Life

Ready

I realized driving home from the city tonight how absolutely ready I am to get out of this place for a little while. I never thought I’d say this. I mean, I love it here, and I love all the people of course, but I just neeed to go somewhere else and find out who I am without everybody else I’ve known my whole life. You know? Everyday I’m growing as a person, and I really think that moving across the planet for a while is going to help that process reach it’s full potential. Whether the experience is good or bad, pray it be good, I’m ready for it. Bring it on.

My AT worked her magic tonight, and I’m feeling much better. My leg was going numb because the major nerve that runs down the leg goes through this muscle in your butt, and that muscle was rather tight in my ass so it was squishing that nerve.. causing the numbness and tingling. For the moment that is gone! Yay! My hamstring was also super tight, which is new. So I’m going to have to remember to stretch that out more. If anybody out there is in need of a fantastic athletic therapist, I have the perfect one for you.

After my AT session, I went for supper with my dad at Stella’s (yummy), and then booked it over to Jysk and Winners to get some pants for me, and some shower gifts for my co-worker Jolene! Got home at 10, and now I’m thinking seriously about bed. Mmmm. yeah.

Willard heads off to a show in Birds Hill tomorrow with his part boarder. I’m hoping he behaves himself for her this weekend, and I’m nervous for them both. Hopefully this weekend goes better for them then last weekend did for us. I’m sure I worked out most of the first show jitters for the horse last weekend though. *crosses fingers*

110 days. Let’s go.

Fizzle

I just baked some peach poppyseed muffins, and of course I had to taste test (more like eat half of) the batter. My burps now taste like baking soda and vinegar. And yes, they are fizzy ass burps. Not my best scheme. Still, tastes good.

  In other news. Went out and hacked Willie tonight. He was a prince. Fantastic collection and on his back end nice the whole ride. Which I appreciated, as my body isn’t really cooperating with me lately.  The leg/foot numbness is back, my hip is causing pain down my whole leg, and my shoulder is still being all angsty and sore from the weekend. Going to AT tomorrow after work to see if we can get these issues looked at and maybe fixed.. again. My upper back has taken to really seizing up tonight too. Hopefully that’s just temporary. Don’t really want to deal with any more issues any time soon.. Grr.

So ready to be healthy again.

Rain?

This is Felix, he’s our little project. He’s just a year this month. He’s my mare, Flash’s, replacement. Hopefully he’ll turn out just as talented.

The week’s been filled with sunshine, sunburns, sunscreen, and lots of dust and wind and everything else that comes along with seeding time when you work on a farm. Got lots of overtime from the past few days, so that is a very good thing!

Mom and I are headed out to Birds Hill tomorrow afternoon for the Victoria Day Show. I rode Mr Willard outside yesterday, and he had energy flying out of everywhere. Hopefully he’s a little calmer tomorrow for schooling, I’m sure he won’t be. It never really works that way, does it?

I managed to pull my hamstring somehow over the past two days at work, or last night working with mr hyper. Hopefully that calms down a little before the weekend. I’m interested to see how my hip holds up over the next 4 days. It’s been decent this week, just some random tingles. Not a whole lot of pain. Which is a brilliant change!

117 days!!!

TGIF

Another work week finished. Finally.

I had a lesson with Charlene tonight. We worked on a two-stride exercise and oxer distances. Willard was a very good boy, and we did quite well. He’s getting so much better at using his hind end instead of just pulling me around with his face. It’s a nice change!

My hip/back feels a little off today. I’m hoping it’s just end of the week fatigue and nothing that’s going to last. However, this does feel familiar. So maybe not so good. Oh well, nothing I haven’t dealt with before. Just a little discouraging. I wonder if I’ll ever get rid of these injury. I guess we’ll just see how the next week goes. Next weekend is my first out door show of the year, The Victoria Day Show. 4 days at Birds Hill Park. My coaches agreed to let me try some lower level jumpers! Super pumped about that! Along with those two divisions I’ll be competing in my regular 3ft level hunters and flats. It’ll be a long weekend for sure, but a good test to see how my hip is going to handle the rest of the summer and how Willard is going to handle the outdoors. He’s usually good. Except when things like rain, bugs, sand… air.. touches his nose. Silly boy.  Mom and I invested in a little fly mask that attaches onto his bridle.. so maybe that’ll make a difference? I have my doubts, just cause I think it’s more of  a mental thing. But I guess we’ll see!

My working holiday visa application was approved yesterday. So I’m all set to go to NZ in 123, just need to finalize my flight! The one bonus of my job is that it gives me a lot of thinking time (sometimes this isn’t such a good thing haha), I can day dream about NZ for 8 hours a day. It’s quite relaxing sometimes. Until it gets tedious. But I’m not going to complain. It’s the best job I can get right now and it’s not half bad either. Definitely made it clear to me that I don’t want to be anything in the agriculture field. So at least we know that won’t cause confusion for me later on.

Anyway, I think I’m going to stop making sense soon if I keep typing, so exhausted. Bed time!

Passion

Through everything we experience, all the great feelings and all the pain, there are things that not only keep us going, but also define our very being. It’s the challenges, life’s little tests, that either break us down or help us find strength and grow as a person. Sometimes both. We go through times where we feel completely alone, and like no one understands what we’re going through. It’s so hard to see clearly when all you can feel is pain, physically or emotionally.  For athletes, injuries are common and probable, especially for those of us who push ourselves everyday in the pursuit of greatness. Many of us hide our injuries and work around them. Eventually, though, this stops working because the injury gets worse, or we gain more injuries because of compensation. It’s impossibly difficult to “rest” or take breaks. Every day off is a day lost. Nobody understands how important it is to keep pushing, keep training, no matter how bad it hurts. If you quit even for a day, people will see you as lazy or undedicated. Nobody wants that reputation.

All you really want is a teammate, a coach, someone to say it’s okay. That nobody will judge you, and you’re doing good. But how often does that happen.

Our bodies aren’t built to handle half the things we put them through. We push so hard, overtrain, and expect to perform under stressful, sometimes impossible conditions. We compete with sprains, tears, chronic pain, dislocations, sometimes even fractures and then ask why didn’t we do better. It’s hard for anybody to understand the amount of pressure athletes at any level feel. The feeling of competition, challenge, achievement, and trust are what keeps the passion alive. Once you lose that part of you, that’s when things unravel. At some point, everyone loses sight of their goal and in turn feels lost and alone.

It takes an unbelievable amount of strength to realize what’s the best way to deal with every challenge presented.  Some of us can’t deal with the pressure, the stress. Every single one of us breaks down. The one’s who can face those moments of uncertainty, pick themselves off the ground, dust off, and keep on pushing towards their goal are the people who get hurt the most, but they’re also the ones who get the most out of life.

Comments anyone?