Rip-Snorting Entertainment At Rodeo
As the bucking bronc tossed its rider like a rag doll, the snorting horse stamped closer and closer to the guard rail surrounding the arena. No danger, unless you happened to be inside the rails, directly in the path of the blind-with-rage horse.
Which is exactly where Twiggy the Clown was.
But the slender, bespectacled clown, sporting a gray felt hat and strands of purple and white yarn for hair, didn’t sweat it. He just hopped up the rails, as nimble as a squirrel up an oak tree.
“I’m just here to entertain the crowd and have fun,” said Twiggy, also known as Jason Gazaway, 20, of Rockford. “Rodeo crowds are just fun.”
As part of the Tri-County Settlers Days, Deer Park’s rodeo Friday brought hundreds of people to the fairgrounds to watch cowboys and cowgirls rope calves, wrestle steer and ride bulls.
“I like the people riding bulls the best,” said Elsie Valiquette, 10. “It looks challenging.”
Though she has never tried riding a bull herself, she said she might someday want to try “ a small one.”
Valiquette was stamping hands at the ticket booth along with other volunteers from the newly formed northeast chapter of the Backcountry Horsemen. As the volunteers collected entry fees, they also tried to get the word out about their organization, which helps keep wilderness trails open for hikers, bikers and horseback riders.
Meanwhile, up in the stands, Terri and Andy Carlson of Deer Park tried to pick up calf-roping techniques by watching the pros. Tense seconds passed as the rider’s rope hovered, then dropped over the calf’s neck. The crowd relaxed, its voice united in a single “ooh.”
“Now when we do it, we have to run out there, grab the calf, grab the rope, someone has to tackle it and then tie its legs,” Andy Carlson explained. The Carlsons were scheduled to compete in the business-persons calf-tying event later in the evening.
Terri Carlson, who works at Washington Trust Bank, also competed in the just-for-fun event last year with a co-worker, but couldn’t get the calf down. This year, figuring she needed someone a bit bigger and stronger, she roped her husband into it - so to speak.
As the Pend Oreille Spirit mounted drill team dazzled the crowd with their spangled aqua vests, riding their horses in marching band configurations, a small girl in a tiedyed swimsuit grabbed handfuls of blue cotton candy and crammed them into her mouth, giving it a ghoulish look.
“If you haven’t got anything to eat, go over there and stuff your face,” the rodeo announcer called, sending people toward the booths offering elephant ears, Belgian waffles, Southwest Indian tacos, curly fries, cotton candy and snow cones. And as the horses kicked up great plumes of dust, their necklaces of bells jangling, the announcer yelled: “Is it Friday night in Deer Park or what?”