Yes, I am a Coward

The problem with plans is that they are always being changed. I don't like change, I am a coward. Sad to admit, but true. I like stability, security, predictability. I get that this is boring, but it does make things safe, and I am a big fan of safe. I have a horse, a big, black, furry footed, beast of a horse. I had planned to go on a trail ride with friends, but cool, very windy weather and my inner coward just took over my body, brain and soul. Every instinct says: "DO NOT RIDE! No, no, no....I think I will knit something instead. Got to admit, knitting is safe - unless you plan to fly on an airplane and someone thinks that you are a member of a knitting terrorist underground and are just waiting for your moment to take over the plane threatening 300 plus passengers with a set of knitting needles. Like that is going to happen, I might drop a stitch and that really would be a crisis.


So back to the ponies and trail rides.....


Doesn't he look innocent? He is until the temperature drops and the wind rises and then he becomes a snorting, spinning, helium balloon. There aren't enough drugs (better living through chemistry) to get me on his back in windy, cool weather. Though I have improved, I ride in weather I never would have two years ago. It doesn't help that horses are perfect mirrors for our emotions - so if I am nervous, he is nervous and I am pretty much always nervy especially when the weather is windy. I have to admire the Drake monster's zealous commitment to saving us both from real or imagined dangers. We see predators everywhere, he and I, though to be honest we do not have the same take on what is dangerous. For example, that jump standard that has been there for weeks, but someone moved it 3 feet yesterday has surely become a threat to life and limb as far as Drake is concerned. I do not share his fear, on the other hand, that 6 inch cross rail looks like trying to jump a 7 foot wall to me and Drake can't even be bothered to get excited enough to actually pick his feet up while trotting across it.

Sigh....oh well, my friends will have a wonderful trail ride because they are the brave sort with an addiction to adrenaline and I will stay at home bemoaning my inner coward trying to remind myself how far I have come overall.