Learning to Fly Without Wings

For Morgan

Two days ago, one of my daughter’s best friends from childhood lost her beloved horse Rumba.  This young woman is now a yoga instructor and for the past year she has been traveling and working in Australia.  The strange thing about this story is best said in her own words:

“I never sign up to go on trail rides when I travel because I know I will be disappointed when all we do is walk. But something drew me to this ride, it was for “advanced riders” with promises of cantering. I wanted to go a few days ago but it wasn’t available so I had to settle for yesterday morning. They gave me a horse named Big, I felt that was appropriate since I am used to riding my big mare. We rode for 3 hours through the streams, by the blue lake water and galloped across a field. Towards the end of the ride the horse started prancing back towards home exactly as Rumba would have done on a trail. In that moment I thought I was riding her and maybe I was. Maybe that was the moment she passed away. She was with me and I was with her.

I may not have wanted to buy her but we did anyways. I may not have liked her in the beginning but I rode her anyways. She taught me how to be strong and courageous. It seemed at times we had the same bitchy personality and in the end we knew each other better than anyone else.
I spent this last day with myself. Sometimes crying, meditating and just existing. I treated myself to some spa time, cupcakes and most importantly yoga. I’ve read all the loving comments and messages from near and far. And I am finally starting to feel better. Thank you all for the love and support. It literally means the world to me.”

With these words on Facebook she published several photos of herself riding her old horse.  In one of the photographs, they are mid-jump over a high double oxer– a difficult jump—together as one.  I can only imagine how she must have felt, airborne, in the split second it took the large bay mare to clear that jump.  It must have felt like she was flying.

I think that we all imagine ourselves flying as children. We dream about it and we try to live it.  From the first viewing of Peter Pan, to the teenage pursuits of riding racing bicycles, or motorcycles, or horses, or learning to sail or ski, we all grow our imaginary wings, and for the times that we are doing what we do, we feel pure joy:  we are limitless, unbound by gravity or sadness or sorrow.  We have wings.

For most of us, growing up is learning to fly without wings—to find satisfaction in our friends, our families, our pets, our careers, and our hobbies.  If we are lucky, we find solace in the daily small pleasures that surround us—the scent of a blooming rose, the wag of a tail, the taste of good food or fine wine.  My daughter’s friend is learning this now, traveling alone in a strange land far from the familiar neighborhood she grew up in.  The day after her horse died, she put another picture on Facebook, of a beautiful rainbow arching over the New Zealand road she was driving on.  I’ll never know for sure, but I think it was Rumba, telling her everything is going to be okay.