Author Archives: stablewomen

My new little male dog, Kique, is becoming so attached to me that he “screams” from the dog yard when I’m out of sight working with the horses. This sounds as if something truly horrible is happening to him and the first time he did it, I ran, panicked, heart pounding to find him jumping for joy to see me…

He scared my neighbor today as she heard his screams and she came running out of her house to my quick explanation. She and I both have that “danger Will Robinson” reaction. Right after she was startled by Kique, my brother returned home and, to my perception, he kept honking the truck’s horn. This would be so out of character that it scared me and I ran to the driveway, totally out of breath from the bronchitis I’m fighting.

Billy’s truck has something wonky going on with a sensor or a connection and when he turns the steering wheel, there is one little spot where it makes the horn honk. Crikey. We’ll get it fixed this weekend, even if we have to disconnect things and run the horn to a toggle on the dash…

Back in the 1970’s when we lived in Tucumcari, New Mexico, my Mum and I went to visit a friend in hospital there (a very small facility surrounded by “QUIET” signs). Just as I shut off the ignition to her Cadillac, the horn started blowing – constantly, loudly! I popped the hood (the bonnet) and pulled a wire from the square horn where the sound was – the tone changed… I saw another square “horn” thing, pulled the line to it… the tone changed… there were FIVE separate horns on that engine!

My “danger Will Robinson” reactions come from a lifetime of “other shoes” falling. I learned, from growing up with an alcoholic father, that I could never let my guard down. I also learned how to wire and strap a driveshaft up level again after the pillow block disintegrated so I could drive the 3 ton tilt cab truck home… how to use my jackets and a blanket to drive a car up out of deep mud… how to put a roll of paper towels under the accelerator when my horse van lost the spring that controlled that gas pedal… how to get a drunk father out of a dangerous bar with the owner threatening me… how to later care for my Mother (for a total of decades) physically and emotionally to make her life worth living after it had seemed destroyed by said father/husband.

I have an infinitely long list of experiences with that “other shoe” and yet, day by day, I do not go around looking for drama or emergencies. I just face them if they rise up in front of me and solve them… most of the time. It was good training for a horsewoman. Life with horses is full of split second decisions; life and death situations; needing to set aside all personal needs, comfort and safety to tend to the needs, comfort and safety of a horse…

Why? Because horses cannot take care of themselves. Not in these “modern” times. Not confined by the lifestyles we must inflict upon them. Horses are “at our mercy”. So are our dogs and other animals… and the people we care about and care for.

So I used to sleep lightly in case my brother would intercom me that my mother was in trouble at their house across my farm yard. Now, after her passing, I am able to sleep better, if a bit guilty about it… better nonetheless. I also sleep better after taking up playing my didgeridoos – the different way of breathing has improved my overall breathing! And, after being told by a man in Australia that it is bad luck there for a woman to play a didge – I am more committed to the playing! A friend in the UK told me it’s good luck there! I’m thinking I likely resonate better with England than OZ… time will tell.

I had a friend here ask me some advice about relationships online – yeah, since I’ve had such great success with the one I tried! NOT! But, I tried. I was open to the possibility of finding something special (which, actually, I did, it was just short lived) and, while I will never do that again, I was brave and honest. It was worth the try.

Here is what I believe, what I have learned that makes life bearable for me, in all of its complexities – just be honest. About every single thing. Be honest with oneself, be honest with the world, be honest with each other. Being honest makes everything easy… even when things get scary.

I don’t shrink from situations. That never would have worked in my life. I’ve told a lot of stories here and they just scratch the surface of the strange life I have lived – and I’m not done. I have an awesome life ahead of me still. But, if I had planned on a simple, quiet career and a peaceful retirement, I would not have been happy… not me, my soul would have been screaming.

I accept the strangeness I attract and embrace and resolve day by day. I don’t sit around waiting for the other shoe to drop… but I’m fully aware that it will… and I’ll deal with it when it happens.

Onward.

