Joe hailed from Tumbleweed Wyoming and had never been farther east than the badlands of Hell's Half Acre until he was 23. One day, however, he'd been out on his horse Trigger when they came across the biggest rattlesnake you ever done saw. It was as big around as a weak man's forearm an as long as a parlor settee. Trigger spooked and fled with Joe on his back, running for all he was worth and didn't stop. Joe tried at first, unsuccessfully, to calm the startled horse but eventually saw it was no use; Trigger was in a Zone now. Luckily Joe had thought to pack enough for a very long journey, because he was obsessive that way, and so there was plenty of jerky. He had to learn to shave on the back of a wild horse and that was no mean feat, but he learned that humans are quite adaptable.
Trigger ran and ran eastward and eastward, until one day he finally collapsed in Shamokin Pennsylvania, dead of exertion. Joe mourned him, as much as you can mourn any horse who runs for days without stopping until it kills itself, and then continued east, since that's the direction he'd been going anyway. Walking, hitchhiking, bus and/or Vespa, Joe kept on going until he reached Greenwich Village New York. He stepped off the free-ride Vespa onto Christopher Street, looked around and promptly changed his name to Joei.
He had no clear idea where he was, only that in this place men were unafraid to hold each others hands (and more) and that the fashion sense he saw around him matched the images he'd had in his head all his life. He was well and truly home. Within a week he'd found a job at an indy bookstore, met the most wonderful man named Tiler and set up house with him, gotten his own Vespa (which he called Trigger 2.0) and become vegetarian. But as they say, you can take a boy (by crazed, running horse) out of the country, but you can't take the country out of the boi, and Joei's true cowboi nature was forever peeking through.
Eventually Joei and Tiler found an abandoned Asian baby in Central Park, brought it home and started their family proper, a healthy child with a Greenwich Village/ cowboi heritage. And they all live(d) happily ever after.