Real

Not a ton of people know, but I absolutely love to write. It’s the best way for me to express myself. If you were friends with me on Facebook 5-10 years ago you likely remember this because I used to share a lot of my writings. I got away from it because some people didn’t care for the rawness of it when my posts got a ton of shares. I’m planning to use this page to get back into it, so if you don’t like my writing topics…unfollow. 🙂 Here’s something I wrote this past January when Aruna cut her heel bulb pretty badly. She’s since made a full recovery. ❤️‍🩹

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‘Real’

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In describing life with livestock, especially with horses, I frequently tell myself, “It’s not always pretty, but it’s real”, and this is what I mean by that:

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Owning a farm means that the animals always come first. At least twice a day they need your undivided attention. It’s clock work. It becomes so embedded into your mind it’s like how we breathe unconsciously; without thinking about it. 5am. Get up.

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It’s when you just picked out your wedding dress that afternoon, and by dinner time you’re in the the barn with tears rolling down your face holding pressure on a gushing wound. It’s having family you don’t see all that much visiting up at the house, but you are called to do God’s work in the barn. It’s when you take up your dad, sister, and fiancés Saturday evening and night outside in the barn tending to an injury. It’s when you’ve skipped out on fancy clothes and makeup for so long to build up a savings for livestock emergencies… just. like. this.

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It’s telling yourself how you wish you would’ve known better, done better. When you double check everything, all the time, ensure your animals have the safest environment possible, but yet a gut-wrenching injury still happens. It’s feeling defeated. It’s wondering, “how much more can I really take?”. It’s thinking, “Why, how was I called for this life?” It’s pondering, “Wouldn’t things be so much easier if it wasn’t for these damn animals?”

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Then it’s realizing, sure, it may be easier, terribly easier, but life wouldn’t be real. I wouldn’t be tied to the sunrise and the sunset, the negative temperatures in January, the biting flies, sunburn, and humid heat of a hot July Pennsylvania day. I wouldn’t have a reason to get up in the morning. Wouldn’t have a reason to do better, to push my limits, to continue to reach for a goal that just keeps evolving larger the closer I get to it. I wouldn’t get to experience the pure joy and goodness of the world, nor would I get to be reminded of the harsh, cruel reality of it either; something that I have found to be an unfortunate necessity to remind you to identify and relish in the good times while you are in them. Without this life I wouldn’t know that everything can change in a flash, usually at the most inconvenient of times possible, so you better love and appreciate what you have while it is here. Of most value to me, though, I wouldn’t get to experience the raw, unhindered love that these furred and feathered soulmates of mine and I share every waking day. 5am comes quick, but the sound of an opening barn door revives my tired soul.

01.29.22

Kate C.