Horse People Are Weird Or Are They?

We equestrians are dedicated to something outside of ourselves, and we pursue our goals with such intensity that it becomes part of our identify. That’s a good thing.

I was helping a friend clean stalls that other day and chatting, as one does, while we worked. I relayed a story about a horse owner I knew years ago with exceptionally specific demands when it came to the depth and arrangement of the bedding in her horse’s stall. I’ll spare you the details, but will say that rulers were involved.

“Horse people are weird,” my friend observed as I finished my tale. “They sure are,” I replied habitually. But almost immediately after the words left my mouth I stopped short. I stared at the wooden stall wall that divided my friend and myself and silently questioned what I had just said. “Are horse people really that weird?” I thought.

I thought about friends of mine with other passions and hobbies, and the stories they’ve told me about their groups and concerns. “Yoga people are nuts,” a friend of mine once warned me as she rolled up her mat. “You haven’t seen strange until you’ve been to a scrapbooking convention,” another friend told me years ago as we flipped through album pages documenting her latest vacation. Surely you’ve heard similar: Cat people? Crazy. Sci-Fi fans? Unhinged. Fans of certain professional sports team? Don’t get me started.

What do all these groups have in common, beyond their alleged lunacy? We are all passionate about something. Whether we call it a hobby or a lifestyle, we are dedicated to something outside of ourselves and pursue our interests with such intensity that it becomes