.... Like a failure right now. Has it ever struck you how many opportunities you have to love on people, and then you just let them.... slip away? Yeah. I have a friend who has been getting interested in God, wanting to attend a Bible Study, great stuff like that. I never would have expected this of her. Actually, several years ago I wrote three people's names on a card that I prayed would become Christians... and she was one of them. I prayed regularly for a time, but then I gave up. How stupid of me! Anyhow, when she began to express some interest, I hadn't seen too much of her, and I was so wrapped up in my own life drama that I didn't hardly do anything about it! I went to a Bible Study with her ONCE, and I haven't been back since. Tonight I am going to go with her for the second time. She has been a couple other times with another friend, which is great, but how many opportunities have I missed to be used by God in this area?!?!
.... I also feel like I've failed other friends. I know there are people who have faced harder things than I have in the past couple months. In fact, I honestly haven't faced anything that many other people don't face all the time too! I just have failed to handle it very well. My relationship with God was really on the rocks there for a time, which makes me sad to think about too. I had assumed that if I pray about things and then just keep doing what I wanted, God would bless it. That's just stupid! I've learned that God is only going to bless what I do IF I am operating in his will for my life! Now if only I can remember that!!!
.... I feel hopeful though, too. I'm learning that EVERY morning is new and full of grace if I will just humble myself before my Lord. I'm learning that he really truly is my eternal lover, and without him in my life, without a MEANINGFUL, GROWING relationship with him, I will never find true satisfaction. And you know what else I'm learning to accept? He is enough for me. I don't need fine clothes or a fancy house... not that those things have every really been that important to me, but they can become a distraction! I also don't need a "special someone" in my life, as much as I think I do at times! HE is enough for me. HIS love is enough to fill the void in my heart when it becomes uncovered. On top of that, I don't even NEED a passle (sp?) of friends. This one might be the hardest to accept, actually. Well, and the idea of being content never marrying if that is God's desire! But not having friends around all the time?!?! Don't get me wrong, I LOVE friends! I love having them, I love hanging out with them, talking, doing fun stuff.... but try as I might, they simply cannot fill that God-sized vacuum in my life. ONLY God can do that. And when I get the right perspective that God is everything I need, then I can see that those other things are simply an extra blessing. And I'll be able to treasure them more, I hope!
.... I also feel disappointed. I know, after that elequent paragraph full of spiritual discoveries, I have to admit, my feet are still firmly stuck in the mud of this world! It is never easy to let dreams go. I've had to do that a lot over the past couple months. But just because I've done it doesn't make the pain go away. The things you love, the things that make you click, for me, at least, I want to hold on to them, forever! But sometimes that isn't right. Maybe the play I directed was right for last year, but it just isn't right for this year! Or maybe God is just trying to teach me to hold onto my dreams loosely, willing to give them up if he asks. I don't know, but I do know that I'm being forced to question my motives about the play right now. Maybe this is God's way of letting me know that there is something more important for his kingdom I should be doing now, or maybe it is his way of pointing me in a different direction, either with WHERE I try to do the play, or WHEN, or even what play! It's all rather confusing. But I just keep bringing my wild dreams before him and saying, "Show me if this is right, please Lord! And definitely show me if it is wrong!" And at the same time, my bruised and hurting little heart silently cries out, "Do with ME what you want, Daddy. I've tried it on my own, and it just hasn't worked. So whatever you desire, I'll do it!"
.... I feel that that is becoming my life's motto. I want to be absolutely available to do whatever God wants me to do. I hope that what he calls me to is work someplace overseas, among Muslims and people who desperately need God. But I also feel woefully inadequate for me. Maybe that is why I want it to happen, though. I want to know that I AM completely unprepared, and I DO need to depend FULLY on the source of my strength. But even though that is what I hope, I'm learning to accept that that might NOT be what God wants me to do. He might decide to do the absolute LAST thing that I would desire, right now, and that would be to stay right here, in the rainy northwest. Well, it isn't that I don't want to do that, it is just that I don't want to do it YET. I think that I might be able to settle down to that someday, but it isn't what I want to do now. I admit, for a time I thought it was... but something was always gnawing away at me that I couldn't do it, just yet. First I needed to make myself completely available to God, including going WHEREVER he wants! Then, if he sets me back down here, I'd know it was his doing. At the time, I hoped he would, but it took me a lot longer than I'd have liked to GET to that point where I was willing to fall at his feet and let him direct me wherever. And by the time I did get there, I realized that, if it was up to me, I really didn't want to stick around here long term. But then again, what I want isn't necessarily what God wants, and my goal is to never be satisfied with just MY desires. I want to never settle for less than what HE desires.
