Being Cantankerous Because I Feel Like It

Last week I raved about my beautiful but desolate riding arena at the front of my little farm. My other favorite place is the pond at the very back of my farm. Waterfront property on the high desert prairie of Colorado was a major selling point when I chose this dilapidated farm. It’s fed by an incognito cross-country waterway, more swamp than babbling brook. With all the construction upstream, it routinely floods now. In drought years, the pond shrinks to a puddle. But all are welcome to drink.

I consider the pond to be the back porch of my farm. It’s a stroll to get there from the house, but it’s the best view of clouds on the water and Pikes Peak on the horizon. Edgar Rice Burro and I share the pond. Donkeys are territorial. He stands guard against the coyotes and the deer that rest in the marsh scrub. That’s why we’ve watched so many sunsets together. Plus, it’s obvious that Edgar would get the best pen.

The problem with horsewomen who read self-help articles is that they get testy. You get to a certain age and you lose some manners, or give up trying to please people. Just like good dogs eventually become old dogs, and sometimes bite children. Not that I’m senile. I’m just tired of being lectured about the obvious. And boy howdy, am I tired of being talked down to.

Still at it, I foolishly Googled downsizing, and the popular option right now is called Swedish death cleaning. It’s more mundane than it sounds. Things like discarding extra kitchen items because nobody needs five platters. The way I hate cooking, I would never have had five. Jolene yodels out, “Vad fan!” No, I didn’t know she spoke the language either. Jolene would like you to know that vallhunds are Sweden’s national dog. Her proud ancestors herded cattle and defended Viking farms against intruders. Some ancestors went on longship raids, another kind of downsizing. She is as disappointed as I am with Swedish death cleaning.

There’s also a poop method of downsizing. The idea is to cure indecision with a gross-out challenge. Would you clean the poop off the thing or just toss it, with poop fear being the deciding factor? Clearly an ineffective method for horsewomen. We spend half of our day cleaning poop off of daily-use items. We are profoundly desensitized to poop, usually from several species.

Here is my version. I have five retired equines in my barn. They are my priority; anything else can go. But that means as long as they eat hay, I am not retired. Being self-employed can feel like riding a tsunami of current events. It’s not just unhappy realities in the horse industry. The entire world seems in transition, so that includes me. There will be unwelcome changes, but if I know anything by this age, it’s that fighting change is a losing battle. Sometimes it’s best to pretend it was our idea in the first place.

It’s easy to let go of things that are no longer used. It’s the cumulative grief and the anticipatory grief that keep me up at night. I worry that my future will be one long goodbye. Mister nods. He is prudent because he’s a donkey in a dog suit, if you haven’t noticed. Mister acts like he grew up in Kansas. Like he has attended too many church socials. Which is fine as long as he’s in the back row of any congregation. Jolene is the revival tent preacher type, throwing her paws aloft and loudly pontificating in all directions. She imparts a sermon of herding dog wisdom. Get up early. Eat a good breakfast. Stay close at the heel. Keep’em moving forward. Settle in close at night.

Jolene is our full-time boss now. Mister and I have never been great at doing what we’re told, so we act like this too was our idea all along.

A short list of things I notice at this age: I no longer have the stamina of a younger me. Or the income of a younger me. Or the vision. Damn, do I need new glasses? There’s a humorless calming signal joke. The irony of understanding horse language is that it ruins what we used to enjoy. We’re no fun. We are no longer entertained by seeing  horses intimidated, their anxiety plain. It’s my job to watch so I can help my clients, but it exhausts my eyes after so many years. Adding to the insult of age, gravity is having a love affair with the skin under my chin. All of this is set to the soundtrack of tinnitus, a relentlessly thick static with unpredictable clicking sounds.

I relax by watching cat videos for the anarchy value. Many horsewomen share a guilty pleasure of pouring over sale ads and pondering another horse. I had to give that up. Having my own retirement community will be my future. Instead, I stalk tiny houses because they’re the ultimate small. After traveling thousands of miles in my minuscule RV, downsizing is not a chore. It’s my dream.

But lately, I have had a feeling something was missing. Or maybe it’s an itch. I keep stalking RVs, even though I love mine. I look at sheds and metal storage containers. I learned the term, accessory structures. Maybe I could turn my horse trailer into a studio. But the horses reminded me I might need it. The quest continued. I saved money for a thing I couldn’t name. The thing that was missing.

I pondered the state of the world. Weighing my hard-won savings against the uncertain future. Then the real question: what is reasonable at my age and income, but impractical enough to get excited about, since I’m not dead yet? What am I yearning for?

Was it a view of the pond? The dogs were thought so, but they are always up for anything. I talked it over with Edgar Rice Burro. I worked the numbers dozens of times. I couldn’t take on debt. And I couldn’t let the idea go. I kept seeing it without my eyes.

Are you this way? Sometimes I fight my intuition so hard. I’d seen the used red barn a dozen times. It kept coming up on a community marketplace. It was too small and too tall. Not right, but it wouldn’t go away. Finally, I went to see the little box. It was what I could afford. The seller accepted my offer. Who knew you could have these things delivered like pizza? That was November.

A dear friend sent a Christmas card and enclosed photos of a trail ride from the 1980s. It must’ve been a national holiday or my birthday because I was riding in my parade saddle with the tapaderos and fancy chrome breastplate. Spirit looked like a vintage Buick, but I could tell he was young because he still had spots. My mentor was riding, along with all my ranch friends. As close to a family as I’ve had as an adult. The horses in the photos are all gone now, and several of the people have died. That three thousand acre ranch that was the center of my life is now filled with McMansions and strip malls. It was bittersweet to travel back, but I also felt pride in the trails I had traveled since that time. No regrets.

An ugly premonition; I think this will be a heart-wrenching year. Sorry, I’m not being negative so much as realistic. It’s up to each of us to help where we can, but also do some serious self-care. What is more peaceful than sunlight on water? Edgar agrees, but he reminds me that he’s retired from being my muse. It was a huge moral obligation that’s been passed down to Mister now. But he is interested in what I am doing in his pen.

To be continued…

Sharing a memory of the one who taught me the word cantankerous on the anniversary of her passing. Click on Donkey Wings and Lilith

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Women Aging Cantankerously