A truly venomous day

One of my horseshoeing customers found out she had diabetes about six months ago. She tried to take care of it through diet and nutrition, but it looks like she will have to start insulin. She said something that struck a chord on my heart. She told me how angry she was at herself for almost a year. She was tired, out of breath and found even daily repetitive tasks difficult.

As a side bar, most of the women I know have daily repetitive tasks that include cleaning barns, training and riding horses, moving 70 pound bales of hay and fifty pound bags of grain. They also run farm equipment, operate their own businesses, maintain a home and take care of an extended family. Not feeling up to par becomes a serious issue with a cascading effects on their family, income, livestock and pets.

She thought it was her fault and just tried harder. Hmm. Sounds just like the story I just told on www.thereisnocryinginhorseshoeing.blogspot.com. I was bitten by a spider at a barn and did not feel the bite. I was alone at the barn working on four horses. I got angry at myself because I had to sit down and rest several times. My arm hurt for what seemed like no reason since none of the horses pulled that much. I was nauseous but assumed it was because it was so humid and I was getting dehydrated. For the rest of the day I was cursing at myself because I was too weak to keep up. I pushed harder.

It was the next morning that I found the two bite marks in my arm and realized that I was having a reaction to the venom. So, why is it that women feel like they need to beat themselves up so bad? Why, when we don’t feel well, do we just assume it is because we are wimps or not good enough? What is it that makes us ignore our bodies and just push back or try harder? Maybe that is what keeps us strong enough to survive. I wish I had an answer.

I am turning 50 in two weeks. All my adult life I have worked in male dominated professions. It really hits home with me if I can’t keep up. The past two weeks I overbooked and my body is exhausted. On one side of the coin, I am so thankful that I am physically capable and strong. Even though I am complaining, I still know I can outwork most men. On the other side of the coin, I just want to pronounce that I am a girl with a Masters degree and that I am ready to be a princess now. Some days, I would like to wear a damn dress and watch other people work!



Sunday was one of those rare perfect days. It was sunny, almost windless and not too warm. Tom and I went to Lawrence to ride the bikes along the river. It felt like we were only out about 45 minutes and I was surprised that we were out for two hours.




I am still working on my novel and am up to about 60,000 words. With horseshoeing this busy I am too tired for a lot of creative work, so I am writing some nonfiction books about horshoeing that I will post on Smashwords by the end of the summer. I have also written about a dozen articles that I will pitch to magazines. I have a person in Topeka who is going to develop a logo for my business that will be adaptable as Smokey Westford. I can't wait to see it. I am developing a brochure for the horseshoeing business that I will have printed at the local newspaper office.

Healthy for twenty minutes

Here are the new garden beds and the new greenhouse. There is still work to be done on the inside of the greenhouse, but we were able to use it in time for gardening season. We purchased two yards of composted soil from a greenhouse, but they delivered top soil. We seem to be stuck with that, but we started with worse soil fifteen years ago and we know how to fix it.


The Shawnee County Master Gardeners had their first annual plant sale. We bought petunias, portulaca, and marigolds. This will their annual fundraiser.

A couple of weeks ago, I had my annual physical. The doctor pronounced me healthy as a horse. Yes, he knows I am a farrier. At least he doesn't sing 'The Old Grey Mare' when he sees me. It takes about twenty minutes to drive back home from his office. When I got home, I walked from the car to the garden and promptly stepped in a mole hole that I didn't know we had. I fell down, twisted my ankle, wrenched my back, landed on my knee and jarred my shoulder when I put my hand out to stop the fall.

The next week, while at a barn shoeing, I went to the car for a cold bottle of water. I turned away from the car to walk back to the barn while I was closing the car door. I didn't time this right and closed the car door on my face. My left jaw line to be more precise. I now have a wonderful black and blue and swollen cheek. Tom keeps checking to see if I have two left feet or if I am just putting my shoes on the wrong feet. He is also glad that he has plausible deniability and was out of the county working each time that I injured myself! And you thought horseshoeing was dangerous.

Oklahoma Writers Conference

I followed the Kansas Writers, Inc annual retreat with the Oklahoma Writers Federation annual conference. This was my first conference. There was a TON of information to learn.

I think the cats feel abandoned. We have traveled three of the past five weekends.

I spent most of the time in classes that teach technique for novel writing. My favorite workshop was on editing, by Robyn Conley, the owner of The Book Doctor. She also taught a class the next day on point of view. The other classes were on women’s fiction, finding your voice, characters, settings and novel structure.

Like most conferences, there was a book room. Part of the room was for published authors. They could sell their books and were available to sign them. There were also books about the craft of writing. I purchased a book called Write History Right by M.H. Collins; American Slang, by Kipfer and Chapman; and Be Your Own Book Doctor, by Robyn Conley.

What is the next step? I need to find wall space in the house to put up an outline of the book. While I know what my plot is, I need to sharpen it. I also need to clarify what it is that my character wants so I know how to stress her. We had fun re-writing Jack and Jill. It was interesting to see how many versions people could come up with.