Kelso

Horses are amazing creatures and I have always felt I had a symbiotic relationship with them.  Even though they are big and strong and unpredictable, I have never felt fear around them.  So I like horses.  I am one of the millions of “girls” who really likes horses.  I haven’t own my own horse since I left Mesa for college, but I try to be around them as often as I can.  Today a new friend invited me to ride with a group that goes out every Sunday morning, of course I said yes immediately.  I didn’t know what horse I would be riding, how old or young, how well trained, if much at all, but I do know that I believe the best view of the world is from the back of a horse. So today I put on a brand new pair of boots that I had purchased with the idea of  dancing, not riding, but with no dance partner in sight it was waste not want not, so I showed up in my shiny new boots and goofy cowboy hat where I was escorted out to the barn to met Kelso.  He was calm enough as I brushed him out, he let me clean his feet just fine, “Hey want to put that big old saddle on me. No Problem”.  Kelso was a piece of cake.  We rode out into a nice piece of desert near Cave Creek Road and it was there that Kelso begin to resemble his namesake, a character created by Ashton Kutcher on That 70’s Show.  He was a big, good looking, airhead.

This meant that to keep me from doing a giant face plant off of him and completely ruining my coolness factor with these people, I needed to devote my full attention to riding him. You see, to Kelso the world is full of horse-eating fence posts, loose paper and, oh yeah, rocks.  A horse who wants to survive has to stay vigilant and be able to jump sideways at a moment's notice to avoid being devoured by such predators.  So as he danced all over the place I managed to stay with him and we made it safely back to the barn. it was an interesting, albeit tiring, few hours. 

Ironically when a coyote wandered by looking us over, Kelso could not have been less impressed, or concerned.  “Why get all worked up over that mangy thing when there’s a vicious looking candy wrapper lurking in those bushes?”  Still Im very glad Kelso let me share his world with him and if I’m invited back I would be honored to ride him again.  Now, that I look back over my life I realize I have always been a sucker for big, good looking, airheads.  Especially if they can dance.

Old Farts Club

I recently got together with a few good folks with who I share a common history of Phoenix television news from the “good old days”.  So, yes we could all be considered old farts, even though most of us are still working in the media in some form or another.  You didn’t get into TV news in the 70’s for the money, you did it for the adrenaline rush, to be where things were happening, to get the story on the air before the other guy, to drive a marked news car down a sidewalk and think it was perfectly okay or just because it was really cool to be on TV.  You did it because you loved it.  This little group witnessed a lot of history, saw Arizona's capitol change from a cow town controlled by the Phoenix 40 to what it is today.  And we tell stories, a lot of stories, mostly on each other, most punctuated with profanity and plenty of laughter, so there are lots of stories.  Yes, Bruce your name did come up a time or two. The majority of them we have all heard before, but the stories in themselves aren’t the reason we get together.  It’s to spend a little time with a small band of brothers and sisters who shared a unique and powerful experience in our lives, to be able to remember, yeah, we did that, we saw that and we lived to tell about it and we know it will always connect us. It was an experience that someone who wasn’t in that particular media circle will never fully understand.  To the people sitting at the next table, and I pity them, I’m sure we sounded like a bunch of old fogies just recalling our glory days, but they were very glorious days indeed.  I can’t wait until we have the next unofficial meeting of the Old Farts Club - Phoenix TV Chapter.