I need to go get ready for Bible Study. Peace out!
"You're all I want, you're all I need, you're everything, everything"....
Sunday, January 28, 2007
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Yikes!
I was driving into school this morning, and this car pulled up behind me about 15 minutes away from my destination. There were two guys inside, and I didn't look, like, really closely or anything, but I didn't recognize them or the car. Anyhow, they proceeded to make a nuissance (sp?) of themselves almost ALL the way to school. They were honking, they were riding on my tail, then they'd pull into the lane next to me and match my speed and wave and try to get my attention. I just kept driving! I looked straight ahead, because I really didn't want to make eye contact with them! I drove the speed limit, and kept hoping they'd get the clue and leave me alone! It wasn't until I turned left onto a residential street and they would have had to wait for a car to go by before they could follow me that they finally left me alone. It was creepy though! For, you know, a minute or to, it's just like "oh, dudes, grow up!" But then when it just KEEPS going on for 10 minutes, I start to feel a little concerned! Then I began to think, should I drive by the police station? Should I call a friend and go to their house and pull into their driveway? Should I just go to school and figure the parking lot is a pretty public spot? I was just glad that they finally left me alone!
On another subject, I'm really enjoying my Shakespeare class! The health class is useful, the art publication class is fairly enjoyable, and the poli sci class is interesting. So far, this quarter has been a lot better than most previous quarters! My Shakespeare teacher is Welsh, and I think everyone should have the opportunity to take a Shakespeare class from someone with an accent... it just sounds so much cooler!
I'm liking hellogoodbye's song "Here In Your Arms" a lot right now. It's just this cute love song. Go check it out! :-)
Tomorrow I get to go argue my speeding ticket... I'm a little nervous! I HOPE I can get it reduced! It would certainly be nice. :-) I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
I got an email from my friend in N. Africa this morning, and it's looking more and more for-sure for me to go work over there this summer. I'm REALLY getting excited about that!!! This has been something I've wanted to do for YEARS, and I think God is going to use it in big ways in my life.
Oh, I went to this missions conference last weekend - wow, was I ever inspired! It is so stupid how I get caught up in the every day silly stuff of life, but what's REALLY important is knowing God, pursuing him passionately, and letting your life be an outpour of his love. That's what I want my life to look like when people see me. That is my goal!
Better go. I've a little bit of daylight left - YAY for spring-ish weather, even though it is the middle of January! - and I think I shall go walk.
Peace out!
On another subject, I'm really enjoying my Shakespeare class! The health class is useful, the art publication class is fairly enjoyable, and the poli sci class is interesting. So far, this quarter has been a lot better than most previous quarters! My Shakespeare teacher is Welsh, and I think everyone should have the opportunity to take a Shakespeare class from someone with an accent... it just sounds so much cooler!
I'm liking hellogoodbye's song "Here In Your Arms" a lot right now. It's just this cute love song. Go check it out! :-)
Tomorrow I get to go argue my speeding ticket... I'm a little nervous! I HOPE I can get it reduced! It would certainly be nice. :-) I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
I got an email from my friend in N. Africa this morning, and it's looking more and more for-sure for me to go work over there this summer. I'm REALLY getting excited about that!!! This has been something I've wanted to do for YEARS, and I think God is going to use it in big ways in my life.
Oh, I went to this missions conference last weekend - wow, was I ever inspired! It is so stupid how I get caught up in the every day silly stuff of life, but what's REALLY important is knowing God, pursuing him passionately, and letting your life be an outpour of his love. That's what I want my life to look like when people see me. That is my goal!
Better go. I've a little bit of daylight left - YAY for spring-ish weather, even though it is the middle of January! - and I think I shall go walk.
Peace out!
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Intruiged and irritated....
First the intruiged part... Do some things just surprise you, no matter how hard you try to not be surprised? It suprises you in such a way that you have to just sit back and laugh, because you never expected it, but yet, once you see it happen, you realize you were misguided in how you were thinking. But even when you realize you were misguided, you still can't help but be surprised and think to yourself, "How odd. I wonder how that ever happened?" And then your curious about the whole thing.
