Garth does it again

All singers have great songs sent to them all the time by writers. That's how it works, and if you're lucky and good enough they pick yours. So why does it surprise me still when I find that Garth has yet another one that just resonates?

"When There's No One Around" leaves me feeling naked. Do others see it? I don't think so, but obviously others do feel the same way.

I suppose that fits what I said the other day. It's just that noone talks about it so we all feel alone. Not that it's ever easy, but what if... what if we could know that it's okay. Just that. I think that might be enough.

Something up His sleave.

With the year I've had I figure God must have really gigantic plans for me. My friends, and even I, wonder how I'm still standing. Onward and upward right?

So I find myself in Colorado with Fawn gone, and Jaguar retired/donated to a handicap riding program. It's a good thing that I do have a church and friends here or I'd run back to Michigan. I'm on the job hunt again, it's so nice to keep putting yourself out there only to be rejected time and again.

Back to God then. With few to no prospects for a job, new horse, or marriage proposal I'm curious about where He is taking me. I'm the stubborn sort you see, and have to have things made crystal clear at times in order to move forward (even then I have difficulty at times). Where to next? I struggle to find the positive, but know that it has to get better. It does, right?

As I write to the far reaches of cyberspace I'm hopeful that someone might reach back. Isn't that why we blog? To connect with others? Otherwise what's the point, except to maybe give voice to the thoughts we can't share in real life. ;)

I suppose I could rant about the gas prices, which is too overly done. Maybe some words about Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama and how ridiculous /destructive they are to themselves, but let's just continue with it and give McCain an easier path to the White House shall we. Of course there is a multitude of things to talk about and remain on the surface with, but I already do that every day with the strangers I meet. Perhaps that is why I'm seen as an extrovert, when in reality I'm so strongly not. All the surface stuff is distracting from what really matters.

The problem is, everyone is afraid of the other stuff, the things we keep inside not wanting the world to know. I think that that is what God is trying to get to, letting go of the surface to get to what matters. That's the hard part. Winnowing the chaff from life. The problem is I don't know what I don't know, nothing new there. It's difficult to go forward when you don't know which way that is. Maybe we all feel like this and just grope along blindly hoping no one else will notice.

Ahh, meloncoly philosophy. The commerse of tea houses that poets frequent.

Spring

The first day of March tomorrow and it's supposed to get up to 70. Wow, that's warm. I guess my blood still hasn't thinned out. So what they call winter around here is nearly finished.

I finally made it out skiing though. Breckenridge. Apparently the conditions were not that great. Think back east skiing on a non-groomed day, ice patches with built-up moguls at the bottoms and uneven terrain. Pioneer on Peak 7 was fun. I even earned a few pictures from an admirer. The yellow jacket, black pants, sunglasses and long hair flying behind me must have stood out. Maybe the close legs finesse style did too. It's been 7 years (can it really be that long ago) since I last went downhill skiing. I had returned to my roots of cross country for a while, but in Colorado downhill rules. So perhaps I'm a relic of days gone by. Oh well, I enjoyed it. My quads on the other hand complained about it not being riding.

Into spring we go. I'm looking forward to the 2nd home game of the Rockies season. The opener would have been nice, but with the season they had last year it wasn't possible. It's just as well. Arizona will be good to watch anyway. Now if I could just get to like the Aves. I'm afraid I'll just have to be a Packers, Rockies, Red Wings fan and give a nod to all the areas I've lived in.

Yikes! Where does time go?

Wow! Here it is after Thanksgiving already. One of these days I'm going to figure out how I get so busy that I can't take a moment to breathe and just write.

So the Rockies lost the World Series. That time off really hurt their game, but that's okay. The boys are on the radar of everyone else now and will be taken seriously next season.

What I really need to get out, and got me back here again is the radio. You know when a song just catches you, turns you around and sits you down. Well, Garth does it again. More Than a Memory just gets me. Yeah, I've got one of those in my past that no matter how hard I try to forget something just won't let me. I know what each line of that song is about and hearing it puts me back there. It's haunting. It's not so bad now, but a song like that makes it fresh again. How do you get past that? If someone out there knows I'd love to hear about it. For now the song abrades the wound, it hurts so very much but you know that the air and light will heal it after the bad stuff is gone. Moving on with one step at a time. That's all I know how to do. Ignoring what's been, and hoping that the future will be different and brighter because it just has to be. Usually I'm good at letting go and know when to move on, usually.

Here's to Christmas and all it brings. New beginnings and hopeful things. Some day though the beginnings will become continuings. I look forward to that.

Denver is abuzz, it's Rocktober here.

