Horse Heaven
When I was 10-11 years old our constantly moving family stopped in one place for about 4 years. I still remember it as the perfect place for a kid to live. The house Dad rented was two stories with the second story unfinished. Up there all our toys and wooden fish crates used for doll houses, trains, and two-seater cars. Pop was sea-going fisheries researcher and got the crates from fish canneries to move our stuff. Then those crates were free, now you see them for sale as antiques on eBay. The upstairs was a child's castle keep, big windows, big space, lots of light and Mom busy downstairs with our one-year old sister. Up and downstairs the windows had beautiful country views. Downstairs the bedroom my sister and I shared looked out at Mt. Hood over a corn field that was framed with fir woods on both sides. In the center of the back of the house was a screened porch that shared that view and Dad put up army surplus cots for us in the summer and we sleep out there in sight of the mountain, the stars, and listening to the night critters.
Now when school is out in June my brain is filled with memories of my summer self walking down the unpaved road in my bare feet, the thick dust drifting over my toes like talcum powder and warm from the sun. The road went past the home of two of our school friends and dead ended at a gate to a wooded pasture, full of foxglove, daisies, blue cornflowers, and about a dozen horses. Horses that hadn't been ridden in a very long time that had been turned out there by their elderly owner. This is the age that horse crazy strikes a lot of girls. We carried notebooks where we carefully recorded every name of every horse we came across anywhere. I sketched them as well. So, over, under, and through the gate we'd go.
We spent hours just standing in that pasture watching. We brought apples trying coax some kind of food based affection for ourselves from them, trying to get closer and closer. Eventually they ate from our hands and would tolerate a small amount of stroking and petting from us. Mostly they ignored us. Horse heaven for young girls.
That was summer, now fall is nearly gone and what I remember about late fall back then is being stuffed into coat and raincoat for the long walk to school and back. It was Oregon and raining by then. On the way home sometimes several of us would detour through the apple orchards and have a protracted, running battle scooping up rotten apples and throwing them at each other. Then we'd hose off in our yard. Funny I don't remember Mom saying about word about that.
Now when school is out in June my brain is filled with memories of my summer self walking down the unpaved road in my bare feet, the thick dust drifting over my toes like talcum powder and warm from the sun. The road went past the home of two of our school friends and dead ended at a gate to a wooded pasture, full of foxglove, daisies, blue cornflowers, and about a dozen horses. Horses that hadn't been ridden in a very long time that had been turned out there by their elderly owner. This is the age that horse crazy strikes a lot of girls. We carried notebooks where we carefully recorded every name of every horse we came across anywhere. I sketched them as well. So, over, under, and through the gate we'd go.
We spent hours just standing in that pasture watching. We brought apples trying coax some kind of food based affection for ourselves from them, trying to get closer and closer. Eventually they ate from our hands and would tolerate a small amount of stroking and petting from us. Mostly they ignored us. Horse heaven for young girls.
That was summer, now fall is nearly gone and what I remember about late fall back then is being stuffed into coat and raincoat for the long walk to school and back. It was Oregon and raining by then. On the way home sometimes several of us would detour through the apple orchards and have a protracted, running battle scooping up rotten apples and throwing them at each other. Then we'd hose off in our yard. Funny I don't remember Mom saying about word about that.
posted by Celia | November 09, 2014
6 Comments:
Once again I can identify with much you write from the wooden crates to the talcum powdered toes. We had a cow and chickens and dogs. nay a horse in sight. Beautiful shot of the mountain view
You and I were lucky when we grew up. Different experiences, for sure, but a world that seems long gone now. It was a good world.
Schmidley - good to know you had some of the same.
Rain - It does seem like a world gone. I had incredible freedom as a kid.
I grew up in the mountains and spent much time outdoors and freely roaming. Kids cannot do that today. I think they much be just as safe now, but we cannot take the chance. I, too, was crazy about horses and had plenty around to try to make friends with.
:) Boy, my mother wouldn't have chewed me up one side and down the other. Hugs.
I had a lot of critters growing up, spent hours alone a horse back, or reading in the hayloft. So many chores and responsibilities so young, but it was all good.
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