FRIDAY'S FOTO--FOR MEMORIAL DAY, 2015

For Memorial Day
A glimpse at the reflecting pool at the World War II Memorial in Washington DC
4,000 sculpted gold stars reflect in the water representing the 400,000 lives lost during WWII
A Gold Star represents a family's loss.

EXCITEMENT + DANGER = DAVIE, FLORIDA PRO RODEO

Gotta love a rodeo!  This year, we were lucky enough to get to the Davie Pro Rodeo, part of the Professional Rodeo Circuit that arrives in Davie, Florida at the Bergeron Rodeo Grounds four times a year.

Held in a covered rodeo arena, this is an exciting and exhilarating event—another sport where action is counted in seconds and winners by milliseconds.

The previous night had a sell-out crowd, so we arrived early and had the opportunity to meet some very friendly people on line and to explore the grounds and the concessions.  There was plenty of food, the usual fair fare of sausage and peppers, corn dogs, fries, cotton candy, ice cream, and a host of other tempting treats.  Beer by Budweiser.  Spirits too.  We ended up drinking Amber Bock.  Hot, sultry evening and beer is a great combo.

Plenty of cowboy and cowgirl gear for sale—from the real thing to adorable stuff for kids.  This is horse country.  It was smile-making to see the little girls in pink hats and cowgirl diamond-patterned boots with those blinking-as-you-walk LED lights.  The kids twinkled as they pranced along the edge of the arena. 

Very good country/western music before the show, so coming early was a really great idea.  Total fair atmosphere, and a kind of electricity as we waited for the hard-hitting events.

That fair atmosphere fades only slightly once the rodeo begins.  This is serious stuff. A dangerous sport.  And it happens quickly.  The chute opens, the event occurs in seconds, the cowboy is rescued; the arena is cleared; another chute opens.  This is definitely not baseball.  If you haven’t gotten your food, beer, cowboy attire and souvenirs by the time the rodeo begins, you’re going to miss some pretty exciting action.

The arena is a big oblong with chutes on either end.  A squad of security guards stands in intervals along an orange railing lined with Danger signs warning spectators to keep off the rails.  Security guards enforce that rule, and for good reasons which I learned later.

More than once during the rodeo, men working the arena leapt up those rails for safety—even the ringmaster at one point.  These are big and dangerous animals on the loose in there. 

Before the rodeo officially begins, cowgirls gallop into the arena, some holding American flags that flutter as their horses circle around the ring.  The cowgirls perform a synchronized riding dance around the ring, passing one another and criss-crossing each other and urging their horses on at full tilt.  Pretty exciting and very fast.  Flags waving in the breeze.  Costumes sparkling.  They are joined by cowboys, but the movements do not slow as the horses perform their complex ballet.

The ringmaster offers a prayer, primarily for the safety of the competitors, our military and for all those who serve their communities. A little nine year old girl in full cowgirl regalia belts out the Star Spangled Banner truer than many professionals I’ve heard.  Everyone stands, silent, many with hands over their hearts, every cowboy/girl hat removed, and frankly it is a pleasure to see no one keeping his/her seat or chatting disrespectfully.  Life is good.

But the serious mood does not last long!  In case you’re wondering if the crowd remains silent, they do not.  They cannot because danger rides in on the opening event.  Bull riding.  This is an incredible event.  Those bulls are humongous!! 

Just watching the cowboys getting ready in the chutes is exciting.  The man gently lowers himself on to the broad, muscular back of the bull.  If he is not seated properly, he rises and lowers himself again.  He fixes his hat (although it may not stay on long), makes sure his gloves are fitted properly, and he winds the thick rope around his hand.  The crowd’s anticipation is almost palpable. 

All these men are making sure that the cowboy is really set to go--
seated correctly, holding securely

Men are hanging over the sides of the chute making sure everything is ready.  Men are in the arena ready to pull open the iron door of the chute, and when they do, the behemoth slams out and the men jump up on the railings.

The bull lunges out of the chute, leaping up in the air, all four feet off the ground.  Despite his size, that muscled monster is adroit, throwing that cowboy, who is hanging on to that thick rope, around like a pesky fly.  We can see the cowboy’s head snapping back and forth.  If the cowboy stays on long enough, the bull twists his body and weight.  He makes mechanical bulls look tame.  One way or the other it is over very quickly, and the cowboy is off in a not so graceful hard landing in the dirt.  He bounces back up quickly because that bull, his head menacingly lowered, goes right for him.  Cowboys need to scurry quickly and nimbly!  Two wranglers quickly ride to cut off the bull’s path, and the cowboy swings up behind one and is taken to safety while the other gets the bull to enter another chute.  When the cowboy jumps off the back of the horse, he retrieves his hat and slaps it against his body, raising a dirty cloud.   Usually he’s shaking his head.

The bull lunges forward, and the men in the arena
leap for safety

Wouldn't guess this animal could act like a kangaroo!

Must be a bull's version of Twist & Shout

Most of the cowboys wear cowboy hats, but some of the contestants wear crash helmets.  They can take some mighty dangerous falls.

Look at the helmet this bull rider is wearing.
He also has a protective vest.
This is not a sport for the faint-at-heart.

If the cowboy lasts on board that monster for the requisite number of seconds, the two riders come alongside, and the cowboy slips behind one and is taken to safety. 

