A Little Too Much Excitement
I didn't know what to write about today, so I thought I'd go on a bike ride, as that often clears my head and helps me come up with an idea for a post. My husband decided to come with me and it was truly a lovely morning, bright blue sky and not humid at all. Perfect riding weather.
I've mentioned before that we live out in the country--horse country, to be exact--and we ride on small, winding, hilly roads. There's hardly any traffic and save for a couple of key intersections that we have to be careful when crossing, there's not much danger involved. Or so we thought!
He was out ahead of me and we were going down a long curving hill into a wooded area. He rounded the curve before me by about 30 to 40 seconds. Lo and behold when I got around the bend, there he was stopped at the side of the road and a woman was lying on the ground in obvious pain, and not far ahead of them was another woman riding a horse with a riderless horse ahead of her.
Turns out that as he came down the hill, the two horses were standing stationary in the road, perpendicular to him, and he thought they'd see him as he slowed down to go around them. When he realized they didn't see him and weren't going to move aside, he had to really hit his brakes hard, which caused him to skid about 20 feet. This, unfortunately, spooked the horses and they bolted, which is what caused the one rider to be thrown and the other to have to hang on while her horse and the riderless one ran off up the road. It was quite a scene.
The woman who fell was basically OK, and fortunately she lived right up the road, so I rode up to her house and let the folks there know what happened and had them call an ambulance. Just after I returned to where my husband was, the other rider was coming back, leading the other horse. It was a humongous thing--a good five feet tall in the saddle. The injured lady was lucky he didn't step on her when she fell off.
She was really lucky by all accounts, as she probably ended up "just" breaking her ankle and possibly her collarbone. We were all lucky that no cars came by during any of this, as that would have been really dangerous. And my husband was lucky he didn't end up falling off his bike as well.
I think the moral of the story is that you simply never know what's going to be around the bend, especially out where I live, so you need to stay extremely aware. There could be a truck stopped in the middle of the road or a deer or--apparently--a horse or two!
My Brightest Diamond--"Lucky (Radiohead Cover)" mp3 off OKX: A Tribute to OK Computer (buy)
Azure Ray--"If You Fall" mp3 off Hold On Love (buy)
Youthmovie Soundtrack Strategies--" . . . Spooks the Horse (65daysofstatic Remix)" mp3 off Hurrah Another Year, Surely This One Will Be Better Than the Last . . . (buy)
horse picture by anna
Shit marcy, thats crazy stuff !! It sounds lovely where you guys ride, all
winding roads n stuff, cool. I don't expect you guys will be going for a
bike ride any time soon !!!
Yikes. We have folks riding their horses around our neighborhood
occasionally, from the nearby farm/stables, but they know there's going to
be traffic and are cautious about it. The worst part of that deal is all
the "holish poop" (the way my 4-year old says it) of the road.
ross--yeah, it was pretty wild. took us by complete surprise. i went for a
ride today, but not on the same road! i know your blog seems dead, but
don't delete it. you might want to come back to it someday. :)
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