There is an Arabian stallion I love and respect whose off spring I have trained and loved as well. His name is Kobiyashi and I trained him in Dressage to show him for the owner/breeder many years ago. I was working to pay for my own young stallion, Darjeeling. I owned Dharma Gita, a son of Koby and wanted a filly, Dream Cat, who is his daughter that I was schooling at the same time.

I now own the sweet Dream Cat who turns 20 years old this year! She is an old friend, a maternal, loving spirit who always nuzzles my cheek. Tonight (it is very cold, wet and windy) she hugged me with her neck after I put her blanket on…

When I was training Koby in the Dressage, I schooled him in a 4 acre pasture. We entered him in Training and First level tests and I was worrying because he had never seen a Dressage Court! My good friend and student across town had a wonderful facility where I had helped her start her Holstiener and we set up for me to spend a day there with Koby.

I hauled him over early in the morning and her geldings were secured in the barn so I could turn the stallion out on their pasture to let off steam before I rode him. My Mum’s best friend came to watch, also (a horsewoman, she was there to help, too, if I needed it).

Koby did his great Arab stallion, tail flagged, snorting, squealing gallop around, then I let him loose in the arena with the Dressage court… not thinking about the pony sized stone statue of a horse outside the court by E.

The stallion Kobiyashi had stood stud in Arizona where they collected his semen (for artificial insemination) with an artificial vagina and a “dummy mare” which is a life sized, padded horse like object for him to mount… running loose, he spotted the stone horse and jumped onto it, quite excited! Yikes! I ran to him with the halter and lead and had to shout him down, getting my elbow struck by a front hoof before I could get him off of the statue! Now, he respected me enough to pull himself together and lead back to the horse trailer where I slowly groomed and tacked him up.

We had had an audience of the farm owner, her handyman, my Mum’s friend and 2 neighbors who could not believe I was now going to ride this horse. But, he and I knew each other. We respected each other. If I would not ride him here and now, the show would be an impossibility.

It was actually thrilling to ride him in the real court with his energy up (and his elevation of stride and lightness!) – although each time we approached “E” and the stone pony, he would nicker low, deep and sexy at it, dancing a bit more and almost growling! I had to vibrate the inside rein, prrrr my tongue and keep an outside leg active.

At the Amigos de Dressage show (a big area competition), he was a very good horse! There were no fake horses – lots of mares, though, whose riders would cut right in front of us in the warm up until I moved way back away from the arena until our ride times! You can only expect so much from a breeding stallion…

At one point, the judge sent a runner to ask me to stay up in the entry area of the arena before my rides – I told him that I was on a stallion. The judge sent him back with permission for me to warm up wherever I wished.

We did well for a first show, scoring 60+’s and one 70%, winning our 1st level class, which pleased the owner. There is so much more about that show to be told, but tonight I just want to share how special my little Dream Cat’s father was 🙂

I was honored to school and compete him.

I thought I had jet lag or something yesterday and the day before. As I woke up one morning to ice and snow and the past two days have been near 70 degrees with sunshine, I realize that I’m just feeling the shifting temperatures. How the horses handle it amazes me. They doze in the sun with their hair coats all held down close to the skin. When the cold returns, their hair stands up on end to hold body heat.

I layer clothes then peel them off, back and forth throughout the day. At night, I throw the comforter off of myself then later search for it on the floor. Most nights, I get a didgeridoo and play a while to get centered before returning to sleep. That is one thing I’m glad I chose to do, to learn to play the didge. I think the breath one uses is a help for sound sleeping.

I have two new doggies in the family. Little ones who needed a home quickly. We love them, my other dogs and me!

As I get back into the rhythms of my life after my vacation (and after a particularly brutal year), I find myself smiling more. I’ve cleared out some stuff, faced some hard decisions, felt a lot of grief and found some deep, profoundly joyful memories to hold onto.

Everything ends. My vacation was so sweet I can still “taste” it – but it ended. My feelings about some plans I had made became conflicted, so some dreams ended. My life will end. But the very process of living it is its own reward. It is an adventure every day if I allow it to be. I see my world here through new eyes since my return. No jet lag – I am feeling the shifting of perspectives.

