A horse!

I grew up on a horse, little one.

Before my parents divorced, our home and our lives were geared towards the many horses that we owned and boarded. The horses were partly the cause for my parent’s divorce.

My father loved them and my mother did not. 

I used to compete in horse shows with my father.

I was bitten and kicked by horses.

A horse once bolted with me clinging to its back, sans saddle or reins. The horse eventually brought me back home more than an hour later.

So when Jeff sent me these images of you on the back of your very first horse, I was both elated that you were brave enough to climb aboard and a little saddened that your mother and I were in Brattleboro, Vermont at a literary festival at the time.

I'm proud of you, little one. So very proud. And just a little bit sad, too, that I wasn’t there to see this happen.