A Horse Tale

Hi all! I hope this week is treating you well. It's been very nice here in Philadelphia, and I am enjoying every minute of sunny days and cool nights and mornings.

Yes, the above image is Mr. Ed, the talking horse. As you may or may not know, Mr. Ed is one of my favorite TV shows *ever.* When I was a kid, I dreamed of having a horse - any kind of horse, really. But if it turned out to be a horse like Mr. Ed, that would have just been a bonus. And Mr. Ed is the reason that I have a lifelong love for horses. Just seeing one makes me happy. If I get to pet one, kiss its nose, or ride one, then it's all exponentially better.

OK, that was some background. Now the reason I'm telling you about this. A month or more ago, when I abandoned my Relax Tee, I said that if anyone was interested in the lovely linen yarn that I was using, I would be happy to send it along. A woman named Barbara who lives in Texas, and obviously reads the blog, sent me an e-mail and said she would love to have it. In the course of our e-mails back and forth, she mentioned that she had horses. REAL LIVE HORSES that she can see every day, whenever she wants to! In any case, I finally got my act together and sent the yarn, and she sent me a very lovely thank you package, which I'll take about in another post. But when I read the note enclosed with it, I was reminded of this story, which I don't think I've ever told you before, so here goes. If you are only interested in knitting or book content, you can skip this post.

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Years ago, when we first moved to Philadelphia, we lived in a neighborhood where about half a mile from our apartment were the City Stables. It was near a little market we used to visit, so when we could we would go and see the horses afterwards. Well, it turned out that they offered riding lessons for adults, but they were so popular, it was by lottery. I took riding lessons as a child, as part of a club at a school I attended in some place where we were living at the time, but hadn't really ridden a horse for years. The Tim had never ridden a horse, so we put our names into the lottery, and we were chosen!

They did the lessons in groups of six people. Our group was 5 women and The Tim. One of the women, whose name was Dottie, said at the beginning that she signed up for lessons because "she was hoping to meet a man." Good luck with that, right?

So after our first lesson, which involved showing us how to put the tack on the horse, get onto the saddle, and then guide the horse around the ring, we were back at the stables, putting things away, grooming our horse, etc. My horse was a sweet boy named Durango. I was the last one out of the lesson, so The Tim was nearby waiting for me to finish. Dottie went over to him and started chatting. Now, you should know that The Tim is a very polite and often charming person in public, and will talk to anyone, but isn't really stellar in the listening department unless he knows he has to be. So he and Dottie are chatting, and I heard her say, "What's your name?" And frankly, I suspected he wasn't paying attention, and that was confirmed when he responded, "Durango." I immediately started to laugh so hard I cried while I was finishing up with the *real* Durango, and Dottie replied, "Oh that's so weird, just like the horse!" Frankly, I was laughing so hard, I have no idea how he got himself out of the conversation. 

Going home, he said, "You know, I wasn't really paying close attention, so I thought she asked me if I knew the horse's name." (No sh*t, Sherlock.) 

Well, this story has become a legend in our family. One of my nieces said the only way it could have been better would have been if the horse's name had been Powder Puff or something like that.

The next 5 weeks of lessons were wonderful, but nothing as memorable as the first night, when we learned that one of the people in our group had the same name as one of the horses at the stable. 😉

Barbara - thanks for the gift, and for bringing this memory into my brain. I hope you enjoy your yarn at least as much as I enjoyed this story, and thinking about it again.

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Happy Trails, y'all. 

You Need to Start Somewhere

Hello all, I hope you are well. And somehow managing to continue to go along every day in this world full of trauma. It's hard. And sadly, getting harder each and every day. Just remember, you have to take care of yourself first and foremost, because otherwise you can't help anyone else at all.

I have two things to look forward to that are keeping me from complete despair. The week after next, we have two little trips planned, and since we haven't really had any outings since our trip to WV over Memorial Day weekend, the fact that these trips are coming up have been keeping me going. I'm the sort of person who can put up with just about anything if I know there is something to look forward to, even if not for quite a while. 

I promised I'd show you my sock project that is in progress, but I keep forgetting to take a picture of it. The first sock is well into the foot section, so by the time I photograph it, instead of a piece o' sock, it might be a finished sock. 

But I did take this photo of a something I knit yesterday:

When did I become a knitter of fiddly things? Let me be clear, this is not my fave kind of knitting, but I have always avoided anything looking or sounding the least bit fiddly in the past. The stuffed doggie I knit was just fiddly in parts, but this project is nothing but fiddly! So we'll see how long it takes for me to finish it. Though it is nice to knit for a short amount of time and have something to show for it, LOL.

