Who doesn't love a good old fashioned rodeo star? Today we're talking to a rodeo champion who is breaking stereotypes left and right and has a love story that Alaska you write in. I'm Alicia Rai.
And I am Sarah Wendell. Welcome to lovestruck daily, where we last show you a true love story each and every weekday and bring it directly to your earbuds. Thank you for joining us today. I'm in love with you. Alicia, cowboys, cowboys thing in the world of romance if you are not familiar, yeah, romance. As a genre of fiction, cowboys are a very, very popular motif. There are a lot of cowboy stories in Romans land.
It's like American. Yeah, American shorthand for a certain kind of man, I think.
Yep. It's a very, very quick stereotype and very quick archetype. The minute you say cowboy romance. You know what you're gonna get? Absolutely.
Cowboys versus pirates. There's a cowboy and a pirate, and there are 10 paces. Oh, geez, who's going to win? Is it going to be the Cutlass? Or is it going to be the the? I don't know what cowboys carry the revolver. I think pirates. Yeah, I agree. I agree. I think pirates are the right choice. I agree. Good heavens, we're gonna get a lot of team cowboy emails.
I feel. We're gonna get a lot of people emailing us being like, let me tell you about cowboys. You are so wrong.
Oh, pirates are better. Pirates are just pirates are just more interesting.
Especially if we're talking about like fantasy pirates where you know, you go look at the ball. Yeah,
I'm not talking about real pirates. That is something I don't have any experience.
No, we're not talking about actual maritime pirates. Clearly media depictions media and romance fiction of pirates. Correct? Oh, gosh. Yeah. I really think pirates have it. I would love a show that's just like a showdown of common romance male hero archetypes, like the billionaire. In one quarter, the billionaire. Imagine the Bachelorette. Only. every contestant is different.
Viking cowboy is a Navy SEAL. CEO, a BDSM. CEO.
Yeah. Are you the BDSM billionaire? Or are you the ordinary billionaire, we need to know, sir. And then there's gonna be like a guy who runs a bookstore, a guy who runs a coffee shop,
a motorcycle gang president.
There's a doctor. There's many different kinds of doctor and a veterinarian, an FBI agent, of course. Oh my gosh. And he's investigating everybody.
I think we just workshop the best show in the world here to
defend the Cowboys. Since we've both picked pirate he's going to be very disappointed when he hears this. We are welcoming guest Brian helander. Onto the show. Brian was inducted to the gay Rodeo Hall of Fame in 2012. And not only is he a rodeo star, he has a love story that will change the way you think about cowboys forever. So maybe we're going to be convinced welcome, Brian. Thank you so much for joining us, Brian. Welcome. Well, thank you. Could you tell me how did you first get into rodeo?
Well, we've been around for close to 40 years now. So it's not a new thing. And really, I got into gay rodeo just by going to one in Phoenix, Arizona.
If for someone who's listening, who has never been to a rodeo has no idea what it's like what happens at a rodeo.
Well, it's a it's a several hours of cowboys and cowgirls competing in various events on horseback and on the ground to show their skills in writing and roping. And we have some amazing LGBT plus cowboys and cowgirls that you'll see in action, just doing amazing things. And you'll also see beginners who've never done it before.
That's very cool. That must be really fun to watch as someone who's been in this community for so long to see the new people coming.
Yes, absolutely. You don't have to have any skills to enter the rodeo. You just have to have the desire to channel your inner cowboy or cowgirl. I love that.
Do you remember things from that first rodeo that you went to?
Yeah, I do. Actually, I remember the smell of the dirt. And how it spoke to me. I was born on a farm in Canada and the smell of the dirt was just harkening back to my roots really.
And when you went for the first time, were you just sort of did you have that sort of feeling of recognition like oh, oh, this is this is for me?
Yes, I did. You know, I entered events that I had never done before because you know, that's what they were offering and I just got in there and did it. I And it turned out that I was pretty good at it. Wow, that's so scary. Yeah, I remember my first time at a flag race, for example, on horseback I, I walked into the arena and I was walking the pattern, I was like a nervous wreck. And I picked up the flag and I carried on and I went around the pole. And I'm, you know, walking down to stick this flag in this other bucket, and I missed it. And I, you know, walked out of the arena. And I was like, I had such a sense of an accomplishment of just being able to get in and get out and still be on my horse. Now, I run it in 9.5 seconds, and but got to start somewhere.
Yeah, for sure. No, no, I want to ask you, because we are a romance podcast, and we are all about love stories. I would wonder if you would tell us how you met your husband.
You know, if you if you talk to him, he would give you one story. If you talk to me, you know, you'll get my story. But what he claims is that I walked into the bar and into his circle of friends, including him, step in front of him, pushed him backwards out of the crowd and stepped on his whole while doing it. Oh, no, I don't remember doing that. So I think he's making that up. But we weren't close enough to be able to begin to chat. So he wanted in the in the long run.
Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, even if you had it worked out
exactly. ends justify the means.
Yes. Do you remember the moment when you saw him for the first time?
I remember talking to him for the first time? It was kind of funny. Yes. He was wearing a cowboy hat. And he asked me, Do you have hair under there? So I had to show him my hair. I guess that was important, because now we were looking at each other. Right? Right, of course. So we're sizing each other up. He said to me, his second question was, how old are you? And I said, Well, how old? Are you there? You said, I'm 38. And I said, Well, I'm 38. Also, of course, I was lying.
