Willy, now Winston

I can't remember how much I wrote about Willy and what happened when I got Elliot.  To get to the point, I ended up having to find a new home for him before he killed Elliot.  He went to live with a young man who was working on the roof of my house.  I went through the "tortures of the damned" for weeks after he left, worrying, imagining all kinds of horrible scenarios.  After a few months I adjusted, but never really relaxed about the situation despite many emails to and from his new owner.  Off and on my imagination went wild with terrible scenarios involving his being mistreated, neglected, unloved. 

In the year that has gone by, I have never really felt comfortable about giving him away, but I had to do it.  Lately I began to worry again.  All sorts of awful possibilities rolled through my head.  I thought about emailing his new owner, but was neurotically fearful that the news would be bad.  Then finally I did it.  At first I got no response from Kyle, the young man who took Willy.  My anxiety rose with every day to the point that I was convinced something terrible had happened.  I thought of nothing else.

Finally I got an email with this picture and two others showing Willy in his new environment.  This picture shows him with one of his adoptive big brothers.  There are no words to describe my joy and I still am thrilled every time I look at this and the other photos I got.  He has a life so much better than he ever had with me............dear Willy, whose name is now Winston, has the life every dog should have.

Spring and the Virus

The other day was so warm and sunny I decided to take my two babies outside for a little fresh air.  Spring appears to be here, and if not for the virus people would be rejoicing.  Instead we are all under quarantine and the world as we know it has pretty much stopped.  Sitting on the threshold of my front door, it seemed like any other early spring day.  The three of us enjoyed it.

My life revolves around my little world.

Horse Tales

I began to think about my horsey years when I read another blog by a person who also loves horses.  This picture is of me and my horse BJ.  It was taken at the farm where I boarded him.........called Trapho Farm.  He was a dream come true.  The second picture is of me and Darby, my second horse.  After I sold Darby I saw his name in the paper for winning a ribbon at a dressage competition with his new owner.  I had to sell both of these horses against my will.  I still feel teary when I think of it.

 Before I had my own, I rode horses at riding stables as a child every chance I got, hung around the race track in Bangor, and generally made myself present whenever a horse opportunity presented itself.  I was a dressage fan and took lessons for many years before I had my own horse.  I learned the vocabulary and all the commands.  I guess my fondness for drama and pageantry drew me to the ritualistic performance of horse and rider together, the rules and regulations, the precision (or at least the striving for precision), the quest for harmony and subtle communication between horse and rider.

 Of course there were trail rides as well.  I can still feel the strange sensation of riding bareback on Peach, a huge gray draft horse, as he swam across a river that flowed through the pasture.  He loved the water.  Those were some of the happiest years of my life, when I was defined  by how well I could perform a "shoulder in" or how gracefully I could "sit the trot at K."

My two kids were young then, and we had a pony as well.  Neither one of them really loved the horse world the way I did, but they participated in it all with good humor.  It seems to me that it was one well-defined chapter of my life.  I was wife, mother, horsewoman.  I made cupcakes for school  holidays and costumes for school plays.  I went to PTA meetings.  I passed out cups of fluoride.  I  printed the PTA newspaper.  This was, I suppose, the second chapter of adulthood after my life as a psychiatric Social Worker.  Although there is some overlap, they seem very separate to me, very different. 

The one constant from the moment I was able to hold a pencil or a crayon, was making art.