I coined a new phrase this morning: bite and flight. The coinage comes, thanks to a horse with big teeth and a bad aim. Instead of taking a chunk out of Heather's hide while I led her from her stall to the barnyard, Lily missed and grabbed ahold of my shoulder.
I can tell you that having some extra layers of clothes saved me from worse pain. Don't know if I'll have a bruise to show for it, but it did hurt, immediately. And, immediately, Lily, realizing the errors of her aim, jumped to the rear of her her box stall and stood, obviously paralyzed with fear of the consequences.
She knew trouble was coming, and poor Heather wondered about all the fuss as I wheeled around, trying to keep ahold over her lead rope while grabbing a tool for discipline. I'll let you guess what that was, but I'll tell you it never touched Miss Lily but it sure as heck scared the beejeebers out of her.
In all my short-lived but intense pain, I could not help but almost chuckle out loud at what a wuss my big, alpha mare can be. She knew she'd been had, and if she could have squeezed all of her 1,200 pounds through a mouse hole in the floor, she would have done it. Lily does not like to be in trouble.
Anyway, the incident got me to thinking about a funny moment when---like Lily---I'd been "had" years ago and there was nothing I could do but hang my head, keep my mouth shut and bear with the stern lecture I fully deserved.
This story came up yesterday when my sisters, my brother Mike and I were sitting around Mother's dining room table, talking about our childhood bus behavior and some of the discipline measures used by bus drivers back in "the day." In one case, our bus driver never had to say anything to get our attention when we were being bad.
He simply slammed on the brakes. Ever had your mouth and teeth meet with those metal frames on the back of the bus seat in front of you. I have. Straightened my behavior up and fattened my lip in a hurry, I'll tell you.
The bus driver would have been sent to jail had he employed such a measure these days.
Mike told of an incident where our neighbor Vic Hudon, an All-American high school football player and all-around nice kid, who never got in trouble, molded a rather large spit wad and shot it forward through the bus. His aim was much better than Lily's.
It landed dead center in the back of the brake-stomping bus driver's neck. Mike can't remember if the driver slammed on the brakes or not, and it could be he never learned who the perpetrator happened to be.
I watched spit wads fly through the bus for years. It was great fun as long as one didn't land on me. As I matured, I gradually felt the need to establish myself as a full-fledged imp like my brothers who had graduated from high school by then.
So, I took to bringing rubber bands on board and pieces of paper for the after-school trip home. The bus ride was usually about 45 minutes cuz we went Baldy Road, Gooby Road, Great Northern Road and finally to the corner of Boyer and Woodland Drive before I got off at night for a short walk to our house.
I had a great time for a couple of days, aiming and occasionally hitting my target, always making sure that nobody knew who the shooter was. Or so I thought.
I found out shortly into my spit wad assaults that a few people knew my identity, namely two sisters much younger than I, but they said nothing to me.
They told their mother. Their dad happened to be an Idaho State cop, but for some reason, they felt their mother had more clout with yellow-bus spit-wad snipers.
Their mother also happened to be our afternoon paper deliverer, back in the days when the Spokane Chronicle still came to most of our homes.
I had just gotten home from school one afternoon when we all noticed that the paper lady had changed her usual route. Instead of stopping at the paperbox, dropping off the afternoon daily and moving on, she bypassed the paperbox and drove straight into the driveway.
My mother saw her coming and went to the back door. She handed my mother the paper, walked right past her into the house and found me standing in the living room.
"Don't you ever shoot spit wads at my daughters again," she lectured, along with a few other warnings. I said nothing cuz I knew I'd been had. Then, she turned around walked out and left my mother standing there with her mouth hanging open.
I never shot spit wads again-----on the school bus anyway. And, later those same sisters had me for a teacher. Fortunately they never held my past discretion against me, and we enjoyed a great friendship.
Seems like the short and sweet of dealing with the "bite and flight" or "shoot; then turn mute" has instant impact and takes care of a lot of problems later.
Still, I think I'll be a little more careful while I pass by Lily's box stall in the mornings.
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