It’s actually rather hilarious that I write about cattle, horses and things. 

Sure, we’ve had cattle on the place for the last 10 or 15 years, but we really haven’t run enough numbers to say we are experienced hands in it.  Yet I write like we are.

I’ve sat in the saddle a few times, and we have a horse on the place, I suppose for aesthetic appeal as much as anything.  I do well if I can stay astride and can’t do much more than that.  Yet I write like I know something about it.

And there are things that I hold important; things around the place, things in the house, and things that happen, that mean a lot to me.  And I write about them.  But you have things in your life too, so I really don’t need to clutter it up with my things.

Now that I’ve the disclaimers out of the way, I’ll rattle on.

I bought a used saddle from the local gettin’ place.  The guy told me he wasn’t so sure that crossbeam down the center wasn’t broken, so he let me have it at half price of half price.  He told me to be careful the first time I did any roping off of it.

I smiled out loud on the way home at his last remark.

Because once I got home, I made my way over to my neighbor, Ron, and had him show me how a person is supposed to buckle the thing onto a horse.  (I had to ask someone else how to put the bit in.)

Rope from it?  Ha.

Anyway, I got home and threw it across our horse’s back and proceeded to buckle it up.  I noticed she was grunting around a fair bit, and skittering this way and that.

I learned later that you never tighten up the back cinch, that most saddles don’t even have them, and that it’s a wonder she didn’t buck me right off then and there for tightening it like I did.

But I have retained a bit of know how about saddling up, and it’s so common sense I’m quite sure you will already know it.

Simply put, make sure your cinch is tight.  (The front one, that is.)

A cinch is a wide strap, usually made of numerous smaller pieces of rope, that swings under your horse’s ribs and up the other side to buckle in. 

Some horses know the trick and swallow a bunch of air when you place your knee up against their side and reef that belt through the buckle for all you are worth. 

It’s never a bad idea to make sure your cinch is tight a little while later once the air is gone from their lungs. 

You wouldn’t need to cinch up tight at all if you and your horse are both going in the same direction, at a general rate of speed.

But everything hits your face if you are going at a nice clip and you get in a storm; your horse sees something it thinks it should avoid and takes evasive action, you didn’t see it, and you are expecting to go a different way.

If your cinch isn’t tight, you and your saddle will do a neat little maneuver and you will be riding on your horse’s side instead of its back quicker than you can say Jack Sprat.

That’s okay if you know how to ride on its side; I’ve never perfected it myself.

It seems to me, that if you end up leaving your cinch loose, you will end up with trouble to yourself and your horse also.

And I’ve worked on just enough committees, and seen a little bit of life, to know that if you decide to make a selfish move that relieves yourself of some extra attention that you could give, that it ends up troubling yourself and at least one other person, if not more.

It always seems to pay, in the long run, to stop and check your cinch occasionally.  You are the only one who knows just how tight it is or should be.