Oh, no.
So how old? Were you? Really?
I was actually 42. So? Well, it's not so bad.
It seems to have worked. So do you remember when you realized that you wanted to be with him and you wanted to get married? Well, those
are two separate events.
Tell me everything.
So I, you know, when we met at the bar, we met with a group, they brought Don, to the bar. And these were mutual friends. And of course, they'd been bugging us to get together. We know Brian, you should meet Don, and Dawn, you should meet Brian and, and I'm like, No, I'm not doing that. And, you know, whatever. So we, we met at the bar, and we kind of struck up this conversation. And I guess the group had made dinner plans to get together the following night, you know, so we were it was getting late, and we were leaving the bar. And you know, we were kind of dragging our feet a little bit. And so we walked out together to the to the parking lot. And I don't know, out of desperation, I said to Don and said, Hey, you want to have dinner tomorrow night? And he just looked at me like with this kind of dry sense of humor. We're having dinner tomorrow night. Oh, yeah. Yeah, we are. So we had dinner the next night with a group. And I met I was able to sit close to dawn. I think I sat next to him if I recall. Oh, when Are ya when? And, you know, I pretty much knew after that first week of conversation that this was somebody that could be long term part of my life. He claims that it took him a little bit longer. But I don't know, I'm not so sure about that.
And isn't it amazing to have that feeling of oh, this this person belongs in my life? Isn't that an amazing thing to look back on and recognize?
Yes, it is. It's very much a life changing realization that this is the person that could be the one that you want to spend the rest of your life where? Yeah.
I wanted to ask you also about the community of gay rodeo. It sounds like it is a truly incredible community. Why is it important to have gay rodeo?
Well, it's it's very important because there are still to this day, a number of LGBTQ plus youngsters out there in the wilderness of the world struggling with their identities. They're in very conservative Western culture, cowboy culture, towns and cities. And the straight rodeo world is still a world in which gay jokes are completely acceptable. So we need to be there are those kids who are seeking a place to to, to be accepted and the Cowboys.
So would you tell me about the gay rodeo community? How has it changed over time? Since you've been involved? I know you were the president for several years. Yeah.
Yeah, I was the president for six years. Two terms of office. I think gay rodeo has changed a lot since the beginning. Gay rodeo took a big hit during the HIV pandemic in the early 80s and 90s, prior to medications coming out, that could save lives. You know, the community now is a smaller community, and an older community. But we do have a lot of young younger folks that are interested in rodeo awesome, even though we're competing with each other, and the competition is fierce. Oh, yeah, we are also pulling for everybody else to do their best. Yeah. Now we hope that we do our best and that we did the best that we do is better than anybody. That's the competition. But we always hope that, you know, folks that are competing, do the best. We celebrate it when they do their best. Yeah. So, you know, that's key to to our culture. Yeah, absolutely.
If you could say anything to your younger self, about the future for you and your husband and your life, what would you tell your younger self?
Well, you know, I think I would remind myself that every choice has a consequence, and that you have to make good choices. And once you go with the choice, there's no going back there's no do overs. No that's that's a learned with rodeo. No, there are no do overs just like life. Yeah, no, there is no do over you can't go back to Saturday and rope that steer better because you missed the day before it's done in over. And I've always taken that attitude. In fact, I admitted a habit of every time a rodeos over i i throw away everything that was related to that rodeo, my, my past my number. No, whatever. It's behind me.
Absolutely no do overs. is a is a great way to look at life. You know, you only get so many trips around the sun. There's no do overs. If someone is curious about the gay rodeo, is there a place online? They can go to find out more?
Yes, of course they can go to ira.com there our schedule is there, how to get involved in there is there and you know, there's all kinds of ways to get involved. You don't have to be a competitor. You can be a timer. You can be a judge. You can be Arena crew. You can be, you know, scorekeeper, there's all kinds of things to do in the gay rodeo slots and fun.
Thank you so very, very much for joining us today. This has been this has been such a great conversation. Thank you, Sarah.
I always love learning about places that people can go to that maybe they didn't know about before. So I hope that this somebody hears this and it resonates with them. And it's something they've been looking for.
Yeah. I have been to a rodeo and it is a lot of fun.
I've never been to any rodeo. And so now I kind of want to go I want to go to the gay rodeo. Yeah, I do too. What is your love to go for today? What do you want people to take with them?
Brian said it best. There's no do over. You get one life. If if you get one you get one life. You get so many trips around the sun. There's no do over when it's done. It's done and you have to accept things and move on. I think that's such good advice.
Yeah, my mom used to always say that there's never going to be this hour on this day. So what am I going to do with it? And if it's just relaxing on the couch, that's totally fine, too. So yeah, no do overs.
Well, if you have a community you want to tell us about or you walked into something and realize that you were instantly in love with it. You want to hear about it. We want to hear all the things in the people you love you can email us at lovestruck daily at frolic dot media. If you have a love story to share, we want to hear it. You can follow us on Instagram at lovestruck daily for extra content and you can leave a review please please subscribe or spread the word about the show. We love hearing from you and we love knowing that you are out there listening and we are keeping you company. Our researcher is Jessie Epstein. Our editor is Jen Jacobs. We are produced by Abigail steckler and little Scorpion studios with executive producer frolic media. This is an I Heart Radio Podcast. We wish you a very happily ever after today. I'm in love with you Now I'm not with you I'm in love with you