Sunday, November 9, 2008

Yesterday I drove to Chapel Hill for a latte at some little kiosk called 'Southern Mudd'.

I was supposed to be going to Chapel Hill for a certification trial for my dog trainer. However, there is apparently a Farrington Road in Durham and a Farrington Road in Chapel Hill, and you guessed it, they don't actually meet. By the time I figured out where I was, and had roughly 43 phone calls between my trainer and I, I ended up going the hell home, 84 miles for a stupid latte.

I found a field along the way, and trained/exercised my very patient dog, then swung by the local Petsmart to help a friend pick out a puppy from a local adoption agency. Nothing to take the tarnish off the spoon like wiggly puppies. They chose a little lab-looking girl puppy that the foster mom found in a trash pile with her two siblings. I love it that there are people that will pick three puppies out of the trash and keep them until they are lucky enough to find happy homes. I hate it that there are far fewer people like that, than people that will look away, and try not to see them.

This morning I helped my riding instructor feed the horses at the farm. How anyone can not like horses is beyond me. Standing in a nearby field watching a herd takes the tension right out of me. This farm, is the only place in my life where everything else just slips away. It's a little like magic. After feeding and turning the horses out, I had my riding lesson. At the end of the lesson, we were talking about canter leads, and my riding instructor was promising me that soon enough, I would just know, I would feel it and soon after that I wouldn't have to think about what came next, it would just come. Riding is new enough to me that I always come away from it trying to make it 'fit' into something else I am familiar with and good at. Today it was running. When I run, I adjust, to accomodate the distance ahead, the cramp in my left hamstring I often get when I run uphill, or the unexpected cramp in my right upper ribcage.

Learning new "tricks" at a rapidly approaching 40 years has been humbling. Many have questioned the smartness and sensibility of me learning how to ride a 1500 lb animal and make it jump over stuff at a high rate of speed at this point in my life. I'll freely admit that I have often felt like a sack of loosely tied potatoes perched on a moving vehicle with a mind and fears of its own. I have learned that running and riding use different muscles, and there are even more muscles in my legs I didn't know existed. I have learned that just when I begin to feel confident a more experienced rider will show me how much I have to learn, and that the ground is very hard and comes up to meet you quickly when you aren't fully engaged.

Probably most importantly I have learned, that laughing at myself is still great fun.

Sunny November weekends where I accomplish nothing real trump looking sensible and smart anyday.

I recommend it highly.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sounds completely productive to me!

kenju said...

That was a good day, no matter the cost of gas.

handy said...

Actually, that is the only reason that I hate Durham/Chapel Hill area. I have been lost there more than anywhere in the free world.

And notice that after all the frustration, she's still 'there' for a friend. :)) They were cute puppies, tho, weren't they?

BTW,
Cravey... you rock.

Tracy Lynn said...

I ♥ you, you know that, but I do not like livestock, except on my plate, and I don't eat horses.

They are huge and smell like, well, like livestock. And that is why I live in a city.

Mojo said...

There's not much that's more humbling than standing next to an animal weighing about as much as the entire starting lineup for an NHL hockey team and realizing that if s/he chose to s/he could put you through the wall. And yet they don't. Or not usually anyway.

Why can't humans figure this one out?

Hope the latte was at good at least!

Doctor Err said...

JC: do you hear ohio calling your name? there will be several days of nothing of anything productive. it will be great.

handy:
jc does rock.

and you have my permission to name her after me (i been trying to get someone to do this with a kid and ironically no takers...).

and then you can laugh when i pee on your floor.

tiff said...

PUPPIES!!!

Yay!

rennratt said...

I'm with the others on this one. The day didn't turn out as you'd planned, but all in all?

Not a bad way to spend the day. Except the "lost" part. That would really suck.

This should explain why I prefer to venture no further than Davis Drive without another driver on hand.

Anonymous said...

mmmmmmmmmmmmmm... Latte.

Hope it was the BEST ONE EVER!!!