Miscellaneous Thoughts

9/11

I was getting ready for work that morning and turned on the TV, mainly for local weather and traffic updates. Instead, the coverage was live from New York. As I paused to watched the bizarre scenes, the second airplane crashed into the second tower. It was incomprehensible. Minutes later I watched in horror as the towers collapsed, knowing full well that there had to be people still inside and that fire fighters, police, and EMTs were massed at the site.

By September 2001 I was nearly numb due to family events that occurred earlier in the year. My mother and I made the difficult decision to place my father in an Alzheimer's care unit. At my prodding, my parents had already gone through the process of getting legal documents updated and in place, and worked with an elder attorney to prepare for Medicaid eligibility. My apartment lease expired so I moved in with my mother to combine our resources. My parent's new home of two years was already crowded with 50+ years of "stuff" (not to mention two rented storage units), so we moved sideways through the house most of the time. Then my father fell and broke his hip which required hospitalization and surgery. He passed away shortly thereafter. After many months of stress, I couldn't participate in the highly emotional national response to 9/11. I had little left to give.

So each September 11, as our country recalls the events of that day in 2001, I recall the year and summer prior -- and the loss of my father. He was Oregon born, a war veteran, professional musician, artist, and career public employee.

Garage Girls

On a much happier note, one of the Garage Girls found my blog. Yay! I'll save the story about the name for another time. Suffice it to say, we are horse women who seem to have scattered to the four winds but still love and cherish each other.

Horse Movies

Behind the Bit had a recent blog entry suggesting it was time for a made-for-TV movie about the eventing world. Her readers recalled International Velvet and Sylvester, two theatrical movies centered around eventing.

This in turn reminded me of an earlier post of my own regarding how movies get horses wrong. Genevieve and I were in hysterics one day chatting about the errors non-horse people make in movies. You know, the Black Stallion is an Arabian until he becomes a thoroughbred on the race track. Or, the horse that has four white stockings on the approach to a jump but only has three on landing. Or the preponderance of new boots among all the characters in the horse movies -- not one of the riders has boots broken down at the ankle and discolored at the calves. And why does everyone wear show clothes around the barn?!

I agree with Behind the Bit, I'd love to see a well-made movie about eventing. Or any sport horse venue. If you think the X Games are exciting, wait until you try to leap over an obstacle on an animate object -- a horse!