Returning home to a snow and ice storm this week was certainly a mind bending thing for me – from balmy beaches and warm sea to doors frozen shut and crunchy hoses reminds me of the extremes we face with all embodiments.

This physical extreme of shifts has my body literally cramping (my feet and toes especially – agonizing if I forget and sit on my feet at this desk) and running for the magnesium powder! It takes a hot bath and a pot of hot Kukicha twig tea to warm my core. Last week, I had the A/C going in the Toyota that I was driving all over the big island. I wake up wondering for a moment where I am; then wonder what on earth to wear.

I make absolutely certain all the dogs are inside before I shut the back door for the evening! The horses are wearing their cozy “PJ’s” and I added hot water to their tubs to prevent freezing for an extra hour tonight.

Emotional shifts or “emotional whiplash”, as I call it, can leave me with the equivalent of those foot cramps – but on an even more painful level. To be loved, to be dismissed, to be honored, to be used, we all have these shifts through life. Non-attachment can be my “magnesium powder” for these soul cramps, but it is hard to find locally.

I once said that indifference is the opposite of love (that relationship kind of love) because even hatred is passionate. We go beyond the extremes of that passion spectrum when we allow indifference to flood the emptiness carved out by the roller-coaster-ing of duality. We can drop the anvil we’ve been carrying around; one of perception, perspective and second guessing. Once it falls away (for the next victim to lift and embrace perhaps, especially with relationships), we drift above that attachment and see it for what it was – good or bad, brilliant or overwhelming… we see it as an entity rather than a component of our own being. We are released.

I’m working my way toward non-attachment on some levels. Anything that takes up most of one’s thoughts, time and energy should bring the benefits of satisfaction, joy and positive anticipation. If it is otherwise, find a way to leave it – if it is important in the Universe, there will be another who picks it up and revels in the processes that tormented you!

And some things are there just for the moment. They serve a purpose that is limited or linear and actually no longer exist after the time has passed.

I got a cool bumper sticker in Hawaii, it says, “Quantum physics: the dreams stuff is made of”. I love it!

On another note, I have added two little beings to the Dharmahorse tribe tonight. They needed a home. They are sound asleep in the living room as I write tonight. These little pumpkins fit right into our family merely hours ago. My Phoebe and Skipper have accepted them. We fill our little house with love tonight.

This is worth the effort. This is love. The animals save me just as thoroughly as I save them.

I am home from Hawaii. Having faced several of my big fears (time to admit it all, time to feel good about the doing of it), from heights, flying and volcanoes (seriously, I used to have very scary volcano dreams)… even deep water. I return home quite a different person from the one who left 11 days ago.

Oh, I will still thrust my foot into my mouth, will still tell too much of the stories for the liking of some and will probably find something new to be afraid of – but that will simply provide some other adventure to use in the conquering. Tonight I realize my math was all wrong on the hay needed for the time of my absence – I brought in too much hay for what was needed. Whew. That helps, I will get past the weekend, hopefully, before I have to bring in another load. My bumbling can be beneficial sometimes.

In Hawaii, I was able to see my life through different eyes. I could sleep with the clean air through windows and the soft awareness of the sea… easy to watch from my bedroom windows, to the west, quietly chanting the Heart Sutra each night. I wept through it at first. Billy and I chanted that Sutra beside her as our Mother died. But, by the last night in that now beloved room, not a tear welled for me and I understood a lot about why some things happened.

My falling in love (with a person) back at the start of autumn was about me just staying alive (because there are things I need to do and be). A purpose served, even though I did not understand the extremes of it all. And I kept my body going.

Hawaii was about falling in love with beauty and challenges… the essences of kindness and strength. And I kept my spirit going.

Coming home is about falling in love with my past. What I mean by that is the loving of all I have accomplished in the past few years. It’s hard to see it when you are in the middle of it. The abandoning of routine and responsibility shakes the senses into a sharper awareness when those factors of one’s life return. And I will keep my dream alive.

