I have little tolerance for people who repeatedly tell me how busy they are, and also use this as an excuse for not getting together or doing something. This has always seemed to me to be an excuse and an exercise in making themselves appear to be more important than they actually are.

And now, I am in this situation. And it’s very real. We have a lot of stuff going on here, and it’s all good things. It’s actually kind of exciting in a way – to be doing such fun stuff. I am lucky that I am still able to take courses through the college – I’ve taken a lot of them over the years – right now, I’m taking the wilderness first responder course, sitting in the wilderness emergency medical technician class, and doing a yoga class. I’m also doing strength training two times a week.

And it is nearly breakup, nearly being the operative word. I’ve been cleaning up the horse pen as the snow has been melting, and today I cleaned the front area and brushed out three of the four horses, in preparation for tomorrow’s veterinary and farrier visits. Our veterinarian, Zach Kaiser, is going to do exams and start in on the trip paperwork. This is a lot of work for him.

Now I will not be here for the veterinary visit. I will be attending the second of three woman’s self defense classes at the college. I’ll be home in time to hold the horses as Josh Morris, our farrier, trims them.

In the afternoon I’ll get horses out. In the evening I’ll work on an article for the Icelandic Horse Quarterly.

Pete is equally, if not more busy. He does not, as I do, get overwhelmed. He just seems to dig into the harness and pull harder.

This, though, is the difference between us and those who say they are too busy to get together. We make time for friends, no matter what’s going on. Should someone show up here expectedly or unexpectedly, we stop what we are doing and give them our full attention. This is important. This place, our lives, is not exclusively about work. It’s also about sharing our thoughts and ideas and encouraging others to do the same.

Tomorrow, Bill Schmidtkunz will come by in the late afternoon and drop off empty manure buckets and pick up fresh manure, a way of controlling erosion on the riverbank across the street from where he lives. I don’t have the time to write it, but there is an article in this, one describing what he’s doing.

Anyhow, Pete will ask him if he would like to stay for dinner or have a beer. If he does, we’ll have a good time. If he does not, we’ll make it another time. Perhaps he will come over some Sunday morning and have pancakes with us. He always comes with flowers.

So busy might be a state of mind. If so, its New Jersey, or maybe Ohio. Definitely far away, on the other side of the Rockies.

Next: 87. 3/29/19: Two Horses Pulling the Cart