Day: December 19, 2011

Categories
Critters

I miss my horse

Sultry

Five years ago today, I lost my big beautiful brown Arabian horse. It was, and still is, one of the worst things I’ve ever seen with these eyes in my entire life.

I still miss that big beautiful horse. She had health problems that forced us to give up on trying to breed her (which, for most folks, eliminates the only reason you’d own a horse of that age), and she wound up becoming a great big pet.

I remember her laying down and letting me sit next to her and lay my head on her belly on sunny days. Or just strolling around with her following me. She knew I was “her person.” I only had her for seven years, but you’d swear we’d grown up together. I had never owned a horse before. And the way it all ended… I can never own a horse again. I love horses, but this just broke my heart.

I wish she could’ve stuck around long enough to spend time with Little E. I think they could’ve had a special bond too. I would’ve trusted her with him – she was always very gentle around me.

In a way, her replacement showed up the same day – we weren’t even taking applications yet. And the boy loves that cat. There’s some small consolation.

I still miss that big horse.… Read more

Categories
...And Little E Makes 3 ToyBox

The droid he’s looking for

Wall-ETo talk about what Little E is getting for Christmas, one has to realize that in some respects, the boy lives in a little bit of a time warp. He likes old cartoons (to give but one example: he’s a sucker for the animated segments of the Super Mario Bros. Super Show, which I dug out simply because he’s so crazy about the games… he’s not quite so crazy about the Captain Lou live-action segments.) This time warp is a bit of a bubble that he’s entered simply by spending a lot of time in my room with me. We play Super Mario and Pac-Man on the computer and on the Wii. He watches Pixar movies of an older vintage than Cars 2 (his favorites: Wall-E and Toy Story 2).

Of course, toys tied to a specific thing like a movie or a game have a very specific shelf life: as soon as the thing’s off the market and no longer making money for the studio, it’s very rare for the merchandise to stick around. Not everything has the seemingly eternal staying power of Star Wars. And this… is what drove me to eBay to do some Christmas shopping this year.

In my previous blog entry, while ruminating about not wanting to saddle someone else’s kid with toys built around a super-violent story, I also mentioned being keenly aware of the risk of saddling someone else’s kid with something completely lame. This Christmas list for Little E was derived from listening to him talk about what he’d like to get over the past year. Everything here is something he’s said he wants. Other family members will get him clothes and books and stuff, and believe me, I’m grateful for that. That leaves me open to get the cool stuff for him. Everything was paid for by me eBaying off some of my own stuff to raise funds.

Here’s the cool stuff. … Read more