“Chicken”: The Day Woody Met the Atlantic Ocean

I, Bernie Harberts, did not use generative AI to write or illustrate this article. Spell check and grammar check, yes. AI, no.

Pete Cochran’s fisherman’s shades make him look like he’s speeding all the time.

Which he is; running his Emerald Isle Stanley Steemer franchise and his Onslow County beer distributorship. But it’s more than just business; he’s got a family of five.

Somewhere between the Coors deliveries and stain removal (the secret is high pressure steam and solvent-free citrus oil concentrate) he managed to bring Woody and I to Emerald Isle.

Once again, Woody sailed across Intra Coastal in a borrowed trailer. He landed in Pete’s paddock with the family horses Flash and Amber. Amber kicked him in a flash and that settled that. The Cochrans treated me considerably better.

Actually they fell over themselves to make me feel at home.

“Bernie, the keys are in the truck,” Pete instructed me once I’d pitched the tent. I use the word “instructed” because it was an order: use the truck.

After three weeks on the road with Woody it felt grand rolling around in the massive white Ford pickup. Hey, check this out, we’re screaming along at thirty-five miles per hour! Wow! Hey, stop, stop! Food Lion! Peanuts! Ace Hardware! Silicone caulk! It’s the little things that give you the biggest charge out here. Like being able to walk into a store without having to wonder where you’re going to hitch the mule.

Your to-do list goes retro too. You live in a tent; it leaks. You stop the rain with a three dollar tube of caulk and suddenly all is well. You live off oatmeal and carrots, as I do, and a can of off-brand peanuts is a grand affair. Once the rush of sodium and silicone vapors wore off it was time to show Woody the Atlantic.

Woody, it seems, is a Capricorn. I don’t put any faith in the signs of the Zodiac but for stereotyping it’s handy. Capricorn: land animal. Pisces: water beast.

I’d gone to a fair bit of trouble orchestrating Woody’s grand dip in the ocean. First I tacked him with only the minimum of tack. I envisioned a romantic stroll through the waves where the waves swirled around Woody’s road weary legs then rising gently to the girth. It wouldn’t do to flood my saddle bags so I saddled him with the old cavalry saddle and the rear panniers.

Then, just on dawn I hacked him to the beach.

It was one of those Old Testament sunrises where the swollen dawn throbs through mobs of birds wheeling on a dark East. We made it across the dunes, past the sea oats blown flat. Through the band of powdery sand ghosting a grain’s height above the strand. Onto the harder, darker, ocean packed bit.

But when the first expired wave slid Woody’s way, he burst through the D-ring snaffle and drug us to higher ground.

Chicken.

Luckily the dark weather had swirled any beachgoers off the beach. Birds are poor judges of horsemanship so I didn’t lose my patience. Back and forth we weaved from powdery sand to hard, leaving an uninterrupted chain of footprints streaming off behind.

It kind of got to me. I hadn’t just walked Woody three weeks so he could spook at the ocean. I hadn’t made all of those vows of taking my mule to the sea just so he could wheel and peel away. I’d just spent four and a half years on the ocean. I was drawn to it. I wanted to share it.

By God, I was going to set foot in the mighty Atlantic.

This called for counting. Waves come in sets. Surfers count them off the break; sailors count them in the gale. The former hope for large; the later pray for the small.

I’m a sailor. After the biggest swells swilled up the beach, I kicked and jiggled Woody down the receding slick. He, of course, was all flared eyeballs and nostrils. Back and forth we sashayed, like plovers dodging the breaking surf. In and out, always just out of reach of the lunging surf. Woody’s hoofs stayed the ashy black of an old chalkboard. A dry slate.

Then whoosh! The tongue of spent ocean rushed up and sprayed up his hoof.

I looked back. There was a smooth stretch of sand washed out of the chain of footprints down the beach.

We’d made it.

Now we could turn West. West with spring. West for the North Carolina mountains.

Read more posts from this ramble: Atlantic to Pacific by Mule.

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