Case in point. I'm at that strange age when people seem to be split by unknown reasons from those who are "single" and those who are "in a relationship." Those who are "in a relationship" suddenly appear to be much more mature than those who are "single," whereas, two years ago I thought the "singles" where much more mature than those who maintained being "in a relationship." Why is that? It's really quite stupid! Just because someone has a boyfriend or girlfriend doesn't mean they're any more or less mature than anyone else, particularly. In fact, it's a horrible measure of maturity considering people "date" when they're in first grade now!
But that elequently confusing paragraph was simply to introduce you to the topic that surprise me today. And old friend - well, I wouldn't even call him that much of a friend... He was an aquaintance - recently left a comment on a myspace that I stumbled across. (we'll address my myspace browsing some other time!). Anyhow, his profile picture is with this beautiful girl, and, naturally, being the curious person I am, I went to his profile and looked at his pictures. This guy, while a nice enough guy.... Gosh, how do I say this? He just never seemed like the type to really attract girls attention! Especially not someone that was, at least from what I gathered of their pictures, a classy/elegant sort of girl! He's, like, the essence of hickishness! I was quite honestly rather stunned. So I laughed! I mean, how? why? what on earth are the circumstances around THAT story??? They just look so wrong, but yet, why should they be wrong for each other? Maybe they are the perfect balance, I don't know. It just surprised me, and now I'm intruiged by how people end up with other people, and whether or not they seem "right." I dunno.... It's one of the mysteries of being attracted to someone, I guess.
OK, now for the irritated part of this blog, which I promise to keep short mainly for the reason that I don't care to dwell on it because just thinking about it gets me irritated. Actually, know what? It's just petty. I'll make it REALLY short! Myspace: friend orders. I know that it is just a way to organize your "top" friends, however many you want that to be, however, I put serious thought into who should go where and for what reason. Honestly! I know that's pathetic, but I do... I carefully select who is ON my top friends to begin with, and then select what rank they get. And actually, it isn't so much for my sake as much as it is for THEIR sake. Therefore, I might have someone as, like, number 3 on my top friends because I think it will make them feel loved or something, even though in actuality, if I REALLY had to rank my friends, I'd put number 15 in their position. However, if I've only known number 15 for a short while, or I know they aren't gonna care, then I'll just leave them at 15 and put the person who will get more out of the experience up at 3.
Alright, so that's how I do it, and this is why it is ridiculous for me to be upset.... I get sad when I'm demoted on someone's top friends, especially when I feel like the proper position is for me to be in the place they had me. Like, I don't have a problem being number 24 or whatever, but don't move me there from number 4, please! Or if you are, do it GRADUALLY! And, of course, communication is always OK. Like if you're moving me because you're mad at me, TELL ME! If you're moving me because you got married and you inherited 22 relatives that need to be higher up, just let me know! Even as a joke! (I operate under the assumption that relatives should be fairly high on the list.)
OK, so I KNOW this is stupid and petty, and I know that it shouldn't bother me... Actually, maybe it doesn't bother me except for the fact of who did it, I'm not sure... Maybe it is just this person's moving me around I find irritating. Actually, I'm getting the sneaky suspicion that is it! See, THIS is why I should just delete my myspace. a) I get upset because I get caught up in the middle school politics. b) I spend too much time on it, and c) I don't even have a reason for c. a and b are almost enough to convince me. Yes, maybe I'll just do that. Ahhh.... I'm oscellating (sp?)..... I'm strongly tempted to! If I miss it too much, I could always get back on.... Maybe I'll sleep on it and decide in the morning.
So yeah, I'm a pathetic person, so I'm gonna go read Romeo and Juliet now!
Case in point. I'm at that strange age when people seem to be split by unknown reasons from those who are "single" and those who are "in a relationship." Those who are "in a relationship" suddenly appear to be much more mature than those who are "single," whereas, two years ago I thought the "singles" where much more mature than those who maintained being "in a relationship." Why is that? It's really quite stupid! Just because someone has a boyfriend or girlfriend doesn't mean they're any more or less mature than anyone else, particularly. In fact, it's a horrible measure of maturity considering people "date" when they're in first grade now!
