Chapter from: Not Quite Kosher

Nathaniel Robert “Bob” Winters
Dude
If you called someone a dude in the 1970’s, it was a name of endearment, like, “Dude pass me that joint.” The most righteous dude of all had to be the first one to say, “Hey man, don’t bogart that joint, pass it over to me.” He had to be one stoned movie buff. Maybe he was the film critic for Rolling Stone magazine.
In 1961 at Ringo Ranch, being called a dude was the opposite of cool. It meant you were a city slicker and you don’t know a horse’s ass from the other end. Well we didn’t. The three of us, my brothers Fred, Doug and I, had never been near an equine. Somehow my parents thought it was a good idea to send us to a dude ranch on Lake Champlain in Vermont.
We joined eight other enrollees as well as an equal number of staff. It was a strange number of kids, not enough to play most camp games, like war or even baseball. So we had to find a different kind of routine. At first we were a bit uncomfortable but by the third week we relaxed and went with the flow. Horseback riding in the morning, swimming and lake activities in the afternoon.
I was a strong swimmer and I decided to swim the mile and a half across the lake. Accompanied by a staff member in a canoe, I made it about halfway and said to myself, screw this, and gave it up. Obviously, I needed more incentive, like a really cute girl on the other side. Oh well, I thought, halfway across the lake, that’s not too bad for an 11-year-old.
I know what you’re thinking; I was too young to be interested in cute girls. Wrong, I was always attracted to a pretty face. I didn’t have a clue what to do if I was with a girl, but I was interested.
When parent’s day arrived, the three of us were feeling pretty enthusiastic about this whole dude ranch thing. Mom and Dad were proudly watching their boys cantering along on their steeds when suddenly the big silver stallion broke loose from his corral.
Tramp, the stud, showing his full maleness, knew what he wanted to do with a mare. Unfortunately, he chose the appaloosa with Doug in the saddle. To my parent’s and my brother’s horror, Tramp mounted the already mounted horse. Just in time, an aware staff member sprinted up and pulled my panicking eight year old brother off the mare.
The next thing we knew, the three of us were slung in the back seat of the car headed home. We stared ahead, eyes wide open, silently shocked for quite a while. Then I heard myself say, “You could have been trampled by Tramp.”
Fred said, “Did you see the size of his thing?”
That broke the spell. The three of us started laughing hysterically. Even Dad laughed, then Mom. We all started to talk about Ringo Ranch, and everything was funny all the way home.
It would be many years an