It’s super-hard to look at that beautiful fence we built and not be horse shopping . . . we haven’t yet heard about when our training visitor is coming; her dad’s been really busy at the café. I’ve been looking on Craigslist and Rollanet and a few other sites, and yesterday a random person texted me about a gelding. He’d gotten my name and number from the guy we bought the trailer from.

And see, that’s the other thing, the trailer . . . so we COULD get a horse. Or two.

And my husband keeps asking if I found one—um, yeah, like 17 of them!

Of course, I keep hearing about wild horse rescues, too . . . so today, I finally jumped on it.

I applied to adopt a wild mare and foal from a range in South Dakota. They’re having terrible hay shortages and may have to euthanize some of the herds or sell to an auction—that’s often code for slaughter.

So I did it. And now we wait.

Lest any of you think I’m completely nuts, since many of you know me from the book industry, I’m not a greenhorn in the horse world.

I got my first saddle on my first Christmas; the pony arrived for my first birthday in March. Before that, as soon as I could sit up, my dad set me on his black gelding, Thunder.

I also had a cart for my pony, Sissy, that could convert to a sleigh for winter. I learned, literally, from the ground up, and one day, when I was about four or five, I wanted to ride and my mom said, “Not now.” So I saddled the pony and took off down the lane . . . a few hundred yards later, the saddle slipped. I hung on for a few minutes, completely upside down, and Mom came to the rescue.

That was only the first of, um, several, accidents.

Since that inauspicious start, I’ve ridden, trained, and showed in Western and English pleasure, speed events, hunter classes, and so forth; I’ve exercised race horses; I’ve taught horsemanship as a master-level CHA certified instructor; I even rode in a few parades, including one where I met Clayton Moore!

Then I had kids.

Couldn’t afford both, so, well, guess I did the right thing . . . 😉