I miss flying.

My head is throbbing as I sit here at my computer... maybe I've been on Facebook for too long, maybe I'm holding down emotions, maybe both.  But I miss it.  I miss riding.  I don't think I even care about the competitions anymore... I have more ribbons than I could ever dream of counting, and certainly more than I care to display.  I don't really want to be the best rider.  I don't think I even care about taking lessons and improving.  I just want to ride. 

Have you ever really ridden a horse?  Not just a pony ride or a guided trail?  Have you ever sat atop a 17H warmblood as it thunders over earth?  Do you know the moment, the question, when it waits on your permission to explode?  Have you ever felt a horse explode?   Have you ever flown?  ...then it's only you, the horse, the wind, and God.  Everything goes to silence; it seems like the world stops turning on its axis.  Just me, the horse, the wind, and God.  I miss the dance.  I miss the strength and power and grace.  I miss flying.  I think it's infused into my bones.  When I see a horse and rider going, my muscles still quiver with excitement and they start to talk.  A million movements at once--hold, turn, rotate, look, sit, rise, lean, tickle, pull, nudge, follow, squeeze, release--the dance.  I miss the take off--the moment where the horse has to decide to trust me and I have to trust him too...  Never a question of will we make it, but rather will we try?  Will we try to fly; will my steed be trusty and so shall I?  Will we simultaneously decide to leave the earth and head towards sky? After learning to fly, it's no wonder being grounded is a punishment..  Sometimes flat work felt like punishment, but right now I'm pretty sure it'd be so good  I'd cry.  I can still feel the movements beneath me; I haven't ridden since July.  The rock of the walk.  The sweep of the trot.  The canter.. the indescribable way we float.  I miss the smell of horse.  I miss the smell of hot leather in my car.  I miss the way the dirt settles on top of my hands while I'm grooming for a ride.  The creaking of leather as I mount and settle in.. shifting my weight from side-to-side, testing to see if the girth is tight enough. ...

I miss flying. And I don't really know how to begin again. Trust, trust, trust, trust... hope.

Ponies and Pictures!

A dreamer who's scared of dreaming.

Way back in December, well maybe just two posts ago, I started processing through one of my forgotten/forsaken dreams—horses.   When I began the post I had no idea how deeply embedded in me my passion for horses still was, and honestly I had little concept of it even after I’d finished writing.  Three days after posting Once Upon a Dream I found out.  I found out that I really do still care—deeply, and it wasn’t until I was crying so intensely that I couldn’t stand that I understood.    

It all started at Intern.  We (the 20 or so interns) were asked to individually pray and write down how we know God loves us.  We each got up one by one to share; when it was my turn to share I became incredibly nervous (which doesn’t happen often, even in front of masses of strangers).  I started sharing:  “I know this will sound a little cryptic, but I’ll say it, and then explain what it means.  I know God loves me because He gives me the moon with a ring around it and a star so I do not lack.”  I proceeded to explain that in some of the roughest times in my life God has comforted me with stars and the moon as reminders of hope and His promises.   I began sharing one of those stories—one which explains the bit about the moon with a ring—the night I decided to drop APSC (If you want to hear it, let me know and I’ll post it later). “The night that I decided to drop APSC, the decision actually came down to trusting God with horses.  It then had little to do with careers or parents or grades; the last decision was all about the pretty ponies and trust.  I was so afraid to let go of my hold on my passion again, afraid that it might not come back, afraid that it actually was over this time” (Once Upon a Dream).   That night God whispered to me about trusting Him to do what He promises—to hold, protect, and restore my dreams.  

As I began to tell my friends about that night, masses of emotion welled up from the depths of my heart.  I started crying.  I looked out at them as I was confused by my own emotions, saying, “I didn’t think I still cared about this.”  As I finished one of the intern leaders turned to me and began sharing the heart of God with me.  (Paraphrasing...) “Amanda, I believe that God wants to redeem horses; that He is going to restore them to you.  I don’t know when; I don’t know how.  But I believe God planted this dream in you.  God loves horses too.  God created horses for you.” He took a purse strap and asked me to hold it like a pair of reins; I started sobbing.  He and another leader and one of my bff’s started praying for me; I collapsed wailing.  (An aside: It’s funny to me that I cry more intensely as an adult than I ever did as a child.)  I cried loudly and for a long time.  It was good.  

