Category Archives: horses

December

The sunrise on December 01 was particularly beautiful. A detail of orange and pink turning mauve to blue. Above the white diesels. After breakfast and a walk with Gigi I said hello to Mac and got his bridle. Hopped on and walked him through the snow, deep in spots. He was good in the snow. We walked up the driveway and down the road. The morning was peaceful. Walked past Quigg and to the crest of the hill and back down. Down the hill and a slight wind was blowing in my face, it must have been at least -22. My face was very very cold and so were my toes. So we rode back, fast, and I put him away quick. And then I made meatballs and brownies.

Then was Tini.  A ride up the road and back, in the cold as well. Tini was her usual Tini self.

Remembrance 2024

Monday, November 11, 2024

106 years marks the Armistice. The end of World War I at 1100h.  Woke to the orange light of the sky on the horizon above the trucks.

 

 

 

After breakfast and coffee Giulia and I went outside for a walk. Slightly cloudy and no wind. I got Mac and rode him on the lawn in a halter. Looked at the mountains stark there. 

Then I started the truck and we drove south in the light to the hall. The parking lot was full and the people all inside, the wooden walls of the community gathering place. Inside people sat in the little wooden school chairs, the old kind, like the one I have in the mud room that was left on the side of the road. I recognized people from town. And a woman came up front and talked about her son in the army, and a man played guitar in front of all. Then we went outside, to the monument, the names of all those who served. And their names were listed, many of them, and after that a moment of silence, but it was not 11 yet. There was no wind, there, then, and the mountains were magnificent as ever. And after that everyone gathered and chatted. I spoke to Frank Zieffle and asked him who Richard Zieffle was, the name that was mentioned, inscribed on the monument. His uncle, he said. We spoke for a time and went inside for coffee, gathered around some more. And then Giulia and I drove back. In the peaceful November light.

I gathered Tini and brushed her and got her bridle and got on. Walked her around and trotted and loped. And it was so good and so peaceful. Watching the mountains. Thankful. And thinking to Ina with her son my age, at war. Vitalyk, whose lungs were burnt of gas, granting him some weeks home, away from war, before returning again. How brutal are the machines of war, instilling fear in thy neighbour, atrocities most of us have only heard about, and never seen. 

    

 

 

 

 

 

In the evening we watched All Quiet on the Western Front, a movie I purchased on Saturday night without thinking to the date. How fitting it was, a movie set on the days leading up to the armistice, chilling and surreal, unfathomable. The movie made me shake. And afterwords, in the dark of night, I took Giulia outside to look at the mountains, unmoving, once more. Lest We Forget.

All Quiet on the Western Front (2022)

All Quiet on the Western Front (2022)

 

October Rides 2024

Thanksgiving Ride in the sunshine

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

October 19, 2014 in the wind

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

October 20, 2024

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

October 24, 2024. In the wind

 

 

 

 

Blessed Saturday Morning- May 04, 2024

 

Saturday Morning before 10 a.m Mac and I head to the hills. Walking down the road in his new braids with his new halter, me dressed in black, head to toe, and we kinda match. I like it, this.

At the south end of the road where it bends we go for a lope in the halter and he is good. I think he wants to keep me good and well though why he sometimes cow-bucks I do not know.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Friday night ride March 15, 2024

 

Drove out in the beautiful evening light, so warm. With Frankie, after eating an iceberg salad, with walnuts and quinoa, and buying chocolate, the salted dark that I like. The evening sun was glorious, Frankie and I so happy, listening to music, driving down that road. We turned towards the farm, the gravel road newly graded and gravelled, turning up big plumes of dust, glorious. Frankie was very happy to play with Skip, as always. I got Mac, brushed him while Amanda brushed Pal. We saddled and bridled them, Frankie went into the truck, and we rode down the road, trotting some. I am mesmerized by those mountains at sunset evening, the colours; blue and white mountains, like the Kokanee mountains, the picture on the beer cans, coupled with a sky that is yellow, orange, pink and blue. How it never gets old. Riding in the evenings is a beautiful thing, all out in the open. We walked down the road, to the picture above, and back.

It was near dark when Frankie and I left. The windmills so stark and tall against the night sky. I felt so alive.