But that elequently confusing paragraph was simply to introduce you to the topic that surprise me today. And old friend - well, I wouldn't even call him that much of a friend... He was an aquaintance - recently left a comment on a myspace that I stumbled across. (we'll address my myspace browsing some other time!). Anyhow, his profile picture is with this beautiful girl, and, naturally, being the curious person I am, I went to his profile and looked at his pictures. This guy, while a nice enough guy.... Gosh, how do I say this? He just never seemed like the type to really attract girls attention! Especially not someone that was, at least from what I gathered of their pictures, a classy/elegant sort of girl! He's, like, the essence of hickishness! I was quite honestly rather stunned. So I laughed! I mean, how? why? what on earth are the circumstances around THAT story??? They just look so wrong, but yet, why should they be wrong for each other? Maybe they are the perfect balance, I don't know. It just surprised me, and now I'm intruiged by how people end up with other people, and whether or not they seem "right." I dunno.... It's one of the mysteries of being attracted to someone, I guess.
OK, now for the irritated part of this blog, which I promise to keep short mainly for the reason that I don't care to dwell on it because just thinking about it gets me irritated. Actually, know what? It's just petty. I'll make it REALLY short! Myspace: friend orders. I know that it is just a way to organize your "top" friends, however many you want that to be, however, I put serious thought into who should go where and for what reason. Honestly! I know that's pathetic, but I do... I carefully select who is ON my top friends to begin with, and then select what rank they get. And actually, it isn't so much for my sake as much as it is for THEIR sake. Therefore, I might have someone as, like, number 3 on my top friends because I think it will make them feel loved or something, even though in actuality, if I REALLY had to rank my friends, I'd put number 15 in their position. However, if I've only known number 15 for a short while, or I know they aren't gonna care, then I'll just leave them at 15 and put the person who will get more out of the experience up at 3.
Alright, so that's how I do it, and this is why it is ridiculous for me to be upset.... I get sad when I'm demoted on someone's top friends, especially when I feel like the proper position is for me to be in the place they had me. Like, I don't have a problem being number 24 or whatever, but don't move me there from number 4, please! Or if you are, do it GRADUALLY! And, of course, communication is always OK. Like if you're moving me because you're mad at me, TELL ME! If you're moving me because you got married and you inherited 22 relatives that need to be higher up, just let me know! Even as a joke! (I operate under the assumption that relatives should be fairly high on the list.)
OK, so I KNOW this is stupid and petty, and I know that it shouldn't bother me... Actually, maybe it doesn't bother me except for the fact of who did it, I'm not sure... Maybe it is just this person's moving me around I find irritating. Actually, I'm getting the sneaky suspicion that is it! See, THIS is why I should just delete my myspace. a) I get upset because I get caught up in the middle school politics. b) I spend too much time on it, and c) I don't even have a reason for c. a and b are almost enough to convince me. Yes, maybe I'll just do that. Ahhh.... I'm oscellating (sp?)..... I'm strongly tempted to! If I miss it too much, I could always get back on.... Maybe I'll sleep on it and decide in the morning.
So yeah, I'm a pathetic person, so I'm gonna go read Romeo and Juliet now!
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Brilliant idea!
So, it snowed last night and -surprisingly enough- both of my school campuses were closed for the day, so I got an extra day off! yay! Anyhow, I worked on homework this morning, and then about noon Heath and I had the brilliant idea to host a neighborhood snowball fight this afternoon. So we made a flurry of phone calls to all of our neighbors and a bunch of people came out and we had a free for all, then some teams, then the dodge ball version of a snowball fight. Heath and I had loaded up a dozen hay bales into the back of Grandpa's pick up and hauled them out to the field we met up in, setting them up like shields and bunkers. It was great! Totally spontaneous and random and community building. Why don't we do stuff like this more??? :-)
The snow is wreaking havoc upon my plans, though. It was so cold and icy, and then with the snow today it's just snow and ice and slick compacted snow, it's insane! I didn't drive anywhere. I wanted to record with Tim tonight, we've been trying to do it all week, but with the weather it just hasn't worked. Bummer. But, I still prefer the snow a TON over the rain, so I'm not really complaining!!!
Homework calls. Latah!
