Mi llama es Taco
by Julie Carter
“Hola, amigos. Mi llama es Taco. I once
had another name, but when I got a new home, I got a new name and a new
profession.”
Some of you may remember Taco the
Border Horse. I told his story a long time ago, but like most legends, a
re-telling keeps the legend alive. As before, the story is really better told
by Taco himself, but let me set it up for him.
At the time we met, Taco was in
training to be an ace speed-demon team roping horse on the heels end of the
roping steer. But for you to understand who he became, he first needs to
establish his credentials from his previous employment.
The story according to Taco goes like
this:
“When I was a colt, starting out my
working life, I was known as Chapo Bueno. In the language spoken in Mexico, that
was a quite a compliment. It means “good pony.”
I was born of purebred Spanish Hidalgo
bloodlines. This was evident in my beautiful coat, flowing mane and tail and my
kind intelligent eyes.
At an early age, I was partnered to
Jose Maria, the top vaquero on a large cattle ranch. Jose loved me and taught
me patiently the ways of cattle and how to work them. We worked hard, made
mucho dinero for the patrón and I became known as a top mount.
As it was in ranching everywhere at the
time, grass became short in Mexico. The patrón asked Jose to do a little night
work taking wet cattle across the river to Texas to sell. Of course, Jose took
me, his top horse, to help get the cattle across the river.
We pushed them hard by moonlight, laid
them up by day, and in the seven days it took to get them all across the river,
we had no trouble. In this fashion, we shipped all the cattle belonging to the
patrón.
At the end of the cattle drives, the
patrón thought that since Jose and I were so good at being border bravos, we
should continue our night riding with a little different contraband. Jose was
reluctant to be on the other side of the law, and I was insulted to be asked to
carry a packsaddle. However, it was work and we needed work.
Our good luck deserted us on our first
run with the contraband as La Migra gathered us in at the border. Jose patted
me, told me goodbye, and slipped off into the night. The other horses and I
were taken into custody, the drugs taken to the police station and later we
were taken to auction.
When I was arrested, I was wearing a
packsaddle so no one knew of my ability as a top cow horse. For this reason, I
was sold for a pittance to a kind man who could see only my plight. This man
had a good friend in Texas and I was soon sent there. Fortunately, he spoke
Spanish and taught me the basics of English. We got along fine.
When I first arrived, I made a few
mistakes. One of those was that I ate all the briars along his fence line. He
explained that in Texas, it was customary to feed me hay and grain.
The man began teaching me to be his heeling
horse. He soon recognized that my cow
horse athletic abilities were an advantage for us both. My royal heritage
afforded me the perfect conformation to be outstanding in this new profession.
There remained a few mysteries about
this new life that I had yet to understand, like why the roper named me Taco, but
at any rate, I was happy to have a home. I decided as long as I got oats, he
could call me anything he wanted.”
As Taco progressed in his career, he
was indoctrinated into the mindset that winning the world was paramount but if
that didn’t happen, just doing well at the task before him made the feed bucket
show up quicker. Team roping comes with that basic mentality.
I’m not sure what became of Taco as he
faded in the sea of rope horses tied to the fence at a million roping arenas in
Texas. But we should not forget that at one time he was worthy of being called
Chapo Bueno.
Life can sometimes can take us down a
notch and the world will call us “Taco” but it doesn’t change who we are at
heart.
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