Relaxed & Forward Blog

Calming Signals: Yoga Mind/Equine Reality

The Dude Rancher and I practice yoga. We started years ago; he was having way too many headaches and my...
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Photo & Poem: Secrets

She attended church with joyless obligation, lip-syncing hymns that praised suffering, with dentures that never quite fit, never a genuine...
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What the Nightmare Revealed

Everyone did what instinct dictated. The beach was so peaceful. Deserted with not so much as a footprint when they...
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Photo & Poem: Second Cup

Second cup of coffee while waiting for light, a second cup while waiting to head out. The horses have thick...
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Cantankary: If Not Now, When?

Expecting New Year's resolutions from me? Nope, I'm not the type. I am so thrilled to have survived another year...
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Photo & Poem: Horse. Woman.

There were always horses, some light and some dark. The woman met them in passing or they stayed forever; some...
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The Future for Horse-Keepers: Isolation or World Change?

It's what we do: We keep horses. Sometimes a foal too young to be ridden, so we show patience and...
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Photo & Poem: Letting Him Lead

  You were there the day he was born, all ears and knees. You knew him when his hooves were...
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Part One: The Future for Horses, a Different Narrative about Herd Dynamics

The first story I remember about herd dynamics was that stallions lived on the rise above the valley to watch...
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Photo & Poem: Rich

  Our family farm was leased from the man who owned the car dealership in town. Once or twice a...
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Calming Signals: How to Show Love

"How do you show your love for horses, then?" A clinic participant asked me at the end of a long...
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Photo & Poem: Girl-Cousin

Seems every farm family had one in a generation; a distant misfit girl-cousin who read too much or wore men’s...
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In Training to Be a Late Bloomer

He was a bona fide dressage master. We were lucky to have him come for a clinic. It was the...
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Photo & Poem: Waiting for the Vet

  No days like the golden photos on the calendar from the gas company, propane topped off at the first...
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Life Coach: The Goat Version

It was a beautiful end-of-summer afternoon, just about feeding time. Cupid had been with us a few months by then....
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Photo & Poem: Holiday Place

  You had a plan for how this would go when you left home. Longing for a thing different than...
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How To Spoil Your Horse

Will we ever stop telling long-winded horse stories? No chance. We are besotted with horses; we need horse friends because...
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Photo and Poem: No Other

  You are wise to not let me see, stoic one. Show not your age, certainly not a weakness. Be...
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