Incredible Focus
Horses are experts at paying attention. That is one of the reasons they are so good as facilitators of our learning exercises. They don’t miss a thing.
During preparations for an exercise in the round pen, all 4 horses stood in close proximity to the participants, whether they were involved or not.
At one point during the afternoon, I spotted 2 of the horses turned around and facing the other direction. There was something in the distance, not visible to us, that the horses had alerted on from two different positions. Their heads were positioned identically, and moved together as if they were connected.
While they stood watch, the other two remained calm and kept their attention on our activity, feeling safe to entrust their well-being to the two sentinels. Whatever it was that had gotten their attention must have disappeared shortly thereafter, and they rotated like a compass needle, to point back at the round pen.
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Training Happens
This is what it’s all about. Yesterday we hosted a training session led by Cyndie and Dunia that was the closest thus far to the type of teaching we long ago envisioned happening here. The 3 of us probably experienced as much learning as the people who came to participate in the session. We discovered a few minor details that can be improved upon for subsequent sessions.
Happily, the hot and humid weather we are experiencing did not spoil the activities outside involving the horses. Legacy was a rock star endurance athlete during round pen exercises, doing laps with each participant as if it was a comfortable day and each time was his first. The rest of us slowly became fatigued (and we had the shade of the canopy!), but he showed no signs of having had enough of the work out in the hot sun.
It is fascinating to watch how the process works with these lessons. Different people have different things to learn, and the response from the horses changes accordingly.
While Legacy was putting on his command performance in the round pen, we experienced a little sideshow of the other horses mixing it up in the paddock, as the newly emboldened Hunter let the other two mares see his change in attitude.
With ears pinned back, hooves flew during agitated negotiations over changes in the pecking order that previously existed. Later in the day, after guests had all departed, I wandered down to feed the herd and witnessed Legacy step into the fracas, essentially telling them to put a lid on all the bickering.
They don’t question his instructions, but it was cute to see Hunter take up a strategic position on the far side of Dezirea, where he felt safe from reproach, but could still taunt Cayenne that she wasn’t the boss of him.
Kids.
We are going to do it all over again today, with a new group of participants, hopefully in more comfortable weather. It is incredibly energizing to see this phase of the dream coming to life and witness the horses sharing their wisdom. Together, Cyndie and Dunia have put incredible effort toward preparing the horses and making this all happen.
I have a sense that, with all the support we have received recently from the Walkers and the Morales family, we are as ready as we’ll ever be to take this to the next level. Lookout world, Wintervale Ranch and Retreat Center is getting ready to go viral.
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Re-framing Hunter
Before our horses arrived here, we received a description of them that included details about Hunter having been kicked in the head after he was born. We were told that it had caused him to be a little slow to learn and that he tended to get picked on by other horses in their herd.
It is my intention that this will be the last time I ever make mention of this.
After our 4 arrived here, we sensed that Hunter had his own way of doing things, but it didn’t come across as him being slow to learn. Still, every time we noticed him askew of the other horses, we imagined the story we had been told, and assumed that it was a likely justification for his unique behavior.
Every time I introduced our horses, or talked about them when away, I found myself repeating that story we had been told. It was who Hunter was to me.
Not anymore.
Hopefully, never again. We are going to tell a new story of Hunter. For me, the first incident that spawned this change happened the last time George was trimming the horses. He had one of Hunter’s front legs up in the air and Hunter seemed to have a problem with a fly or something. Hunter picked up his other front leg and reached up over George’s back with a scratching motion.
The image of a horse rearing up on its hind legs is a normal thing to picture, but Hunter wasn’t “rearing up.” Picture a horse standing horizontal and lifting both front legs.
George said, “Don’t let this horse ever make you think he can’t do something. That took a lot of athletic ability. Most horses would fall over if they tried that.”
While Dunia has been here these last two weeks, and when Rachael spent a day with them working the horses, Hunter has proven to be a very capable student and has responded well to their direction. He has needed some extra attention, because of his usual pattern of avoidance to being haltered, but that behavior is one to which Dunia has been training.
We tended to accept his avoidance behavior as understandable, given “the story.”
When I think back to the memorable interactions I’ve had with Hunter, of which there are plenty, not one of them ever seemed like he was reacting to any sort of disability.
This week, Cyndie and I had an epiphany about our perception of Hunter. There is no reason we need to perceive him through the filter of that story we were told. We are going to re-frame Hunter to the horse we have direct experience witnessing. He will now receive a new vision of himself from us.
Hunter is an athletic, intelligent, beautiful, awesome, and truly capable horse.
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What For
I don’t always know the reason something catches my eye for a photo, but similar to the way I assemble words in a poem just because they come to me, whether I understand or not, I tend to take pictures on a whim. I have no idea whether the resulting image will appeal or mean anything to others, I just do it because a scene catches my attention.
Here is one that I took while at George and Rachael’s on Tuesday. Does it trigger anything for you?
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Mutual Support
We have received a lot of support from our neighbors, George and Rachael Walker in the time we have been here. They have provided us with meat and eggs from a share in their CSA farm, cut and baled our hay, George trims our horse’s hooves, and Rachael has provided riding lessons. We welcomed an opportunity to finally offer support to them in return.
Yesterday, we went over to learn the details of feeding their variety of horses so that we can “farm-sit” while they are away for a few days over the weekend. Most of their animals will be set up with enough food for all three days, so it is just horses that will be our primary responsibility. Still, I found the process of feeding some of the other animals equally fascinating.
The pigs eat anything and everything. Rachael found a stash of eggs that had been secreted away in some nook, so she tossed them to the pigs. Mixed in with the pulverized corn that had already been served, it looked like a baking accident had spilled in there. The pigs took to it like… pigs.
