The Free Lunch

 

As often is the case, I really had no idea what I was doing... but I did it anyhow.

And it's not that it felt right

It didn't feel safe

It didn't feel smart

It didn't seem realistic

It actually felt quite scary and that's still not why I did it

I don't know why 

There is no poetic explanation

Only that something in me knew to say yes to the yes that wanted very much to leave my lips

and to be a YES, instead of a no...

There is a saying that many have said, but I recall my darling stepfather as being the one who brought it up to me most often in my life.  

"There is no free lunch".  

I have altered this saying a bit; "There is no free horse".

I got one of those free horses offered to me and that's where the whole YES that wanted to be comes in.

As often is the case, I rationalize that I did this for my children...

And I did... 

As I have done and continue to do many, many things purely for my children's sake; like going to watch a Disney film yesterday in the 111 degree heat, where I forced myself to sit idle, eating popcorn and Milk Duds, while there was carpet to be vacuumed, laundry to be sorted and paper to be filed at home.

I took a free horse for my trapped child

I took a free horse, who was beautiful and lost, for my lost and beautiful daughter

and he freed her

and he filled her days

which fill my days

emptying my pockets

leaving impossible to displace hay in my car 

mud on our boots

calluses across my hands 

And these things multiplied when the love doubled and I "yessed" again on a second horse...

The no free lunch/free horse had a bum leg, but so do I and I never let it stop me, so why should I have let his stop him/stop us?

And he's been a blessing and maybe he's a curse, because today the Vet will come to the stall I find myself cleaning all the time.  Today, after months and months of free lunch love, the bum leg of the free horse will be examined more thoroughly.

She says, "I can feel his pain"

I tell you that I can feel her pain

She says, "It's killing me"

I tell you that I can feel the dying part of her, while I know with all my heart that a portion of her is more alive and stronger then ever

...and somehow it's the most gut-wrenchingly, beautiful thing I've ever experienced.

The no such thing as a free horse may be trapped now, but he freed my daughter. 

My different girl is different now, though her heart is breaking, she's less broken

She's become someone she never was or might have been if not for him.

And for that and for one thousand other reasons, he is, quite possibly, the great love of my life.

And I don't know what I'll do when I know more...

I'll probably follow my heart

rack my brain

empty my pockets

grow some

change some

arrange something
Find another yes or no or maybe so...

and hopefully there will always be impossible to remove hay in my car

mud on my shoes

calluses on my heart...

"There is something about the outside of a horse that does something to the inside of a human being" -

 Winston Churchill