"Oh my God, that was so funny!" Canna yelled as she turned Pedro around and trotted away. "Let's do it one more time."
She lined Pedro up opposite me, and I lined Frenchie up opposite her. We grabbed our pool noodles under our arms and charged towards each other like jousting knights. As we approached the center, we began hitting each other with the colorful foam strings.
It was such a stupid game, but Canna and I loved concocting stupid games. There wasn't much to do in our small country town, so we had to use our imagination.
A few days prior, we'd had the exciting idea of filming an adaptation of Pride and Prejudice — with chickens. We thought it would be hilarious; the epitome of irreverence and wit. We drew storyboards and laid out each scene in detail. We somehow assumed the chickens would follow our cues and stay exactly on script.
Unfortunately, this was not the case. The film set was mayhem. Chickens were running around with handmade bonnets and top hats perched on their heads that slid down under their beaks. Feathers were flying everywhere. If we managed to get two chickens to stay still in a scene, they would wander off before we could do the entire voice-over. It was a disaster; a failure.
And so we decided to pivot to Pride and Prejudice — with rabbits! Canna only had three rabbits, so each rabbit had to play multiple roles. There was one particular scene where we dressed the female rabbit as Mr. Darcy and the male rabbit as Mr. Bingley. Halfway through the scene, Canna ran out from behind the old handheld camcorder, yelling, 'Mr. Bingley! Stop! Stop mounting Mr. Darcy!' We gave up after that.
"I think the boys are tired," I said. "Wanna take them home?"
"Yeah," Canna agreed as she swung Pedro around again, this time heading for the road.
Frenchie trotted forward to flank his friend. We wandered up towards the mountain where Pedro's paddock resided, and where Frenchie was also staying for the week. The horses knew where they were going: home. They knew that home meant hay, and munching fresh grass, and hosing, and brushing, and frolicking, and rolling in the mud. We could feel their pent up anticipation in the reigns as they waited for our signal.
"Ready?" Canna asked.
"Ready," I said as I turned Frenchie onto the grass strip leading up the mountain.
We both looked at each other, leaned forward, and took the tension off the reigns.
All that potential energy exploded in a flurry of hooves as the horses bolted home.