The Dharmahorse tribe gave me that opportunity by taking impeccable care of the horses and everything here. Tonight, I will weave myself back into this tapestry, but not as it was – my focus is what I want it to be. No longer just what it needs to be to “get through”. We are going to see differently. After I sleep some more… just a bit more sleep…

Yesterday I was at sea on a whale watching ship for hours. Within a few hours of that, I was on the plane crossing the ocean as I returned home. While many fly without a second thought; for me to willingly end up at 38,000 feet, going hundreds of miles per hour with 22 degrees below zero outside is a testimonial to how much I wanted this vacation. For me to walk down through a lava tube, look into sulfuric acid steam lava vents, swim with the fish and turtles in a wet suit, go up the right nerve wracking road to Maunakea, go way out on the ocean on the boat to watch whales and dolphins – these took a deep breath.

BUT, as soon as it all started, I found myself enthralled with every moment and every sight. Hawaii healed me.

My Mother had always dreamed of seeing whales and dolphins. I did that part for her.

So, while I still forget to say “crikey” lately instead of cursing, I am seeing a balance (sometimes, you just have to let go with the profanity to really release something, sad, but true). I made gestures toward a continent, ate snow by the telescopes, swallowed more sea water than I meant to and ate much more food than I intended! It just tasted so good.

Now, the massive amounts of coffee I drank, that was intended. Kona coffee has enslaved me, nothing will ever taste as good again – but, for now, the beans that flew back with me will be my dear friends for as long as they last, being savored, never taken for granted. And that will be easy.

So, I am sitting at a desk as the sun sets on the big island in Hawaii. This miracle in my life has me bouncing around, perspective-wise… I’ve come from the desert (where I poured any little bit of left over water from a student’s bottle onto a plant) to a world of water.

I have heard from my brother that his house doors and truck doors were frozen shut this morning… the Dharmahorse tribe is taking impeccable care of the farm… I really am the luckiest woman! And I am grateful beyond measure.

So far, I’ve been swimming with thousands of different colored fish and a big turtle who almost led me too far. I’ve watched surfers, played on beaches and saw the house where the original Reiki Masters practiced! I have much to share after I return home. Life really is its own answer. Keep living bravely.

I’m watching the mountains change color as the sun sets. For just these few moments, the glow is indescribable in its peach, pink, orange, purple palette. And, in the time it took me to type that, shadows swallow the peaks and only the memory remains. I love that mountain. I look to it now and see my Mother’s ashes, the ashes of her three beloved dogs as well. I see my Mum on the beautiful mountain. I love my Mother.

I love my dogs. They have been fed supper, but try to convince me otherwise! I love their cleverness and soft warmth and loyalty. I love my horses. I love their strength and gentleness. I love their ability to adjust and rise to the occasion and I love just how incredibly beautiful they are.

I love a lot of beings. I love a lot of things. And my favorite definition of love is from Eric Fromm: “Love is the active promotion of the well being of the love object”. My mentor in Dressage shared that with me, decades ago, in an article he wrote with personal notes to me attached. His name was/is Charles deKunffy. He taught me how to love Dressage and how to love horses on new levels. I love him, too.

That definition touches my spirit – I really hope that is the way in which I love others… I have been loved in that fashion in mostly platonic relationships… that “active promotion of the well being”. I have loved clients I worked with in equine assisted psychotherapy and loved horses that belonged to other people.

I love rock and roll bands and I love my didgeridoos.

One word has so many interpretations and flavors.

I love the warm weather and I love the stars at night. I tell my furnace that I love it and I say, “thank you” every time I walk by it when it is running (I really do, and I mean it).

And even when love goes awry, tasting bitter after a flavor too sweet, it is something to have savored, not something to regret. No love is wasted. It holds well its own sovereignty and lights its own way even in the hands and minds of those who would manipulate with it or be swayed by it. Love is never wasted. Love is an energy like sunlight, like the breezes that catch our breath or slam upon a beach driving the waves. Love finds its own way through pretense, through sorrow and through the over exuberance of lust. Love prevails. Love is patient and gentle, yet brave and daunting.  My soul is full of love and my heart remains the door through which it comes and goes…

Tonight I saw that glowing mountain, fleeting as the show was, and I felt the love moving through me. I’ll never close that door. I will never block the flow of that very essence of life itself.

