RIDING DRAG / FALL

Will we actually have a real fall this year? For the last several years we have gone from 100 degree days to below 40 in a matter of weeks. This morning I sit here on the east porch in the cool air while enjoying a cup of hot tea. I love when the mornings are cool enough to start drinking hot tea. Something about wrapping my hands around a warm cup conjures images of sitting around a campfire. I scan the trees for a slight change in color in the leaves and pray for a real fall.


As the mares and babies come up to the east pasture for breakfast I am reminded that it is weaning time. We wait for the cooler days to wean as it seems to stress both mothers and babies less. It does not stress me less however. I feel deep sympathy for the mares as they stand at the gate and call for their offspring. This year will be worse as my daughter married this year and lives south of us. I see her nearly every day, but she is not here full time. I know she is safe with the wonderful man she married, but I do not know where she is at all times as I once did. My desire to protect her, to keep her in my sight is much like the mares’ own fears that cause them to call out for days. My heart goes out to them.

Suddenly I lose my desire for fall. Can summer not stay? Can things not remain as they are a little longer? Of course not; life marches on and we must move with it, like it or not.

Tomorrow I will call my daughter and she will come and we will separate the mares and babies. Until then, I will sit and wrap my hands around the warm cup and listen to the wind. “Fall, is coming”, it whispers. I sigh and get ready to march.


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RIDING DRAG with DEBRA COPPINGER HILL is featured each week at ALWAYS COWBOY where Debra is a Resident Western Poet. Join her and her Cowboy Friends for Cowboy Poetry, News & Events. http://alwayscowboy.net/debra_coppinger_hill_poetry.html