I have two goddaughters, Jessica, at 14, is torn between eventing and cheerleading. Emma, age 16, is a veteran of national dressage competitions. It goes without saying that they are both terrific horsewomen, but they can be a bit blasé at times about the horse scene.

When both decided to spend a long weekend with me in Somerville, Tenn., in December, to ride in a dressage clinic given by a traveling German guru, I was thrilled. We planned to do the clinic in the mornings, regroup, hit the mega mall in the next town by noon, graze through enough junk food at the food court to sustain us through six months of healthy eating, then see the latest movies at the mall or browse the stores and return home in time to feed the horses.

All went as planned until we were hauling back on Monday, the last day of the clinic.

“What’s a Christmas Parade?” Emma asked from the back seat of the dually.

“What? Jessica turn down the CD. Sorry. What did you say?”

“Back there. There was a poster for a Christmas Parade on a telephone pole. I thought there was something about horses on it.”

I took a deep breath. “Really?”

“Yes, ma’am. I’m sure it said like, uh, bring your horses or something.”

“It said what, Em? Where was it?” Jessica stopped texting and swiveled in the front seat to look at Emma.
“Back there. Where we turned.”

I sat up straighter.

“No, before you ask, I am not turning the truck and trailer around so you can read the poster.” I started praying hard to all the saints and Mary because I knew what was coming.

“So, what is it? A horse thing with costumes or something?” Emma asked.

“Well,” I swallowed, hard, “it’s a little parade the town has every year with bands and floats and a few of the local horse people ride.”

Every Thing A Good Parade Should Have
I lied. The Christmas Parade is huge. Like many small southern towns we don’t have a Fourth of July Parade. It’s too hot in July to either parade down Main Street or stand in the sun and watch others parade down Main Street. Instead, we have a Christmas Parade, with dozens of every thing a good parade should have, especially horses, all decked out in red and green.

Except me. In the 15 years I have lived here I have never ridden in the Christmas Parade. My husband Calvin rides, but I just watch. It’s a fear of embarrassment phobia thing I have. I fixate on “What if” scenarios like, “What if Jaz decides to do a whirl-a-gig move, and I end up on my bum?” Or, “What if Jaz calls to his pasture buds all the way around the square, or does the nervous piaffe—you know, the movement that alternates bucking with piaffe—while everyone rides by staring at me?” I become a wreck just thinking about the “What ifs,” so, I don’t ride.

“Ma’am?” Jessica prodded.

“Excuse me. I was thinking of something else.”

“I said, is it like a costume parade with horses? Because if it is we just HAVE to go!” Jessica snapped her phone shut and looked at me with that Disney teen movie look: wide eyed, innocent, winsomely beguiling.

“We are going to ride in it, aren‘t we? The sign said it was tomorrow.”

“Em, you’ll be back home tomorrow. You have school. Both of you will. It’s just a little parade.” I added the Apostles to my prayer and tried unsuccessfully to backpedal the conversation to that morning’s clinic rides.

To my horror, by the time we got back to barn, Jessica and Emma had: 1. Called their mothers and gotten permission to skip school and ride in the Christmas Parade as long as Calvin and I both rode with them; 2. Sent texts to all their friends extolling the “sooo coolness” of the parade; and 3. Made up a list of “to dos” for maximum parade enjoyment on Emma’s Blackberry.

I was trapped. The girls had turned from nonchalant horse show veterans to squealing 8-year-olds because of a poster.

Rather than succumb to my fast approaching panic attack, and hoping for some sympathy given the state I was in, I called Calvin and told him he had to ride with us instead of his Quarter Horse friends. Like most women I always feel safer with a cowboy in tow.

He asked me to put the camcorder on the charger and make sure we had a new memory card so he could record EVERYTHING. So much for my John Wayne fantasy.

The Preparation
I spent a sleepless night imagining everything that could happen to me at the parade the next day. Every scenario ended with me turning beet red while being stared at by a crowd of otherwise perfectly nice people who had momentarily turned into Chuckies.

