Taking a walk

Yesterday I had an amazing experience walking out to "the rocks" from where I live. It is a short walk but one that I don't take often enough. When I went this time, I felt like I was stepping into a painting...

...the blues, yellows, and greens...


...seemed to vibrate right off the trees, bushes, grasses.

I felt transported into a storybook. Around the corner sat a swinging seat, inviting me to be still and rest...

...then I continued on...


...down the trail, laden with clover and butterflies...




...and into the woods...


...the living trees seeming to be dancing to their slow tune...


...and where they parted...well, that is something best left to be experienced in person...

On my way back, I saw the first wild roses blooming...I wish I could send the smell along with this picture.

Is there anywhere that is calling you to walk today?

A king unable to rule his country

Here is a new acquaintance I made today. Anybody know what these are? Each cluster is about the size of a ping pong ball or smaller.

Here is the mystery plant as she dances her way up to the sun. You can see some of her buds starting to develop.

Today I spent time sitting on the fence between Sofi who is still on her diet and Patrik and Sundance who have been assigned the task of eating the fresh spring grasses so Sofi won't get laminitis when she goes out again.

The flies are starting to get bad but I remember last year Lynne Gerard writing in her blog about how she found that the times that the flies were the worst, the grasses were at their most lush and the flies had the effect of inspiring the horses to move around more. I've always used fly masks before but I'm going to try having the horses go without this year so they will hopefully exercise themselves more and also get closer to each other by learning to swish the flies off each other's faces with their tails. My horses haven't developed this closeness, I think in part because of the fact that I've always taken care of their flies with masks.

I've noticed the unexpected benefit of having Sofi on the other side of a fence is that JD and Tricia can get closer to her and work on scratching her without feeling as threatened...and also, Patrik and Sundance can get closer and she doesn't feel as threatened by them. I hadn't realized his would be the case.

After I scratched him some, Patrik went over to a tree to show me how he really wanted to be scratched.

Then he and Sundance wandered off...

...and I soon saw why, JD had arrived to feed them dinner. I kept quiet and watched the scene as JD figured out how to get everyone in their proper places. First, he let Patrik in with Sofi...

...then he walked back out to give Sundance her grain.

After Sundance finished her grain, he let Patrik out and gave each of them a little bit of hay. I decided that they probably didn't need any hay at all at this point so he fed them about half of what he had brought out and then was left with a bag of hay while we were hanging out and absorbing the horse vibes. I used it as an opportunity to show JD how to work with the energy to keep the horses away from the bag of hay.

Patrik is using his finest Jedi mind tricks to try and sweet talk JD into allowing him into the bag of hay.

We were both vigilant though and Patrik finally resigned himself to the bit of hay that he had already been given. There seems to be a calming effect when the horses know their place in the herd and can trust that their leader is strong and confident.

Today, Klaus Ferdinand Hempfling sent out a nice email which included the following:

In my new book I begin the first chapter with the headline: We are concerned with the horse – but the horse is concerned with the world. And that is the only reason at all why I personally went to the horses. It was told about one of the ancient Kings, that he was unable to rule his country, because he was not even able to handle his horse. At the end of the day a human always stands completely alone in front of a horse, in front of destiny or in front of the tremors of the world. And somehow that is, so our forefathers said, one and the same thing anyway. And the tremors of the world are meanwhile threatening to take on giant dimensions.

He paired this with a new video clip which you can watch here.

As I walked home, I was treated to the following...

Sunset enocunter

This morning I awoke to some heavenly clouds with rainbows and waves included.

This little guy dropped on me when I opened a door. He didn't want to stick around to find out why I was so interested in taking pictures.

Here is an impression from the day. I was walking across the horse pasture after coming from a meditation. The sun was setting and lighting up the horses on the hill. I felt drawn to want to be with them but as I approached, from about 500 feet away, Patrik turned and walked the other way. I didn't want to chase or demand, he was clearly sending me a message. I sat down on the grass and took in the beauty of the scene, all the while recording the following video from my phone. Watch the video to find out how it turns out.

pulling hearts

Rays of life feeding plants...


...touching I's...


...pulling hearts


Can you feel it now?

The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.

Mahatma Gandhi

Beauty dripping up

Sunny was ready for an adventure today. It took me a long time to get away from the computer but finally I made the break.

Waving grasses and sailing clouds.

The pine at the top of the hill, near our sitting spot.


Another highlight, underfoot.

A wild iris, getting ready to open.

An open iris.

More waving plants and a poem of a dog.

Two more poems, waiting to be read.

Patrik was trying to show me just where he wanted some scratching and other body work but I wasn't getting it quite right. So he decided to walk me over to the tree where he could demonstrate. I made some mental notes and will try again later.

More beauty dripping up from the earth.

I realize more and more how I keep the horses in a thought-box of "not so intelligent" by doing things such as repeating requests over and over rather than realizing that they heard me the first time and if they aren't responding it's not because they're dumb, it's probably because they don't see the point in doing it. For example, when Patrik knows food is involved or something that makes sense to him, he is very quick to respond in an enthusiastic way. My task is to understand what makes sense to the horses and learn to play within that paradigm.

Shaped by your own choices

The mystery plants continue their climb to the sky. Two winners so far. If you know the name of this plant, email me at stormy@stormymay.com and the next correct guess will get a free Path of the Horse DVD.

On Saturday I worked in the orchard hanging plastic containers for a molasses solution to go into to lure coddling moths away from the fruit. At least I think that's the way it's supposed to work. I got tricked into spending some time with the trees checking out their baby fruits. What good fortune.

Tricia found this beautiful creature on the ground at the dump when we were dropping off the trash from both of our households. We shooed him off to the side so he wouldn't get squished by the next truck to roll by.

Here's Patrik enjoying a romp.

One of the greatest feelings in life is the conviction that you have lived the life you wanted to live -- with the rough and the smooth, the good and the bad -- but yours, shaped by your own choices, and not someone else's.

Michael Ignatieff

progress report

Sometimes I feel like I'm living in a storybook

Yesterday Tricia took some video of my work with Patrik. Our relationship is still very much a work in progress. I'm happy with Patrik's enthusiasm for the process.

working on a crunch

progress towards pesade, spanish walk (rough)

miscellaneous work

The ending of the octave

Today a friend read something from Carlos Castaneda. Here's how I remember it. Don Juan was telling Carlos that people in the past had a more accurate view of things because they were closer to nature and therefore, had a better perspective of our place within the rest of creation. Modern people base their perspective on the society that they are part of, which has been created by human-centered thinking.

By coming into relationship with parts of nature that are not human-centered, and certainly not human-created, we come closer to what has been created by an intelligence far beyond our own.