I’ll just get this out there.  I hate January. Bad stuff always happens in January and I’ve come to dread it wondering what expensive and frustrating dilemma we’ll face each January.

Starting in 2015 is when I noticed January really kind of sucks.  Following is a list of the stupid that has happened in January.

January 2015  – We had just bought our place and moved in in November of 2014 so I was still part of the crowd that thought “yay, a new year full of promise”.  My mare Boody was pregnant with what was supposed to be the last horse of my show career.  Boody had suffered career ending injuries in 2012 at the Appaloosa World Championship Show and I’d been really disappointed for her and me.  In 2014 I’d decided to breed Boody in the hopes for my next show and all around horse.   All went smoothly and Boody was confirmed in foal in June of 2014.  I was so excited.  I have had Boody her entire life, I had her mom and her grandma.  Skip to January, we’re getting all settled into the new place and I’m happy for the future.  That morning we discovered Boody had aborted the fetus at 6 months along.  It was so sad.  What was going to my attempt at a world title and the excitement, fun and promise of a new foal was gone.  I won’t go into the rest of the long story but suffice it to say that many thousand dollars and 3 years later we realized Boody is just not meant to have a foal.  I’m still dealing with the disappointment of what could have been with that baby but that won’t get me anywhere.  Picked up those pieces and moved along.

January 2016 – We dealt with a stupid expensive plumbing/water/well issue.  When you live in a rural area and are on a well things don’t always go smoothly.  I’ll just say after a week with no running water and a few thousand dollars later, we had water.  I’m starting to think January is a big jokester.

January 2017 –  In the middle of one the snowiest winters in decades under 3 feet of snow and temps of below zero our shop burned down.  Again, we live in a rural area so fire response is a small volunteer department.  While the fire department was excited for a “real” structure fire I was fairly upset.  We had to scramble to save our tractor and my husbands work van that is our livelihood.  Luckily there were no injuries and we saved the two biggest pieces of equipment that make our lives much easier.  However, we lost a lot of irreplaceable stuff with sentimental value that is just gone.  We were lucky that we some insurance and were able to rebuild a much a better shop.  Dealing with a fire and all the water the fire department used in minus zero weather made for quite the messy ice rink and made clean up a real pain.  Again, no injuries human or animal wise so I’ll count it as lucky but still it was a very stressful start to the year and again I’m thinking January just sucks.

Here’s a pic of the shop on fire.

January 2018 –  Ok I think let’s see what this January can provide us.  Low and behold another water problem in freezing temps!  This time we discover rats and mice have gotten into our cistern and it needs drained, cleaned, sanitized, etc on top of having to find and repair another clog in a water line.  Of course we had a real plumber out to help find the clog but they swore it was frozen pipes when we knew it wasn’t.  After a $500 bill to useless plumbers we got to cut up our deck and dig down to the waterlines underground and fix the clog ourselves.  Yay us.

While none of these things are devastating in the scheme of life, they sure are frustrating.  With January fast approaching I wonder what will go wrong to cause us to file bankruptcy or something.

I’ll be grateful for the new year in February.  I hope everyone has a safe,  happy holiday season,  and a prosperous, healthy new year.

This is a long post, mostly rambling my thoughts out in no real order and I don’t know why I can’t get the line spacing to change on the last half!

Something I don’t talk about much is my head trip issues.  I’m one of the millions who deal with depression, lack of confidence, etc.  Most of the time I deal with it ok and some days I feel like I’m running in quicksand against a gale force wind.  While I know my life is soooooo much better than a lot of others I seem to dwell on the ones whose life mine doesn’t appear as good as.  The old cliché of count your blessings runs through my mind on the hard days and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.  No matter how we try, those of us with head trip issues have no control over what will trip our emotions that day.

So…recently I decided to really work on remembering that cliché and try to focus on the good and not dwell on the not so good and try to be grateful for what and who I do have in my life.  I have a few really really good friends who will be on my side no matter what stupid thing I do or say (and I’ve had some doozies).  I have a husband who tolerates my mood swings, emotional freak outs and odd inappropriate  humor with nothing but love and attempt at understanding.  I have family who loves me and thinks I’m awesome most of the time.  I have my animals I love so dearly and I have opportunities to ride my horses, travel some (taking my dogs and horses  with me a lot of the time).  I have other good things but these are the biggest to me.

