Remembering Nomad

Some days like some horses were made to be remembered. Nomad was one of those horses.

We met shortly after I decided to start a retirement home for horses. Nomad turned out to be my first client. His arrival also signaled the beginning of another amazing relationship with his owner Dee.

Meeting Dee felt like a re-union of lifetimes. I welcomed in a kindred spirit, a riding partner and a trusted friend. I remember thinking the day Nomad arrived that Dee and I would know each other for a long time.

The first order of every day was figuring out how to get Nomad’s pergolide medication into him. This may have been an easier task with almost any other horse, but it was always a challenge with Nomad. I called him “Nomad the Rascal” in the mornings. Often he would make me catch him before I could administer the magic potent. But sometimes he would stand stone still waiting for me and I'd think, "finally" he is with the program. But no sooner than I would shoot the syringe in his mouth, he would spit it right back out along with the mouth full of grass he’d been holding hostage.

He loved his owner; his sponsors, bananas, brushing and he loved Succotash, the goat. On many a rainy day I would spot a bone dry Succotash standing directly underneath Nomad. On a sunny afternoon it wasn't uncommon to see them taking a nap together, the goat carefully tucked around his friend, head comfortably resting on Nomads heart.

Once a visitor to the ranch lost control of her Boarder Collie. The dog immediately began to chase Succotash all over the paddock. Out of thin air, Nomad and Angel (Nomad’s paddock mate) flanked Succotash, moving at a perfectly synchronized continual canter. Two hero horses keeping the dog at bay until her owner retrieved him.

A year or so before, Nomad was run down by an aggressive Gelding in the pasture. Toyota, one of my EGE program horses placed himself between the struggling Nomad and the charging horse, mule kicking out at the aggressor until the Gelding retreated.

After the incident with Succotash and the Collie, I thought to myself, "Nomad paid it forward."

The day Nomad passed away started out as any other. I looked out of my bathroom window onto an unusual sunny morning in mid January. It was about 6:30 am, I saw Nomad standing in front of the barn grazing peacefully. At 8:30 am, I headed to the barn to feed. As I walked through the open gate and rounded the corner with Nomads pergolide in my pocket, I noticed a strange feeling in my gut. I looked out onto the front pasture where normally every horse in the herd is lined up for breakfast.
There was no horse in site. My gut started to constrict. I looked in the paddock and from 30 feet away I knew Nomad was gone.

He was lying down, his blanket perfectly placed around him. There were no signs that he had tried to get up, no tell tale circles in the dirt around his body. It was as if he melted into the earth with one graceful movement, a last breath and a final bow.

I found him facing west, eyes open, head first facing his herd. His paddock mate Guinness was standing next to him, head bowed low.

I knelt down, reached out with both my arms to hug his blanketed body and through a flood of tears, said a silent prayer. Guinness and I paid last our respects to our dear friend, our horse shaman, and the ambassador of Medicine Horse Ranch.

Nomad was in my care for almost 4 years- of course this is referencing linear time. In horse time, it seemed so much longer than this. Truthfully he is still here. I often feel his majestic presence. He sends messages to me in dreams. He fills my heart with memories when I gaze into the sky and see the horsetail clouds above the barn and hear the cry of a red-tailed hawk circling above. Some horses were made to be remembered.

Horse Sense for Women™ in the 21st Century

I’m always fascinated by the number of phone calls and emails I receive from women who start out by saying, “ I really don’t know exactly why I am contacting you, but somehow horses keep showing up in my life. I feel them calling to me.”

Often I discover, they mean the horses in their dreams, or the horses in a field they pass by on their way to work each morning. Books fall out of the bookshelf at the library with a horse on the front cover and their heart skips a beat.

On occasion someone has a real four- legged horse in her life and wants to feel more connected in the relationship. Always quick to point out that she doesn’t mean just while riding. But rather the deep reach into the heart and soul of the horse, learning to connect and interpret the vast energetic, kinesthetic territory of “horse speak.”

Often I will hear similar comments from participants on the first day of an Equine Guided Education program. The energy underneath the words almost sounds apologetic, as if the answers to such a mysterious invitation should be obvious. They aren’t obvious, they aren’t even answers. It’s so much bigger than this.

I understand all too well this intuitive reach, these longings and musings. It is no accident these women find me and often come to study with me.

Hearing the Call

Eight years ago I heard horses calling to me and as it turned out… quite loudly.

