BACK IN THE OLDEN DAYS: I'm showing Azteca de Oro BSN at Monterey. This was the big show in 1873. (Azteca is a horse, by the way, not a mule.)
Some of you are aware that I sold my horse and gave up riding forever perhaps nine months ago. This was after being advised by pretty near every medical type in my life and the Rector of my church that I would go Splat! if I came off a horse at my age and state of decrepitude. There is truth to this. I would be a dope if I didn’t acknowledge it.
The only thing is–riding is addictive. Not just the wind-in-your-hair thrilling part of it, all of it, including picking out horse’s hooves. Contact with the equine species is addictive, but riding is super addictive. It’s a physical thing: body memories, muscle memories. What allows dancers to remember and perform entire ballets without having to look at their notes. I’ve ridden for so long that the sensation of being on a horse can come to me anywhere. Swinging down the aisle of my local mall, for instance. The grocery store. Not riding was painful.
After suffering for months, I decided that somewhere on the planet a gaited horse existed for me–and this is a very important bit. I’m wanted an easy-gaited horse. No trot: the back breaking bounce-bounce-bounce you get on most horses. We’ve had Peruvian Pasos since the late 1980s. They are reputedly the smoothest riding horses in the world, a claim I believe. The only thing is, they’re a Spanish breed and very hot–Ole! That means if you move your pinkie, you may be in the next county before you can say, “How did I end up on the ground?”
If I couldn’t find a Peruvian as sedate as what I wanted, I wanted another breed just as smooth. I had very limited goals in my post-optimal, maybe end-of-the-trail equine experience. All I wanted to do was meander slowly around our arena and mosey down our mostly flat trails. I also desperately needed a way of getting away from my computer. I’m an author and I spend most of my life in front of my screen, turning my spine into something like a pretzel. Outdoor exercise would fill the bill!
Last June, after another disappointing attempt to find the horse of my dreams, I was in Santa Fe NM having dinner with friends. It was really fun. They ride mules. Sue and Dick love their mules and ride them all over. The mules are nice and like their owners. “They really are friendly. They’re more like dogs.” Said mules don’t go lame or break. Dick runs a “Meet a Mule Day” at the County Fair where mules and their people get together and walk across mattresses and through kids’ wading pools and do amazing things, to the delight of all. Dick described all the things his mule could do: find lost people, keep their property free of varmints, and do their income taxes. These are useful skills.
Most of my good ideas come when I’m asleep. I woke up with an Ahah! Why not get a mule? Mules like to go slow. They’re careful, smart, sure-footed, live a really long time (up to fifty years), and they’re sturdy. Why not get a mule? A gaited mule! I know they come gaited from seeing the Peruvian National Champion Mule at a horse show in Monterey.
Great idea! All I had to do was find one. I said, “I think I’ll get a mule,” on Facebook. Lickety split, I was hearing from people I hadn’t heard from in years. It was really fun. Did you know there’s a worldwide network of women who actually run the world? They all have mules. I began hearing from them. It was really fun and got me off of FB for hours at a time. And then back on the Net, searching for gaited mules.
I found a lot of gaited mules, all a long way from Santa Barbara, CA, and mostly in the South. I’d find one that sounded good in Alabama, another in Oklahoma, Wyoming, Colorado, Tennessee. Clearly, my mileage points were going to be challenged by this search. But then, a new friend told me about trainer Lou Moore-Jacobsen and One Moore Training in Templeton, CA. She trains mules! And she told me about the Reese Brothers Mules in Tennessee. Their family has been producing and selling mules since the 1920s! That’s even older than me. Here’s their FB page.
I contacted Richard Reese, who handles mule sales. Click here and you can contact him yourself. I told him what’s above and asked if they had a mule that would fit my needs. He said he’d think about it. Somehow the fact that he would be in San Tan Valley, Arizona, at a sale and could bring a prospect for me with him came up. All of a sudden, yipes!, it was late July. The sale was in a few days.
LEAVITT RANCH SALEMy husband and I found ourself at the Reese Ranch the last few days of July and through the sale. Richard Reese brought a semi-truck pulling a gigantic trailer full of mules.
It was so much fun! I want to thank Buck Leavitt and the Leavitt family for their gracious hospitality in letting all us mule-and-would-be-mule lovers tromp all over their place trying them out. And thanks to all the people that staffed the cash registers and so on. And also all the other people at the auction. It was such a fun event and I enjoyed meeting and being around so many people. They’re going to do it again in the spring, so if you’re at all inclined to mosey on down, it won’t be 110 degrees then, either. That was the only negative.
I do want to apologize to those people whose views I blocked at the auction, standing on the rail and trying to put together a video to put up here. I didn’t realize I was in the way until someone told me. My husband said, “Yeah, you were really in the way.” Oops. I get a little excited.
There is a downside to a mule auction. So many of the mules were so cool that we could have easily ended up with, oh, three or four. Really. A lady at the check out rushed off to get her trailer, “I just bought two mules!” Richard Reese showed extreme honesty in telling us, “They’re too green for you.” This was very good advice. My husband wanted one. Or two. It is true that we are codgers knowing nothing of mules.
Oh! Did we get a mule? Yep. Lil’ Annie, who had been with the Reeses one and a half years, ridden by Richard himself. She is exquisitely beautiful and I rode her all over the Leavitt Ranch. Reese Mules are known for their good manners and quality. Did it ever show. I want to share a couple of pictures of Annie when we brought her home. This is her first airline trip. She was so good!
Annie and I on the moving walkway at the Phoenix Airport. Talk about the glide ride!
Doesn’t this beat fighting your way through the airport on your own hooves? Once we got to the terminal, Annie’s behavior was even more exemplary.
Annie's behavior while waiting to board was better than most of the humans in line. Note her seat number, cleverly placed on her rump by the nice airlines people. She did have trouble fitting in her economy class seat.
Annie’s home now, a lovely addition to our family. How’s she doing? Freaked out, man. She’s in major culture shock. But, I got her some sunglasses and an iPhone. She’s starting to adjust to California life. I told her we’d cruise State St. and hit the beach soon. Maybe do some surfing. I’ll report when we do.
I also called trainer Lou Moore-Jacobsen. When you need help, get it. We’ll get it sorted out.
All the best,
