When my mom was growing up, she spent summers in North Carolina. My grandpa was a realtor for houses in the mountains and he had this farmer friend named Sherman. So, when she went down, she had some responsibilities and the opportunity to take care of a horse. She was always a horse person. When I was younger, we'd go down to visit and go on trail rides, but it was mainly with horses that were called “deadheads.” They go on the trail and that's what they do. You can't get them to go any faster, you can't get them to go any slower, they walk in a line, and they go. Then, when I was maybe around eight or nine, my mom's best friend, who lived in Minneapolis, decided to move. She moved about 30 minutes into Wisconsin, just over the bridge in Prescott and ended up with a herd of seven horses on a 25 acre valley. I took lessons, learned how to farm, and learned about ethical consumption of meat. So, we had a pig that we processed and ate, we had chickens, and we had cows in the end. The whole time we were riding horses and going on trail rides down in the valley. 

 

Then there's this long gap of time where I wasn't able to be around and my trajectory of what I was doing changed. That was in my mid to late teens. I was doing high school stuff, graduating from high school, and then going to college. In college, I went for ASL interpreting. For the last few months of the program, a mentor of mine, had me interpret for a deaf woman who owns a sanctuary for blind horses. It’s called HOC Rose Blind Horse Sanctuary. While interpreting for her, I got to reconnect with horses. It was a nice remeeting of the energy that I need to work on within myself to be around them. You know horses, they see you for exactly who you are. They can perceive you in ways that you may not even be trying to be perceived. So, there's this relearning of trust in a very tender way because they are blind. It's not just like a sighted horse that has sight, hearing, touch, feeling, and smell. They're missing one of their senses. Reacclimating into horsemanship, in that way, was so important to me. I did some riding and desensitization work with them. I've done that for about two years now.
 

We made a relationship with a woman named Jessyka who does boarding, lessons, and has horses herself. We worked out a situation where blind horses that were a bit safer and had the capacity to ride could have more intense training. We would send them to her to live for X amount of time. Then, they would come back to continue working on the boundaries we set and the lessons we taught them, until they could be adopted. She's really cool. She had ins into the competition rules and stuff like that because her competition horse is completely blind in both eyes. They changed the rules so that she could compete against sighted horses and she's taken first with him multiple times. This whole thing around ableism has been incredible, especially now that I'm injured from a horse riding incident. Before it, Jessyka and I worked out a trade. She would give me a lesson at the end of the day after chores and work. I only made it to one official lesson and we rode a couple of times after that. Now, my connection is interesting. I long and wish to be riding horses so much more than I have ever in the past.

 

On September 17th, I fell off of a horse, broke two parts of my spine, herniated three discs, and gave myself a wicked concussion. Her foal was running past us and she decided that she did not want to go out. When you're learning how to communicate your body language with your energy, any little step that is an agreement between you and another being is huge. So, she's spicy trotting and she's shaking her head. So, I'm like, “alright, well go back.” So, we agreed that we were going to spicy trot back to the barn. I wasn't going to yank on her head, but just keep my reins where they were, post real good, and head back. But, her foal saw that we were heading back and she took off past us which made Mom bolt. We’re on, we're going, she took a hard right, and slipped on gravel. She didn't fall, thankfully. She's fine, but her trip made me fall off. So that's the beginning to the present of my relationship with horses. I'm so excited for next summer and to not have to wear a body brace when I do things. I’m even excited to just take care of them, but definitely to get riding again.