My Winter Friend

On Sunday, it was the perfect day for burning our brush that had fallen out of the trees last June in the almost tornado that we had go through the yard and reek havoc on our shingles and soffits.  We had another wind storm blow through and knock more of the broken branches out onto the ground, so we had a lot to choose from.  I started the fire in the fire pit and got it going pretty well.  Everything was pretty wet from the 2 inch rain we received about a week ago, now, so I was looking for drier wood to keep the fire burning hot.  As I was wondering through the woods, I noticed my poor old toboggan lying on the ground.  It had been there for a few years after it was broken from dragging logs around the yard to stack them.  It wasn't the best way to use such an old friend of winter, but it was what we had at the time.  The logs were cut to about 18 inches in length, but it was old cottonwood and was big and wet and very heavy.  Neither my hubby and I could lift them very far, let alone get them the the opposite side of the property.  So rolling them onto the toboggan and dragging them to the site of where we wanted them stacked was all we could handle.  Well, after an afternoon of doing that, the front of the toboggan cracked and it wasn't much good for sledding or dragging fire wood around, so it was retired to the woods to live out its life among the trees until I spotted it. 

I was sorry we had done that to it.  It really held many memories for me.  I'm not usually that nostalgic, but as I burned it I remembered some of the times I had with it.  It covered about the first 20 years of my life, and then the next 20 years of my kids lives.  My uncle had given it to me as a Christmas gift when I was about 8 or 9 so I could go sledding on the 18th Green at Greenhaven Golf Club in Anoka, Mn.  That was the greatest hill to slide down.  It had the regular rope to pull it up the hill and what made mine special, is that it had a cushion.  Not all of them did in those days. 

At 15, I got my first horse, Gai Lanor.  She shared my birthday month and day.  She was a palomino with a golden coat and flaxen main and tail.  I could ride her without a saddle, or bridle or halter.  She just followed my leg commands or weight change, or clicks of my tongue.  I also had, and still have, an antique Arabian Western saddle that was totally made by hand.  It was an antique then and it sure is now!   It may be around 75 - 80 years old by now.  All the tooling on the saddle was hand carved and it was all black with white, long latigos to tie your bedroll or other stuff to it.  It was a roping saddle, so it has a rawhide covered tree to handle the roping and tying of cattle or whatever, without breaking the saddle horn. THe saddle also had those really cool stirrups with the fancy toe covers that reminds me of Zorro and the Mexican saddles.  I had to take them off because I couldn't show in horse shows with them.  You have to have open toe stirrups for show.  But they were great for trail riding as you wouldn't catch your toes going through brush.  It also came with a martingale for parades and a bridle, but the bridle rotted from all the horse sweat and I couldn't keep it oiled well enough to preserve it.  Well, I used to pull that toboggan behind Gai and my horsey friends would ride behind.  It was a great time. 

I also knocked myself out with that toboggan going down a slope while leaning too far over the front when I hit a bump and went under it, ass over teakettle!  I had pulled my friends on the toboggan to the hill and I must have scared them, because I was out cold for a few minutes and had amnesia for a while.  I couldn't remember where I was or how to tie the toboggan to the saddle horn so we could go home.  I had a fat lip for a while, (which didn't help my French Horn playing), and a scrape on my forehead.  It's funny when I think of it now -  we did things back then, I'm not sure I would have let my kids do.  At least if I knew about it!   

I picked up my old winter friend and found that it had some moss growning on the underside of it.  It didn't weigh anything being so rotten.  It still had the rope through all the leather loops, (amazing), even though they were stiff and dry.  The cushion was gone long ago, so it was just the bare wood.  I reverently put it in the fire and watched as it burned as brightly as my memories playing in my head.  It seemed a proper end to such on old, dear friend of winter and as I smelled the wood smoke I watched it rise up and find it's way home.