Finding A Place in All of This
When I was a child, I breathed horses. They paraded between my eardrums, galloping and whinnying wildly. I counted them when I travelled, read about them at the library, covered my lined notebooks, my journals, my sketchbooks with their majestic bodies, pretended to be one when nobody was looking. Oh how I loved horses. Brown ones, Black ones, Speckled ones. I cheered for Black Beauty, wept for poor Ginger, flew to new heights with My Little Ponies, and eagerly anticipated every opportunity to be near a horse, a pony, anything with four legs, a whinny, and a soft velvet nose.
When I was a young girl, I wanted to be a veterinarian. Agricultural Veterinarian, to be exact. The soft velvet noses that tickled my hands as a child were the same noses I wanted to protect, to care for in this life. Those soft velvet noses never hurt anybody maliciously. They didn't make fun of your freckles, or laugh at you at recess. Those warm bodies never lashed out at mine, their whinnies never called me names. On the contrary, these soft eyes and pricked ears had always cared for me, looked to me for love and affection, for direction, for company. And when they did act out, it was only because I had done something to deserve it. Yes, these four-legged friends were mine, always, and I wanted to protect them from what I certainly knew was a harsh and uninviting world.
But one day, something changed. I went to college, "grew up," lost touch with those soft noses and gentle nickers, and I lost my way. I didn't know what I wanted anymore, didn't know my own dreams, passions, and desires. I was lost, and in the absense of my sweet equine friends I hopped, ungrounded, from aspiration to aspiration, holding to each only as long as my interest remained. I found a love of art, of music, of science, philosophy, a love of God that clung to me. All of these things I loved, and yet none felt quite home. The God of love was the same God that rejected my weaknesses; art that I appreciated went unrecognized, philosophy told me that "there was no place for me in the academy." I could not find the simple love that existed in the sweet, warm faces of my equestrian compadres.
TBA>... (tim's here)
When I was a young girl, I wanted to be a veterinarian. Agricultural Veterinarian, to be exact. The soft velvet noses that tickled my hands as a child were the same noses I wanted to protect, to care for in this life. Those soft velvet noses never hurt anybody maliciously. They didn't make fun of your freckles, or laugh at you at recess. Those warm bodies never lashed out at mine, their whinnies never called me names. On the contrary, these soft eyes and pricked ears had always cared for me, looked to me for love and affection, for direction, for company. And when they did act out, it was only because I had done something to deserve it. Yes, these four-legged friends were mine, always, and I wanted to protect them from what I certainly knew was a harsh and uninviting world.
But one day, something changed. I went to college, "grew up," lost touch with those soft noses and gentle nickers, and I lost my way. I didn't know what I wanted anymore, didn't know my own dreams, passions, and desires. I was lost, and in the absense of my sweet equine friends I hopped, ungrounded, from aspiration to aspiration, holding to each only as long as my interest remained. I found a love of art, of music, of science, philosophy, a love of God that clung to me. All of these things I loved, and yet none felt quite home. The God of love was the same God that rejected my weaknesses; art that I appreciated went unrecognized, philosophy told me that "there was no place for me in the academy." I could not find the simple love that existed in the sweet, warm faces of my equestrian compadres.
TBA>... (tim's here)