Posts Tagged ‘horses’
Deep Meaning
I am greatly moved by what I have enjoyed the past two days here, learning from the horses. There are many words to be written about it, yet, at the same time, few that will convey the fullness of my experience. It is quite an exercise to move from paying primary attention to my mind, and the limited cues modern society relies on, toward giving the heart and gut equal value. There is wisdom, ancient wisdom, in practicing a more informed awareness of the unseen signals of communication.
Observing and interacting with untethered horses, offers a special opportunity to become more aware of parts of ourselves that we often neglect, or even, simply disregard.
This is Mystique, who communicated with me in ways I have yet to fully comprehend.
I look forward to absorbing the full depth of what transpired in the sessions with the equine companions here.
I believe it is infused with deep meaning for me.
More Posts
Monday is the weekday I don’t drive to the day-job, with my 4-day work week, and yesterday provided me the opportunity to witness the process of fence posts installation. I discovered there is a lot more to the task than just digging a hole and dropping a post down into it.
I am very grateful to see the crew we hired are very particular about getting the posts precise, to assure we end up with not just a functional fence, but one that will look good, too.
With each post, they have to watch multiple things, simultaneously: first, that it is the right distance from the previous post, but then also that it’s set to the right depth, level in two directions, square to the line which the cross-boards will run, and ultimately, in line with the rest of the posts.
When they finally achieve all of those parameters, they need to back-fill the hole, packing the dirt tight as they go, without allowing the post to move out of position. When you are setting a lot of posts in a line, one bad one can really stand out of the bunch. They have to repeat this series of steps over and over, with sustained vigilance to meet each goal, for every post. I think it’s pretty impressive.
They also agreed to create a radius, which I didn’t think they wanted to do, so the fence by the new driveway will follow the arc of the loop.
While that work was happening, we received one more truckload of sand for the driveway, and then the trusses for the hay shed. The dump truck driver informed us it would be the last load for now, as he discovered the route has been posted with road restrictions for reduced weight limits, due to the spring thaw. That restriction will likely last into May. We got close, but we were intending to put at least one more load than was delivered yesterday. Luckily, we have the fill we need for work on the shed to commence.
Here is a wide shot that shows how the fence line will arc with the driveway, and where the hay shed will be located beside the driveway loop:
At Least
It’s not really all that much progress to boast about, but at the very least, the wood has finally been unloaded from the trailer. The major effort put forth yesterday involved moving snow out of the way, in the areas where work will occur in the days ahead.
Today we are anticipating delivery of several truck loads of gravel, which will get distributed and packed in construction of our expanded driveway to the barn. At this point, any progress it thrilling, but this step will significantly define the fence line for the first paddock, which is a really big deal. Already, as I was walking around after I got home from work, I was better able to visualize the area that will soon be fenced. It is energizing.
Actually, just walking around on the land that we now own is pretty energizing. Since we don’t have any horses yet, we haven’t been spending much time down around the barn. As I explored the area where they had cleared away the snow, I experienced a sense of how much this will change with the arrival of horses. This space will become the center of attention.
I discovered that the snow that slides off the “uphill” side of the barn roof, and piles up against the wall, eventually leads to water leaking into the barn there. Next winter, when we will be spending time in the barn every day, I will be managing the snow more regularly, and will take steps to keep it from piling up to this same degree.
We have learned a fair number of things about our new property this winter, but I’m not sure it has been all that helpful toward helping us prepare details for when we get horses. I think the best way to do that will be by actually having horses. I expect we will quickly discover what works and what doesn’t. Then, as with all things, we will simply adjust accordingly.
I’m told that we could see fence posts installed by Thursday or Friday. Yahoo!
We’re Off!
We are off to a walloping start for the new year at our place. We took care of some details that have been lingering unaddressed during the time we were overly focused on our open house/party, and the Christmas and New Year holidays. Cyndie now has Wisconsin license plates for her car, and I learned that our energy company does the billing for electric and propane, independently. I applied for auto-pay, but it only went into effect for the electric bill. I was past due on the propane, because I needed to apply for that separately. Who knew? It’s all taken care of now.
We made some great progress in designing the layout of our future horse spaces, and the fencing that will define it. Our special friends, Barb and Mike, were here to ring in the new year, and helped us identify a miscalculation (confusing ‘feet’ for ‘yards’ in our numbers), which allowed us to move past a stumbling block that was truly foiling our attempts to plan. Then they graciously accompanied us in trudging through the snow to ‘test’ our layout in real scale.
