Phil reading_fastandslow

“He’s just a good all-around horse. He aint a finished horse but I think he’ll make a cow horse.
I’m pleased to hear it. Of course your preference is for one that’ll bow up like a bandsaw and run head first into the barn wall.
John Grady smiled. Horse of my dreams, he said. It aint exactly like that.
How is it then?
I don’t know. I think it’s just somethin you like. Or don’t like. You can add up all of a horse’s good points on a sheet of paper and it still wont tell you whether you’ll like the horse or not.
What about if you add up all his bad ones?
I don’t know. I’d say you’d probably done made up your mind at that point.
You think there’s horses so spoiled you cant do nothin with em?
Yes I do. But probably not as many as you might think.
Maybe not. You think a horse can understand what a man says?
You mean like words?
I don’t know. Like can he understand what he says.
John Grady looked out the window. Water was beaded on the glass. Two bats were hunting in the barnlight. No, he said. I think he can understand what you mean.”
― Cormac McCarthy, Cities of the Plain