And the Days March On

The past week (since Sunday) has been very sad, and I've mostly been removing myself from social media, because knowing the harsh realities is one thing, but the barrage of information is overwhelming. Constantly thinking about those who have suffered, the ongoing problems in our country, and fearing for yourself and friends and all your brothers and sisters...is overwhelming. My heart is sad and I'm mourning and I feel helpless. But I've also worked hard to continue living my life and BEING ME. 

Which, you know, means riding horses. This is me doing a selfie with Khade. (He has some strange Arabian breed name but everyone calls him Khade.) Like most Arabians, his deck is short a few cards. He's old enough to know better, but OMG DID THAT LEAF JUST MOVE I THINK IT DID - WHY ARE YOU ON THE GROUND?

His training (whatever it was) before we got him didn't really help this, as far as we can tell. He has a lot of neurosis (when he's nervous, he HAS to touch his nose to his knee and give it a rub). He's also physically unbalanced and his back muscles are weak on the right side, so the rider tends to list to the right. 

This summer I'm riding him once a week and another girl is riding him too. She's a much better/skilled/experienced/confident rider than I am, but between the two of us, he seems to be making a lot of improvement in a lot of different ways!

Wednesday I ride the quarter horse named Dish, and she's less stressful in being nervous, but she takes a lot more leg/seat than Khade. But she's also helping me learn things and improve my riding, which is helping when I ride Khade, so it all works out. Those two sure are different, but I'm having a lot of fun switching back and forth. I love a challenge!

And that was the first half of my week. Lots of horses and riding and being connected to the community and nature. It was great.

I've also been thinking about switching to a different blogging site, because Blogger just doesn't feel like it's really satisfying my needs anymore. There's a lot I like about Blogger, but there's so much social media posting that other sites do FOR you (rather than me linking to a billion places) that I'm really tempted. Just a heads-up. I will of course spread the word far and wide ;)

Finally, I'm planning something for my birthday toward the end of August, so keep an eye open for that!