Open the Gate!

Small town fairs are the best.  I like going to the larger county fairs for sure but in my opinion you can't beat a truly small town celebration.  We had the opportunity to enjoy such a time a couple of weeks ago when we attended Benton City Daze, our local community event.  We enjoyed the whole time but one event will stick with me for quite some time.  When we first heard that Benton City Daze was happening, the flyer said that there would be mutton bustin (sheep riding) for the little kids and calf riding for the older kids.  All three of my children were completely excited about the idea of riding these animals.  I was NOT so excited.  It was my thought that these kids didn't have a clue what they were signing up for.  I even told them, "You know, this isn't like the pony rides, where the thing walks along while you smile for pictures from mom."  All I got was "Pleeeeeeaaasssssee Daddy!".  Fine.  I wasn't worried so much that they might get hurt, they're pretty tough.  It troubled me more the psychological hurt that could happen.  LOL right now you're thinking I'm pretty wierd, and you're right.  Though I'm ashamed of it a little bit now, I was sure that they would chicken out once they climbed on these critters in the chute.  Not that that would bother me, but I didn't want them to feel "ashamed" of themselves if they got scared and the other kids went through with it.  Just a Dad over thinking everything. 
I soon found out that I was wrong and underestimated my children.  We arrived and got signed up and my daughter Zoey was the first to go.  She climbed right down onto the sheep and started the routine.  There was a young bull rider in the chute with her to get her all set up.  When she got all set up and ready to go, she looked pretty nervous but didn't say anything.  I asked her if she was alright and she said a resounding "Yep!".  I said just hold on as tight as you can and don't let go.  I had told all three of them the same thing, "It's your decision to ride and you can decide not to at any time, but you have to make the call.  When you're ready you have to look at the gate man and tell him 'Open the gate!'.  So I told Zoey everything was ready and we were waiting on her.  Immediately she hollered "Open the gate!."  That ol sheep took off outta there like a rocket but Zoey hung on and would not let go.  The sheep took a hard right and she slid off to the side but would not let go.  So at this point, my daughter was riding on the side of the sheep.  She continued to slide until she was directly under the sheep but she still held on.  The clown was chasing her hollerin,  "Let go, let go!"  Finally she dropped and that was done.  To my amusement she jumped right up and jogged across the arena like nothing had happened.  Job well done. 
There was no time to enjoy the moment for Dad though because, Isaac, my baby was up next.  As Isaac was sitting on his sheep preparing I could see that he was taking a completely different approach than Zoey.  His approach was ignorance.  That's right my three year old had absolutely no clue what was about to happen, and for that I felt kind of bad, but if I took him off the sheep at this point he would have cried all day, so gotta let him go.  I asked him, "You ready?".  He said "Sure."   He then said the magic words, "Open the gate."  Didn't take long for Isaac to find out this wasn't what he was expecting.  The sheep exploded out of the chute and little Isaac hung on like a trooper but only made it about two jumps before he flew off the sheep, face first into a pile of horse poop.  Nervous Dad was running right behind as Isaac rolled over, looked me in the eye, and held his hands out palms up and said to me, "I fell in poop!".  He's a trooper.  He stood up and walked out of the arena with his head held high.
 Next up was my oldest boy, Zane.  Now he was too big for one of the little sheep so he had to ride a bull calf.  I know my children pretty well and I could tell when Zane climbed down on that calf that he was genuinely scared.  Poor kid.  He couldn't back out now, his little sister and baby brother had just rode their critter, no way was he going to "chicken" out.  I said "It's your call, Zaner."  He looked up and said the words...... "Open the gate."  One jump, Zane had it licked.  And then that silly little calf put the brakes on and stopped, Zane kept going, flying straight over the top.  He flew about ten feet and belly flopped on the ground.  He popped straight up and jogged out of the arena and a relieved Dad met him outside the gate.
 It was over, they had all did their adventure ride and no major injuries.  As we sat and listened to them for the next couple hours it was fun to listen to their stories.  Nobody claimed victory over the other siblings for doing any better than the others, they were just all happy and proud.  It hit me that they didn't care that none of them made a "qualified" eight second ride, none of them knew what their score was they all just knew that they were really scared to do something and they had the courage to holler "Open the gate!"  That convinced me that my children had just learned a valuable life lesson.

As I thought about this story the other day, it brought me back to a decision we had recently made to move to a larger acreage farm and expand our business.  At the time the opportunity came to us, we didn't have any money to make the move let alone purchase extra animals and feed.  It just seemed like it was the right move for us.  We didn't quite know how it was all going to work out but we felt God was working in our lives and asking us to live faithfully.  We knew it was going to be incredibly difficult.  Just like I told my kids, "I don't think you understand what you are getting yourself into.", I felt that many of our friends were thinking the same thing about us.  We finally decided that this could be our only opportunity to move to a "real" farm and grow a sustainable operation.  We made the move.

No way of telling right now how this is all going to turn out.  We may be like Zoey and hang on to our dream refusing to let go while it drags us across the arena.  We may be like Zane and have our dream suddenly stop while we fly straight to the ground with a loud thud.  We may be like Isaac and not realize what we are getting ourselves into and land face first in a big old pile of horse poop.  But whatever happens, just like our children, one day when we look back on all this we can proudly say that we had the courage to holler, "Open the gate!"