I meant to say “crikey”, the 300 times I yelled “f*ck this” during the past two hours. Crikey was my choice about 14 years ago, needing a word to use around parents and clients… it has served me well. Tonight, it doesn’t cut it. The wind has exceeded the predicted 50 mph now and the temperature has dropped from 40something to under 20 degrees. We are expecting freezing rain/ice storms… crikey… nope, F*CK this is appropriate, forgive me, it just is.

What was I doing the past two hours? I was wrestling horse blankets onto patient, grateful steeds, with metal parts whipping across my face, missing my eyes, but hurting like… like crikey. I was gathering flakes of hay into the carrier and leaning into the frosty blast to get to each horse’s feeder with some of the food I started with. Eyes full of dirt and hay specks, I filled water tubs before the hoses froze…

I’m warm inside now, no real worse for wear, but a bit shaky. The theme of my life lately seems to be “struggle against the weather” and I’ve played this part a few times too often. I just thought, “rage against the machine”, and sorta wonder if there is any real difference in the challenges we face – beyond the names and the forms they manifest – struggle is struggle.

But I live almost between worlds here. My house is small and simple and just this side of actually being outdoors. I am SO grateful for my home and my furnace and the fact that each horse has a roof and wind break (and a waterproof blanket!)… but we all have to face the weather together. I wish I could make things better for us all. We are up on the side of this mountain because the water is safe and clean, the air is safe, there are no agricultural chemicals being sprayed on us… when I remember my reasons, I know it is best… but, CRIKEY, I’m tired of struggling.

So, I’m whining again. I recognize this fact, but seem to return to the process too often. It is a “whine night”. It is also a “wine night”… just to relax enough to sleep later, I’ll have a bit with some very hot soup!

I have a large box fan tied in a tree by our grooming area. In the summer on a rare still day, the fan with the shade makes a wonderful little cool spot for the horses and for us. Tonight, the sound it is making is actually frightening. But, more frightening is the thought of trying to get it down out of the tree in this blast… I could really get hurt, I think.

So, my brother tells me that the entire country, the entire planet is struggling with harsh weather, earthquakes, fires and changes and he reminds me that I have faced worse nights than this one (I have). Yesterday was a beautiful day… strangely different now… it is disconcerting to go so suddenly from one extreme to another. But much of my life lately is a roller coaster of sorts. Some aspects have good enough “up” parts to make the “downs” acceptable. Some aspects remain to be seen… I am in the evaluation stage on a couple of them.

I’ve done the best I can for my horses tonight. I’ll go searching for things like muck buckets and cones when the wind stops in a day or two. I’ll go on vacation soon and I bet the weather here will be lovely (I hope so for those who are taking over for me!). I’ll have a hot bath, soup and wine and try to get some sleep. I am so grateful for propane, electricity, good food and the very sweet wine I love, made by a student’s family! I can handle this.

Saturated ground around my horses’ pens has kept me from dumping their water tubs, scrubbing them clean then filling them with clear, better water. And the frozen hoses, chunks of floating ice with about a 45 minute time frame before my hands seized up, frozen as well, have added to my reluctance; water-tub-wise.

But today turned decently warmish and I thought I would dump Wally’s tub and get him clean water. You see, he dunks his face all the way into his tub and sloshes the water out into puddles; then he paws at the puddles, splashing mud into his water tub. It is rarely of the sparkling clean sort of liquid that I would “drink myself” as my BHSAI teacher in my youth would have insisted upon.

As the sun set and the air chilled, I filled feeders with hay and bran mashes, put Wally’s blanket on and went to dump his water tub. Water is heavy. Water is dynamic, it moves of its own volition at times. Water can overpower me (remember this fact at the ocean, Katharine).

So, I start rocking his tub a bit to get the water moving. I can usually just give a shove after it’s moving and tip out the majority of it before I scrub the inside of the tub. In the winter, no algae is growing so it’s only the mud and hay slobber I’m apt to encounter. Tonight, the still frozen part of the earth by the tub caught it funny and tossed the contents onto my legs. And my shoes of course.

