personal vernacular

Here's a new genre for my ramblings: words in my vocabulary that haven't seen the proverbial light of day in a zillion billion years because, for some reason or another, I no longer have a reason to use them. A lot of them have to do with horses and their related needs and shit because I rode and for nine years and taught for four until I was nineteen (instructors lied about my age and paid me under the table because it's not technically legal to work with or around animals until you're eighteen in most of the US), most of which are confusing to non-horse-people or need to be explained in more words than it would take to just use the descriptive term in conversation. Some general terms like 'mare' and 'gelding' and broad terminology for tack (aka, riding gear) are usually common knowledge but others are obscure enough that it's more trouble than it's worth to use them. Mostly for very specific markings or features, like 'forelock' for that bit of fringe on the forehead or 'frog' for the triangle-shaped lump of tissue in the concave bit of the hoof. (I never have figured out why it was called that. It's the most sensitive area on any given horse's body apart from the genitals--they can feel the vibrations of approaching potential threats through the ground long before anybody will see or hear it, and damage to the frog can cripple a horse for life.)

One term I hardly used even while I was working with horses is 'wall-eye'. Even horse people sometimes don't know that it means. It's just a fancy term for the one blue eye characteristic of a common minor mutation. (Horses rarely have two blue eyes, for reasons I have never understood.) Sometimes it's applied to a horse with any colour eye but the normal brown, but technically it's specific to the one blue eye. Usually the pupil is quite distorted, as well. I used to think it was actually really special but as far as physical oddities go it's a pretty common thing to find in horses. I remember it almost exclusively found in horses with light colouration, or at least mostly-white faces and pink skin. (Like people horses come in 'dark' and 'light' skin tones but unlike people they can pretty commonly have patches of each on their bodies.)

Another term I didn't really use was 'god's thumbprint'. It's another abnormality you sometimes find but I only saw it a handful of times. It's a small finger-sized indentation in the neck or chest area but I don't know what the technical name is for it--I don't even know that other people really use this term for it or not or just call it a 'neck dent' or something. The glurge-heavy story has its roots in Islam, of all places, in which horses play a significant role because of their cultural importance. (Only the Native Americans love their horses more.) Supposedly god told Muhammed to deprive his horses of water for a few days and then release them to a watering hole before blowing his war trumpet to summon them back; whichever horses responded to the call at the expense of their own thirst were to be the ones he should breed for god's race of superhorses or something and five mares turned around and came back when summoned. God 'touched' each of them to protect them and left his thumbprint so he'd know which were the descendents of the chosen horses.

A cute story but I've only ever heard it once.