Greetings!
As much as I love to travel, one of my favorite things is coming home again. Yesterday was not exactly a smooth-sailing travel day for me however. Just as I was headed from the hotel to the airport, Rich called to say Dually was feeling bad again. Some days he just feels punky—not really colicky, he just doesn’t want to eat and wants to lay down a lot. Our standard remedy—the same one we use for a mildly colicking horse—is to put him in the trailer and take him for a ride. He always feels better after that. I wasn’t overly concerned about Dually because this happens with a fair amount of regularity and I knew that if Rich had any doubts at all, he’d drive him right to the vet. But still, it’s not the best way to start the day.
Then, without realizing it, I entered the wrong airport into my GPS and so drove blissfully for an hour before I arrived at a tiny little airfield no where near Sacramento International. I finally found someone to ask and hit the freeway driving 80 mph hoping not to miss my flight. Fortunately, I had left extra early (which I always do because I hate having to rush and worry—exactly what I was doing now). As luck would have it, I made it to the correct airport, still an hour and a half before my flight which was plenty to time to return the rental car, check my bags and get to the gate in time to check my email.
Once safely there I called Rich to check on Dually and found out there was good news and bad news. The good news was that Dually was fine—back to his old self and enjoying the day. The bad news was that the house keeper had called to cancel, meaning that with house guests coming the next day, when I got home, I’d be making up beds, cleaning toilets and vacuuming. Not exactly what I had in mind. I know, I know, you are thinking I am very spoiled because I have a housekeeper that comes every other week for a few hours. One of the questions I get the most is, how do you do every thing you do? Well, that’s one way—I have someone to help me keep my house clean! Fortunately, Rich used his magnanimous powers of persuasion and Megan came after all. So at the end of the day, it wasn’t so bad.
After landing in Denver, lugging my huge and heavy bags to the car and driving about 2 ½ hours, I come to my favorite part of the drive home. It is when I top the last little pass (I go over about 5 small passes on the way to and from Denver), I am rewarded with an incredible view of the valley we live in, the Upper Arkansas Valley, and the range of mountains that form the western border, The Collegiate Peaks. These are a range of 14,000+ foot peaks that are just magnificent and they always remind me of how great it is to live here in this mountain paradise. And they have become my symbol that soon I will be home with my husband, my dog and my horses (not necessarily in that order ;-)
Today I am scrambling to meet several writing deadlines, go grocery shopping and then be here for the arrival of my dear friends from Kauai. Rich is taking a vacation week from the ski area and he is busy setting up a challenging trail course. We are all going to ride hard the next few days in preparation for the Versatility Ranch Horse clinic and competition we are going to this weekend. Since Dually hasn’t been ridden for four days, he’ll be a little fresh today so some extra riding this week will be just what the doctor ordered. Hopefully by Monday—the day of the competition—he’ll be good and relaxed!
Until next time, enjoy the ride!
Julie
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Yowsah...that ranks as a day from hell if I've ever heard one! I wish you much continued success so that you can hire more people to help you get all your stuff done...maybe starting with a driver?
ReplyDeleteLinda
http://the7msn.blogspot.com/
I think we would all hire a housekeeper for a couple hours every week if we could spend more time with our horses.
ReplyDeletePS the temps here in Cal have dropped 20 degrees since you left.
hey jule,
ReplyDeleteGlad your home safe. About Dually's colic. I'm no vet, but ponder this. Could it be an environmentally induced psychosymatic condition? The litany of stress induced GI maladies in humans is well documented. Could it be that the horse just plain wants, or wanted, to be someplace else then where he was which brought on some inner stress. Hence when you take him for a ride it goes away. Maybe he'd rather spend more nights outside than in. Or vise versa. If you don't want him on grass that much then maybe spending the night out in a large paddock with suffienct hay and a buddy might work. You'll never know until you try. Maybe keeping a log from now on at the outset of such incidents, (where he spent the night, with whom, what'd he do the day of, the day before, and of course his feed habits), any detail that might lead to a common thread in his routine, (or breaks in routine), may give you a clue. You might want to take a walk thru the pasture with a lawn expert. Maybe there's a new strain of weed that's settled in the pasture that's disagreeing with him. Just a thought.
And don't feel guilty about having a cleaning girl. Back when I was actually successful and hanging hundreds of boards of sheetrock a week, the last thing I wanted to do was clean my place on my day off. Then I met a cleaning lady. An endearing, lovely woman who was a Haflinger/white tornado cross. A real worker. She went thru my place like nobody's business. From dusting to food shopping. I couldn't pay her enough. At times, in fact, I overpaid her. Worth every penny to a hard working guy. Not to mention invaluable, "cus the ladies love a clean bathroom" :)
Alas, my career went bust and being penniless has rendered her a thing of the past and I'm back doing all that drudgery myself. Food shopping is the worst. Especially when one is broke. At today's prices it's very disheartening. So's living on pasta. Steak, what's that??? So if you've earned it, you've got it coming. Toss any guilt and leave the girl a tip.