I owned and showed horses when I was a kid. This buckskin looks a lot my mare Peaches before I roached her mane. Well it would if it would stop disappearing. I also seem to not have my media library. Not sure what is up here on WordPress. Anyway, she had a bit more dapple than this one and maybe a bit less muscle. She was mostly quarterhorse like this horse. No white sock.
I loved horses.
Instead of eating lunch in junior high school, I sat in the library and read horse books. Horse books of all kinds. Fiction/nonfiction, didn’t matter. I was getting thin so my mother called the librarian to kick me out to eat lunch.
I was about to give some dates that would really date me, but leave me to say that I followed horse racing. Secretariat was by far the best horse that ever lived. I’ll never forget that Belmont race. They said he couldn’t run long and since he’d always started at the back of the field– last– I was shocked when I saw him in that blistering pace in the Belmont. Surely he he was done for. I was on my feet as I was for any of the Triple Crown races and instead of jumping up and down I watched stunned as he opened the field and won that race by 31 lengths! It seemed impossible.
I didn’t mind the long shot winning today, but the horse didn’t seem to capture my imagination–especially after he kept attacking his trainer and pony over and over. I was rooting for Zandan whose jockey I am not sure served him all that well.
I sold my horses when I went off to college. My quarterhorse had navicular disease so I sold her to some people who had a handicapped child and just wanted a gentle horse they could lead their daughter around on. My Arab I lost track of. It was heartbreaking but I knew I planned to see some of the world, and I couldn’t leave my parents taking care of them. Two of my friends inherited my love of horses, got their own, and never left their acreage. I traveled around. Lived in Tulsa, Newport Beach, CA, Florida, Nasvhille, Tennessee, Indianapolis, IN. Romeo MI, and now northern Michigan (both northern and Upper Peninsula).
I don’t really regret giving them up.
Most days…
I dream about my horses a lot. And when I’m really stressed, I imagine I’m lying full length on my buckskin mare in her stall while she munches hay, my ear pressed against her neck. The sound of her teeth masticating the hay would resonate inside my own skull. She’d shift back and forth as she ate, the warmth of her body warming my frontside, the smell of the molasses and corn and second cutting hay mixed with the dustier smell of the straw, a bit of ammonia muted with lime.
Sometimes, I miss them so much I ache.
L.E.K. 
I had a great-uncle who lived in the Detroit area; his wife raised Arabians, and I think her son took over when she died.
Arabs were always my favorite. But I showed western as well as English. I rode my buckskin western and my Arab English (flat saddle). Really miss it.
I remember Peaches! Takes me back to a fun time.
Huh, you do, huh?? How is that that you do? 🙂 Fill me in. 🙂 She was a great horse. I miss having them a lot. They were indeed some fun times…
Oh, just an admirer of yours amongst all the others. How could I forget. Trying to remember the name of your little weaner dog maybe Herman???
HERMAN? Ginger, and Rusty, called him Russel. Then later we had a dog name Kiddo, a dog we adopted. People named him Kilo but Mom wouldn’t call him that. Didn’t have that many admirers. But I seem to remember a few sheep farmers out at the fair who had a few…