2017 in Review

What a day... when you look into the sky in the morning and you are virtually rejoicing that the clouds have partly disappeared to let the sun glance through. While when you look onto the ground, you really wonder whether the tourist destination "Seenplatte Wetterau" should become reality. SUP, canoeing, you name it...
It was not the time for winter sports (lack of snow), nor were the past weeks time for a horsy life in our region. For my horses, there was no grassland for more than two weeks now, due to the heavy rainfalls that transformed everything in little rivers or lakes. Muddy rivers or muddy lakes. To be honest, I am rather happy that it was mild outside because in a frozen state, the whole situation would really have resulted in pure Boxenhaft.

With today's mail, I received a paper from the Cavalo Lusitano e.V.. I wondered whether I have to frame it? So I decided to make a small recap of the last year, 2017.

The horse. 

At the end, all became different than planned if it had been planned at all. Early this year, a sweet little Haflinger boy called Sion came to our house for a couple of months. I saw Sion at a private barn and I swear he has the sweetest face you can ever imagine. He moved in, broke our hearts but after every ride with him I thought "he is too tiny for you". Sion was pony size, 145cm. To make it short, I was unhappy about this fact because I believe in perfect matches and saying this, Nicole found us. Nicole found Sion, fell in love with him (you cannot not fall in love with him) and now he lives with Nicole in a wonderful stable nearby. Sion is not too tiny for Nicole, he is perfect for her. To continue perfect matches, and as mentioned in a previous post, I had been looking for a horse to ride with my two artificial hips for a long time. And I had just given up this endeavor, as a Facebook entry on Lusitano Marketplace popped onto my screen. This was the beginning of another fateful three weeks, with a brief visit in Portugal,  that resulted in the (see above pic) Lusitano Stud Book entry I received today. Capote jumped into our life. This was special and unexpected.

One year ago, I honestly thought about completely giving up the idea of having horses in the family or riding at all. The pain was just too heavy to imagine that riding would ever be possible again.

The book. 

Earlier this year, author Heidi Rauch had contacted me to ask whether I was ready to submit some "user information" of my life with artificial joints, here: hips for a book directed at everyone who may need new joints. This request came shortly after my second hip surgery, after I had just taken a lesson on a plastic horse, called Reitsimulator. The result of this lesson encouraged me to take up the challenge of trying to ride again. I did not hesitate to say "yes" to Heidi's request and now we, that is Cockpit and I (oh, Capote is also in the book), are in the latest book "Mut zur neuen Hüfte" as an example of how well you can ride horses with artificial joints. On several pages, (some text pieces are older entries from this blog!) we decribe the situation as we perceive it, along with examples of some other people who are into sports despite of their TEP.

Life.

Chris had his year running in 2017. He ran marathons again and he ran with the horses which is a very funny form of "Gassi gehen" and he ran when he did not work or did not bake cakes or gingerbread houses which is his passion next to running. To me, Chris is the most wonderful person on earth. We had a wonderful vacation in Italy in summer and met Glenda and some of her close friends near Siena. I continued my freelancing, mainly working from home, and translated, edited, localized... texts for various clients.

So this is how it was and we will see what 2018 plans for us. Running and horse riding will certainly be on the menu, and the rest may result in pleasant surprises. I have booked a language course in Portuguese, as another trip (a little longer than the last one) to Portugal is planned. I want to learn more about the country and about the Lusitano horse.