I remain pleasantly encouraged that we have plenty of space to accommodate what we currently have in mind. It’s not a perfect science, since we don’t know which of our potential plans will actually be achieved, in the long run, but the possibilities appear to allow room for us to fit any of the variety of visions that are floating in and out of our dreams.
The owners of the fencing company came to our house on the afternoon of the New Year holiday, to consult on the current status and future planning. We came a couple of steps closer to choosing the type of fence, and are now leaning toward a vinyl-coated high tensile wire strung between wood posts. It will help keep the total cost of this phase of our project down in a range that almost fits our budget.
They will be pounding some stakes and stringing temporary lines to help us visualize how the fences for two paddocks around the barn will look.
These are significant steps for us. In the month-plus since we started talking with this company about our wishes, the progress has felt rather hobbled. There is a very good aspect to the delay of progress, in that, we have had time to adjust our perceptions and work on our imaginings of what we wish to create.
I take it as a good sign, that none of the changes that have evolved are very significant. Overall, it is pretty much on plan with our combined visions.
On top of the energy we felt from working on that project, our inspirations were led to spend some time together exploring the possibilities for a dog, or dogs, that will be good companions for horses, and visitors, and our cats, and us! We share a feeling of attraction to certain, but not all, herders, for our situation. We like the Belgian Shepherd, Australian Shepherd, Sheltie, and Great Pyrenees. All tend to have similar benefits/challenges. It will be a tough choice.
There is plenty ahead for us in 2013. It feels like we have picked up right where we left off in 2012, and we got a pretty good start on day one. Hang on for another wild ride!
Getting Readier
It’s December again! We all know what that means. Winter is coming!
Winter will be the reward for all the folks who fear the world will come to some spectacular end on December 21 this year. They will wake up on December 22 and the world will still be on, and it will be winter. Well, at least for those in the northern hemisphere. For those on the southern half of the planet, happy coming of summer to you.
I always find it difficult to reconcile the thought that people are experiencing the season of summer when we are in the depths of cold and dark.
We are going to celebrate the new month today by getting our very first quote on the job of installing new fencing and creating an arena. I don’t know if it is too late in the season to actually get fence installed, but this is one of the things we really would like to have in place before we bring horses to the property.
Cyndie contacted a local company and a representative is supposed to come out some time this morning. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that we will be able to afford fencing that is robust, low maintenance, good looking, and has a long life expectancy. We want to have enough money left over to install an all season, on-demand watering system for the horses. Add to that, a hay shed, and we will be getting dang close to horse-ready.
You might have thought the cats were going to be a source of tales to be told here, but they’ll have nothing on the horses. Unless they finally catch a mouse. If they turn out to be good hunters, I’ll make sure to get them a fair share of “air-time.” When horses arrive, it will be hard for me not to post and write about the most essential of reasons we are here.
Reverse Order
It took some time, but there is now a “Sold” placard added to our realty sign in the yard, bringing some formality to our status. It is official.
Each day that goes by, in which I don’t take on some task related to preparation for our move, feels like a lost opportunity. Luckily, last night I was able to take advantage of the big work that Cyndie has been doing in our library. She went through most of the books on the shelves and sorted them into keepers and giveaways. I invited friend, Gary, over for dinner and we urged him to help us out by taking some books home with him. Mission accomplished.
Gary and I got to hear some of Cyndie’s latest stories of connecting with horses. She has been taking some lessons in dressage at a stable that is new to her. Yesterday she took advantage of an opportunity to spend some time making first contact with a few of the many horses at this place. Turns out, there were plenty of interested talkers.
Should I be suspicious about the one that wanted to come home with her? Especially when the owner wandered by and mentioned the horse was for sale?
At the rate things are going, we could end up with a horse before we even have the farm.
Wild Ride
Twenty-two of the twenty-seven most-recent emails in my inbox are labeled with the name that Cyndie and I have chosen for the farm we are dreaming of acquiring. I have chosen to keep that name confidential, until we are able to close on the property, but I have been using it to categorize the email traffic related to the process that started back in February of this year.
There are 283 messages in that folder. The first one is from the person we chose as our realtor. Then there are messages with the drywall company and painter that fixed up our house while we were preparing to put it on the market.
In hind sight, it would be accurate to relabel email exchanges with our precious friend, Ian Rowcliffe, to be marked with that same identifier. Traveling to Portugal to meet Ian and his family, and spend time with their horses at the paradise that is their Forest Garden Estate, definitely deserves credit for inspiring this dream.
