Got Lucky

Soon I will be submitting a story I wrote about Ransom to an anthology of horse stories. It’s about my childhood dreams of having my own horse and how Ransom fulfilled them. As I wrote about the experience of buying my first horse, I realized that on the surface, it looks like I did a lot of things wrong.

Here’s my confession: I bought the one and only horse I went to look at. I didn’t ride him. I didn’t vet check him. One of my horse friends says, “You got lucky he worked out.” In my defense: I knew what I wanted. He was barely broke and there was no riding area. I wasn’t buying an expensive performance horse.

Still, I can see how it would look foolish and risky to others. At the time it was a leap for me too. But I wasn’t a novice. And I just knew.

I did the same thing with each car I’ve purchased. I decided on a make/model based on consumer reliability ratings, researched the value, and then watched Craigslist everyday – waiting for the right deal. That usually took a couple months. But when the right one showed up, I was ready to seize it.

The story doesn’t always reflect how much planning I put into big decisions, especially when finances are involved.  Buying the first thing you see sounds spur of the moment. Ransom was anything but. I had a checklist: breed, age, training, disposition, location, and price. It took me a week to even convince myself to go see him. During that time I arranged for the company of a knowledgeable friend, a trailer if I needed one, and took a hard look at my finances to see if this was feasible long term.

Perhaps my desire to do it right the first time is driven by a fear of failure. Or maybe it’s just to save the hassle of the search process. Either way, I did get lucky.