15,300 days old today

http://thepioneerwoman.com

In honor of turning 15,300 days old today, I wanted to share my favorite blog these days. It's written by a lady who grew up in the city (she refers to it as 'growing up on the golf course'), moved off to California for college and then found herself back in Oklahoma and married to a genuine rancher. A friend of mine from Oklahoma shared the link with me a few weeks ago and said that the "pioneer woman" reminded him somewhat of me. I'm not so sure I see the connection but oh my, she is so funny and is certainly a gifted story teller.

After my buddy sent me the link, I spent my off time reading through her old blog posts and was quickly hooked. One of the main reasons it cracks me up is that I grew up in the country (no where near the type of ranch they live on), but we did have horses, some cattle and a few rather odd type animals - a few goats here and there and a couple of pet raccoons. I've ridden more than my share of horses and have dents in my legs to prove that I once ran barrels (a rodeo term). At one time I could rope a calf with the best of 'em and have hauled more hay than I care to remember.

It's just funny the contrast of hearing a "city girl" talk about country life vs a "country girl" now living in the city. This "was country - now city girl" now refuses to have an animal that she's going to have to take care of. I have jokingly told my better half that I never want to own anything that we have to make arrangements for when we want to go on vacation. Unless you've fed horses and cows in the middle of the winter and broken the ice in the water buckets so they can drink, you'll never appreciate being able to go on vacation & not having to worry about someone feeding everything correctly! We can lay our bee-hinds on the beach and not have a worry in the world for any ol' horse.

The downside though, is that I can read through her blog and for a moment or two I swear I can smell the aroma (now, my children would call that an odor), of sweaty horses and hay, and I can just imagine the fresh air and sunshine and it makes me terribly, terribly homesick.

Several years ago I took Ryan to Nashville for a horse show type thing - it was more of a play/opera/cirqe de solei type thing set to horseback. I was all excited and couldn't wait for Ryan to enjoy watching the horses. The entry way took you through the stable area and then to your seats. When we walked in, the smell of horses, hay and leather was impenetrable and I was in heaven! We hadn't taken more than two steps in when Ryan said "oh man, it STINKS in here" and I was quickly brought back to reality. Maybe we should move back to Oklahoma so our children will know what a sweaty horse smells like!