The current batch of 22 messages received in the last two days reveals a boost of activity that has come from our finally taking the step of visiting farms we have been marking as “favorites” on the list our realtor has been providing weekly. That step follows the milestone of having received an offer on our home.
The fact that our first offer was received only 3-days after Cyndie returned home brings a smile to my face.
Three days after that, we drove a lot of miles to visit 4 different properties. Yesterday, we finally had an opportunity to walk through the property that has been on the top of our favorites since we first received a list from our realtor.
There are a fair number of issues, all with contingencies, that are yet to be determined, but this flurry of messages coincides with our having signed our names on a lot of documents in an act of hope toward realizing a precious dream.
Will all the pending uncertainties resolve in our favor? Regular readers here should know how Cyndie is willing the universe to direct the outcome. I am doing everything I can to keep my feet and hands inside the cart at all times during this wild ride.
Finally Looking
Now that Cyndie is home, and because we have actually received an offer on our house, our realtor is finally allowing us to look at potential horse properties. We spent a lot of hours yesterday afternoon and evening, driving and exploring. We saw 4 very different possibilities. All of them had something good about them, but none of them are right for us.
At the property that was most enticing for me, we came around a corner of a building and found two bald eagles perched in the branches of a great big dead tree. It was very inspiring. This place had about 3-times more in the way of out-buildings than we could imagine being able to use. Cyndie says it will be nice if we can have some covered or indoor arena space to work with horses. This property had a HUGE indoor arena. Unfortunately, it had so many structures, they made the area near the house feel too closed in. I said, “We could knock some of it down.” But there was also a bit too many bodies of stagnant water bordering, or overlapping, the lot. The location was also too far from the airport. Access to the airport is still a priority, both for Cyndie traveling to
Today, I will be forced out of working at the day-job in order to drive to Wisconsin to finally get inside the buildings and walk on the property that remains our favorite out of all the listings that have been sent our way throughout the summer. I look forward to seeing how it compares to the places we toured yesterday.
Also, since we will already be in Wisconsin, our plan is to continue on after that, and head to the lake home paradise in Hayward for the weekend. Cyndie has already received an invitation to go riding with her niece up there this weekend.
Tough Decisions
Here is a view of Cyndie in her glory, enjoying the great outdoors in the company of horses. Now, imagine this poor girl stuck inside a public school office building, in a big city, dealing with bureaucratic foibles, facing impossible situations, operating among a crowd of people with mixed agendas (many of them hidden, and some of them hostile), for 18 hours a day, 7 days a week. That’s the way her work sounded to me from her descriptions. I’m wishing that she would never have to go back to that type of environment.
At the very least, I’m hoping she could do it as an outside consultant, with control over the hours, to allow her opportunities to spend quality time working with horses.
We are at a crossroads now, with her between employment, and us on the cusp of our dream. We are trying to move forward toward our vision, but are wrestling with how to do that prudently, in order to minimize risk of being under-prepared, or getting in over our heads. It doesn’t make sense to us, to throw caution to the wind and go for it, if we do so in a way that will have too high a risk of failure, leaving us unable to take care of the animals and property for which we become responsible.
Our happy-go-lucky styles are coming face to face with a need to make some tough decisions.
Suddenly, time seems to be moving pretty fast for us. Nonetheless, I think we are both finding pleasure being on this wild ride.
Not Sure
I wish I had some of the horse sense right now that this guy possesses, to help with the negotiation process in which we are engaged.
I like the mysteriousness of having the eyes out of view in this image. There is still a lot conveyed by the rest of the face and muzzle.
Is this view destined to be a daily experience in my future? It’s quite possible, yet how near a future remains uncertain.
I’ve waited this long, I can wait some more. I’ve said many times that we aren’t in a situation where we really need to sell our house and move. If we can’t get an offer that we are satisfied with, we are still more than happy to stay where we are and continue to enjoy the luxury of a house we are very lucky to have.
For the time being, Cyndie can take advantage of the open invitation to visit the horses she has worked with in the recent past. I’m okay where we are at. I’m still trying to get used to having a housemate again. It’s almost like living in a new place.
One thing that has potential to change our mind about how much we want to be paid for our house is, if the place we are most interested in became available for a similar discount to what we are being asked to give. It can’t hurt to inquire.
This is one of those times when my propensity for not easily making decisions becomes most evident. A right or wrong decision? I wish. It’s all in how you frame it. If I wait long enough, either an answer materializes, or the question goes away. That is my usual modus operandi.
It’s a good thing I am pretty proficient at waiting. Time will tell all.
Relative Something 