At the time, I was traveling 21 days a month on a plane, working in a high paced and demanding field as unrelated to horses as you could get. I flew to exotic locations, wore expensive suits, stayed in fancy hotels and walked around daily with a huge hole in my heart. The only horses in my life were ceramic ones that I had collected since childhood.

Looking back, it wasn’t that I lacked anything, nor was I identifiably unhappy. Upon reflection these many years later, “ the hole” was the disconnection from my spirit’s calling, the yearning for integration and completion.

Horse Medicine

On Thanksgiving Day 1998 while hiking at Tennessee Valley, a horse (named Mystery) literally fell out of the sky and on top of me. A young rider had lost control of her horse when someone playing Frisbee missed his or her mark and hit the horse. The horse spooked, reared and like a derailed train slid off course and right into me. I was thrown into the air and landed sprawled on the hood of my car underneath 1300 pounds of horseflesh. Miraculously, I didn’t break any bones, although my body was so black and blue and swollen that it took about eight weeks to fully heal. But the accident abruptly and irreversibly awakened something deep inside of me and I would never be the same.

I slowed down; I listened intently to that odd, inaudible voice and gave it permission to inform my life. I took long walks in nature and observed the natural cues from the environment that beckoned me to take action and believe. I tuned out everyone who told me I was nuts and/or too old and/or too inexperienced to center my world around horses. I decided to pursue my love of horses and sponsor a horse appropriately named Sage. After a few months the opportunity presented itself and I purchased her.

Eight years have passed in what seems like the wink of an eye. Sage and I are still together. Today we live on 1000 acres in Tomales, Ca and teach Equine Guided Education classes. I also have a retirement home for 28 horses that Sage helps me manage as lead mare in the herd.

Like the women who call me today, I could never have imagined this life all those years ago. Nor the countless adventures of Sage and me in between then and now that shaped both our destinies. I only know, it was impossible for me not to follow the call, to trust that voice of intuition and test the muscle of faith.

And if you are reading this and saying to yourself ‘she sounds like me,’ I say to you hold your dreams up to the light and pay close attention to the horses in your life.

WANT TO USE THIS ARTICLE IN YOUR EZINE OR WEB SITE? You can, as long as you include this complete blurb with it: Horse Sense for the 21st Century™ Alyssa Aubrey, CEGE Incorporates horses in human development through Equine Guided Education. www.medcinehorseranch.org

Horse Sense for the 21st Century and the Blue Moon

The   last night of 2009 exited with a blue moon in the sky.  A rare and utterly potent site to ponder as the first day of  2010 prepared to emerge.  

A good friend and astrologer commented recently that during the month of December 
 all the surrounding planets and energies signaled change...a real "take no prisoners" shake up.

She said "All secrets will be revealed, anything that is not in alignment for the highest good will be cast out and  that which lingers in the unconscious will be forced into visibility."

 For myself, all of the above rang true as I reflected on the past year, speculated about my relationships, went to work each day, watched the news and listened to others talk about what was happening in their world. 

January 2010 has arrived and with it the opportunity to create a vision for ‘what now’ and ‘what next.’ 

The challenges of this time in our lives call us forward and onto the pathways of peace and a correct way of living from the center of the heart.

We are required to shape-shift patterns of behavior that no longer serve into skillful, sustainable, life-honoring responses that offer peace, justice, healing, contribution, creativity, beauty, and love in our hearts expressed out into the world and for all our realtions.


 
Here is a story about peace that I was gifted by a shaman and I now carry in my daily meditations.



There once was a king who offered a prize to the artist who could paint the
best picture of peace.   Many artists tried.  The king looked at all the
pictures.  After much deliberation he was down to the last two.  He had to
choose between them.

One picture was a calm lake. The lake was a perfect mirror for the peaceful
mountains that towered around it.  Overhead fluffy white clouds floated in a
blue sky. Everyone who saw this picture said that it was the perfect picture
of peace.

The second picture had mountains too. 
These mountains were rugged and bare.
 Above was an angry sky from which rain fell. Lightening flashed. 
Down the side of the mountain tumbled a foaming waterfall. 
This did not appear to be a peaceful place at all.

But when the king looked closely, he saw that behind the waterfall was a
tiny bush growing in the rock. Inside the bush, a mother bird had built her
nest. There in the midst of the rush of angry water, sat the mother bird on
her nest. The king chose this picture as the perfect  picture of peace.

The king chose it, "Because," he explained, "Peace is not only in a place
where there  is no noise, trouble or hard work.  Peace is in the midst of
things as they are, when there is calm in your heart. That is the real
meaning of peace."



May the Blue Moon rise again and may we take notice.