found a steel riser with enough space: high on the south side, safely out of reach of the footle of the insidious clown. We had to be back in the barn before the girls’ 9pm curfew, and I quietly barred the idea of becoming his public fodder with my young ‘uns in the meantime.

I nodded apologetically at the middle-aged gentleman immediately at front right of us because my little group was definitely teenage girls watching a rodeo. But, I shouldn’t be apologizing for them. I was kind of making them scream with me, wildly, exceptionally, extremely loudly. I just didn’t want that gentleman to know that it was, well, my fault.

As I explained each activity to the huddle around me, we groaned, cheered, shrieked, clapped, and pounded our feet. As always, there were the moments I buried my head in my lap, refusing to watch something too gladiatorial, grateful I didn’t personally pay money to watch that fellow take a beating from a crazed animal. And there were the moments the clown was too disgusting for words when I turned around to watch the girls’ horrified faces with my own alarmed orbs, or to playfully cover my sister’s ears or eyes with my hands…

I asked the sweet sixteen-year-old girl next to me if she had met any of the brave-hearted cowboys or wranglers below, and she sighed sadly and shook her head “no.” She looked so forlorn about that thought that I had to try not to laugh, offering her my kettle corn remnants as solace. The middle-aged gentleman looked over his shoulder again and winked at me. She stared ahead with moonlit brown eyes, silently, slowly eating one kernel after the other.

“Noooooooooo!” we shouted when the brave men fell or failed, though we were sure to cheer them all the way back during the long walk to the edge of the arena. We tumbled over each other in trying to see if that man was really trampled, and doubled over laughing when the clown got it right. Our voice becoming hoarse cheered on the ropes that were straight and true and the ladies who seemed to fly on Pegasus’ otherworld wings.

My sister leaped to her feet with a gasp, when she was sure a young steer’s neck was broken after being violently wrestled to the ground. She wouldn’t sit until I assured her it was fine, after it worked its way back up onto wobbly legs. The blue-eyed lass behind me running her fingers through my hair, jerked suddenly when a cowboy took an inhuman launch off his horse, catapulting him to a night of fame. Another freckled girl tearily pleaded to leave because she thought they made the horses buck from painful abuse and then shot them for being so bad in a few years.  Lengthy explanation sorted it out and later she was the one begging for “one more minute” when 8:55pm showed on my clock.

Hues of brilliant pink and orange in our heady sunset had faded inky blue and starry on us. To our great disappointment, we had to scoot out before the barrels were all circled and the bulls loosed. But our dusty, boot-clad feet passed the threshold of the barn as the clock clicked over to “9.” So I ask…Does anyone have an extra ticket to the rodeo tomorrow night?