Sometimes that bull is an angry, moving mountain of muscle and not amenable to being coaxed into the exit chute, or he might really get dangerously close to the cowboy.  It’s then that the rodeo clowns come to the rescue.  Those guys move like greased lightning, and we see bulls chase them right up and over the railings—you remember with the signs warning against climbing! 

A helmet and a protective vest, but it's the rodeo clown who is the
real savior.  And look at the guy with the brace on the knee.
Wonder what the story is there.

It’s a tough way to make a living.  And it must be a “late-bloomer” sport as four of the top bull riders in the entire country’s rodeo circuit are in their 40’s.  What happened to the rest of them????

Each of the events has its own kind of excitement, but always, always, the event is fast.  Single and double rider calf roping takes place in under six seconds.  What is amazing is the way the horse and cowboy work together to keep the rope taut.  The horse is an equal part of the team whether it’s a one man event or a two-cowboy event.

Once lassoed, the cowboy jumps down while the horse keeps
a taut rope, and the cowboy ties the calf's legs together.
Imagine doing this all day to brand the new calves in the herd.

In the 2-man, one cowboy lassos, and the other ties.  If the first man
misses, the game is over for them.

Bucking broncos---just a few seconds.  Those horses leave the ground and leap to incredible heights, backs bowed and cowboys flapping like paper cut-out dolls.  Tremendous strength and over 1,000 pounds of propelling muscle beneath each leap.  Add the twisting, and you can see how skillful these cowboys are. 

The your usual find for a trail ride, huh?

The cowgirls competing in barrel racing show just how communication between horse and rider is tantamount.  Look at the lean in that horse as he rounds the barrel.  They come out of the chute full speed, round the barrels in a pattern, and race back to the exit chute. Every one of the competitors finishes the course in less than 15 seconds.  It’s an event made of superior horsewomanship and unbridled fearlessness and trust. 

If you are anywhere near Davie, Florida, check out the schedule to see if the rodeo is coming to town.  Get there early and enjoy the leisure before the events because once it starts, things happen very quickly!!!

FRIDAY'S FOTO--SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY

Here I am in the courtyard of Doris Day's beautiful Cypress Inn
in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California.  Beautiful boutique hotel.

AIR TRAVEL MUSINGS

by Stuart Mills

Getting through airport hassle may make flying a chore, but nothing can rob me of the slightly nerve-wracking thrill of speeding down the runway guessing when lift off will occur and when we will swiftly rise to places man has only been reaching for a bit more than a century.  The Wright brothers flew in 1903, and the first commercial flight was in 1914.  It's only 2015 now. That’s not a lot of time to accomplish so much.  I don’t want to miss that tremendous sense of history and wonder each time I board. 

In my favorite classic movies like the seasonal joy White Christmas, travel is by train.  So many of the 1940s and 1950s movie intrigues begin on trains or ocean liners—meeting strangers, witnessing murders, falling in love.  And then travel began to change.

My grandmother was an old lady wintering in Florida before she ever flew.  My mother didn’t leave the ground until she was middle-aged.  I boarded for the first time at 16, and as the plane made that tilted turn above La Guardia Airport in Queens, I saw the wing dip, dip, dip over the water, and my nails dug into my friend Edith’s hand leaving deep, red scratch marks.  My daughter, Allison, flew to at age 6 to Disneyworld, and my grand nephew, Theo, arrived in New York from Los Angeles when he was barely more than a month old.

What grand and wonderful changes these are.  We must remember to think of them.  We might complain of a bumpy ride, but just visit the Boeing Museum of Flight in Seattle, and you will learn that those in-pocket bags were not there for decoration.

photo attribution in corner

But back to my excitement.  Once airborne, I don’t ever want to get over my amazement of clouds.

As we leave Boston’s Logan Airport on this trip, we rise into high cloud cover.  Total white out.  Thick and blinding.  White—all the colors combined so that we see no color.  Nothing. 

Then suddenly without warning, we break through the blanket of cloud.  We are above it. The man in the seat in front of me quickly pulls down his shade because the sun is so bright it hurts his eyes, blinding him for the moment.  I squint a bit at the reflection of light off the brilliantly white clouds, but I don’t want to miss anything.  On the horizon, if there is such a thing in the sky, at what appears to be the end of the clouds’ flatness there is a brilliant cerulean blue area, straight across with a fairly even width, and above that oasis of blue, the whitest clouds surround.  It’s quite a fantasyland up here.

On this JetBlue flight to Cancun, a 4.5 hour flight from Boston, I have to marvel at our speed as we quickly cross thousands of miles.  I think of pioneers in Conestoga wagons or frontiersmen on foot.  How far we’ve come in our ability to wander the world.

I love the live map on my seatback screen tracing our plane’s progress.  Talk about a shrinking world right before my eyes.  We are at an altitude of 34,453 feet, flying at 423 miles per hour.  It feels as if we are barely moving.  Think of that and how 55 mph is the speed limit on many roads—70 mph if you’re lucky. 

Sometimes it might seem easier to gripe about a hassle in the airport, a late flight or a bumpy but safe descent and landing, but if you can use your imagination and think of how amazing the trip is and even how in a few years this might seem primitive, you might end up with a lighter heart and a smile.

FRIDAY'S FOTO

A peaceful day might mean a stroll the Morikami Japanese Gardens in Delray Beach, Florida
and pausing to listen to the sounds of the waterfall and feeling the serenity of the
green surroundings.