As some of you may know I was quite the little equestrian for the majority of my life and have just recently taken a sabbatical from it. I was just thinking back how much I loved riding, grooming my horses, mucking stalls (I know you wouldn't think that would be possible but it is satisfying), traveling to shows, competing, taking lessons and the long drives out to the barn where I got to think about my day. Riding was a very therapeutic activity ever since I can remember. When I was little and upset by something I would just run down to the pasture hop on one of the horses go for a ride and when I was done the world was all better again. At night I would lay down on the back of my horse and look up at the stars breathing in the hay, dirt and fresh air. I spent more hours at the barn than I did at my own house growing up. Instead of long summers playing with my friends, swimming in the pool, I had spent my summers at horse camps, showing, getting up at the wee hours of the morning to get to the barn to ride before it got too hot. Over my 20+ years of riding I broke 5 different bones, dislocated my shoulder, sprained my wrists and ankles a handful of times, been rolled over on, stepped on, slammed into several walls, thrown into fences,kicked and bitten but with all of that I still managed to learn about hard work, responsibility, patience, perseverance, how to handle disappointment and even how to run a business all just from riding a horse. It was a lot of work and sometimes a lot of pain but well worth it in the end. Hopefully one day at least one of my children will have the desire to ride horses and they will have the same wonderful experience that I did.
