Second thoughts, seconds too late

The Houston Livestock Show & Rodeo has been an annual occurrence in my life for as far back in my life as I can recall. I was taken there as a child, patted cow noses, ate cotton candy, walked among goats and piglets at the petting zoo, and rode the ponies. Later, I graduated to the concerts and the actual rodeo, bucking broncs and barrel racers, ad nauseum.

For the past several years I've had colleagues in town for this Houston event. Colleagues from London or Sydney, Paris, where have you. When they hear rodeo, they have to go. Because in their minds, they have to see it in real life. Which is to say that in their minds, this is what we do with our free time in Texas, we gnaw on Turkey legs while riding our Quarter horses through our back 40 and counting the dollars spewing from our oil wells. And if those horses are bucking sky-high, well then, since we're Texans and by boot-scooting nature, uber-cool, we just calmly sit back in the saddle and holler out for a friend to toss our way another Lone Star beer. Because that's how life is here in Texas. Bring it on.

This year, I attended from a different perspective. This year, I went with locals, so to speak, to the Longhorn Sale. Um, excuse me, I should have written, The Texas Longhorn Breeders Association sale. Don't mess with that name. No matter where you live, or more importantly your long-horned cattle live, the breed is still Texas Longhorn. We love our state, we do. And if you let us get away with it, we'd love to put our name on your state as well. It's serious, this Texas Longhorn stuff, serious enough to show your colors through buying a Longhorn (ahem, Texas Longhorn) pendant and wearing it around your neck in a spot where many women wear a heart or a cross or whatever, but pendants less oops-I-just-gave-myself-a-tracheotomy (aka, horn-less) all the same.



I was there Saturday night, but for the first time, did not go to the rodeo. Which is kind of cool. Because there is so much stuff going on outside of the broncs and barrel racers, the concert and ridiculously expensive beer stands, so much activity behind the main attraction, that when you are invited to witness it and get to enter Cowboy City via a side entrance and a screaming yellow Exhibitor pass hanging from your rearview mirror, you start to feel as if you belong, even though you had to dust your boots off since you haven't worn them since you went to the rodeo last year. After watching Lots 11, 14 and 22 auctioned off, our lots, mind you, we walked through the complex and petted Llamas, Alpacas and a wonderfully large-headed, fluffy-eared donkey named Jackson. Then we went to the Carnival, which is to say that at that moment, I left all my sense and sensibility back with a donkey named Jackson who has if not the good sense to lock himself up when the sun goes down, then at least sense enough to let someone else do it for him. To save him from himself, you follow me?

This picture here, this is of my friend and me, taken moments before our carnival ride started and I found myself in a chair spinning around and around at the end of a mechanical arm that was also spinning around and around, and shooting us forward at each turn, which since we were going around in circles, was every second. The ride is called Remix. When we walked up to it, I thought that from the music that was playing, it sort of made sense in an 80s music scene sort of way -- Red Hot Chili Peppers, Tom Petty, Missing Persons, etc. -- and I was all for a loop around the music. But soon enough I realized that the name had nothing to do with music but instead meant remixing my insides, as in my heart moved to my throat and my lungs below my bladder, and my stomach, well that left the picture altogether. This smiling, ignorantly blissful and happy photo was taken just moments before we were launched into spinning circles of hell above the crowd, circles spinning so fast and around that all I could think or say (okay, scream out loud with all my lung power) was BAD IDEA! OH MY GOD, SUCH A BAD IDEA!

When the ride was finally over and we were able to get out of the torturous bindings, I stepped off the platform with very unsure foot. I thought about my family and my home and my dog. I thought about the clean linens on my bed. I pictured Jackson in his stall, safely munching his hay. And I realized how happy I was to be alive.

You probably think I'm kidding.