I didn’t go to any rides last year. I couldn’t. I am going to tell you why.

My horse wasn’t fit, because I wasn’t fit to ride. There wasn’t anything wrong with me, exactly, but everything was wrong around me.

After nearly fifteen years of my career (the kind that earns a living, not my endurance career), I found myself the target of a campaign to make me go away. It was about politics. It was about money. It was about a special interest group that didn’t want me doing the job I was hired to do.

Ugly doesn’t cover it. Defamation ran rampant, culminating in accusations ranging from incompetence to illegal activity. Powerful people believed the story without checking the facts.

I had my friends, of course. People who knew the truth. But there’s no stopping a runaway train.

It wasn’t that I didn’t ride. I did. I rode for hours. But my mare and I didn’t condition. We walked.

Sometimes, I listened to music or a podcast. But mostly I just rode, shell-shocked, listening to the wind and feeling the sun and staring at a world that would never look the same.

A few years ago, I had a big, strong, fit horse. We were getting top-tens and BCs and completing hundreds. We had our eyes on Big Horn, then Tevis. Walking was not in our vocabulary. When forced by footing or slope to cool our heels, we did so with reluctance, gritting our teeth until we could fly again.

But last summer, I lacked the energy to trot, let alone compete. Slowly, mile by mile, month by month, I learned to let go of what should be and accept what is.

People don’t always behave ethically. The truth doesn’t always win. This ain’t the movies, darlin’, and sometimes the bad guys get their way.

Sometimes, walking is enough.

At Christmastime, I walked away. From the job, the lies, the money, the strain. I spent January in Death Valley, walking some more. Through slot canyons. Across salt flats and painted hills. Amid the stunning debris left by waters that used to roar and now have gone.

Then I cam home. And saddled my horse. 

We trotted today, but it’s early season and she hasn’t done a 50 in over a year. So we also walked. Down the hills, through the sand, up the steepest climbs. The wind sang. The sun embraced. And walking felt every bit as right as speed.

There’s a saying that sticks in my mind, repeating itself on a loop I need to hear: Light in the leg, soft in the hands; ride the horse and not your plans. 

It’s not just about horses, is it?

It’s about life.