There aren't too many places around here that you can go to lately that you don't see some sign of support for the Rockies, and who can blame anyone one for that? Who doesn't like the Kid Rocks? Though I'm not going to put anything purple on my black and white horse, I did wear the color myself on Tuesday after they won the National League pennant. Even my school has a banner in the entry way that says "Go Rockies!" (Now if the Broncos would follow their lead...)

In my own backyard, well.... if I had one.

It's amazing who's around town and how small the horse world really is. In my search for a new horse I met Bruce Ford. Yup, THE Bruce Ford. Rode two real fine horses he's got for sale. (5 time world bareback rodeo champion saw me ride, I daren't ask what he thought of me.) One would make a great reiner, the other's good with cows and roping. Nice, solid, big geldings. It was too bad that they are not what I'm looking for, and I hated telling him that, but the pleasure was mine in meeting Bruce.

Not the way I planned it.

It looks like Jaguar is finally, unavoidably, slowing down. It became ever more obvious during my lesson with Grant yesterday. I guess it's time, but losing Fawn makes the search bitter sweet.

Fawn was my little girl. I bred her, Jaguar saw her born, we raised her. She was our baby. The plan was for this stunning two year old to take over for Jaguar. She had outstanding movement, unbelievable talent, and an awesome personality. Nothing bothered her, everyone was her friend, and between her intelligence and laid back attitude she truly was special. In the woods she looked like a deer bounding along passing in and out of shadows over uneven ground and fallen trees. In a field she floated with piaffes, passages, extended trots, canter pirouettes and flying changes. One time I put her in a round pen on her own with a couple of cows, the likes of which she had never seen before, to see what she'd do. At first she wasn't sure, then she became curious. The next thing I knew she was cutting them and pushing them around like she had been doing it her whole life. Two old cowboys looked on with amazement. "Boy, now she's got cow." I beamed. Of course my baby girl did. Thinking it was a fluke I tried it a few weeks later. She loved it, the cows were her new toys. And with Affirmed as a granddad she had speed and heart too.

It was only a couple of weeks after moving Jaguar and Fawn here that I got a call telling me that Fawn had cast herself and was beat up a bit. I got to the stable as fast as I could. Fawn was disoriented, bleeding from her nose slightly, and had some small cuts. The manager's wife saw the whole episode and thought that Fawn had spooked, reared up, fell over backward then struggled and cast herself. I cleaned her up, watched her for a bit then put her back in the pen. Shortly after she started to have a seizure. We moved her to the round pen where she continued to have full on generalized as well as partial seizures over the next several hours. The vet I called thought it might be caused by the change of altitude, but he said the onset is usually immediate. The next day we went to CSU where they took radiographs of her head and neck. Nothing conclusive was found. We were given antibiotics and anti-inflammatory meds and sent home.

Two weeks went by and then she seized again. I had blood pulled and drove it to the lab. Nothing unusual showed up in the panel. Another trip to CSU and we came back with a prescription for phenobarbital. I started researching the possibility of EPM since it can cause seizures and she had other symptoms/background that fit. By this time I had contacted Stephen Reed DVM of Rood and Riddle and was working with him. Next came another trip to CSU for a spinal tap for fluid to further test for EPM since the blood work showed a high positive for antibodies. That came back with a high positive so I started the treatment for it. (Don't ask what the vet bills came out to be.)

May ended, and June past with no new seizures that anyone was aware of. The treatment ended, but under Dr. Reed's suggestion Fawn stayed on the phenobarb.. The thinking was that it would give her brain time to work around the damaged area and eventually she would be taken off of it. I could tell she hated being on it. The medicine made her unsteady and sleepy. Some times she wouldn't eat all of it right away, but leave some in her feed pot to finish later. Most of the time, however, she was her normal, bright, outgoing self.

Late one night in July, 1 am on the 19th, I got a call that she was seizing again. This was the worst episode. Jaguar tried to help her by putting himself between the panels and her body, but it didn't help. She crashed into everything as she struggled to keep her feet. She had beat herself up pretty badly and blood streaked her sweat soaked coat. I couldn't let her continue that way so when she settled down we loaded her into my stock trailer and the vet put her down. Jaguar and I said good bye, and then I drove her body to CSU.

Donating her was the best I could do in the end, and it was through the necropsy that a tumor was found in her middle ear. A very rare, and because a MRI could not have been done while she was seizing, inconclusive reason for her seizures.

I still cry body shaking sobs for her, but am glad that I followed every thing through as completely as I had and now know that there was nothing to be done other than what I did.

Good bye my wonderfully beautiful baby girl.