About 4 a.m., I decided it might be better to ride my mare Totally Weezle, because on a 16-hand bay, whatever happened, I would be less noticeable than on a 17.1-hand, bright orange Oldenburg.

The girls, of course, slept like stones.

Around 11 a.m., I decided to have my hair and nails done. Regardless of the humiliation that awaited me, I would look good. Jessica and Emma told me they planned to spend the afternoon washing and braiding all three horses, re-cleaning all our tack, and deciding what to wear, so I should “take off and get beautiful!”

“After all, everything needs to be perfect. We may never do this again in our young lives!” Emma said gravely, before the giggles took over.

When I got back, the horses were tied in their stalls with hay nets. Jessica and Emma’s horses sported button braids with little red and green bows, checkerboard patterns with glitter accents on their rumps and sparkly glitter hooves. Weezle, however, had silver stars sewn into her braids, giant glitter stars on her rump, a silver swath in her tail and gold sequins glued on her hooves. She looked like a horse from Rivendell on steroids.

“Where did you get the glitter and stuff?” I said, imagining Weezle flitting around the square like a giant, four-legged Tinkerbell while the crowd, now including Brides and Kids of Chuckie, stared at me.

“Ma’am? Oh, Calvin took us to the craft shop in town. Look at the felt antlers for our horses and elf hats we got to wear over our helmets!”

“And cute bell bracelets and earrings for all of us!” Jessica chimed in.

“Calvin said riding in the Christmas Parade was the opportunity of a lifetime, and we needed to make the most of it!
We also got you a wand thing with a silver star that sort of twinkles on and off. Calvin said you hadn’t ridden in the
parade before because you didn’t have a scepter!” Emma looked sublimely innocent as she related this last bit.
I was done for. Kaput. Nothing that happened to me in front of the crowds around the courthouse square could top me on Weezle just walking along with my wand twinkling on and off.

The Day Arrives
So, we loaded up and went to the Christmas Parade.

The blow off from the cotton trailers that haul through town in November still lined the streets like leftover snow,
and all the Christmas lights around the courthouse square blazed. Emma and Jessica got to see most of the parade as we waited our turn to move out: the cotton, corn and soybean floats, the marching bands, the dignitaries in a fleet of Elvis-era Caddie convertibles, the homemade, three-wheeled car leading the antique paddy wagon and fire truck while the new fire truck inched along behind running its siren on low every few minutes.

When the barbershop quartet backed by a gospel choir rolled by on a flatbed trailer pulled by two Percherons, Emma and Jessica clicked pictures with their phones. Ditto the blue and gray clad Civil War reenacters with camp followers and supply wagons. They clapped when the trailer with the enormous bucking bull
from the local rodeo company finally pulled out with a police escort.

They oooed and ahhed as an eight-horse Streamliner cruised slowly by with the heads of the royalty of the southern horse world, the Tennessee Walking Horses, sticking out; then cheered when the Pony Club polocrosse team jogged by followed by a horse club in Aussie dusters and drovers hats on flat-shod walking horses.

And then it was our turn. The hunt club contingent with hounds, tails wagging at the speed of light as they wandered from the horses to the crowd, moved out, and we followed after a few horses’ lengths. Behind us was a new quail hunting wagon with pointers and their owners pulled by a four-mule hitch and behind that groups of Quarter Horses and flat-shod pleasure riders as far as we could see.

The girls’ horses walked along like well-trained police horses on the Broadway beat in New York: ears perked,
looking for kids to come out of the crowd to pat their necks. Emma waved to the crowd and clicked pictures while Jessica alternated waving and texting.

Weezle lived up to her valley girl name. She cruised along like it was Saturday at the mall, for sure. I surprised myself by being euphoric. My mind was a complete blank. No “What ifs” at all intruded as we rode around the square. It was magical, but I don’t think I’ll do it again. What if it’s not the same next year? 

Bunny O’Connell