Horses and Barns and Cabins Oh My

Date: 1/8/2018

I had the greatest dream last night. It started with mom and dad deciding to buy property up North for Andrew and I. It was a nice small cabin/cottage with just enough room for us, and parents if they wanted to join. It was about the size of a two-bedroom apartment, and it suited us just fine for a vacation home. I got the feeling that I lived there year round, with Andrew coming to visit often and parents coming when they could. Then going outside and going down a little hill was this big beautiful barn that we built. It was in an upside down L shape, with the first stall on the left when you walked in belonging to an old mare named Lady who was apparently our childhood horse. The fact that I even had a childhood horse though! The first part of the barn was built of old, solid wood, reminiscent of the front barn at Constantine, but larger. The aisle was dirt, the beams of the building made of beautiful, solid chunks of oak, a hay loft sitting above the stalls with easy access hay storage in a section to the left near the turn of the 'L'. The stall fronts were a solid lower with bars across the top, and a swinging portion you could open so the horses could stick their heads out. The shorter side if the L was open at both ends and had a concrete floor. There was a wash stall at one end, and a well-worn path to a compost heap at another. (I got to thinking I ought to start gardening with all that compost!) This end also housed the tack/feed combo room. In my dream, I would get up early, before Andrew. I would have a piece of toast, strap on my barn boots, and trek outside to throw hay to the horses. (Mom had magically somehow already fed grain.) Then I cleaned the stalls (sawdust bedding, hallelujah, I am so done with straw!) and hauled it out in a wheelbarrow to our compost pile, where a Kubota with a frontloader was waiting patiently to turn the pile. Afterwards, when chores were all done, I went in and pulled Lady into the crossties. I brushed her off and pulled a bridle out for her, planning on a bareback trail ride. That's where my dream ended, but oh man... What a dream it was.