Celebration 2004: An Intact Jack Experience
A tired Dwayne and a Cocky Corduroy pose for Official Photos
Well, our more experienced donkey showing friends had warned us about that first show with your herd sire, but being stubborn types we had to try it on for size ourselves! With a giant jar of Vick's Vapor Rub in hand (to confuse his nose so he couldn't get a whiff of all the pretty jennets), we set out for Shelbyville for the Great Mule and Donkey Celebration. One of our wiser decisions was to take ONLY our jack, Corduroy, and his Small Standard gelding companion, Scissors. Some of you may recall that Scissors is world-renowned for laying down in full harness and cart and playing dead! (Our second wisest decision was to NOT enter Scissors in any cart driving classes!)
Scissors Decides to Play Dead Rather Than Pull the Cart (Photo from June, 2003)
First, there was the trailer loading episode. Our jack has traveled only once, but being the adventurous guy he is, we thought he would jump right into the trailer. To compound this error in thinking, we had recently purchased the world's smallest mini-horse trailer, which he simply would not get in! We were unable to pick up Cordy, and Scissors would not get in first. After several hours of frustration, and knowing we were getting close to missing registration deadlines on the other end, we called our ever helpful neighbor and borrowed his twenty foot draft horse trailer! It was still a ridiculous feat trying to get these two into the huge trailer, but we finally managed. We felt crazy arriving with a trailer big enough for the Budweiser Clydesdales!
After barely meeting registration deadlines and being bone tired from the loading episode, we decided to give both donkeys a trial run in the large arena. Scissors immediately bolted when a donkey with a lime green sheet on trotted past him. He thought this was the scariest thing he had ever seen! Corduroy had never seen so many pretty jennets in his life, and jumped around like he was on fire, even with a nose full of the Vick's. Deciding that this "practice" session was not bolstering our confidence, we walked the donkeys back to their stall. On the way back, they acted like Green Acres goes to New York City. We had to laugh and remembered that this trip was just supposed to be "an experience" for these two donkeys.
Cordy Eyes Jennet Babes in Shelbyville
Things were not quite so funny when we got back to our barn and realized we had left our hay in the tiny trailer that the donkeys wouldn't load in! Thankfully, Joe and Dayle Haworth came to our rescue and graciously gave us enough hay to last the whole show. Their generosity restored our faith in the process, and we began to forget about the loading episode and our late arrival.
Amazingly, Corduroy did great in his first ever cart driving class. He didn't place, but that didn't matter. It was his first time in an arena with other donkeys and he had the heaviest cart out there. We were quite proud.
Cordy in His First Arena Driving Class
Scissors got sixth place in Adult Costume Class, which was an amazing accomplishment. Adult Costume is one of the most competitive and creative classes at the Celebration. He endured wearing a witch hat and carrying cauldrons and extra witch supplies for me. Corduroy was a rodeo bull but his horns kept falling off, creating all sorts of pandemonium. In true form, he blew all the Vick's out of his nose in the arena and acted like a total nut brain. Scissors decided he could finally show up his pal Cordy and brayed to the crowd and took bows. I had a mask on or you would have seen my astonishment! Later I was asked if I had taught him how to do this on command!
Dwayne as a Rodeo Clown and Cordy As a Bull (with horns falling off)
Marianne as a Witch and Scissors as Her Warlock
Although we had high hopes for our jack in the conformation classes, his lack of a tail did not seem to amuse the judge. He did place in ACOSA classes, so all was not lost.
Cordy Really Shows the Judge his Choppers (AND his parking brake :)
Our last day we had two classes in the same bracket, with Dwayne and Cordy in one class and Scissors and I in the other. The classes were supposedly four apart, so we thought we had time to return to the barn for Scissors, and that it would be easier for two of us to handle our jack while waiting so long. The short story is that several classes got canceled due to lack of entries, and when we returned to the ring with Scissors, we found he had missed his class. We pretended we won and took pictures anyway!!!
Marianne and Scissors Pretending They Didn't Miss Their Class
Cordy and Scissors still did not load (again!) when it was time to go, and some of our friends had to help us out. We returned home weary but with smiles on our faces, and the donkeys happily rolled in the dirt. We think next year we might show jennets!