The snow is wreaking havoc upon my plans, though. It was so cold and icy, and then with the snow today it's just snow and ice and slick compacted snow, it's insane! I didn't drive anywhere. I wanted to record with Tim tonight, we've been trying to do it all week, but with the weather it just hasn't worked. Bummer. But, I still prefer the snow a TON over the rain, so I'm not really complaining!!!
Homework calls. Latah!
Tuesday, January 09, 2007
School again!
School's back in full swing, I started the one class I hadn't been to yet today. I've got three classes at the community college on the quarter schedule, and one class at the branch university on a semester schedule. I'm taking a Poli Sci class one day a week, and I think I'm going to like it. My health class is inspiring me to make better health choices (I drained the grease out of the hamburger for tacos tonight, and it was so gross how much liquid there was! Granted, some of it was probably water, but it was still nasty.), like documenting what food I eat and when. And I'm trying to be more inspired to exercise more regularly. Especially in this weather, it's hard for me to stick to something!
I started a Shakespeare class today, and the teacher has a British accent, which seems appropriate for Shakespeare. I'm hoping to direct a play of The Merchant of Venice, and we get to read it during the class, so that'll be cool. And sonnets, I like sonnets.
Only problem is I now will be required to write papers... and I think when I have to write papers I'm not as inspired to write for fun. Sorry guys. My entries here might be lagging in the next couple months.
I slept for several hours this afternoon, when I got back from school. It was wonderful to crash, but I'm hoping it won't upset my sleep schedule. I hate it when that happens! And, now I've got a bunch of homework I didn't get accomplished, unfortunately.
Gotta go fold laundry. Take it easy!
I started a Shakespeare class today, and the teacher has a British accent, which seems appropriate for Shakespeare. I'm hoping to direct a play of The Merchant of Venice, and we get to read it during the class, so that'll be cool. And sonnets, I like sonnets.
Only problem is I now will be required to write papers... and I think when I have to write papers I'm not as inspired to write for fun. Sorry guys. My entries here might be lagging in the next couple months.
I slept for several hours this afternoon, when I got back from school. It was wonderful to crash, but I'm hoping it won't upset my sleep schedule. I hate it when that happens! And, now I've got a bunch of homework I didn't get accomplished, unfortunately.
Gotta go fold laundry. Take it easy!
Saturday, January 06, 2007
Sharp turn
I drove off the road tonight. I took a turn too sharp, and my car completely didn't turn, I went straight off and ended up on the other side of the ditch, actually. Fortunately, it was the best possible place to go off the road, since there was nothing but grass on the other side of it. Some awesome guys I know who live nearby came and rescued us (Heath was with me). So, even though it shook me up a bit, I can clearly see God's hand in it. We weren't hurt, the car isn't too damaged (I don't think), and God provided the guys to be our champions.
Only down side is that, through a serious of events that I won't go into on here, [check out my myspace blog if you want to read more: www.myspace.com/daniL012988 ], the back window in one of the guy's cars was broken, which I feel really bad about since it was because of me that he was out there anyhow...
On a different note, school started, and it's, eh, OK. I actually ended up changing my class schedule today, so I've got to add another class or two on Monday, since I dropped one today, but hopefully I can get that taken care of without too much further problems. I'm gonna be busy this quarter, but I guess that's OK. Better to be busy than bored, I suppose.
Alright, it's LATE, so I'm going to bed now. Dad's been watching this great movie that I keep getting interested in, and staying focused is a bit hard, but it's winding down now, so I think I can go to bed!
Drive safe!
Only down side is that, through a serious of events that I won't go into on here, [check out my myspace blog if you want to read more: www.myspace.com/daniL012988 ], the back window in one of the guy's cars was broken, which I feel really bad about since it was because of me that he was out there anyhow...
On a different note, school started, and it's, eh, OK. I actually ended up changing my class schedule today, so I've got to add another class or two on Monday, since I dropped one today, but hopefully I can get that taken care of without too much further problems. I'm gonna be busy this quarter, but I guess that's OK. Better to be busy than bored, I suppose.
Alright, it's LATE, so I'm going to bed now. Dad's been watching this great movie that I keep getting interested in, and staying focused is a bit hard, but it's winding down now, so I think I can go to bed!
Drive safe!
Monday, January 01, 2007
Horse Hamburger....
