Mr. Brown - The horse that cried - Conclusion

I put him away and sat down on my tack steps, where to begin? I have no idea, yet I did have a feeling start to come over me that I knew I was going to have to honor. If this fellow that brought this horse to me is the same person that has done this thing to him, then there is no way in hell I am going to take one step towards removing one ounce of his armor.

I am not going to help this horse trust again, help him open up and be vulnerable again, and listening again,, so that some jerk can stab him in the back again.

No! I will call this fellow and if I determine that he is the one, then I will tell him to come get his horse and I will send this guy home with all his defenses still in place, as braced as he came. And so I got up and walked to the house to make the call, he picked up at the first ring and I said, "John, I want to visit with you about your horse."

Sure he said , "What can I tell you ?" Well John I have been working with him a bit and was wondering if you could tell me a few things such as how long you have owned him, and what you are wanting to do with him? Sure he said, "I have owned him about a year, bought him from a horse trader near here and was just hoping to be able to start trail riding with my wife and perhaps to start someday roping a little, I have watched some of that and it looks like it might be fun."

That was all I needed to hear, this was not the person who had done this to Mr. Brown. John like so many horse buyers had simply inherited someone else's problems. I said thank you John, was just curious and without another word I hung up and walked to the barn thinking now what? Where do I begin with something so troubled as this? Trail horse? Roping Horse? I can't even ride him to the arena! Then it hit me.

Not one single part of that is important at this moment... the only thing that matters now is to help this fellow stop crying. Yet how? Until thirty minutes ago I had no conception that such a thing could even be possible, and now I need to try and figure out an answer? What techniques do I use? What tools? Where is there help for this problem? I realized that there were no tools, no techniques, and as far as I knew there was no one who could help me, and him. Help him stop crying,, help him stop crying. How? I did not have one single clue where to begin. I left him in his pen and decided to sleep on it, and in the night I awoke with one clear thought in my mind, he does not want to be this way and yet I cannot fix it for him, he has to find it within himself first.

My job is going to be to try to help the little horse inside that is hiding in the closet grow to fill out the hair that we have been looking at. By helping him to believe in himself, to believe again and to have faith again that if he will only look that he can find answers, and that the looking is really and truly the answer itself.

Trust does not matter at this moment, faith is what we are looking for, faith in himself, faith in the human race, faith in life. I gave up any and all goals with this horse, I said I have no goals, instead we have a direction , perhaps he will be able to see through to that.

My direction was to build the inner horse.

For three weeks I walked to his pen at least twice a day, haltered him and took him to the round corral. From that point I tore down the walls of everything I ever thought I knew about horses and horsemanship. It was a totally clean slate. I discovered how to communicate, how there are three steps to communication without words, and three steps only.

What I do, what he does, and what I do back, 1,2,3. Sometimes it is 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 3. Yet that is fine, he taught me that with an abused horse that we often times must wait for them to see the question, or else their fear makes them braced and blind.

I worked with him several times a day, catching him, taking him to the round pen and only working with him from the ground. Doing the best I could figure out to do to try and show him that there was actually sense in the world again. That if he would look he could find it, that there was some consistency and that someone was there to say "thanks" for trying.

Try... He had been so lost for so long, and it had been so long since this guy had tried that he had forgotten what it even looked like. I felt like a boy scout in the woods trying to light a fire with a tiny bit of moss and some damp wood.

I tried, and tried and offered and offered again until I began to doubt if he would ever see my reaching out. Until I one day saw what looked like a tiny little bit of smoke... I gently blew on it with the most careful of breaths, I knew too hard and it would go out and not enough it would die. Day after day I would walk into his stall and there would be the wooden Indian standing in the exact center of his stall, facing the gate with his head up looking over my shoulder at a horizon a million miles away.

I kept gently blowing at the glow, hoping. Three weeks, several times a day this never changed. Some days were better than others, I started to understand the ebb and flow of brace and softness. Far more ebb than flow, yet if I could even trick myself into imagining that I felt some softness often times that would be enough and I would tell him thanks and put him away with a scratch.

Three weeks without any real change, until one morning I am walking with a halter down the line of stalls to actually go catch another horse when I saw something I couldn't believe.

There sticking out over his gate is a big brown head looking at me with a soft eye as if to say "Where ya been all morning?" It was Mr. Brown. I was absolutely stunned to a stop, what had happened to the wooden Indian with the frozen vacant eye? This eye looked sticky as bubble gum it was so soft. So instantly my plans changed, I instead just stopped at the gate and with his head hanging over I haltered him. Perhaps it was my imagination but it felt like he actually lowered his head into the halter a bit as well.

I led him to the tack room, not allowing myself to get ahead of the moment, but also noticing what was and wasn't happening. No hesitation,, no slight holding back just before I could reach the tie rail. I tied him and went inside for a brush, as I turned around I noticed his hip cocked and a foot resting on a toe. His head and neck were level with his shoulders and his eye, his eye was quiet, no tears.

I knew then that something great had happened in my life, I didn't know exactly what but I could feel that it was taking place in front of my eyes and I only hoped that I was going to be big enough to accept it.

I saddled Mr. Brown, and stepped on right there in front of the barn, he walked off like an old pro. I rode him to the arena, past the steers, and on out into the desert beyond. It was simply awe inspiring to me. I only had this fellow for another couple of weeks of training yet in that short time I started him on cattle and roping well enough that I felt John could possibly take it from there.

There is a strangeness about this story that strikes me even now years after it happened, I never actually knew the horses name, I simply started calling him Mr. Brown and have thought of him that way ever since. I have never had any follow up reports, and have never spoken to John since, nor would I know how to contact him. I mention this because I have told versions of this story several times before at my clinics, and people invariably ask me with some wonder "you mean you never found out his name?"

No I did not, and it has never mattered to me at all... You see in my heart whatever his name was before I met him did not matter, that was simply what the horse was called that was crying.

The horse I got to know startled me with his courage, the courage to be vulnerable again, to open up and trust again, to believe in himself and in humans again. The horse I got to know showed me something that I had never considered possible in a horse, and he showed me how I could use some of the bricks around my heart to build a foundation under his. This horse without a name showed a pretty tough cowboy that he could be softer, and be stronger for doing so.

I don't need to know what they called him when he came, in my mind, and in my heart he will always be Mr. Brown.

Sincerely,
Craig Hamilton

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