This is my first piece in the Fall Harvest Charm Set, by Susan B. Anderson. Apparently I do love kits, and I do have to say that Barrett Wool Co., Anderson's company with her son, put together really lovely kits that usually are not overly expensive, considering what you get. Anyway, I bought this kit a very long time ago, and much like the puppy kit, decided during a recent stash review that this fall I was actually going to make this thing. Making this tiny acorn reminded me of the quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson: "The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn." Reminding me that in both knitting and life, you may start small, but it's the starting that is important.

So I need to figure out how to try to start in so many ways. I've gotten some things started, and they just need to continue. But with the world constantly bombarding me with so much terrible, I need to make my way through to finding positive things to start, to move along with, to keep myself sane.

I hope that those of you reading have been able or are able to start finding ways for yourself to be in the world without complete despair 24/7. Granted, what works today may not work tomorrow or next week, but we should all keep on trying so that we can work our way to better days, better health, just better all around. 

My plans for today are to post this, then work on finishing the laundry, and take a walk. I woke up this morning with a killer headache, so instead of taking my walk right away, I took some Tylenol and just sat for a while. The headache is close to being history, so the walk will come soon. I'll probably also work on the aforementioned sock, and read a bit. The Tim is cooking dinner tonight, so I can forget about having to plan that. 

Have a good day, however you are able to. (Well, unless that means murdering someone - that's not good and face it, they are likely not worth a lifetime in prison. Try to focus things elsewhere. 😉)

September

 

Hello and Happy Labor Day! I for one am always glad for the "official" reminder that a lot of the things we take for granted - set working hours, a limit to working hours, etc. - are in place thanks to labor unions. Even if you are not a union member, you benefit from many things they fought long and hard to gain.

So here we are with Labor Day actually taking place on the first day of September, which for many people, marks the start of a new year. I have been out of school since approximately 1893, and I still think of Labor Day and the beginning of September as a new start. This year is no different, but I'm taking a slightly different approach.

As you may have heard me blather on about mention, I have been working hard to create new exercise/activity habits, along with my niece Amanda and my friend Lisa. We all keep each other updated and accountable, and I have to say, this has worked better for me than anything else. Having support and people who give you grace when you fall short of what you hoped to do is game-changing in my life. Not that I didn't have support from The Tim before, but it makes a big difference when you are also supporting the others as well. The Tim has always been pretty fit and never has health issues for the most part, so he didn't really need me saying "Good job" to encourage him to continue.

My niece Amanda has a personal practice that I'm going to try to adopt for myself. Instead of trying to keep track of overarching goals over the course of a whole year, she thinks about what she hopes each new month can be. In her case, she creates a type of vision board and uses it as her wallpaper on her phone. I am not that advanced, but I like the idea of thinking/working on a month-by-month basis rather than a yearly one. So starting this month, that's my new practice. I have a few things roughly thought out, but one of my activities today is to actually put them on paper - yes, I still use paper! - so I can see them and remember them more clearly than if I just tried to put them in my brain for storage. 

I'll let you know how/if this works for me, in case you are interested in trying it. Though it wouldn't be surprising to know that a lot of you already do this type of thing, since you are more on top of your lives than I may be. 😊

So here we go - enjoy these -BER months!

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Thank you for the nice comments for me and especially for Alfie and his newfound freedom to roam in the garden. We spent a good deal of time out there this weekend, and here he is just enjoying the chance to be outside. 

In the comments, Jose asked if Alfie was on pain medication because I mentioned that he is declawed. First of all, before you give me a lecture about the evils of declawing cats, please know that when we got him, he was a three-legged, declawed cat already. So we were not in any way involved in that. 

But to answer the question, Alfie doesn't take medication at all. He doesn't seem to be in any pain, and gets around very well - especially if he is chasing something! He goes to the vet regularly (as do the others), and we have never had any indication that he is uncomfortable. So as far as we can tell, and based on his activity levels, Alfie seems to be just fine as he is.  He was on medication briefly last year for ear problems, but those are resolved, and now he's just busy in his true destiny of Nature Cat. 

I hope all of you have a good holiday, if Labor Day happens where you are. Unfortunately, it turns out that The Tim did in fact have to labor today, so we'll be glad to see him later to have a good evening. I'm going to attempt to make shrimp kebabs for dinner, so wish me luck!