Dragging The Dread Away

 I had a few days this week where I woke up and I was just grumpy. SO GRUMPY. For no particular reason at all but I was not in the mood to life. I was like a tornado in a trailer park just ready to cause disaster everywhere I roamed. Could it be the alcohol I gave up during the week? Stress from not being able to get enough done in a day? An ever changing schedule? Who knows but I made myself go quietly sit in my house with a cup of coffee and chill out after chores. An adult time out if you will. I tried to pinpoint what was causing such an upset and even asked the dogs their thoughts to no avail. Regardless, I grabbed a couple of Biscoff cookies that I'm obsessed with and meandered back to the farm. 

I then dragged the indoor arena. It's my silly mental morning cleanse that I do religiously every morning. I let the grumpy thoughts drift away as I drove in my many perfect circles and straight lines. With every day-old hoof track covered, I felt the weight of stress lift off my shoulders just a smidge. And slowly, the once messy arena, became a nice clean slate as was my head. It was ready for a new day. For sassy horses that don't deserve a bitter Ali, but a fresh minded one. It was prepared for lessons to be gave in and for dogs to run across. Animals don't hold onto things like us silly humans do. They move on. I needed to also. 

The next morning I was bitter again. Just the moment I woke up-pissed. And once again, I couldn't tell you why. I was annoyed my phone was blowing up. Everyone needed something and there just wasn't enough Ali to go around but usually that doesn't bother me. I was irritated my schedule changed. My gears were just grinding and I was anticipating it being a tough day. I was mindlessly going about my way, but then I was surprised because we ended up having a few extra set of hands swing in to help and suddenly we were ahead of schedule! I was delighted. Maybe today was doable after all!! I set off to once again, drag the ring. I set myself straight, and started my day. As I drove my circles, I cleared my mind and planned how to attack my ever busy day with a new skip in my step. 

Today was a much better start to my day except a questionable tummy. I had a lot to do in prepping for my upcoming derby I'm hosting and I was feeling behind on set up for it. I was intelligent this time around and asked for help. The extra hands made the work go so much faster and actually allowed for laughter and relaxation after. Who knew that asking for help from friends could be so easy? Of course bribes of Chinese food and margaritas never hurt anyone. And as I was working setting up that dressage ring with my Pandora blasting out some tunes, I forgot all about that pesky stomach and remembered how excited I am for the derby. So many faces I am looking forward to seeing. There's lots of new horse and rider teams, many people showing for the first time and the promise of summer! Who wouldn't be pumped?

As I'm heading to bed with lots of thoughts and ideas for the derby circling in my mind, I force myself to chill out and smile. I remind myself how much I enjoy planning shows and watching our eventing theme park come to life for the year and how excited people will be to be here. It will inevitably stress me out a lot but that's ok.  I have friends that love free margaritas in exchange for labor.  And there will always be an arena full of yesterday's hoof tracks that needs to be dragged to perfection if I need to set myself straight.