Welcome to the West as I see it

The Christ in Christmas
By Julie Carter

At daylight on an icy, snowy Christmas morning, my dad went to the barn to do the usual daily chores. He was also keeping a secret there and the secret needed to be watered and fed.

Hidden in our barn was a coal black Shetland pony he’d ended up with in one of his horse trades. He had sold a perfectly good 2-year-old bay gelding for some Christmas cash and somehow ended up with this “prize” pony as part of the deal.
My dad hated ponies, believing that if you wanted to ride, you should ride a real horse and there were plenty of those around.

That point was driven home, literally, when the pony unloaded him on Christmas morning when he rode him bareback to the creek for water.

Landing hard on his jean pockets on the frozen ground left my dad with a broken tailbone that offered a painful reminder of his horse-trading abilities for months to follow.

While my dad provided many opportunities for memories during my formative years, there isn’t a Christmas day I don’t think about that incident and the many years that followed with the black pony adventures.

That simple, almost accidental, gift to us children became a memorable bookmark in our childhoods through many seasons.

I look at my children and wonder what parts of a tradition-filled holiday do they remember?

I’m sure there are individual stories for them, too, but generally, they remember the traditional things passed through generations of our family.
My teenage son tops his list with family get-togethers and big dinners.
Food to fuel a growing boy’s stomach is still a big part of his priority list.

However, with that is the delight in having the relatives gathered in one place.

My daughters recall the traditions they now carry on with their children.
A cookie-decorating event, a family tree-trimming night, making grandma’s recipe for homemade caramels and peanut brittle, the hanging of the stockings designed and sewed by grandma and the arranging of the traditional Christmas village.

A family favorite for generations has been the nativity display, complete with real straw to litter the barn floor and a light to represent the
star in the East.

Bringing forth the solemn wonder of Christ’s birth was, and is, as much part of our tradition as any one thing. Unlike the Christmas pony, it was not an accidental gift.

It is the one true gift that has kept on giving.

Political correctness makes every effort to sterilize the season by making it improper and, in places, even illegal to use the term “Merry Christmas.” It is only a matter of time before they realize their “Happy Holidays” is only a version of “Happy Holy Days.”

Somewhere in all the red and green everything, the masses of lights and never-ending glitter, it is important for us, as individuals, as a family and as a nation, to hold on to the true meaning of the season. The Christ in Christmas.

I never was very politically correct.

Merry Christmas!

About two blinks ago, he was a little redheaded cowboy with a big grin, dragging a rope behind his denim bottom and cowboy boots complete with jingling spurs.

Today, Taos Muncy is living his dream, having achieved the ultimate for a cowboy — competing at the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas, Nev.

Taos has become a hero for every little cowboy and most of the big ones left back at home in Lincoln County, New Mexico.

“Wow, Mom,” my son said after watching Taos win his first check ($4,230.77) in the second round of the finals. “It’s pretty exciting that somebody we know from right here could do something so good and really be there.”

Taos thought he had qualified for his first National Finals Rodeo and that was all there was to it. I’m sure he doesn’t yet know his achievement has spawned hope and belief in the possibilities of life beyond junior high school.

Prior to his 2005 graduation from Corona High School, Taos had already set in motion a cowboy’s dream to make it to the top. Racking up more than a dozen all-around high school rodeo titles his senior year, it became very clear he was accomplished, driven and had learned how to handle the pressures of competing and the grace of winning.

Working both ends of the arena, the rough stock and roping events, Taos was the true definition of an all-around rodeo cowboy. His ranch-raised cowboy roots and a family of rodeo genetics were paying off. He went to college in the fall of 2005 on a rodeo scholarship in four events – bareback riding, saddle bronc riding, tie-down roping and
team roping.

For a cowboy, qualifying for NFR is first on the dream list, winning a world championship when you get there tops the dream with a gold crown, or in this case, the gold buckle. Achieving the former has made the later a possibility for Taos in the saddle
bronc riding.

The gold buckle is within reach for this NFR first-timer and, undoubtedly, that fact will test his ability to handle the pressure.

As I write this, the seventh of the ten rounds is complete and Taos has picked up three more checks, two of which were for first place at $16,394 each. He has totaled $41,250 in seven days and made qualified rides on six of his seven horses.

That has moved him to second in the average making his year-end total, to date, $150,628.17. Not bad wages for a kid who is also a full time college student, a junior and member of the college rodeo team at Oklahoma Panhandle University.

With three more rounds to go, three more horses to ride to the whistle, a lot can still happen, but whatever happens, Taos got there.

There seems to be little doubt this will be the first of many NFRs for Taos. However, the grin he wears when he walks away from a winning ride, this first time, is priceless.

When he stands in front of the ESPN cameras and answers the interviewer’s questions, his humble, well-mannered raising is evident but the adrenalin rush seems almost to have him walking above the ground.

Yes, little cowboys, you can have a dream, and it can come true.

Click link for photo of Taos.

Taos at the National High School Finals in 2005