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Connecting People with Nature Page Lambert Connecting Writers with Words |
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Greetings!
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Farside's first day |
Five years ago, I could barely walk up a flight of stairs, and in April of 2008, I was literally about to get back in the saddle again. In many ways, I was coming home. I had first learned to ride in this mountain community fifty years ago, and this picture was taken the day my friend Sheri Griffith trailered her handsome gray Arab endurance horse Farside from his home in Moab, Utah, to Colorado, where I had just returned. "Farside just doesn't seem to have his heart in racing like he used to," Sheri told me. "He'll be perfect for you." And so Farside was about to become mine. But he was leaving behind his stablemates back in Utah. Would he miss Rio? And Diego? I don't think Sheri and I gave it much thought. That day, watching Sheri lift my heavy old western, hand-tooled saddle onto Farside's back, I was overcome with emotion. |
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Riding Bingo in Mount Vernon |
Despite the fact that I feared I would never ride again, I had hauled that saddle, with its custom tooling and heavy wooden tree, with me when I left the ranch in Wyoming, when I moved back to Colorado to care for my mother, to Santa Fe after she died, and then when I moved back to Colorado. The saddle symbolized hope. And now, thanks to Sheri, Farside symbolized the future.
In 1982, the year my son was born, Farside's sire Xenophona won the U.S. National Open Cutting Horse Championship. Three years later, my husband and I moved to Wyoming with our son, and 6-week old daughter. We loaded up my saddle in the pick-up truck, along with our other tack, and a few months later, we brought the horses from Colorado to Wyoming. My old mare Romie would be buried there. |
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Rio and Farside |
If I were writing a novel about a woman learning how to carve out a new life for herself after physical and emotional upheaval, after leaving her marriage, and the land and the animals she loved, to care for her dying mother, I might include a scene where she overcomes her sorrow and fear and rediscovers a sense of destiny. I might use something as symbolic as a hand-tooled leather saddle and a horse who would carry her on his elegant gray back into a new and purposeful life.
And so it was that I climbed onto Farside's back that day, settled into the saddle, smiled at Sheri, turned Farside's nose into the breeze, and urged him onward.
Then, two years ago, Sheri and I loaded Farside into her trailer, next to his best buddy Rio, one of Sheri's younger endurance horses, and hauled them both to the Literature & Landscape of the Horse Retreat at the Vee Bar in Wyoming. The two horses were so glad to see each other, they were nearly inseparable - they were definitely "mothered up!"
Had Rio and Farside missed each other? What stories did they hold inside them about the endurance races they had shared? Had they missed each other? Had Farside missed Sheri? Yes, I think so, but I will never really know. But I do know that he and Sheri helped me to remember how to live a purposeful life, and for that I am eternally grateful. This is also what you might call "the story behind the story," about why I love returning to the Vee Bar and those wide-open spaces of possibility.
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Walking to the barn. |
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DATE: June 2 - 7, 2012
WHERE: Laramie, WY
(2 hours from Denver)
OUTFITTER:
COST: $1490.00
DEPOSITS:
$300 due now.
$300 due in April.
Balance due June 7th
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Page & Sheri
Mountain Ride, Vee Bar |
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THROUGH THE EYES OF A HORSE
CELEBRATE HORSES, HORSE STORIES, AND WRITING!
BRING YOUR CAMERA! BRING YOUR PAINTBRUSH!
For anyone who yearns for nature, longs to reconnect with horses, and hungers for creative inspiration in an authentic western setting.
Wild about horses? Crazy about writing?
- What stories do horses hold inside them?
- How can horses help us understand our stories?
- This 5-day retreat at the foot of the Snowy Range Mountains in Wyoming is the perfect place to find out!
- No riding or writing experience necessary
HORSEBACK WRITING RETREAT click for more details.
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Watch PhotoShow
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Mountain Ride Break |
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 | | Vee Bar Remuda - Morning Gather |
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 "So many wonderful things happened because of your retreat--
going to Wyoming and meeting you and Sheri, working on writing,
working on "horse spirituality," having Kirk go to Wyoming to ride,
and, last but not least, meeting and adopting sweet and patient
Dakota. Thank you for your friendship, your encouragement, your
thoughts and words and ways." - Lisa Couturier, Maryland
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Connecting People with Nature PAGE LAMBERT Connecting Writers with Words
Questions? 303.842.7360
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