Musings: All Roads Lead to Horses

They say that you attract whatever you think about. I’m not sure this is entirely true. As an equestrian, I think about horses all the time. And yet I wake up everyday with the same two horses in my backyard instead of a pasture full of ponies.

Don’t get me wrong, I am very happy with my horses, Bear and Shiloh. I’m just saying that thinking in and of itself doesn’t necessarily make something so. Results generally necessitate action of some kind. Thinking about a horse doesn’t make it appear.

While I may not have a sea of horses in my possession, I do seem to find the mention of horses in lots of unexpected places. In that sense, I guess I do end up attracting what I think about.

The most recent occurrence of the phenomenon happened while perusing an issue of Poets and Writers magazine. This isn’t a place I would expect to find an article related to horses. And yet, there it was.

The horse article I came a cross is titled “Saddle Up and Read.” It features equestrian Caitlin Gooch and her non-profit organization that pairs reading and horses. Last year, I mentioned Saddle Up and Read in my post about Giving Tuesday. If you’d like to learn more about Saddle Up and Read, please visit https://www.saddleupandread.org/.

I was delighted to see the organization featured in a literary magazine. Hopefully it will be good exposure to a wider audience outside the horse world. Although I must say that Caitlin has had no trouble attracting positive attention. I saw her featured on a national morning news segment. Oprah knows her name too. That is pretty good advertising, if you ask me.

My hunch is that I will keep thinking about horses until I die. Even if I develop a cognitive disorder as I age, I bet that horses will still figure prominently in my mind somewhere. I would venture to guess that the mention, sight, sound or scent of a horse will still evoke a visceral response in me. I will keep seeing horses everywhere.

In the mean time, I will keep finding horses in unexpected places. After all, for those of us afflicted by the horse bug, the roads we travel have a tendency to lead us to horses. The horse right in front of us or the horse we dream about. Real roads or imagined roads. I can’t think of any more scenic highways to drive.