2007 did not start too well for me. Well, OK, 2007 itself started fine, I was with friends, had a couple sips of champagne (not NEARLY as good as our Italian dessert wine in Como last summer, though.... for details on that, click the link ----> ) http://shulkeshenanigans.blogspot.com/2006/07/ciao.html#links , before heading home. I didn't end up going to sleep until, like, 3AM this morning. The one day that my Mom is usually perfectly happy to let us sleeep as long as we'd like is January 1st, since it's sort of expected that we'll be up late. At 9:15 she comes in and says "Dani, your horse is out. You should probably get up and go get her from the neighbors."
Couple things that may be important to know. I don't like horses. I don't like my horse. I don't know why I even HAVE a horse, but I bought her 10 years ago and I've never been able to get rid of her (despite popular belief, I think I do have a bit of a tender heart underneath all my layers of callousness... :-) But I still don't exactly LIKE her at all!). I particularly hate horses when they get out and interrupt my sleep... such as in this case! Although usually it's on a Sunday Morning, so I guess it is getting better! Anyhow, I took Olivia up with me to our neighbors place (they had secured the horse in their corral) to get her.
Unfortunately, because of the darn elk population around here, all our fences are virtually trashed. Jewel (the horse) has been in one field for several months, and I drove in our driveway a couple weeks ago and she was out, so I put her in the field next to the previous field, which is the one she escaped from this morning. Dad suggested I put her in a little barn/shed thingy we have on farm 2. When I got to the shed, though (after DRAGGING Jewel down our neighbor's driveway and across the road and down the hill along our rather busy country road to farm 2's entrance, and waiting for Max to emerge from someplace in order to show me what little shed Dad was talking about... and did I mention Jewel was freaking out this whole time, trying to rip my arm out of its socket??? Yeah, she was!), there was no way to close it off, and there was boards and two small, decomposing animals (rats? oppossums?) in the middle of the shed, AND the ceiling was so low she wouldn't have been able to put her head up. I didn't feel like I could really leave her there, so I started across our large hay field.
In the middle of the field there was a herd of cattle. Jewel doesn't like cattle, or at least she isn't on friendly terms with them. Once again she starts overreacting. She steps on my feet, throws her head around, tries to run circles around me... generally, she was making a big nuisance of herself! We FINALLY made it to the far end of farm 1, to the haybarn that we've kept our horses (back when we had more than one) in. Unfortunately, a cow was last in there, and it had torn down fences and bent gates and all kinds of fun stuff, so I wasn't in teh position that I could pin Jewel up there like I'd wanted. So I walked her up to our house, tried to find Dad who was no help at all in suggesting another field, so we went back down to the haybarn, where I yelled at Max and Olivia and told them to "just hold her, for me, OK?!" while I tried to get the barn in order. After wrestling with those stupid burr things that stick to absolutely EVERYTHING, pulling heavy metal gates around, tying everything together with baling twine, I FINALLY got things secure enough to put the horse in. Once she was in place, though, I had to haul buckets of water from the creek 200 feet away. Do you know how long 200 feet can be when you're hauling a 5 gallon bucket full of water splashing over the rim, onto your pants, and down into your rubber boots? REALLY far! Especially when you have to do that multiple times! Oh, and in order to GET a bucket with a handle to haul the water, I had to crawl under sticker bushes to get one that was pushed way back by the roots. Not only did I have burrs on my clothes from head to foot (about 2,000 of them!), I also had stickers and tree branches pulling my hair apart and scratching my face... AND my arm was ACHING from the 90 minutes I'd spent pulling that darn horse around! I was NOT happy by the end of all this (OK, actually, I wasn't happy from the BEGINNING of it! In all honesty, though, by the end I'd started to see a little humor in the situation!).
But the end of teh tale is, the horse was secure as of this afternoon, with grain, hay, and water. Until we can get some fences repaired, she's liable to be staying in the barn, but I guess she might enjoy the change from being out in the cold.
My day did get better though. My family met some long-time friends of our at a Pizza Parlor for dinner, and it was fun to catch up with them. I also got a walk in (no running, but a walk is better than nothing.), which was nice. Yesterday I did my 20 minute Cardio Kick-boxing workout video before we went to see Carrie get baptized, and I have to tell you, even only 20 minutes has my arms and back REALLY sore today. Maybe that was another reason dragging Jewel around was so painful... Oh, and I also did a whole bunch of stuff with Heath's new 8 lb barbell working on my arms, so that would also contribute to the soreness.
