It's funny about some books.  I am by no means a voracious reader.  I read before bed as a means of sleep inducement.  Some folks read 4-5 books a month, while I meander through one in whatever it takes for a few pages a day.  If it is really a barnburner it may keep me up reading longer but never for hours.  

My preference is for fiction - entertain me.  I know there are those who read biographies or non-fiction.  These people have an unquenchable thirst for knowledge.  Me, not so much.  I want to feel, not learn. 

The last My last book, Blind the Ponies by Stanley Gordon West was first published in 2001 and was a whopping 574 pages.  It was an improbable tale of a small, nearly dead town in Montana who high school basketball had a losing streak measured by years.  Something like 0 for 7 years.  In a kind of Hoosiers-esque season a teacher-coach guides his team to the state finals.  The length is dictated by all the sub-plots and fleshing out the characters.  

It took me months to get even to the quarter mark and I kept thinking what a drudge this was and maybe it was time to chuck it and find something else.  And yet I persevered.  And persevered.  It ended up time well spent.  Each character was broken in some way.  Pete's dad was the towns alcoholic.  Tom lost his parents and lives with his grandmother.  The Coach, Sam, lost his wife and daughter in an accident.  Tom's granny has cancer.  One of the teams fans, an Indian, is being chased by the FBI for tax evasion.  The richest guy in town lost his only love 20 years ago and searches for her still.  The restaurant owner who serves as a town meeting hall is about to go under.

But then a funny thing happened.  I couldn't wait to read the rest of it.  It ended up being a fun read.  But more importantly is the title.  It refers to a an incident long talked about around Billings, Montana.  On the south side of Yellowstone River where it curls around the city is an outcropping of sandstone.  These are the Sacrifice Cliffs.  The story goes that sometime shortly before 1850 a Crow scouting party returned to their village in the area.  They found all dead, except one old man, including their wives and children.  Apparently while they were gone a smallpox outbreak took the village.  The old man didn't live long after the party returned but he did say to stay away.

Both men grieved so much they decided they would rather join their families in the hereafter than continue.  So they wrapped cloth over their horses eyes and rode them over the Sacrifice Cliffs.  

In actuality, it is likely the smaller cliffs further downriver is where they rode.  There is also some indication that some of the children, maybe a dozen were able to get out and join another Crow camp but heck, never let the facts ruin a good story.

For our purposes, blind your ponies, is a succinct phrase to tell yourself to gut it out, keep persevering, and to continue when there is no hope.  Pretty much every day for me.