Day Eleven

This morning, Julia's mom was coming. I was slightly anticipative as to how her visit would go, and also a bit nervous. I wasn't sure what she would want to see us do, or if she would want to talk about uncomfortable subjects for hours on end... But I ended up really enjoying her visit. It's funny, I get nervous every time somebody is coming, but once they get there I seem to be able to melt right in.

I had Cherish's halter and 12' line out. I began to make my way out of the gate, secretly hoping that I would have some time to walk around with just her and me before the others came out. I realized that my hope was not going to come true as Julia and Sharlie began to quickly make their way down the hill. Oh well. I enjoyed their company anyway. Hope and my mom came out just after they did.

I watched across our whole back field on the ground, letting the other four girls ride with each other. I didn't care to get on just yet, and I knew that neither of us were ready to ride with each other. I decided that I would wait.

Some time down the gravely pathway, Julia turned in her saddle and asked me if I was going to get on her yet. I had to look away from he land of particulars and small beauties that I had been staring at and puzzle for a moment over what she had just said. Finally coming to realization of what she was asking, I promptly said no and continued walking along my way. I think she found it slightly comical, that I would go on a trail ride and then walk on the ground for part of the way. But I think she found it fairly normal for me. No matter, because I enjoyed it.

Just as we were rounding the turn, I saw some beautiful feather grass over to the left. I whole heartedly led

Cherish to it and let her eat it for a bit. I was glad to finally hop up on her back when I felt that it was right, just as glad as I had been to stand next to her. We walked for a bit before we reached the point of the creek. Julia and I went down to the bed (I got off) to investigate, as we had heard some obscene things last night from both the field and the barn, involving a few dogs and several men. I found some scratches in the mud, but I didn't think that this was where it had been. It did not... "smell" of it, as I suppose you could say.

Cherish and I continued walking for a bit until the briars became too high and I hopped back on. My mom warned me that we didn't want to be walking on Lester Elkin's property, and I responded with a bland "I know." This didn't feel like his land to me. I figured that his land would have his deep and strong sense of full ownership on it.

Ah ha! I had been right. We reached a barb wire fence that lined Lester Elkin's property, all the way up to the top of the ridge and then to the side. It made me giddy with excitement, that we knew where his property line was, because now there were so many more places left to explore that I had never been on before! Cherish felt my excitement and turned her head, looking at me with a humorous laughing eye. I smiled at her gladly.

All of a sudden, I saw Sarge dart in front of me. He was running straight for the barb fence. All three of us yelled for him to stop, for him not to go any further... But he was chasing something, and he was quite alright with going through it. He dove through the bottom of the fence, and was hidden by the grass. I felt a shocked whimper and a slight struggle for a moment, and then silence. It scared the death out of me for a moment, before I saw his head pop up on the other side. A large sigh of relief came out. He had only been running. We hurriedly walked with our horses away from the fence, calling Sarge to get him to follow us. We could only hope that he wouldn't get stuck again. Not being sure how badly he had actually gotten stuck, I hopped off of Cherish and grabbed him. I looked all under his belly, his legs, his throat, and his back. Phew. There were no signs of large marks on him as I had pictured, with barbs stuck into his legs and blood oozing down the sides of him. The fear of barbed wire was something that was engrained into me as a young girl, thanks to the Pony Club Girls and one of the girls who either had or knew a grey horse that got stuck in the barbed wire fencing. Even as a young girl, I had an extremely vivid imagination. I cried for a long time about that poor pony, seeing all of the seeping blood, the stained grey legs, the face of pain and fear and hopelessness. Ugh. It made me sick.

Thankfully, the same thing hadn't happened to Sarge. I immediately dropped the sick feeling and hopped back up on Cherish. All was well for now, and I didn't think that he would be going back through there.