In the weeks following I've allowed my heart to indulge a bit in the horsey things—somewhat ironically I watched Dreamer, I started reading Seabiscuit (I'm still only through the intro and first 2 pages), I considered looking for a way to teach beginner riding lessons, I thought about emailing my old riding coach just to catch up, and I allowed myself for just a moment to imagine riding my horse again.  But I'm still scared, or is it scarred, maybe both.  I find myself scared of dreaming again, dreaming from the depths of who I am, and either never realizing those dreams or willfully walking away from them again.  Still I feel God whispering, "Just trust."

"Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but desire fulfilled is a tree of life." (Proverbs 13:12).  

“Delight yourself in the LORD; and He will give you the desires of your heart.  Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He will do it.” (Psalm 37: 4-5). 

"In Your right hand there are pleasures forever."  (Psalm 16: 11c).

"'There is a hope for your future,' declares the Lord, 'and your children will return to their own territory.'" (Jeremiah 31: 17).

Once Upon a Dream

A few days ago I watched a dorky-cute teen-girl movie, Ice Princess.  It’s about a girl who gives up a massive physics scholarship from Harvard to pursue ice skating.  Like all stories about pursuing dreams and passion, it got me thinking about my dreams, as I came into college and now as I leave college.  I had planned to attend Tech and study APSC ever since I first understood what college was, and as I entered college, riding was my passion.  I selected my top three schools by their riding programs—Virginia Tech, Sweet Briar, and Hollins.  This may seem a surprise to those who’ve watched my activities through college, for my visible passion is people.

To catch everyone up, here is a history of me and horses:  I ride Hunter, an English style originating with Foxhunting, so I do a good bit of jumping.  I own a horse, a Thoroughbred X Quarter Horse mare, 15.3ish, dark bay with dapples.  Her name is Angel (Queen of Hearts), and she’s 22 like me.  From about age 10 on, I was horse-obsessed.  I began riding at age 12 (roughly 5 years after most of my peers started).   I was good and very driven.  I loved competition.   I loved learning.  But most of all I loved the feeling of flying above the ground as the world and all its cares rolled away.  The summer between my college freshman and sophomore years, I actually trained to try out for the VT team—three months of exercise riding in return for private lessons and coaching.  But I never tried out; when I returned to school, riding came to a seemingly dead halt.  I stopped talking about it, I stopped doing it, and I even stopped thinking about it.  To this day I still don’t really know why… It was like I just gave up.  For no apparent reason I gave up horseback riding.  That spring I got a job cleaning horse stalls! Sometimes it was torture—I hadn’t ridden in months, but was surrounded by horses daily.  There were some days I would just sit in the barn crying, begging God for a way to ride.  I didn’t get to ride regularly again until the following January; I got into a riding class at Tech.  It was amazing and redemptive in many ways!  I rode for two semesters, but had to stop when I dropped APSC. 

The night that I decided to drop APSC, the decision actually came down to trusting God with horses.  It then had little to do with careers or parents or grades; the last decision was all about the pretty ponies and trust.  I was so afraid to let go of my hold on my passion again, afraid that it might not come back, afraid that it actually was over this time.  The night that I chose to drop, I also chose not to try out for the riding team ever, a tryout which both of the coaches encouraged, and I chose not to take lessons at Tech.   It was a rough night.  But God showed up and moved massively in my heart.

Now as my undergraduate career comes to a close, I face feelings much like those of my sophomore year.  Horseback riding seems on the verge of slipping away.  Riding is an expensive hobby, and it doesn’t travel well.  I find myself preparing to bury my dream again, but my dreams aren’t dead.  And I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to bury a dream, but they don’t stay in the ground—even dead dreams seem to float back up to the surface.   I know what I exchanged my dreams for—the pursuit of people and relationships and Jesus; I don’t regret it at all. 

I don’t mean for this post to be “Everyone, look what Amanda gave up!” or a pity-party for myself, but more to digest doors closing and seasons shifting.  I walk away from graduation without the things I had planned on—the degrees, the ponies, the relationships—but I possess the things I needed—the truths, the family, the redemption.  I walk forward, yet again, to surrender and trust—to trust that my dreams are not dead, but are safely surrendered.  “It’s just in His hands to come back the way He wanted it, and this time without all the stress and struggle.”