No, I didn't bolt to the local mall to shop.
Nor did I drive to the nearest World of Beer for a designer brew.
I took a sunset bike ride.
Pumping up my perpetually mushy bike tires, I rode my red cruiser across the neighborhood away from the busy main street. In less than a mile and a left turn onto a soft sandy road I found myself in a different world from my cookie cutter housing development.
My eyes drank in the placid green expanses, white railed fences and gentle horses grazing. I could breathe again.
At first the bronzed beauties nodded in suspicion. But then sidled up to me where I had dismounted and leaned against the pasture fence.
I wished I had brought apples or carrots to share. Noticing the grass on my side of the fence was much greener, theirs having been grazed bare, I plucked the long blades and offered them. After a pat and caress on their smooth jaws and noses, they soon were eating out of my hand.
As a little girl, we had a nearby neighborhood of little ranches too. My dad and I would jaywalk across Beach Boulevard to that hidden enclave of rural life. There he taught me how to feed horses. You have to keep your fingers together and your palm very flat, so that their teeth don't bite. I loved the feel of their fleshy, soft-haired lips brushing my palm as they nibbled the food.
I like it just as much now, by myself, but thinking of my father and the gift of that experience....And then I think about my son.
If only I could endear my son as easily as I did these horses. The relationship is awkward and difficult to maneuver. If only he would respond to my overtures for companionship and nurturing as effortlessly as these creatures.
But he is a lone ranger; a stranger in my house sometimes, whose thoughts are more foreign each day as he nears his exit to the university campus.
As I write this, my husband studies a letter in the Hebrew alphabet that stands for an ox goad. A device that helps steer the animal on a straight path, when he is too stupid to know better. It pokes him gently to guide him when he is too obtuse to stay on course on his own. Most of us are.
Mounting my bike to leave, I see another horse headed my way on the dirt road in the distance. As it closes in, I notice the rider has a polo mallet slung across his right shoulder, reins held tight with his left. I nod and pass as a Pizza Hut delivery car goes between us.
Suddenly I realize I need a picture of the polo guy. Sand flying as I make an abrupt U turn, I notice the pizza delivery car has turned around too, the three of us, horse, bike and Ford Focus jostling for road space, a little Three Stooges-like.
Hola. Como se llama?
Tito.
May I take your picture with the mallet on your shoulder? Sure. Do you like polo?
Yes, I do.
Snapping away as the sun has almost completely left the sky, Tito the trainer is captured on my smart phone, a bit blurry, but still there.
He is leading the pony home from the nearby International Polo field after an afternoon of Sunday games.
Thank you, Tito. Gracias!
Then, the Pizza car comes by and the driver calls me by name.
Lo, and behold it's a friend from church working at her second job. How funny. A little chit-chat and she finds her customer's address and pulls up to the long ranch driveway.
Tito continues into the sunset and dusk leads me back home.
I am refreshed, having biked off some steam.
Clear headed I can pray and devise a plan with my husband to draw our son in, not push him away; to help him rein himself in on a good road.
Thank goodness for a little equestrian therapy.
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