Anyhow, I'm gonna go make a cup of hot tea before I head to bed, because it sounds immensily delicious at the moment. Actually, cinnamin toast sounds better, but I'll stick with the tea, I guess! Ta ta for now!
Couple things that may be important to know. I don't like horses. I don't like my horse. I don't know why I even HAVE a horse, but I bought her 10 years ago and I've never been able to get rid of her (despite popular belief, I think I do have a bit of a tender heart underneath all my layers of callousness... :-) But I still don't exactly LIKE her at all!). I particularly hate horses when they get out and interrupt my sleep... such as in this case! Although usually it's on a Sunday Morning, so I guess it is getting better! Anyhow, I took Olivia up with me to our neighbors place (they had secured the horse in their corral) to get her.
Unfortunately, because of the darn elk population around here, all our fences are virtually trashed. Jewel (the horse) has been in one field for several months, and I drove in our driveway a couple weeks ago and she was out, so I put her in the field next to the previous field, which is the one she escaped from this morning. Dad suggested I put her in a little barn/shed thingy we have on farm 2. When I got to the shed, though (after DRAGGING Jewel down our neighbor's driveway and across the road and down the hill along our rather busy country road to farm 2's entrance, and waiting for Max to emerge from someplace in order to show me what little shed Dad was talking about... and did I mention Jewel was freaking out this whole time, trying to rip my arm out of its socket??? Yeah, she was!), there was no way to close it off, and there was boards and two small, decomposing animals (rats? oppossums?) in the middle of the shed, AND the ceiling was so low she wouldn't have been able to put her head up. I didn't feel like I could really leave her there, so I started across our large hay field.
In the middle of the field there was a herd of cattle. Jewel doesn't like cattle, or at least she isn't on friendly terms with them. Once again she starts overreacting. She steps on my feet, throws her head around, tries to run circles around me... generally, she was making a big nuisance of herself! We FINALLY made it to the far end of farm 1, to the haybarn that we've kept our horses (back when we had more than one) in. Unfortunately, a cow was last in there, and it had torn down fences and bent gates and all kinds of fun stuff, so I wasn't in teh position that I could pin Jewel up there like I'd wanted. So I walked her up to our house, tried to find Dad who was no help at all in suggesting another field, so we went back down to the haybarn, where I yelled at Max and Olivia and told them to "just hold her, for me, OK?!" while I tried to get the barn in order. After wrestling with those stupid burr things that stick to absolutely EVERYTHING, pulling heavy metal gates around, tying everything together with baling twine, I FINALLY got things secure enough to put the horse in. Once she was in place, though, I had to haul buckets of water from the creek 200 feet away. Do you know how long 200 feet can be when you're hauling a 5 gallon bucket full of water splashing over the rim, onto your pants, and down into your rubber boots? REALLY far! Especially when you have to do that multiple times! Oh, and in order to GET a bucket with a handle to haul the water, I had to crawl under sticker bushes to get one that was pushed way back by the roots. Not only did I have burrs on my clothes from head to foot (about 2,000 of them!), I also had stickers and tree branches pulling my hair apart and scratching my face... AND my arm was ACHING from the 90 minutes I'd spent pulling that darn horse around! I was NOT happy by the end of all this (OK, actually, I wasn't happy from the BEGINNING of it! In all honesty, though, by the end I'd started to see a little humor in the situation!).
But the end of teh tale is, the horse was secure as of this afternoon, with grain, hay, and water. Until we can get some fences repaired, she's liable to be staying in the barn, but I guess she might enjoy the change from being out in the cold.
My day did get better though. My family met some long-time friends of our at a Pizza Parlor for dinner, and it was fun to catch up with them. I also got a walk in (no running, but a walk is better than nothing.), which was nice. Yesterday I did my 20 minute Cardio Kick-boxing workout video before we went to see Carrie get baptized, and I have to tell you, even only 20 minutes has my arms and back REALLY sore today. Maybe that was another reason dragging Jewel around was so painful... Oh, and I also did a whole bunch of stuff with Heath's new 8 lb barbell working on my arms, so that would also contribute to the soreness.
Anyhow, I'm gonna go make a cup of hot tea before I head to bed, because it sounds immensily delicious at the moment. Actually, cinnamin toast sounds better, but I'll stick with the tea, I guess! Ta ta for now!
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