I didn’t see the ducks getting fed, but they put on a nice show of their dark colors, strutting their stuff in the yard. It had me wondering how we might ever condition our dog, Delilah to accept the presence of poultry on our property without assuming they were put there for her to eat.
I’d like to have some ducks and chickens as assistants in controlling the fly populations around here.
After animals were all fed, and George finished cutting one of their hay fields, we joined them for dinner at the nearby El Paso Bar & Grill. I ate fried cheese curds, and other ill-advised choices at an unusually late hour, and stayed out way past my bedtime. It was wonderful.
George and Rachael are a joy to be with, and we feel ever more connected to community as we grow more familiar. Being able to offer them some support contributes greatly to that feeling of connection.
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Cultivating Authenticity
In the everyday reality of each passing moment, we are constantly choosing, consciously or otherwise, our personal energy, which we project outward to every living being in our vicinity. For decades of my life, my energy was unconsciously that of a depressed individual. Sometimes it was encased within a facade of “I’m okay,” but the supposed ‘okay’ me was not whole.
In the years since I began managing my depression, I have continually discovered new levels of awareness about my mind and body. In the very normal fluctuating rates of change and growth, there are periods that stand out. The recent days of preparation for the visit from our friends, the Morales family, and the splendid excitement of our time together again after they arrived, have generated a terrific boost of energy for Cyndie and me.
Granted, we are all a bit drained from lack of sleep, due to all the fun we have had, but that is a recoverable circumstance. We are feeling a significant surge of progress toward crafting the framework of how we might best express the essence of the growth and learning we want to make available at Wintervale Ranch. Dunia and Marco Morales have helped immensely with inspiring this surge.
In the wee hours yesterday morning, Marco and their sons began the long day of travel, flying back to their home in Guatemala. Dunia is spending another week here to work with Cyndie and our horses, and help lead some training sessions.
When I pulled up the driveway yesterday after work, I spotted Cyndie and Dunia in the arena space, along with our neighbor, Rachael Walker, who was providing her counsel and guidance in getting the horses ready for Cyndie to begin riding again. For the first time since the horses arrived here, and 10-months after a hip replacement, Cyndie was back in the saddle.
With our horses as guides, I am discovering new insights about cultivating authenticity.
These feel like noteworthy milestones for us on this journey of creating Wintervale Ranch to become the place we have imagined.
Having written that, it comes to mind that I have a sense from the horses that they have been patiently allowing us to take all the time we needed to reach these milestones, while they have been ready and available all the while.
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Guest Photos
Cyndie and a few of our party guests have shared some photos from our summer celebration extravaganza. They save me coming up with words today…
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Summer Celebration
The weather held! In the morning yesterday, radar indicated rain showers were moving past just north of our county, and hours later, just south of us. We stayed dry the whole time. That allowed us to set up for our gala gathering of friends and family to party and picnic throughout the afternoon and evening.
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Our friend, Marco, went above and beyond the call of duty and stood over the hot flaming grill to cook enough brats to feed an army, even though he and his family were the guests of honor. Eventually he snagged an opportunity to wash up and return to enjoy the epic social extravaganza.
High school friends rallied and assembled a superb ensemble of guitar, keyboards, bass, & drums for amplified live music over the lawn. There was dancing on the deck.
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People brought incredible contributions of food and some excellent yard games. Passing through the line to fill a plate was not a one-time occurrence, because new dishes kept appearing that demanded attention. I faced the unsolvable challenge of wanting to be down at the barn, up by the house, with folks at the labyrinth, or guiding them on our trails, all at the same time.
At the end of the night, Cyndie was able to fill me in on some of the grand excitement I missed. She and I were in two different places for almost the entire time, so our combined experience paints a better picture of the whole event. Sounds like the horses were a big hit with people, young and old. Cyndie and Dunia went with the flow of energy and ended up doing precisely what they had planned to avoid, by allowing people to have turns inside the paddock to interact with individual horses.
As I suspected, I had to rely on visitors to experience the details of our place under their own initiative. I received enough reports from people that they had walked the labyrinth or explored trails to feel satisfied that they were getting a pretty good sample of what life is like here at this time of year.
It ended up being a classic summer afternoon and evening, perfect for the fun and frolic we had in mind. I sense that it would be safe to say, a good time was had by all.
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It’s Today!
The day of our spectacular event to celebrate summer at Wintervale is upon us. We are mostly ready for guests to arrive this afternoon. There are just 368 things left to do. I’m sure we will have a very relaxed morning, lounging around after finishing everything with time to spare.
We drove home from the lake yesterday and had enough time to get some mowing done and take a few first steps toward preparing. Unfortunately, there was another gully-washer of a rainstorm while we were gone and it washed away some of our new lime screenings and pushed the sand out of our round pen.
Two steps backward for our one step forward last week.
I need to do some landscaping above the round pen to divert the water before it gets a chance to run through the new sand.
For every accomplishment we achieve, there tends to be an additional step that also deserves attention.
Today, that will be shelved for a later time. We will be doing our best to focus on the precious friends who are driving long distances to see Wintervale and celebrate summer with us and our guests, the Morales family from Guatemala. There will be music, food, sunshine (possibly through clouds), horses, our dog Delilah, fields and forest trails awaiting our visitors.
I will be trying to find a way to help folks figure out where to park, and doing my best to spend as much time as possible with every person who shows up. Despite my desire to tell visitors every story I have about our place, it will serve me well to figure out short versions and parse them out sparingly.
People will pick up the gist of what we have going on at Wintervale by the experience of simply being here. The property and our horses will tell enough of the story to accomplish what I wish them to know. I would like to relax, enjoy the moment, and let people discover whatever is theirs to discover.
I hope I remember to take some pictures…
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