As we started to make our way home, we realized that Julia's mom's car was in the driveway. I felt a sudden nervousness again, except for this time it was not my own. We all walked quietly the rest of the way home. When we reached Julia's mom, she had a large smile on her face and looked very proud. We spoke to her on horseback for a while. All of a sudden, Julia randomly fell off, the bareback pad slipping to the side. I had to laugh at her, with the hilarious expression of complete surprise on her face. I challenged her then to try and get on Sharlie without help from another human... She found a hill, and after quite a few tries, she did it successfully! I felt like cheering for her, but because there was a new person here was slightly uncomfortable and instead just decided to tell her that it was awesome. I let her know that that was how it started out mounting Cherish - and now I am starting out again with a different way of mounting, it being quite awkward and more difficult for me as well.

Julia and my mom gladly showed Teresa some things that they could do, but I believe that I pretty much got off after that. I am really not a showy type of person, so I much preferred to just watch them.

After a bit, we put the horses back up and all sat down on the picnic table to talk. My mom and Julia had reflections, but I somehow managed to get out of it, by changing the conversation topic and getting Teresa to tell about what she was doing with Casper, and then beginning to talk about something else. I hadn't even really realized it until after we left, but it was fine by me. I really hadn't felt comfortable sharing with a new person there anyway.

When we came up to the house, we must have talked for hours while on the deck. It felt quite nice, to talk about all of our beliefs and whatnot together. Even though some of mine were slightly different, they were all basically the same. (Reminder to self: go watch something of Chris Cox's, just to see what he is like so that you can voice your opinion on him.)

In the evening, Julia and I went for a walk, ride, classroom thing with both Sharlie and Cherish. I thought it was extremely enjoyable, walking through all of the brambles with Sharlie and Julia following behind. At first, I was thinking about it as they were chasing me... but then, Julia's energy lowered and suddenly I felt as if they were just following softly. Then I was able to stop and wait for them to catch up without feeling any extra anxiety. I thought that this was extremely interesting...

We talked and I taught and she listened for quite a while. I hopped on Cherish at one point, then got off soon after that. We were mainly just walking around. All of a sudden, we heard these loud dirtbikes or motorcycles getting closer an closer... until they were on the hill that was just above us. Call me paranoid, but this was the picture I saw: they were going to come over the hill, fly over it, and hit all of us just perfectly so that we would all be either injured forever or dead. I won't share the details, because it was all quite greusome, but Julia could sense my anxiety. I helped her onto Sharlie quickly, hopped onto Cherish fast, and then told her that if I started going faster, to hold on. Not only could these people accidentally run into us, with the way that they were so reckless, but some people, when they get drunk... get angry. They could purposefully run over us if they were drunk, or think it funny to chase our horses, or they could even like the idea of teenage girls and decide that if we didn't submit to them that they would kill us and our families.... and my mom kept on reeling terrible scenes. You may call me paranoid if you wish, but when you live way out, and your nearest neighbors probably don't even own a gun, and the next ones live much farther down the street and probably only own one weapon for hunting and the afterthought of protection... yeah, I really wouldn't want to get tangled into that. Plus, the police wouldn't get there in near enough time. It's better to be "paranoid" - I just call it being mentally prepared.

At one point, Sarge began to follow a dear trail up the hill... these reckless dirtbikers were doing wheelies down the pathway on the top, just across. If Sarge hadn't listened to our frantic screams, he was going at just the right speed that they would have intersected at the same time, and he would have gotten hit and died. To tell the truth, both Julia and I started screaming, and then I stopped... and just started repeating, "Oh, he's going to get hit. He's going to die now. He's going to get hit, and he's going to die."

My mom was angry at them for zooming back and forth, but by the time that she made it up to the top of the hill where they were streaking across as quick as lightning, they had left. It was unfortunate. I was looking forward to them trash talking her, her fading off, and then me galloping up and running them off with both words and true horsepower. Oh, you can tell that if I ever have stupid neighbors, their lives will become really interesting really quickly.

Afterwards, Julia and I just spent undemanding time with Cherish and Sharlie and let them eat their grain. It's always a joy to stand in the barn aisle and listen to the horses rest and crunch on grain and oats. Completely peaceful.