A Late Summer Ride
It's hard to find time to mope around about the son going off to college when I have my daughter Devin and her friend Ellen keeping me busy with their elaborate schemes. Yesterday, they came up with a plan to take our three horses to Steep Rock Land Preserve for a long trail ride. The complicated part was that I only have a two horse trailer. No problem, said the girls. I could drive two horses there, they would stay with them, then I could drive back to the barn, pick up the third and bring him to Steep Rock and we'd all go for a ride. Despite the fact that this would add up to about three hours of horse hauling for me, I agreed, as the girls and I are riding in the Bedford Hunter Pace this weekend and I wanted to see how the horses would behave trotting and cantering together in a group. Besides, how can you turn down a pair like these two?
Or, for that matter, these two:
So we eventually got all three horses transported and we rode the beautiful trails of Steep Rock, which look like this:

Trotting through the pine groves, splashing in the river and climbing the hills of Steep Rock on horseback, accompanied by two of my favorite people on earth, was such a restorative and, I hesitate to say it - it's so cliche - but really a spiritual experience. Before I disengaged the "Google Alert" on my computer, I used to be able to see every nice and nasty thing anybody said about me, anywhere, on the web. One blogger said that, in addition to other despicable things about my personality, I have a blog in which I brag about what a great life I have, which made me wonder if that's how I come across. But I do have a great life, and it wasn't always so great, and I'm prone to depression which sometimes makes it hard for me to see all the goodness around me, so it helps to write about the good stuff. There's so much.
I'm grateful. I'm .... again, sounds trite... incredibly blessed.














