Most summers when we visited Morgan, Utah for summer vacation, my cousins and I would go on a horseback ride up into the "range." The range was open land up in the mountains to the west of the Whittier farm in Milton. Most farmers would take some of their cattle up to the range and just leave them there to freely graze until they needed them back at their farms to sell. It was a fun trip for Dee and Dick Whittier and I to saddle up some horses and spend a day riding in the open range. Aunt Barbara would usually fix a lunch for us and we would load it into our saddle bags along with some water. I remember one year I got to ride Jumbo. Jumbo was the Whittier's Shetland pony. Shetland ponies are little miniature horses that never get very big. Though small, Jumbo had a competitive spirit and never liked having the larger horses ahead of him. Whenever we decided to gallop the horses, Jumbo would shoot forward as fast as he could to take the lead, despite my efforts to keep him reigned in.
A trip to the range would usually included time spent playing in a creek. We would take off our shoes and socks (and sometimes more than that) and play in the cool water. It always felt good to cool off on a hot summer day. We would also race the horses. As I mentioned, Jumbo did not like being behind, and a race for me was sometimes pretty scary because I wasn't that experienced at riding horses. In an effort to be in front, Jumbo would cut across some pretty treacherous terrain and leave me wondering if I would fall off and into a ditch.
On this particular trip as we started for home, Jumbo could sense when we were getting close to the barn. We were on a gravel road and still had several miles more to go. All of a sudden, Jumbo broke into an uncontrollable run. He wanted to be home and there was nothing that could stop him. I remember pulling back on the reigns as hard as I could, over and over again, with no success in getting Jumbo to stop. He just kept on running. It seemed like this went on forever. I just knew I was going to be thrown off and hurt. But I held on. Then almost as suddenly as he started his breakaway run, he just stopped and began munching on some grass on the side of the road. I got off as fast as I could. By then Dee and Dick, on the bigger horses, had caught up to me. Jumbo's saddle blanket and saddle had worked their way toward his back legs and were not far from sliding right off of him. I don't remember what happened next. Dee, being the oldest, probably adjusted the saddle back into place and finished the ride home on Jumbo. I probably rode one of the calmer big horses the rest of the way.
It always amazed me that Jumbo was so anxious to be home. But years later, I can understand it a little better. Whenever I am gone from home for an extended period of time, it always feels so good to me to be home again. There is no place like home.
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