Write Everyday

Well, it's a gloomy, overcast kind of day. Perfect for reflecting, reading, writing. Going to the opening of the keyboard fest tonight and looking forward to that. So miss having a piano. Would have to have a crane to get it upstairs in my house and cannot afford a baby grand right now.

Think I found a Border Collie to rescue named Sheah. Have applied and will know in a couple weeks. I soo miss having a dog to greet me when I come home, lick my face, take walks with, make me laugh, love me without conditions.

My flowering trees this year were so bright as to be called spectacular. Everything is sprouting life from the ground and seeing this rebirthing gives me life energy too.

My mare is fully recovered from her near death due to neglect while  I was away from Montana home to see my mom. It's hard not to be angry at the person who did this to her. But I am trying to learn how to better LET GO of anger. It's a hard thing. Meditation and lovingkindness help some but it is hard to forgive someone who mistreats and animal. He also did not care for my dog, resulting in her tearing a tendon, having to have surgery and ultimately resulting in her death. That too is hard to forgive. How do people live with themselves. Why are they cruel to a helpless animal, watch them suffer and do NOTHING? It's really inexcusable, like not treating a child right. Maybe that's where it comes from. He was abused as a child as well.  Sigh. Reap and sow...

I have been riding every day. That is so exhilerating to me, so peaceful at the same time. To combine those two feelings is unusual and pure gold.

So, that's it for today's random thoughts.

What Dreams May Come

I've been having vivid dreams. It's so strange how in dreams the strangest things seem perfectly normal, like a person who then changes to another person without a pause, like communication without verbal language but telepathic, like being in one place and suddenly another, or being in a familiar place you've never been.

Sometimes I wake in a sweat in the dark of the room. I listen to the sounds of my house, knowing them all by heart as I live alone and it's important if there's sound that isn't "normal", to pay attention. The refrigerator kicks on. The critter living in my walls shifts and I can hear his claws scrape as he turns or whatever he's doing in there. I don't want to know. The clock ticks. The neighbors' son just pulled in the drive. I smoke a cigarette and hope I don't return to the same dream, like a replayed movie or continuing from the moment I left off and woke myself in an attempt to escape the night terror.

They make sense then, in the night's darkness, but in the morning, I wonder, what was that all about? How strange!

I'd like to sleep without waking, just once. I'd like to sleep without dreaming, just once. I'd like to dream of being a dolphin or a horse flying or have happy dreams. I tire of nightmares, both when I'm sleeping and then when I wake, tired from the struggle of the dreams that come without the asking.

Can somebody turn off the subsconscious button?

Thanks much.
Ah, daybreak.

Keep on going?

Every time I get on the highway headed west, I cannot help but think, "I could just keep going and be in Colorado in 22 hours or Wyoming in a bit more. It's so damned tempting. I so adore the mountains and the West and feel so much more at home there. I remember the first time driving out at 17. Drove all night, arrived in Estes Park the next morning and climbed a mountain. Then I went to a pay phone (do those still exist?) and rang my mom and exclaimed, "MOM! I just climbed to the top of a mountain!" I'd never seen a mountain much less climbed one. I was ecstatic.

Of course, no matter where you go there you are, but some places just seem more "at home" than even your first home base. I love my mom and am here for her but yeah, I do wanna move out West again. Hopefully there will be time and I won't get dusted before that. What a happy thought...I amuse myself sometimes.

Been riding every day and oh, how I love the feeling. It is simply my bliss. Everything is right with the world and my mind quiets when I'm out there in the woods. Now if there were just mountains...

I spose I could be happy and stop wishing for what I don't have at the MOMENT.

I am glad to be alive and well. Right now. That's the only thing we have. I try to pay attention.

In other words, wake up! Pay attention. Be grateful for everyday blessings. Big girls don't cry...etc.

It's a good day...it hasn't started to rain, yet. Smile.

Feeling Connected

Just had friends drive 36 hours from Idaho to pick up stuff that I had stored for them when their mom died. Friends I've known since I was 16 but have only seen twice since then. Such a great uplifting, fun visit. We ate pecan encrusted trout, listened to some horn and guitar, drank some champagne, shared old stories and new, looked at pictures of their recent trip to South America, took a nap with doors and windows open, worked outside together, shared gifts, all kinds both material and non. Doesn't matter how often you see real friends. The connection immediately and without awkwardness or effort is present. So encouraging and special.

So then though, I said, "Let's call....so and so." Another friend from the old days. Got message on cell. Left message and had friend from Idaho leave message. Then get an angry call the next morning because friend's boyfriend freaked out because a guy left a message on her phone. WTF. We are not in HS anymore. And we have a past and friends and he's been married for 30 years, happily, and get over yourself and your insecurity. I would have said that but she hung up after asking what would possess me to have this mutual friend leave a message on her phone, blah, blah...oh, maybe cause we were thinking of you and wanted to surprise you and sorry about your stupid boyfriend's insecurity and immature controlling relationship. I forgot about that I guess. Jeeez. What is wrong with these people?  The energy is all negative and backwards. Gack.