Also recently I decided to buy a new colt.  Do I need a new colt?  No.  Can I afford one? Not really.  I saw him in an ad.  I wasn’t even looking for a horse, I have plenty.  I was struck by him and kept thinking of him. I don’t even usually like colts or geldings, I’m a die-hard mare person.  So, I went about finding ways to justify getting him.  There’s a lot of boring back story to chasing my horse dreams that would take another 14 posts to explain so I’m not going to go into that now.  I sent the sellers a message asking price of colt.  They didn’t respond for a week and I was a little relieved and also a little bummed.  They did respond with a price that is a great deal as they are dispersing their herd and want to get the horses sold.  I showed my husband and some friends and asked opinions.  I went through all the reasons of why not.  Then I started looking for signs as to why.  I wanted a big glaring flashing neon sign telling me what to do.  I’ve never been so stressed out about buying anything, even the house.  My husband supported my decision no matter what I decided and he was almost as excited about the colt as I was.  So the signs I was looking for were right in front of me and they are:

 

 

I don’t know why this cartoon makes me chuckle.  Maybe because while I’m not “old”, I’m definitely older.  Why does 1990 seem not that long ago? I see people my age now and I see them as “older” adults, like I’m still 25 or something.  Why is that?  Is it because at almost 50 I still don’t feel like I have my shit together and probably never will.  I had my shit more together at 23 than I do at 49.  When do we feel like we’re fully functioning adults?  Do we ever?   What constitutes a fully functioning adult?  I pay my bills on time, I show up for work on time, I’m not in trouble with the law (but I will be someday when I finally freak out on a driver at a round about) so why don’t I feel like I’m a real grown up?  I’ve been noticing that a lot of my friends are younger, like half my age, and I feel comfortable with them.  I have some friends who are older or close to my age and I feel comfortable with them too, consider them some of the best people on this earth.

I’ve noticed too that as I get older I start to think more about faith and wanting to find something that helps guide me spiritually.  I’ve never been a religious person.  In fact, I use to buck up against any organized religion.  Now I find myself thinking about trying to go to church.  But why?  What is it I’m needing?  I know the basics of being a good person (do unto others and the like) but my life motto has usually been more of the “don’t be a dick” attitude.

I’ve also noticed my husband getting older and he’s younger than me  (I’m not a cougar, he’s not that young) and I’m thinking of other things he can do not that far into the future.  He’s a farrier which is hard on the body.  And dealing with horse owners can be really hard on the mind sometimes.  His body is breaking down at the ripe age of 46 due to his job (which he loves most of the time).  But now he and I are thinking of other ways he can make a living when he’s to broken down for farrier work.  He’s thinking of teaching, maybe opening a farrier school, maybe go back to learn silversmithing (something he started in the past).  I feel like we need a plan but have no idea what kind of plan we need.  We have so many goals we want to accomplish and sometimes I feel like we’re running out of time.  I know that sounds ridiculous to people who are “old”.

Even my damn dogs are getting older.  My old precious Elly Mae doesn’t have long left in this world and we have another one not much younger than her showing his age.  It seems like yesterday they were puppies.  My horses are getting old at 17 & 18. Geezus, they were just babies running around the pasture.  My other horse is young but she’s aged me!  Time really does go fast, a hard concept when you’re 30 and younger.

I used to drive sports cars.  I love love love fast cars.  As I get older I find myself wanting my old sports car back.  Is this a beyond-mid-life crisis?  Is it because I drive sensible vehicles now that I feel even older?

So, I’m not getting any younger and wondering when I’ll feel like an adult.  Worrying about my old dog, worrying what my husband will do that he loves as much as being a farrier, worrying about how my siblings and I will handle our parents getting old,   worrying about how I’ll be able to retire, and on and on and on…..

Please tell me I’m not the only one who worries about stupid stuff like that at my age.

As my mom always says, “getting old ain’t for sissies”.  It’s sure not.

 

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton

Well, I’ve always said I want to do a blog and I’m completely tech illiterate so this may be a trial and error undertaking.  I mostly want to write about life in general and how messed up, beautiful, frustrating and mind boggling it can be.  I’m married to a farrier and the horse world is an amazingly entertaining place.  I deal with stupid head trip issues that can make me wonder just what the hell I’m doing.  I want to share my sometimes funny stories, my frustrations and observations on marriage, life in the country.

Please share my journey with me.