And yes, I did have on dark blue jeans, but they did not bleed… I did. I caught the side of my hand on the edge of the tub trying to stop its momentum and cut myself open (just a little, no sutures required). Lots of lavender oil on it later.

So, the bladder part should be self explanatory. A sleeping hand in warm water might work, but so does approximately 30 gallons of ice water down one’s legs. And, needing to finish cleaning the one tub then fill ALL of them before the sun set and the hoses froze, I had to push on wet and shivering with great sucking sounds coming from my Sloggers (shoes gifted to me by a student) with every step.

This leads to the propane tank. Inside now, I pull off barn clothes, pull on warm, dry Yoga clothes and turn UP that thermostat! I do have a good amount of propane in the tank and tonight, I am using some of it!

All in all, it has been a really good day. I did not play my guitar as well as usual at my lesson, but I forgive myself. I taught a nice riding lesson this morning and my working student dumped last night’s manure and rode two horses (very well). I had money to deposit and my truck has plenty of gas for tomorrow (hay day). Things were rolling along well until I decided to clean Wally’s water, but it worked out okay in the end. He has clean water for now.

A pot of hot tea beside me and the itchy, but worth it, wool socks are helping. I’m excited about my vacation coming up and a new year with new possibilities to unfold. I always swear I won’t complain about the cold when summer is sweltering and that I won’t complain about the heat when my bed is so cold and the frosty air freezes my eyeballs… and sometimes, like earlier tonight, I just swear… loudly.

I have a pair of jeans on today that I love – they are very dark blue, a little stretchy and skinny legged. My hands got wet while watering the horses and I kept rubbing them down my thighs to dry off the water. Now, with dry hands and damp pants, I realize that my palms are blue. The intensely dark blue dye is obviously transient. And, of course, with such frosty temps, I first thought my blue hands were from lack of circulation… but this is a different shade of blue!

I had a similar experience last year with a comforter from the thrift store. Often, I discover the reason that someone gave away a pair of pants – usually it is a zipper that does not stay up. Comforters, usually they are worn looking and that doesn’t bother me – they become dog beds when too worn. But, I wondered why the very crisply new, dark blue and green plaid cover had been relinquished. After a few nights, I figured it out.

Each morning, in the shower, I would notice a quite disconcerting bluish tinge to my feet. Again, I started thinking poor circulation, but it made no sense. It took a few days to realize that my bare feet rubbing against the comforter were taking on the dye. It was seeing the blue colored water at the drain that brought the realization. Multiple washings and dryings did nothing to fade the potent blueness, I gave up on the comforter… didn’t even give it to the dogs (I have a white dog, don’t want a blue dog).

And… decades ago, while married to the biker (who was almost 20 years my senior), living in the dome, I bought a pair of new Levi’s 501, button fly jeans – the only pants I would wear most of my life. Now, the buttons are a struggle…

Bob told me that the way to make them fit properly was to put them on, get into the stock tank and let them dry on my body. You already know what I’m going to tell you.

The bottom half of my body remained blue for at least a week.

So, today, I feel blue from the depressing weather… have blue hands and feel like I really blew a few important things in my life. It’s just blue all over day for me. But I find my memories much more amusing than I found the situations at the time. Bob was not on my lovingkindness list for a long time. The Levi’s didn’t fit any better than all the previous pairs that went into the wash without a dunking attached to my legs and fanny. And as I sit here now, I am seriously wondering if my thighs are blue! I will peel these jeans off promptly after finishing this post! I am NOT going to Hawaii with blue legs!

I’m back – couldn’t wait, had to get those jeans off quickly! Some blue things in my life are just wonderful. I love my little blue guitar. I love my little blue Ford Ranger truck. I love my blue didgeridoo, used to live near the Blue Ridge Mountains… hmmm. I have a lot of blue in my life!

And, as for the times that I “blew it” this year with relationships, job interviews and remembering where I was supposed to be each day – well, I’ll just take my blue self up the mountain soon and sing my apologies into the wind with a bit of smudge (blue sage?)… that oughta fix everything (wink).