Why would you live your life that way? I just could not. Part of why I'm on my own. More ease...
Course if I could meet an adult person who knows who they are and loves to love and not wallow in silly games, it might be different and lovely. And I'd have someone to do the heavy lifting. I'm hurting today from trying to use too much brawn...but I had to git her done! Trailer is clean, sub pump fixed, water sucked out of basement and dumped bucket by bucket up the stairs, and my ding back hurts. Wah, wah. Sometimes it'd be nice to have a man around the house....

Just Another Saturday Night and I ain't...

Got nothing to do, cept think about stuff. My trees are all blooming and it's so fleeting that it moves me everytime I drive in or out of the drive which is a couple times a day only, all the more amazing as a result.
My mom is turning 80in a few weeks and today I bought her an emerald ring, her birthstone. She's always, her whole life, wanted an emerald. My dad bought her a fake one for her 40th birthday that I have and love. But I wanted her to have her one wish. It cost too much, my mind said. But my heart said, your mom is gonna be 80. If not now, when then does she get her emerald. Fuck money. I'll pick it off my flowering trees, or quit smoking or something...One finds a way when one has to.

I've been struggling as is obvious from this blog which I don't want to be a blah, blah, blah blog, but oh well.
Lots of life and death struggles, not the usual annoying kinds of struggle stuff. Lost love, people dying by the dozens, little dog gone, fractured fairy tales, little kids people don't care about and that makes me near crazy, spending most of my time alone with too much thinking time, long, grey winter....yeah you read about it, or not. So it goes..

I just keep gettin up and moving forward and try to notice the good stuff and not deny the sadness of the what's real but accepting it and not letting it beat me up too much. Sleep and riding are both good healers. I haven't gotten sick so maybe I'm doing somethin right dealing with "stuff."

I am in a kind of limbo at the moment. Not good for a driven personality type like mine. I like to be doing, not just being, especially when the whirlpool catches me and won't let me move downstream...

But I'm still above water...and that's the most important thing. And I can see the sky and the flowering trees...

I don't always get it...

Ah, geesh. I am still friends with everyone I ever dated, except my one ex-husband and there was good reason for that clean cut. I am even God-mom to ex-boyfriends kids. Friends with all their wives. I figure if you loved someone once, that doesn't just stop just cause you're not together. I remember the fun and good times as a conscious choice. I figure life's too short for animosity and anger and stuff I deem energy draining creatures.

In my way of thinking, there's never blame to be laid for a broken relationship. There's usually hurt on both sides and a sense of some failure on many levels, but that's just one way of looking at it. I figure it just wasn't meant to be and didn't work. And that's all. So why harbor bad feelings when you shared good times and lovemaking and laughter and happy times along with the sad?
I just don't get it.
But there's lots I don't get. I keep trying though.

Quiet your Mind and Pay Attention

Ok, so for the past few days, my horse, Chance, who yes,at times can be a bit hard headed, has been refusing to let me bridle him. He even did not want to be haltered. The other day he broke the cross ties, rearing as I tried like I had done a hundred times to put the one ear bridle on. It is however a new one as his old one had worn. Someone else put together the bridle. Mistake number one.

I was mad at Chance. Frustrated. I could not understand his refusal. I believed it was obstinence and alpha struggle. If so, it's not a good thing to let him get away with. But we haven't had that battle for awhile.

We rode in the ring and in the woods last week. He was shaking his head. I figured it was just spring head tossing and glee. Wrong. Mistake 2.

 Finally today, after patienty trying again and again with varying methods and failing with Chance or believing so I realized what it was.

I had taken a leisurely ride on Gracie after working with Chance. Summer like sun warmth. Birds singing and swishing and first tree shoots showing lime.

Driving home aha moment. OMG. The side I was trying to loop the one ear bridle on, is Chance's left. He has lumps in that ear, always has, and it is extremely tender. Have had lumps removed and they came back. He will let me softly rub it, when he trusts me, but it is a serious issue for him. When I rode him the other day, it must have really hurt that ear. Horses remember things for a long time if something isn't right. And horses don't respond well to pain. Me either.

So what'd I learn? Shut up your head and observe and listen quietly. Don't assume. Don't force the issue. Always be gentle. Horses have no language but if you listen to who they are and watch what they do, you will eventually know what they are experiencing. And then there's no need for words..just an intuitive, complex way of knowing. And how frickin special is that?

I love my horses.

If you read this, you already knew that and were willing to tolerate yet another horse story.

I assume you must have an affinity as well, of some sort.

Life's lessons. They're good.

Glad to have the return of bird serenade and a breezy, warm spring day...topped off with some lessons in humility and sensibility.

Alrighty then. Think I got it.