All I Really Want Is a Horse

Obsession [uh b-sesh-uh n] 

the domination of one's thoughts or feelings by a persistent idea, image, desire, etc.



When I was a child, I had one obsession: horses. Every story I wrote, every picture I drew, every dream I dreamt involved a horse. My friend Nikki was just as horse-obsessed as I was. When she'd come over to play, we'd put up jumps all around the living and dining room in our house and jump around on all fours again and again, pretending to be a different horse each time. My sister really liked horses, but she managed to think and do other things that didn't involve horses; sometimes I found it difficult to relate to her balanced approach to horses.

My sister and I (and my friend Nikki and her sister Heather) were lucky girls because our parents paid for our horseback riding. I began taking lessons in second grade and walked and trotted and cantered until I got to fourth. At that point, we moved from Georgia to Hawaii, where there was a barn near the beach. That was fine for awhile--can't believe my parents drove all that way nearly every day--but then we found a barn closer to us.

Me & Flashdance,
at Wheeler Army Air Force Base, circa 1988 

And then we found Flashdance. His owner was heading to college but leased him to me. Please, who am I kidding? My parents paid for him, but it was me who rode him almost every day. Flashdance was a great backyard horse who I curry-combed until his coat shone in the Hawaiian sun. I braided his mane and tail for fun, and also for the horse shows we entered. I bathed him, I picked up after him, I made sure the the tack that sat on his body was very clean.

The hours I spent away from the barn were just as horse-filled. I flipped through catalogs dreaming of stuff I could buy in our color--hunter green. Necessity wasn't required; if the gear looked cool, I wanted it. I bought magazines and read them and books to learn more, learn everything I could about horses.

Still, Flashdance wasn't mine. While I fully appreciated that he was basically mine, the thing was, he wasn't. My friends Nikki and Heather owned their horses. My parents even bought my sister a horse (for $1! then the people bought him right back when we flew off the island for good). I really wanted to own Flashdance. Or another horse. Okay, any horse.

I never got to, and my childhood was still pretty blissful without it. But now, at 40, watching my daughter ride and riding once again, I would love to have a horse of my own. Though he would never articulate it, I know he believes love is finite, and the love I'd pour into the horse would mean even less love for him, and he already gets too little after three kids and a cute puppy.

But you can't logic away an obsession. And I've still got it. Because aren't we all just rehashing our childhoods in one way or another?