Cowboys don’t ride bicycles.
Well, not typically, but we know a cowboy and cowgirl, who ride rough country roads on a daily basis. “More exercise than our horses,” they claim. We disagree, but will acknowledge bicycling is better than walking, if a horse isn’t available.
Hate to admit it, but we had a bicycle before we owned a horse. Anticipation was high when our parents brought the bike to our cousin’s farm at Beman. It was a Firestone, with a back seat, saddle bags, basket, horn, handle streamers and lights. Clumsy us wrecked it on the first ride. We hadn’t fallen off our cousin’s horse, Sandy, earlier in the day.
Too young to ride the bicycle to school, we rode it around the city block many times daily. Oddly enough, when we got our first horse in the fifth grade, we started riding our bike to school. We would get our cowboy friend and take him to and from school, too. If we hurried at dinner, we had time to go ride our first horse, Spot, before afternoon class.
Still have a twinge of fondness for bicycles, although it’s been years since we’ve ridden. Today’s bikes, with skinny tires, gear shifts and hand brakes, look nothing like the one we had. Bicycling is admirable and good for the health. It’s quite a feat to pedal coast to coast or even all day from city to city. We wouldn’t make it around the
section.
Problem is: bicycles scare horses. Not all of them, but we’ve found that many horses, for some reason, are alarmed, panic and will even run off when a bike passes our riding pasture. Bicycles frighten certain horses more than motorcycles or noisy trucks.
Last week in our car, we passed what looked like a farmer riding his bicycle down the major highway with his dog trailing behind. We almost didn’t see them. He and many bicyclers don’t wear appropriate clothing or have alert mechanisms to help motor vehicle drivers see them. That’s dumb. No one should ride a bicycle without reflective attire.
Somebody said meditative prayer is a way of prayer that approaches God faster. “It is like going by bicycle,” they claimed. About the only way to be much closer to nature and God than riding a bicycle is on a horse. Time spent pedaling is perfect for meditating a prayer such as a Psalm or just breathing a simple: “Oh my God, I love you.”
According to Isaiah 35:8: “And an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called The way of holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it; but it shall be for those: the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein.”
It’ll be an easy ride as in Isaiah 40:4: “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and rough places plain.”
+++ALLELUIA+++